In 1999, Midway released Hydro Thunder, a powerboat racing game for the arcade, and they later ported the title as a Sega Dreamcast launch game. It was known for its over-the-top antics, which felt like Mario Kart on water — but it never got the same recognition as popular Nintendo franchise. Although when it was released, it was praised for its unbelievable virtual waves — which would crash into each other — creating havoc for gamers who raced through the course.

A source inside PAX EAST in Boston, has sent us a snap shot from his phone (picture above), which shows the classic racing game coming to Xbox Live Arcade. Although we have no details because the show has yet to start, we do know that the game is coming to the Microsoft online service, but we’ll have to wait and see if it’s coming to PSN as well.

It’s official, the videogame streaming service OnLive will debut on June 17 in the US, which is also the last day of E3. Their will be a monthly subscription of $14.95 and other fees like renting or owning a game will be extra.

According to COO Mike McGarvey, who talked to MCV, the membership price “provides access to an ever-increasing library of high-end, new release game content and a host of exclusive community feature such as Brag Clips and massive spectating.” He also noted that “individual titles will be available for purchase or rental on an a la carte basis. Specific game pricing, including rentals,purchases and loyalty programs, will be announced prior to the consumer launch event at E3. We’ll also be announcing additional loyalty and discount programs for consumers in the coming months.”

When the service launches, it will only be available for both the PC and Mac; however, the home Micro Console — which allows games to played on any TV — is scheduled before years end. “For the initial rollout of the consumer service, we are focusing on delivering high-performance games to PCs and Macs and we will be making an announcement regarding our plans for the MicroConsole rollout later on in the year,” said McGarvey.

Three titles have been confirmed when OnLive launches on the internet, which are Ubisoft’s Assassin’s Creed II and Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands, along with THQ’s Metro 2033. Although, expect more to be announced soon — maybe even tonight when OnLive has a keynote during GDC.

It’s been known for awhile that Electronic Arts, Ubisoft, Take-Two Interactive, Warner Bros and THQ have all jumped on the OnLive bandwagon. However, up until this point the biggest publisher in the world — Activision — has yet to be sold on the streaming service concept.

After the jump, read about what I think is the biggest hurdle for OnLive.

While I personally believe the future of videogames and other forms of media will mostly be purchased digitally — heck I even think streaming might be the norm in 10+ years — I’m not convinced OnLive will be the service we’ll all be using. I’m not bashing the quality, I’ve barley seen it. But so far, the marketing has been terrible.

The company had a decent showing at last year’s GDC, and probably had more buzz when compared to anything else that was revealed during the conference. But when I look back, what other information has come out since then? From my recollection, the people over at OnLive have been mum for about a year. Sure we’ve seen the CEO Steve Pearlman make a couple speeches, most notably at a college seminar, but sadly no features were revealed. Most sites have yet to preview it in their homes, and the ones who did get access, didn’t have kind things to say about it.

Again, last year OnLive hit a homerun with their presentation during GDC; however since that time, there has been a lot of criticism about the service. And with the company being quiet about pretty much every question people had, it’s left a bad taste it gamers mouths. OnLive certainly has a uphill battle ahead of them.

BioWare has created some of the most sought-after games of this generation. From Mass Effect to Dragon Age, the studio has redefined RPGs for the home console. The company has been so successful that they announced last year that they are opening up a whole new studio in Montreal, Quebec, which means more original games will come out from the studio.

While having a live chat with Eurogamer earlier today, the CEO of BioWare Ray Muzyka confirmed with viewers that BioWare is developing titles for the PlayStation 3. When asked if some games, not necessarily for the PS3, will be unveiled at this year’s E3, he responded with the simple answer of “yes!”

Sadly, he didn’t reveal if we should expect completely new titles or sequels to already successful franchises. Although, I wouldn’t be surprised if we see something about Mass Effect 3, even if it’s a tease. Muzyka has confirmed the third installment of the space RPG is already in the early development stages.

via: vg247

In the beginning of the month, lead designer over at Epic Games Cliff Bleszinski, tweeted that he has some “awesome shit” to share to everyone who loves his games. Obviously, with the vague description people  could only speculate exactly what he was referring too. Most people, including me, are assuming he’s hinting towards the announcement of Gears of War 3, which Epic Games has a contract with Microsoft to develop.

Now, Bleszinski has tweeted that whatever he has been talking about, we’ll be hearing about in short time.

“Kick ass news soon. Very soon. Watch this space…”

I think soon is referring to an upcoming event, which could be a couple things. First, Microsoft has just confirmed X10, which is an Xbox 360-only event and will be held in San Francisco on February 11th. If I were to bet, I would think this is when this “kick ass news” will be revealed to the world. However, a month later in the same city, the annual GDC will take place. So don’t be surprised that’s where we’ll first hear about whatever Cliff Bleszinski is tweeting about. And remember, Gears of War 2 was unveiled to the world at GDC 2008.

CEO Steve Ballmer took the stage this evening at CES Microsoft keynote speech. One of the first things that was on his agenda was to discuss the success of the company’s Xbox 360. According to him, the Xbox 360 has sold 39 million units since it launched back in November of 2005. However, what was more important was the number of software that has been sold, since the original Xbox debuted in 2001.

Microsoft has tallied the total number of games sold since the historic launch almost ten years ago and it stands at about 500 million, which is almost the same number of people living in North America. Obviously, that number would translate well when it comes to how much cash flow came into the seattle-based company, and apparently that would equal to about $20 BILLION.

It’s an easy case to prove that Microsoft entering the gaming industry was a good thing, even with the criticism it received when they first announced the original Xbox during the first half of last decade. Although, even with those great numbers, the company is more than likely still in the red. For the longest time, for every system sold with the original Xbox, Microsoft was loosing quite a bit of money since the debut of the first Xbox — a trend that would later continue when the Xbox 360 launched four years later. Thankfully for Microsoft, this was the plan, and they are not looking to make a quick buck out of their console; but they anticipated well before they unveiled the Xbox that this would be a long term goal, which is still to be the king of the videogames…. They obviously still have a long way to go — but don’t count them out just yet.

I wasn’t sure how I felt about Medal of Honor going all modern combat on everyone. If you didn’t hear, Electronic Arts announced last week that their successful series will put the World War II theme on the back-burner and have this newest installment be told in today’s era. It’s pretty obvious the company has seen what their rival, the Call of Duty series, from Activision, and they have experienced nothing but a lucrative bank account since they decided to take the game into the modern times.

Last night, EA showed off to the world for the first time a trailer for the Medal of Honor reboot. After watching it, it’s hard not to compare the title to Modern Warfare 2, not like we weren’t already doing that in the first place. So the question is, how does it measure up to MW2? Well, it’s too soon to know really. But so far, I’m mighty impressed — in fact graphically speaking, it looks as good as Modern Warfare, maybe even a tad better. Of course, EA is only hand picking what scenes look fantastic, so when people do watch it and think Call of Duty, they might think it could be a MW2 killer — that’s kinda the point of the trailer.

But before anyone jumps on the Medal of Honor bandwagon, let some people play it and let the previews trickle down a little bit, before we give it the first-person shooter crown. But it’s definitely something I’m gonna be watching out for in the near future.

During the Video Game Awards, Bungie revealed the first trailer of their last Halo game they’re developing. While not much has been talked about the upcoming Halo: Reach title, we did get some alleged leaked photos of the game in action. Last night, the long trailer somewhat proved those screen-captures were real because if you analyzes them, you would have seen what looked like a Spartan hand holding various guns.

When the trailer aired last night, we saw a whole bunch of Spartans, some with masks and some without. What this ultimately proved is that players who buy the game, will more than likely play as the famed Spartans of the Halo universe, and not a military guy like in the last and perhaps disappointing Halo title, ODST.

Graphically speaking, Halo: Reach looks considerably better when compared to the last two entries of the series. You could probably contribute a number of reasons why this would be. For one, Bungie might have been pushed a little to hard by Microsoft to bust out Halo 3 within the year the company’s competitors, and Nintento, systems were out for a year. So Bungie had a decision — improve the visuals and make it compete with other next-generation titles, or sacrifice that and perfect the gameplay. Obviously, they made the right choice by focusing on how well the game played.

But what Bungie has proven with this latest trailer is they still have it. The game looks like what many of us were hoping Halo 3 would have looked like back in 2007. So combine that with the gameplay of Halo — this just might be one of the best games to come out in 2010.

One of my favorite series of all time is Prince of Persia. When I learned that Disney greenlit a film adaption of the videogame, I was ecstatic beyond belief — especially when you consider the games never sold up to expectations. Ubisoft is obviously banking on the fact the franchise can now finally become a smash-hit, something it should have been years ago. But this time, it should have some momentum because of the movie.

This May, when the film hits theaters, Ubisoft announced earlier in the week that a sequel to the film and videogame of the Sands of Time will be in stores. They decided to debut the trailer at the Video Game Awards, but sadly everything looks CGish.

The only real news to come out of the clip, is the design of how the Prince will look this time around. He looks more like the film character, and less like the star from the Sands of Time videogame.

If you like UFC, I’m sure you’ll dig the world premier trailer for UFC Undisputed: 2010.

Here is the first look at the next TRON videogame, which should debut when the film TRON Legacy hits theaters.