heroes

Making good on its word from a couple of days ago, the Android 2.1 update is now available for the HTC Hero.

Aside from getting a taste of Eclair, the update also brings enhancements to the HTC Sense user interface and corporate e-mail as well as a number of bug fixes.

Sprint will not be releasing the update over the air, so you'll have to head over to the carrier's support site for instructions on how to download and install the software. Happy updating!

This week on preGAME we bring you a trio of some of the most unique PSP games around. That's right, on today's episode we bring you live demos of Fat Princess: Fistful of Cake, Patchwork Heroes, and Echoshift. Joining us on the phone to chat about the PSP version of Fat Princess will be Matt Morton, the U.S. producer on the game.

But first, we'll take a look at the just-released teaser-trailer for one of the most acclaimed mashup fighting games around. Join us as we screen the first-ever video for Capcom Vs. Marvel 3! Sure the game may not be out for another year, but Mark tells us why this title is so important. Next, we'll talk about some of the most highly anticipated Xbox Live Arcade games due out this year. From Limbo to Sonic the Hedgehog 4, there's something for everyone on our list.

Been to a 7-Eleven lately? The company has announced that after a successful trial, used console games will be available for sale in most of the nation's stores by September. Games will go for $20 or lower and classic consoles may soon be supported as well.

Next we'll chat about publisher Ubisoft and the announcement that it will soon be removing paper instruction manuals from games to reduce the cost of production and help prevent waste. Finally, Mark and Jeff discuss software piracy and how it affects portable gaming consoles the most, especially now that Nintendo blames it for a 50 percent sales drop in Europe.… Read more

If a pair of recently leaked photos are correct, Sprint's HTC Hero may only be a few short weeks away from getting the Android 2.1 update. The images show screens from an internal Sprint system that indicate that "the much-anticipated Android 2.1 software is coming in early May."

Indeed, it's been a long wait for many Hero users. We can trace the start of the rumors as far back as December when Sprint said they'd have an upgrade in the first half 2010.

Sprint remained largely mum on the rumors until earlier this … Read more

PORTLAND, Ore.--After rowing solo across the Atlantic Ocean and a good stretch of the Pacific for more than 8,400 miles so far, Roz Savage is getting better at finding pleasure in it.

"I won't say that I positively enjoy it. It's more like enjoying not banging your head against a brick wall anymore," Savage said in a recent interview. "Some people love it out there on the ocean. I'm a land creature."

So what's a land creature like her doing in a place like that on a 23-foot row boat?

Partly, to challenge herself. But mostly, to inspire people to take better care of the planet. This week, the ocean rower and environmental campaigner is temporarily trading her boat for a much bigger one, the National Geographic Endeavour, where she will speak at an ocean-themed TED Prize conference in the Galapagos. Next week, if conditions are right, she plans to set off on the final leg of a three-stage trip in her attempt to become the first woman to row solo across the Pacific.

Savage admits she does not fit the description of your typical adventurer of old. As she puts it in her book "Rowing the Atlantic," she doesn't sport "a frost-encrusted beard," nor is she tall. She is just under 5'4" and blonde. Savage, 42, was born to Methodist preachers in Cheshire, England, and attended Oxford University, where she first took up rowing. For more than a decade, she worked as a management consultant and project manager. While she may not be a Shackleton or a Cook, she does have a name fitting of an explorer. (A student asked her during a recent visit to a San Francisco Bay Area school, "How did you come up with your stage name of Roz Savage?") … Read more

Up to now, rocking out with guitar-playing simulators has typically been about pushing buttons or bars.

Universal Music Group, the largest of the four top record companies, is trying to inject more realism into the experience with a new music app designed for the iPhone and iPod. The game is called Six String and is expected to debut Wednesday at the iTunes App store.

The game, which will sell for $4.99, is similar to the biggie guitar-simulation games: Guitar Hero and Rock Band. Players are directed to the proper strings with a scrolling series of dots and arrows, according … Read more

Announced Tuesday at the start of the Game Developers Conference, Power Gig: Rise of the SixString is a novel approach to the well-trod music game genre.

Instead of using plastic simulations of guitars that are essentially just dressed-up plastic game controllers, the game uses fully functional six-string guitars that control the game, but can also be played in real life.

As one might imagine, the game is being developed by a company connected with the guitar business. Developer/publisher Seven45 Studios is a sister company of First Act, a leading musical-instrument maker responsible for making the entry-level guitars, basses, and … Read more

Rock Band Free is a one-song, no-cost preview of Rock Band, the iPhone and iPod Touch adaptation of the hit rhythm-based game available on consoles such as the PS3 and Xbox 360.

The game's interface shows incredible fidelity to the console version, right down to menus, sound effects, and a look and feel that closely mimics the original. Without plastic instruments, though, gameplay is of course fairly different, as you're pressing touch-screen buttons in time with approaching notes on bass, guitar, drums, and vocals--but the game still does a good job of keeping a Rock Band feel, with … Read more

BARCELONA, Spain--In addition to introducing two new Android phones, HTC revealed on Tuesday that it will release an Android 2.1 update for the HTC Droid Eris as well as the Sprint and GSM versions of the HTC Hero.

The company said the devices should be getting most of the features of Android 2.1 as well as the enhanced HTC Sense user experience that was announced today. However, it will ultimately be up to the carriers to determine which features make it onto the device. Unfortunately, HTC did not give any time frame for when the update might be … Read more

Games on the Wii aren't always pretty. In fact, the Wii tends to celebrate the old, the retro, the kitschy throwback titles so often seen on the Virtual Console. The Wii isn't capable of HD, and its graphics aren't in the same ballpark as the those of Xbox 360 and PS3.

This is why we're often excited by original Wii games that, rather than try to replicate what higher-octane HD gaming systems such as the Xbox 360 and PS3 are doing, instead branch off and lay claim to the Wii's unique qualities. Ubisoft's No More Heroes franchise is a classic example of this, but is the newly released sequel also a good game?

Scott: No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle is a sequel to the equally bizarre original designed by Suda 51, an artist/designer known for an aesthetic in gaming that's as much about artsy statement as it is about "fun gaming." As the game's ridiculous, murderous hero Travis Touchdown, you're off to compete in a repetitive series of boss battles against psychopathic killer-heroes in an attempt to be the No. 1. Each mission tends to consist of a very linear journey through subvillains on the way to this boss attack, and the game's 3D look is angular and even ugly at times. This is deliberate: in fact, No More Heroes 2 is almost a celebration of old-school gaming, down to its Nintendo Entertainment System-era minigames, scratchy, degraded-looking cut scenes, and 8-bit sound effects.

Does the game make sense? No, it's madness. You give your cat a workout in one series of games, and can spend time playing a disturbingly sexual arcade shooter on your character's living-room TV, all of which seems like it's parodying the ridiculousness of "real-world" games like Grand Theft Auto.

Assassination missions are given to you by a big-busted hostess, and the adolescent sexual fantasies and toilet-based waypoints are simultaneously juvenile and funny. The blood-soaked nunchuck-based attack moves, combining motion controller moves with button-mashing, are trigger-quick and satisfying. Ammo upgrades and other unlockables are weird and somewhat useless, but that's what this game is largely about: celebrating the absurdity of video games.

Though the main adventure is on the short side, the library of 8-bit retro minigames are a great bunch of fun as well. It's ugly, it's messy, but No More Heroes 2 is also inspired. Just make sure, no matter what, that you rent or play this game before buying.

Jeff: No More Heroes 2 is certainly one of the Wii's most ambitious franchises. From an aesthetic point of view, it's a visual gem, pushing the hardware limits of the Wii. As an action game, it controls well and provides a solid challenge for any fan of the genre. There's no doubt we love No More Heroes 2; we're just not sure it's accessible enough beyond being the "artsy film" of gaming.… Read more