Ratchet & Clank #1
Written by T.J. Fixman
Illustrated by Adam Archer
Colored by Jonny Rench
Lettered by Saida Temofonte
Cover art by Creaturebox
Published by DC/Wildstorm

Every time a video games-based comic arrives in my mailbox, I experience a moment of trepidation.  I don’t game and have absolutely no knowledge of the Ratchet & Clank games, so it’s certainly possible that some element of the game’s universe could act as a story linchpin for some readers yet slip completely past my notice.  So I read with the tack that this comic could possibly be someone’s first exposure to the characters and concepts.  To date, video game-based comics have left me cold; however, with this approach in mind, Ratchet & Clank #1 really works.

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DC Comics publishes a lot of Batman comics. This November, the latest month they’ve released solicitations for, they plan to publish nine ongoing Batman comics, plus three issues of one-shots or miniseries featuring Batman, plus eight comics headlined by his various lieutenants and supporting characters, plus six team comics featuring a Batman. So there’s somewhere in the neighborhood of 12 to 26 Batman comics scheduled for the month of November,* depending on how you want to count them up (and I’m assuming you don’t want to count reprint material, because there is of course a whole mess of trades as well).

DC Comics also publishes a lot of comics based on video games. This November, they’ll be publishing six of ‘em**, which isn’t all that many, but accounts for about a third of their Wild Storm line.

Batman is the star of an extremely successful video game that was released last August, Batman: Arkham Asylum, and will star in a hotly anticipated sequel that will debut next year, Batman: Arkham City.

And yet DC has not published any comics based on that particular video game.
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Hensin A Go Go, baby!

It’s looking like life is viewtiful, as Viewtiful Joe and Dormammu are joining the cast of Marvel vs. Capcom 3!

Viewtiful Joe, from the Capcom side of things, is an ordinary guy named Joe, who is turned into a high-flying super-sidekick when he’s drawn into “the movie world” by the hero Captain Blue. For those who played the Gamecube and PS2 versions of the game, Joe was able to speed up and slow down time by increasing the frame speed of the movie world.

Dormammu, meanwhile, is one of the greatest foes of the Sorcerer Supreme — a flame-headed sorcerer from another dimension, Dormammu is some bad mojo for the Marvel Universe, and judging on the trailers from the game, it looks like he may be a Doctor Doom- or Thanos-level threat for more than one universe.

The game — which will have Captain America, Iron Man, Thor, Deadpool, Wolverine, Hulk, Doctor Doom and Super-Skrull from the Marvel Universe, and Ryu, Chun-Li, Morrigan, Dante, Chris Redfield, Felicia, Trish and Amaterasu from the Capcom side — is due out in the Spring of 2011.

[Image via Marvel]

Marvel vs. Capcom 3: Fate of Two Worlds is the first installment of the series in 10 years, and scheduled to hit Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 in spring 2011. Naturally, there’s been a lot of speculation as to which Marvel Comics and Capcom characters will be included in the game, and thanks to preview videos and what’s been demoed, we already know a few, including Captain America, Deadpool and Wolverine on the Marvel side, plus Ryu, Chun-Li and Morrigan on the Capcom side.

But it looks like a reader of French Web site PS3Gen may have cracked the code, quite literally, allegedly viewing the source code of Capcom’s Japanese site to find what could be a complete roster of playable characters for the game. (View a translated version of the page here, plus enjoy fun phrasings such as, “When the official channels are silent or too slow, some fans redouble their imagination to get their hands on what they want.”) Here’s what they’ve got: (more…)

Details are still coming, but Little Big Planet, the popular PlayStation 3 game powered by user-generated content, is about to see some additions in the Mighty Marvel Manner.

Marvel Comics announced on their website today themed downloadable content debuting July 7 on PlayStation Network — four “costume packs” for your Sackboys and Sackgirls coming once a week, with five costumes each (that’s 20 total, for the math-shy). As you can see from the silhouettes on the teaser image to the right, they look pretty adorable.

There’s also a “Marvel Level Kit” coming, with Sackpeople running afoul of Magneto, and a healthy amount of Marvel-related material to create suitably superheroic levels. No word yet on if the DLC will be available for the PSP version as well.

Full list of soon-to-be available costumes after the jump.

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UPDATE June 9, 2010: Mystery SOLVED. This is in fact a SPEC trailer for a Mortal Kombat live-action movie. According to actress Jeri Ryan, seen in the clip as Sonya Blade, the movie is not yet greenlit, and this was basically a “tryout” by a director. From her twitter:

Okay, so… Mortal Kombat. It’s not a game trailer. Actually was made for the director to sell WB on his vision for a reimagined MK film.I did it as a favor to a friend. No idea yet what WB’s reaction to it was.

She also made a plea to fans that enjoyed it to reach out to Warner Bros and ask them to make it, though she didn’t know how. Your best bet? Comment here that you want this movie to be made, and I’ll send the link over to Warner PR.

Original Story June 8: Is this the trailer to a new Live Action Mortal Kombat Movie?

Is this a live-action trailer to a new, relaunched Mortal Kombat game?

Those are the questions being asked by fans of the franchise today. It’s clearly a professional trailer, with some major star power from across the science fiction/genre worlds, but there’s no real indication as to just what it is. The one thing we can say for absolute certain: it is AWESOME. Peep it below, and tell us what you think this is for. We’ll be at E3 next week to see if we can get some answers from the franchise’s new stewards, Warner Bros.

[Source: Kotaku]

With the help of its new corporate parent, Rocksteady Studios is looking like it will get a whole lot… Rocksteadier.

The developer of the Arkham Asylum game has, perhaps to no one’s surprise, been snapped up by none other than Time Warner Inc., who now has a controlling share of the London-based developer. This comes after Warners’ purchase of Midway Games for $33 million.

“Rocksteady clearly has the talent, expertise and technology to make great games and we are fortunate to continue working closely with them as we further expand our games portfolio,” Josh Berger, president and managing director for Warner Bros. UK, told the Wall Street Journal.

GameDaily has reported that what’s particularly interesting about this is that Rocksteady had only come out with one game prior to Arkham Asylum — the unimpressive Urban Chaos: Riot Response. Rocksteady has said there is a sequel to Arkham Asylum on the way, but there’s no word on plot details or a prospective date.

Warner Home Video spoke with rising anime director, Toshiyuki Kanno, about “The Babysitter” episode within Halo Legends. This is an all-new anthology of seven stories that expands the universe of Halo, one of the world’s most popular video games. Halo Legends will be available on February 16, 2010 on DVD and Blu-Ray as well as On Demand and Digital Download.

Kanno provided insight into the production of “The Babysitter” in this following interview with Warner Home Video:

Question: How does Halo lend itself to anime/animation?

Kanno: Halo is a property filled with so many exciting characters and detailed story settings with a very vast/huge background and I believe that the property has a lot of room to create episodes. Thus, I think that various ways in anime development can suit the property in whatever style the creators employ.

Question: What was the inspiration for your artistic vision in your episode of Halo Legends?

Kanno: What inspired me the most are the “ruins of an unconfirmed space alien.” Of course, we had a premise that the ruins are Forerunners, and Microsoft/343 Industries provided us with a good deal of leeway to create new elements. We have tried to incorporate a Japanese taste as much as possible to the buildings, costumes and other visual things to try to add greater depth and expand the Halo realm.

Question: Were there any particular images within the Halo realm that helped shape or drive your creative vision?

Kanno: We found inspiration in all of the art books provided by Microsoft, especially the beauty of the nature shown in the image boards as well as in the game itself. I tried to incorporate a similar beauty in my episode. In addition, the costume and the weapons of various characters such as the Brutes, Elites and Prophet provided me with inspirations in creating the characteristics of this episode.

Question: Why were you the right person to direct/design/write this episode?

Kanno: The original script describing a story relating to the relationship between Spartans and ODST was provided by Mr. Frank O’Connor. I discussed with Ms. Tanaka, the producer of the episode, that we needed to brush up the story to make it more understandable and impressive, and proposed the new scrip to Microsoft. I believe that the script has become better suited to animation.

We had a very strong design and animation team. I was in charge of character designs and focused on creating designs to easily express emotions of each of them. I employed Mr. Hayashi and Mr. Suzuki to design mechas, such as those involving the Spartan, ODSTs and Covenant. They have been very good in creating mechas that are simple but very cool designs.

Mr. Sasaki was in charge of background designs, and his ideas helped realize a very distinguished world of “The Babysitter” – giving our anime sensibility, but retaining the Halo taste. He has created an origina UNSC spaceship and the design seemed to please the Microsoft staff.

Both Ms. Miyuki, who was in charge of coloring, and Mr. Watanabe, who headed the CGI as well as the screen plan, focused on keeping a balance throughout the entire episode. I believe that they contributed a lot in accomplishing a profound screenplay.

Question: What did you set out to accomplish in this episode, and why do you think you achieved or exceeded your goals?

Kanno: The most distinguished characteristic of this episode is that this is the only episode in Halo Legends where ODST characters appear. During the production of this episode, a new Halo game, “Halo 3: ODST,” featuring ODST characters, was released – and our episode has some common characters with the game. Thus, we felt an intense pressure to make the episode very enjoyable to the newcomers to the Halo world and, more over, to ensure that the episode would not betray the trust of the game fans.

I, myself, was quite a newcomer to Halo at the beginning of this project, and it was a very hard process to understand the vast realm of Halo and to create new things out of it. Consequently, I have found out that the episode has become very exciting and much better than I had originally expected. I believe that this result comes from the efforts of each and every member of our production staffs. This was a very collaborative effort.

Question: How important was having Halo gaming experience to bringing the world to life in anime?

Kanno: I am not at all good at playing video games, and I have not played that much. But my staff played a great deal, and both myself and my staff spent a lot of time viewing the long-playing movie many times to ensure we understood the Halo realm as well as the details of its settings.

Question: Are there any hidden images or behind-the-scenes “Easter eggs” – special little things you included for the devout Halo fans – that appear within your episode?

Kanno: It was simply tough enough for me to understand the Halo universe during such a short period of time, so I did not have time or room to created such “hidden images” etc. However, I strongly believe that every viewer will feel the enthusiasm of all our creative staffs in the episode.

With horror more in vogue than ever, UDON has announced that you just can’t keep a good monster down.

The publisher announced on its blog this week that, due to the positive response from its Darkstalkers Tribute Book, they would move forward with a three-issue miniseries based on the Capcom fighting game. The premise of the series? Vampires, succubi, mummies, catpeople, lagoon monsters, and more fight for the fate of the world!

The cover shown above is drawn by Alvin Lee; meanwhile, Street Fighter writer Ken Siu-Chong will be writing the stories, while Joe Vreins and Eric Vedder will be drawing the interiors. The book is due out in January.

IDW has announced that it will be publishing two new comics with Electronic Arts, to capitalize on some recent video game franchises: Army of Two and Dragon Age.

According to a press statement, EA will be in charge of the creative aspects of the books, while IDW will print and distribute them. Yet the talent is perhaps even more surprising: Peter Milligan will be writing Army of Two with newcomer artist Dexter Soy, while Orson Scott Card will be writing Dragon Age.

“This is a great opportunity for IDW to work with a worldwide leader in video games,” said IDW’s COO Greg Goldstein in the statement. “We look forward to bringing a tremendous amount of great content into the comics market.”

You’ve probably already seen the image to the right already, which DC released at San Diego, revealing a couple of characters who will be appearing in James Robinson and Mark Bagley’s upcoming run on Justice League of America. Between Donna Troy on the right and Dick “Batman” Grayson is Mon-El, who’s been keeping the Superman monthly comic warm for Superman while the Man of Steel’s off starring in World of New Krypton.

As you can see, Mon’s got a new, more Superman-like costume, complete with an S-shield and belt to hold up the underpants he is now wearing over his tights. (Will he be changing his name to SuperMon? I hope he’s changing his name to SuperMon…!)

Here’s another look at his new costume, which Alex Segura posted on DC’s The Source blog last weekend:

I like it. You know who  it reminds me of?

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Because I still think it’s disgusting.

From Kotaku:

Let’s play this down the middle, as much we can. “Costumed representatives,” are there to make a physical appearance, both sides would agree. But Iola is right: Neither Comic-Con, nor E3, nor any other convention, is a strip club. It’s no more appropriate to assume she’s there for casual opposite-sex companionship than it would be to think a well dressed public relations professional – who’s also there to promote a product and likewise is expected to look good on the job – is after the same thing.

The problem is that EA’s promotion projected just that image – not only on their own reps, but reps of other companies as well, whether or not it was consistent with the spirit or tradition of Comic-Con, E3, or any other show. That’s the reason for the furor, and that’s why you got an apology.

The whole post is worth reading, as it includes comments from a self-proclaimed costumed rep who’s suffered through much obnoxious behavior at cons.

The comparison to a strip club, however, struck me as particularly apt. Because it’s NOT what Comic-Con is supposed to be. Yet by projecting the idea that cons are for boys, the corresponding assumption that any girl who is there is there for the sexual gratification of the male attendees (and thus the attendant reaction to the Twilight-fangirls who are there for their own damn visual sexual gratification, thank you very much) is not only prevalent among attendees, but played to by just this sort of promotion.

I find it interesting that the most egregious examples of this stuff came from video game companies. Am I strange in noting this?

Wow, this is pretty low even for the kinds of things we’ve already seen floating around Comic-Con.

I know all about the “booth babes” and my own feeling on the subject is pretty much meh. Maybe I’ve just been inured to the use of women’s bodies to sell things, and I’m used to the idea that comic conventions are “for the boys” even though I’ve been fighting that notion in this here blog. It’s kind of funny to me, too, that “booth babes” are still used to lure fanboys, who then turn around and complain about Twilight fangirls squealing over Robert Pattinson. Still, way to take the whole idea to a new low, EA Games. Rewarding guys for committing “acts of lust”? With no definiton on what that entails?

So now the girls standing around awkwardly at various booths are not only going to be stared at and groped a few times, they’re going to have boys trying to do so and document it on photo to try to win a chance to–hang out with more girls?

Sounds like EA Games needs a quick lesson. Hey guys? Women aren’t like your video games or comic books. We’re people, too. We get to choose with whom we commit “acts of lust,” and sometimes we don’t like it on camera. We certainly don’t like being bought and sold for the price of a video game.

Someone keep these guys away from the Twilight fans, please.

Also, if I never hear another joke about a “chest full of booty” it’ll be too damn soon.

(thanks to Blog@’s own David Pepose for setting me off on a rant at 9:30 on a Saturday)

Cartoonist Carly Monardo has taken it upon herself a challenge: take the characters from one story and redesign them to fit another story or artist’s style.  Dubbed the “Whirring Blender Design Challenge” (and posted on a blog of the same title), she’s done this on several occasions… but this recent one seems like the most off-the-wall and just-plain-awesome yet.

Final Fantasy VII meets European cartoonist Gipi.

She’s done four examples, with the latest being the best yet: Barrett.

Check it out and cheer her on!

In addition to being a cartoonist and musician, James Kochalka also has a passion for what he calls “obsessive compulsive narcissistic twiddling” to insert himself into a hacked version of the classic video game Super Mario Bros.

The video game blog Offworld has posted Kochalka’s mod of the classic Nintendo game in which you can play as Kochalka himself. Game on!

…That’s right, a brand-new Ghostbusters web site.

With a new video game in the works, as well as some strong hopes to a third film in the making, it’s perhaps no surprise that the Dan Aykroyd-led franchise is getting itself a facelift.

The new site has message boards, photos, as well as resources for the upcoming video game.

After quite a bit of speculation from the fan base, Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment, TT Games, and the Lego Group have announced that the latest franchise to get the bumps-and-blocks treatment will be none other than the legend of Hogwarts, Harry Potter!

Not to be confused with the earlier Lego Creator: Harry Potter games, TT Games will be infusing Lego: Harry Potter: Years 1-4 with the same sort of 3D action and metahumor that has been seen in Lego Indiana Jones, Lego Star Wars, and Lego Batman. Here’s a trailer, posted by Romain766, for the uninitiated:

According to the group’s press release, this game will span Harry’s first four years at Hogwarts (through the Goblet of Fire, if you’re wondering), and will allow players to control Harry, Ron Weasley, and Hermione Granger, as you explore areas like Hogwarts, Diagon Alley, Hogsmeade, and the Forbidden Forest. The game is scheduled for release in 2010.

The Flash is the latest character released by Sony Online Entertainment to appear in the upcoming MMORPG DC Universe Online. The game will allow gamers to create their own super hero or super villain to fight alongside and against the big names (and some of the small ones) from across the DCU. Comic art living legend Jim Lee and a team of artists are designing each character and environment, then seeing them rendered in 3D. Click through for more of Wally West, including the game’s description of the Fastest Man Alive and some hints of villains players might encounter when running alongside the speedster.

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Reports have popped up today that Warner Bros. Entertainment has bid 33 million dollars to purchase Midway Games. The buyout would include Midway, the Mortal Kombat franchise, and the Chicago and Seattle development studios. Midway has been suffering for nearly two years now, having already shutdown several projects and locations, and laying off much of their staff at remaining locations. The deal apparently does not include the TNA Wrestling license, nor two other development studios. There will be an auction before the deal goes through to allow other companies to take a shot, but it’s expected that WB will come out on top.

A sell-out was expected, as it is the only way at this point that the Mortal Kombat franchise and Midway as a whole could avoid a fatality. Time Warner clearly wants a larger stake in the games industry. Their first major step, buying a chunk of Eidos Interactive, was foiled a few months ago when Square Enix decided to buy the company outright. This move would all but assure a sequel to last year’s well-received Mortal Kombat vs. DCUniverse, and possibly see a new internal development point for more of Warner’s many properties to be translated into games.

Despite zombies being en vogue after Marvel Zombies (volumes 1 all the way through 4, natch) as well as DC’s upcoming storyline Blackest Night, I’m pretty sure nobody saw this toy coming:

Aw yeah. Zombie Solid Snake, from Metal Gear Solid. Or as I propose we call him, Rotting Snake.

I can pretty much see him at work — he’s sneaking up on someone under his trademark cardboard box, when suddenly a security guard is like, “jeez, what is that awful smell? It’s like somebody left the garbage out in the sun or something.” And then Snake’ll jump out and yell, “I have a condition!!!”

This toy’ll be available for order starting in October (appropriate, I guess) for about $79.99. There’s also a more “realistic” version of Zombie Snake available here.

[Link spotted via Ryan Penagos]