Looking for some great video game deals? Well, look no further than Circuit City and the Sunday newspaper ads. This week, Circuit City is slashing $20 off select games including titles like TMNT ($29.99), GRAW 2 ($39.99), Spider-Man 3 ($39.99) and Call of Duty 3 ($39.99). Also, since both the Red and Black Edition Player Packs will be free downloads, why not pick up Rainbow Six Vegas for the low, low price of $39.99 too? You can't pass that up. Maybe new releases are more up your alley, then we advise picking up a free $10 gift card with a Transformers: The Game purchase. And if you're in the market for Shadowrun, purchase it for $37.99 on Windows Vista and Circuit City will throw in a wireless receiver for free!
All deals are available online or in-store, so save a few bucks and pick up some new games to add to your video game library this week.
Today, you'll get to try out the new and improved Marketplace by downloading a new map pack for GRAW 2 called the Throwback Pack. This map pack costs 800 Microsoft points and includes seven remakes of multiplayer maps from not only GRAW, but Ghost Recon 2 and Ghost Recon 2: Summit Strike. Maps included are Bonfires, Desert Gulch, Fishing Village, Jungle Mines, Mountain Base, Mountain Falls, and Peninsula. And if you need a little more information about the new maps before you commit to a purchase, head over to IGN as they have a nice preview of each map.
If you've already downloaded the new maps, what do you think about the value you get for your 800 Microsoft points?
There's a very interesting article at Popular Mechanics exploring the differences between the technology of GRAW 2 and its real world counterparts. Of course, we already know that GRAW 2 is the most realistic game ever produced, but how realistic is it really? Popular Mechanics compares the Cross-Com of GRAW 2 with the American Army's Land Warrior system. So, how does GRAW 2's system compare? First of all, both systems allow for the tracking of friendly units. In Ghost Recon, these are indicated by blue diamonds that move in real time. The Land Warrior system has a similar system that uses blue circles on a GPS map. The only difference here is that the tracking is far from real time. In fact, it takes a full minute to register new movement. The article notes that the GPS system is useful for large, conventional battles, but that it proves far less useful for the smaller, faster battles of modern day warfare.
We love us some MEGA64. That really goes without saying (which kind of nullifies the first sentence ... never mind). The latest video from the group is actually an advertisement for GRAW 2 but, as usual, it's pretty damned funny. Given the reaction from the Mexican government concerning GRAW 2, the video is also surprisingly relevant (in addition to the obvious hilarity). We won't spoil the video, so let's just say that it's worth watching. Click play, give it a watch, and tell us what you think.
According to a Spanish newspaper called El Diario, the Governor of the Mexican state of Chihuahua is demanding all copies of GRAW 2 be pulled from retailer's shelves. The Governor's knee jerk reaction to the game seems to be coming from the city of Juarez's mayor who has openly criticized GRAW 2's content calling it "a crime against the intellectual capacity of Juarez residents". And if you don't know, GRAW 2's storyline does deal with Mexican rebels and US forces duking it out on the US / Mexican border ... something the Mexican government obviously doesn't like. What do you think, silly government officials on their soap box or something to be really concerned about?
Kicking off GRAW 2's 72-Hour Weekend the Xbox Live powers that be have unleashed a free gamer picture pack to the XBLM. This GRAW 2 picture pack is only available to United States and Canadian residents, but so is the 72-Hour Weekend ... so it kind of makes sense. We just downloaded the gamer pictures and found three stylized blue and white characters with the fourth picture stating "GRAW Has A Posse". Now we can finally put a name to the loyal GRAW 2 fanboys ... a posse. Jump online this weekend for a chance to win a few prizes and have a whole lot of fun with your posse. Word?
United States residents fear not, Canada gets Call of Duty 3 love, but you get GRAW 2 fun. With the release of Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 2, Xbox Live will be hosting a GRAW 2 72-Hour Weekend starting March 16th and running through the 18th. During the weekend's festivities you'll have the opportunity to win great prizes, play against GRAW 2's dev team, and download an exclusive gamer picture. They'll be giving away prizes every hour (pre-registration required) for all 72 hours, Friday will be play time with the developers, Saturday the Frag Dolls will be online, and Sunday will be the universal leadboard competition where the winner will walk away with a Xbox 360 HD-DVD drive and a Samsung home theatre in a box. Phew ... check out the official website for all the details and be sure to register before the 16th for the hourly giveaways. Free friendly competition and prizes, what could be better?
With the release of GRAW 2 this week those quick purchasers over at VideoGame News unearthed a few unlockable headgear items. What's interesting about these pieces of headgear is that they are only unlockable if you've previously played other Tom Clancy games on your Xbox 360. To unlock them, GRAW 2 will search your hard drive for game saves of either Rainbow Six: Vegas or Splinter Cell: Double Agent and unlock the corresponding headgear. It's kind of an interesting way to unlock goodies, but forces players to either borrow the other games or purchase them. Marketing 101 for the win! So, what do you think about this interesting way of unlocking extra items? Is it innovative or just pure sales and marketing bologna?
Australian and New Zealand fanboys who have Xbox Live silver accounts will be happy to know that a free gold weekend is upon them. Thanks to Ubisoft's charitable nature, GRAW 2 will be sponsoring an Australian and New Zealand free gold play weekend starting Friday, March 9th and running through Sunday, March 11th. Fellow silver members take advantage of your free play weekend as they are quite the rarity. Second thought, just purchase a Xbox Live gold subscription and all your life problems will disappear. That's almost a guarantee.
If you've been in search for one of the best GRAW 2 deals this week, it looks like Circuit City is the winner. For this week's release of GRAW 2 Circuit City will be discounting the game by $10 and will retail for $49.99. It's not an amazing offer, but it sure beats paying the full $59.99 price tag. And, as an added bonus, if the game isn't in store by 2PM on Wednesday they'll give you a $20 gift card. So, save yourself $10 on the (very similar to GRAW) sequel and hope the UPS guy gets lost in the massive urban sprawl.
Our UK friends who preordered Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 2 at their local GAME store will be receiving a special treat. Xboxic discovered that preorders will be emailed a code that will allow them to download a new gun called the Famas. Of course this begs the question whether or not it is really fair for certain players to have weapons that others either can't get or would have to pay for. We don't agree with messing up the "balance" of GRAW 2's multiplayer weapons system (if there is balance) by allowing exclusive weapons and not having a level playing field. What do you think, should developers offer rare or purchasable weapons in FPS or do you think it just isn't fair?
Update 1: Chris stopped by the forums to set things straight. This free code is for the Famas gun in the single player campaign and not multiplayer. Everyone will have the gun in multiplayer. You can now rest, everything is zen-like in the world.
Tom Clancy fans eager to get their hands on GRAW 2 will be happy to learn that the game has officially gone gold. TeamXbox reports that Ubisoft made the announcement today, stating that the game should be available on store shelves by Thursday, March 8th (just in time for our heads to asplode from covering GDC). In celebration of this momentous occasion, Ubisoft also revealed the entire list of achievements for the game. Achievements are more or less evenly spread among campaign, co-op, and adversarial modes. The adversarial achievements all require that at least 5 gamertags be in the session, presumably to prevent boosting. So, the game has gone gold and the achievements have been uncovered, but that's not the best part. No, Ubisoft had one more surprise for us. GRAW 2 will feature an in game achievement tracker. The achievement tracker, surprisingly, keeps track of your achievement progress. In other words, if you're wondering how many more sniper kills you have to make to acquire the "100 sniper kills" achievement, all you have to do is pull up the tracker and check. We're going to go on record and say that this feature should be in every game. You listening Microsoft?
Now that we've all had a chance to try both campaign and multiplayer demos, what do you think? Is a GRAW 2 purchase inevitable?
The GRAW 2 multiplayer demo that was promised last week is now available on Xbox Live Marketplace. Clocking in at around 300 MB, the demo allows up to 16 players on one map called Outpost. It's arguable that this demo is more important than the recently released campaign demo, as players will be spending most of their time in multiplayer. The demo is currently only available to gold members.
In a surprise twist, a much larger MLB 2K7 demo is available as well. Go forth, download, and enjoy.
For two weeks in a row now, we've had demos creeping into the Xbox Live activity charts. This week is no different, bringing a forth into the fold, ironically taking the forth spot. Of course, we're talking about the Def Jam: Icon demo. Gears of War and Rainbow Six: Vegas continue to dominate and hold onto their stranglehold for the top spots. COD3 moved into bronze position, pushing Crackdown to fifth behind the aforementioned new demo. Madden, Lost Planet, NBA Street and Oblivion stay put, and GRAW 2's demo replaces its predecessor in tenth place. Take a gander at our handy dandy list after the break.
Over at Hexus Gaming they are reporting that they received some insider information on the status of Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 2's multiplayer demo. After attending a Ubisoft hosted GRAW 2 event, Hexus Gaming says they confirmed with a Ubisoft representative that the GRAW 2 multiplayer demo will be available on the XBLM this coming week. The idea of a multiplayer demo isn't all that far fetched, but being released this week might be stretching it, knowing Microsoft's certification process. We hope we can get more hands on time with GRAW 2 before we commit to a purchase, because the single player demo just wasn't long enough to get a good enough feel for the game.
Looking for some great video game deals? Well, look no further than Circuit City and the Sunday newspaper ads. This week, Circuit City is slashing $20 off select games including titles like TMNT ($29.99), GRAW 2 ($39.99), Spider-Man 3 ($39.99) and Call of Duty 3 ($39.99). Also, since both the Red and Black Edition Player Packs will be free downloads, why not pick up Rainbow Six Vegas for the low, low price of $39.99 too? You can't pass that up. Maybe new releases are more up your alley, then we advise picking up a free $10 gift card with a Transformers: The Game purchase. And if you're in the market for Shadowrun, purchase it for $37.99 on Windows Vista and Circuit City will throw in a wireless receiver for free!
According to a Spanish newspaper called El Diario, the Governor of the Mexican state of Chihuahua is demanding all copies of GRAW 2 be pulled from retailer's shelves. The Governor's knee jerk reaction to the game seems to be coming from the city of Juarez's mayor who has openly criticized GRAW 2's content calling it "a crime against the intellectual capacity of Juarez residents". And if you don't know, GRAW 2's storyline does deal with Mexican rebels and US forces duking it out on the US / Mexican border ... something the Mexican government obviously doesn't like. What do you think, silly government officials on their soap box or something to be really concerned about?
Australian and New Zealand fanboys who have Xbox Live silver accounts will be happy to know that a free gold weekend is upon them. Thanks to Ubisoft's charitable nature, GRAW 2 will be sponsoring an Australian and New Zealand free gold play weekend starting Friday, March 9th and running through Sunday, March 11th. Fellow silver members take advantage of your free play weekend as they are quite the rarity. Second thought, just purchase a Xbox Live gold subscription and all your life problems will disappear. That's almost a guarantee.
For two weeks in a row now, we've had demos 
Over at Hexus Gaming they are reporting that they received some insider information on the status of Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 2's multiplayer demo. After attending a Ubisoft hosted GRAW 2 event, Hexus Gaming says they confirmed with a Ubisoft representative that the GRAW 2 multiplayer demo will be available on the XBLM this coming week. The idea of a multiplayer demo isn't all that far fetched, but being released this week might be stretching it, knowing Microsoft's certification process. We hope we can get more hands on time with GRAW 2 before we commit to a purchase, because the single player demo just wasn't 
