Eurogamer sat down with Keiji Inafune, creator of Rock Mega Man, Onimusha, and the upcoming Lost Planet for 360. He spoke at length about the arctic 3rd person action game. He also had some interesting things to say about game development in general. Speaking on developing games for a worldwide market, he had this to say:

“The way that most Japanese developers used to work was of course that you’d focus on what you know. So we’d always focus on Japanese players. But we’re adapting to the international market, and trying to make games thinking of gamers overall - we’re not looking at it in terms of national groups any more, because we can’t afford to. Right now I’d say Asia has different tastes to the rest of the world, so there’s this gap that’s making it tough for us, but there are games that everybody likes and we need to start focusing on that as an industry.”

Check out Eurogamer for the full interview.

Did you find yourself up last night, hugging your knees, rocking back and forth, cursing Peter Moore, and mourning the loss of 360 backwards compatibility? Well, have no fear. The fine folks at Gamerscore Blog did a little sleuthing:

“Lots of talk about backwards compatibility online today.  We wanted to get to the bottom of it all, so we went right to the team working on the next back compat update.  We hear directly from them that they’re in the testing phase of another update, and it should be out in the next few weeks.  We saw the list they’re testing, and it looks like they’re hoping to add at least a dozen titles.”

So there you go. Backwards compatibility still going strong. Well, going anyway. Gamerscore Blog assures us that the “Emulation Ninjas” are still hard at work, just like Santa’s little elves (if Santa’s elves were badass ninjas).

Kikizo spoke with Peter Moore recently on the issue of Xbox 360 and backwards compatibility. Moore had some interesting things to say:

“Nobody is concerned anymore about backwards compatibility. We under promised and over delivered on that. It’s a very complicated thing… very complex work. I’m just stunned that we have hundreds of games that are backwards compatible. […] More are coming, but at some point, you just go, there’s enough, let’s move on, or people aren’t as worried about a game being backwards compatible - and I like to think we’ve upheld our end of the bargain in making at least two or maybe three hundred games backwards compat.”

Under promised and over delivered would we? Look, backwards compatibility isn’t really important to me—I would have been fine without it—but that statement is just asinine. I like Peter Moore—he helmed the launch of my beloved Dreamcast—but give me a break. A good 3/4 of the Xbox games I own are not backwards compatible. I’d say “over delivered” is a bit of a stretch.

As Xboxic points out, this quote may signal the coming end of backwards compatibility altogether. They’d better get Capcom Classics and Street Fighter Anniversary Collection on that list, or I will write them a nasty email so fast. Oh yes, I will.

—via Xboxic

In my recent tradition of picking up games two weeks after everyone else, I finally bought New Super Mario Bros. this weekend. It’s pretty much everything you would expect. It’s really more of a return to the original Super Mario Bros. than an expansion on the series. You will be hard pressed, however, to not feel the “magic” when you happen upon the first Tiny Mushroom. I am upset that the game has completely abandoned the flying dynamic established in Super Mario Bros. 3. Someone pointed out to me that you can still hijack Lakitu’s cloud, but it ain’t the same thing. It’s still pretty fun though. I will no doubt devour it quickly.

In another retro twist, I powered through Mega Man this weekend, too. A friend of mine got me the anniversary collection last Christmas. Let me assure you, anyone who can get through Mega Man the right way—in one sitting with no saves—has my respect.

In yet one more blast from the past, I played through a level or two of Halo 2. I also picked up the Halo 2 Soundtrack Vol. 2. It’s pretty nice if you’re a fan. I’ve kind of been on a Halo kick recently. I’m going back through the novels in aniticipation of the next graphic novel/book/game/movie. Hell, I must have spent two hours last week reading the Wikipedia entry on The Covenant. I also found out what a Covenant engineer looks like. They look like this:

Crazy, no?

Anyway, I hope the Americans among you had a nice Memorial Day. I did.

Major Nelson has confirmed the Spring Update for LIVE. For those of you who haven’t heard about it, the update will introduce many new features to LIVE and the 360 dashboard. Among the new features are background downloading, download queues, and easier content access. My favorite feature is the ability disable autoboot. It’s really annoying that you have to take a game out of the tray in order to boot to the dashboard. Well, not anymore. Check out Joystiq for pictures.

First thing’s first, congratulations Reggie.

Hey, internet peoples. Remember that VGA cable I ordered for my 360? Well, it showed up yesterday. Lo and behold, my eBay curse has not been lifted: it wasn’t what I ordered. The guy I bought it from advertised a Microsoft brand VGA cable. That is not what I received. Call me a snob if you want, but I don’t like third party cables—unless it’s high end stuff like Monster, which is too expensive anyway. Besides, I didn’t order a third party cable, I ordered a brand new Microsoft cable still in its blister pack.

So, I sent him a pissy email. He was gracious about it—already refunded my money—so that was good. In the end, I just went out and bought the damned thing at a store (Best Buy if you must know). The picture is much brighter than component cables, though I suspect this has more to do with my TV than the cables. It’s almost too bright really, almost washed out. Remember, I was playing at 1080i before and traded cables to get 720p. So the picture is technically fuzzier but it runs at a smoother framerate. I think the trade was worth it. I played Tomb Raider on it. My brightness settings—still very bright from the component cables—actually had to be tuned down much lower than even the default. The picture was great though.

Speaking of Tomb Raider, I finished the game last night. It’s very good. I would go so far as to say it’s the best Tomb Raider yet produced. Keep in mind, I finished the game, but there are still unlockables that I have not attained. In most games such things would not bother me but Tomb Raider is different. Seeing as the unlockables are found by exploring—or “raiding”—tombs thouroghly, I am enticed to “catch ‘em all.” I’m actually looking forward to laboriously going over every inch of these levels to find what I missed the first time. I haven’t done that since Ninja Gaiden. Let’s just say Tomb Raider: Legend is good and leave it at that. I’ll try and write it up properly soon.

Now I only hope the fine people at Crystal Dynamics can get back to making Legacy of Kain games.

I almost forgot, the Hitman: Blood Money demo hit Xbox Live Marketplace yesterday. I haven’t downloaded it yet. Still busy raiding tombs.

Cruising Bungie.net, as I am wont to do, I found this. Bungie has published a few emails from banned cheaters. Pleading for shortened sentences or offering to turn in other offenders, these cheaters will say anything to be unbanned. The rest of us can sit back and enjoy the hilarity. I haven’t played Halo 2 for a while. Maybe I should boot it up. My favorite email:

The gamer tag –blam!- is wrongfully accused for cheating. He should not be suspended on a wrong default. To most casualties, this game is taken very seriously. Most just leave feedback over jealously of rank, sense a overwhelming percentage of X-Box Live players cheat for their levels. This person has not done “Modding”, “Standbying”, or “Bridging” of that kind. If Bungie seriously wanted to suspend someone of doing something along the line of cheating, then look over some stats. If none of these accusation are settle, you may be hearing from a lot of complaints. Some may be said by lawyers.

Inconclusive, I hope you consider to un suspend –blam!- Thank you for your time.

Don’t you just love it when people try to sound smart? I sure do.

Thanks for the link Joystiq. And welcome to Joystiq readers.

Man, post-E3 makes for a dull week. So much news and then, nothing. Is this what postpartum depression feels like? Anyway, a supposed HDMI cable for the 360 popped up on Lik-Sang recently—sans any images. Lik-Sang describes it thus: 

Showcase stunning Xbox 360 high-definition graphics with the component connection on your HDTV. Play high-quality audio with the included stereo connection or use the optical audio port for digital sound.

# Official Microsoft Xbox 360 Component HDAV Cable
# High-definition gaming output
# Progressive-scan DVD playback
# Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound output
# Superior quality image output
# For NextGen Television sets offering HDMI input slots

I realize that for the majority of people this means nothing at all. I just so happen to have an HDTV, so I think it’s super. It’s also pretty interesting in the wake of Sony’s PS3 announcements. In case you’ve forgotten, the basic core PS3 won’t even support HDMI. It will be interesting to see how much Microsoft charges for HDMI, but at least it’s an option.

So, does this matter to any of you? Do you even have an HDTV?

—via my newest source: Xboxic

This was briefly up on the Bungie.net forums. It was quickly taken down and all those involved—including those who merely responded to the post—were banned from the forums. Is it real? Fake? Who knows? It certainly borrows from Halo 2’s menu, most notably the “Y” button bringing up the friends list. And what’s classic mode? Interesting. I get the feeling Bungie might start banning all cellphones/cameras within the studio.

It’s fake. Just looked at Bungie.net’s main page. They had this to say:

“The user interface screen floating around the interzone right now is a fake. It’s a pretty fake, but fake nonetheless. We’re not going to debunk every fake we see, but that one is clogging the forums. So stop talking about it. It’s fake.

That’s right, fake”

I guess it’s fake.

—via Xboxic