It’s a sad week. Granted, it’s an inevitability that’s more than five years in the making, but nonetheless, it’s sad. This is the week that Harmonix releases its final regularly scheduled Rock Band DLC – a streak that’s stretched across 281 weeks.

Harmonix should be applauded for its loyalty to the consumer. Alongside the 2007 release of Rock Band, the company pledged that it’d support its game with new downloadable tracks every week. Harmonix upheld this promise for far longer than anyone expected it to, and possibly longer than was financially beneficial. Now that the weekly DLC’s being discontinued, it’s tough to not feel as if everyone has more or less thrown in the towel on the music genre. I wish this weren’t true.

You see, Harmonix and the music genre of videogames mean more to me than they do to most other people. I’ll probably never forget the exact moment that these games entered my life. It was the winter break of my freshman year of college, and my friends and I were bored and all sitting around at someone’s house. In an effort to kill some time, the person whose house we were at fired up a PlayStation 2 and pulled a plastic guitar out of the closet.

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The announcement of DuckTales Remastered caused a lot of people to freak the hell out, but that wasn’t the only trick WayForward had up their sleeves. They’ve got a new IP coming “exclusively” to Nintendo 3DS, DS, Wii, Wii U, XBLA, PSN, PC, Vita, iOS, and Android this Fall. Even the Wii? Wow. I’m pretty sure the only thing that leaves out… Neo Geo X? Yeah, looks like Neo Geo X loyalists are set to lose this round. Sorry dudes.

According to WayForward, “The game combines elements from several gaming genres, including puzzler, platformer, shmup, action, shooter, adventure, strategy, fighting, rhythm, arcade, horror, tactical, RPG, TPS, RTS, and visual novel.” So if you have ever liked a videogame, you’re covered. The story “follows the adventures of Kebako – a female space bounty hunter and four-star chef – searching for love and adventure on the intergalactic space seas. Kebako is joined by her insipid squadron of Calamarites on their quest to rid the cosmos of the notoriously-tardy NekoNekoNeko Clan.” So basically, it’s better than all the other things that you thought were good.

Kebako was co-designed by Teenage Pokemon character designer Lindsay Collins, which I’ve just found out about minutes ago. Regardless of my personal ties to the development team, this is a game that I want to play very badly. Tune it to Destructoid for more on this important new thing as it comes in.

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As I have been lamenting, the regular DLC updates for Rock Band 3 are coming to an end next week, but it’s going out with a bang. Don Mclean’s classic 1971 ballad chronicling the disappointments of counter-culture movements in the prior decade (and all-around good time sing-along tune), “American Pie,” will conclude the historic 281-week run of content releases.

There’s no better way to go out, in my opinion. “American Pie” releases to the Rock Band Music Store for PS3 ($1.99), Xbox 360 (160 MSP) and Wii ($2.00) on April 2nd. Long live the Jester.

DON MCLEAN’S “AMERICAN PIE” COMES TO ROCK BAND [Rockband.com]

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The 3DS continues it’s streak of original, exclusive games as it gets HarmoKnight ($14.99) today. In other 3DS news, Legend of the River King (3DS VC, $4.99, an and awesome fishing title, by the way) is available, as are full digital downloads for Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed and Resident Evil Revelations.

As for the Wii U and Wii, we have…wait. Wait a minute. Um, it appears as if nothing is going to hit Nintendo’s console realm today. There is a sale however, for Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed, a game I highly recommend and can be played by five players (with the GamePad).

So go pick up Punch Out!! for 30 cents and just hope the April update hits sooner than later.

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Poor, poor THQ. A series of catastrophic mistakes led to the 23-year-old company’s closure earlier this year. Among the more notable mistakes was the uDraw tablet, originally released in 2010 exclusively on Wii where it became a smashing success. Hoping to capitalize on the “next big thing,” THQ released PS3 and 360 versions of the device the following year. The result was $100 million worth of unsold uDraw hardware and associated software. Ouch.

In an interview with StrategyInformer, Volition producer Jim Boone described the immediate effect uDraw’s failure had on the rest of the company, and in particular how it completely negated the high sales of Saints Row: The Third. “[H]ere’s this game, we’re so proud of it, and it’s a huge success… but thats also the same time where the uDraw came out for PS3 & 360, and we lost about $100 million on days,” Boone states. “When you have a failure of that magnitude coupled with a success of that magnitude, I mean basically all our success was invalidated by that, it was tough to look at that and think, ‘Is it just business as usual then? Or did we just get dealt a death blow?’” Soon afterwards, Naughty Dog co-founder Jason Rubin became president of THQ, and Boone felt assured that Rubin could turn the ship around. Obviously, that didn’t happen.

Hindsight is 20/20 and all, but someone on THQ’s board had to have been wary about flooding the market with more superfluous peripherals. It’s yet another case that just because something worked on the Wii doesn’t mean it can work on the HD boxes. That’s no longer a concern, of course, but quite a few companies would have been wise to learn that lesson sooner.

THQ’s UDraw failure “invalidated” Saints Row: The Third’s success [StrategyInformer]

source Destructoid

The 3DS is red hot again this week with Luigi’s Mansion: Dark Moon, and Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Gates to Infinity, which are both available on March 24th. Gates to Infinity will have a free DLC dungeon, the Poké Forest, available until April 30th — at which point it’ll cost $2.00.

In other 3DS news, the Pokédex 3D Pro app will be on sale for $9.99 for a limited time, as will Mutant Mudds, on sale for $5.99. The 3DS is also getting Lola’s Math Train and 50 Classic Games 3D today.

Let’s all hear it for the Wii U breaking out of its slump! It’s getting…one game today! Zen Pinball 2. The Wii virtual console is also getting The Path of the Warrior: Art of Fighting 3.

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Club Nintendo is celebrating the release of Dark Moon with a sale that will run for the next three days, appropriately titled “Luigi’s 72 Hour Sale.”

Not everything is Luigi-centric though, so be sure and check everything on the site before you ignore him (poor Luigi!).

On a related note, my Luigi’s Mansion: Dark Moon review will be going up on Thursday, so be sure and tune in then to see what I thought. You can also catch the green goon later this year in his own version of New Super Mario Bros. U.

Luigi’s 72 Hour Sale [Club Nintendo]

source Destructoid

Underneath my gruff exterior beats the heart of a kid obsessed with LEGO. Even now, if I see some of those little bricks, I drop what I’m doing, and start building, ignoring whoever else is in the room. With that in mind, it should come as no surprise that I’m pretty excited for LEGO City: Undercover, which drops this week along with a whole bunch of other games.

Set in an open world and story-based, it sounds like my cup of tea, especially since my favorite LEGO game has to be LEGO Batman 2. And come on, the hero is called Chaise McCain, the name I wish I was now blessed with.

Along with the tiny brick goodness, a slew of other games launch this week. Gears of War: Judgement is a thing, and will undoubtedly feature shooting and steroids; fighting giant monsters refuses to go out of style in Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate; The Walking Dead: Survival Instinct appears, and still looks terrible; and the Wii U gets a Need for Speed game. All this a more falls from the skies this week.

What are you grabbing? 

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The Disney Movies UK Twitter account revealed that Epic Mickey 2: The Power of Two will be heading to the PlayStation Vita sometime this year. No other info was revealed, but we’ve reached out to Disney and will have more for you as soon as we know.

Quite peculiar that Epic Mickey 2 is getting a Vita release. The game didn’t review all that well, leading to very poor sales, and the inevitable shutdown of developer Junction Point.

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The rare act of generosity aside, support for WiiWare has been reduced to almost nothing, leaving the platform to shuffle along until the earth swallows it up. How fitting then that one of its few releases in recent months would revolve around vampires hunting zombies — the undead preying upon one another is the perfect visual metaphor for WiiWare’s current status.

Vampire Crystals is but a modest twin-stick shooter in the vein of Smash TV. It actually does one better than the arcade classic by allowing up to four people to play cooperatively or competitively. Fun in small bursts for anyone who wants to shoot up rotting corpses on a Sunday morning.

And after about an hour or so, it becomes both painful and painfully boring.

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source Destructoid