Zombinis by EastSide Games Terrorizes Google Plus

Vancouver Developer Eastside Games has released the social game Zombinis to the Google Plus Social network as part of a 30-day exclusive deal. This freemium game tells the story of Z Land, which has been thrown into chaos when a giant factory squished the King Zombie and his loyal army. Now it’s up to you to raise an army of Undead animals that will fight for a supremacy in a post-apocalyptic cartoon landscape. The art style eschews the usual cutesy trappings of social games for something more suited for animals whose body parts fly off when they fight. Players will find lots of creatures and attacks to explore within the game. The Facebook version will be coming soon and Eastside says they are also working on a stand alone version. You can try out the game on Google Plus here.

Source: InsidesocialGames.com.

Phil Harrison steps up for Peter Molyneux


Former Sony Game design Chief Phil Harrison has been hired as Chief of Microsoft Game Studios in Europe. This move comes in the wake of Peter Molyneux’s departure from the division to form 22-Cans, an indie start-up. Harrison has served as a partner at the venture capitalist firm London Venture Partners and as a board member at Atari. Most of the press release is a bunch of doublespeak calming investor fears over this management change-up, but Peter Molyneux leaving the Triple-A arena is a good move for him, and the game industry at large. Molyneux’s been criticized for making promises his games couldn’t possibly keep, and that may have been due to all the resources at his disposal at Microsoft. With the economic constraints of a start-up, we may yet begin to see some things come out reminiscent of his old days at Bullfrog.

Source:VentureBeat

Sakuracon Fashion Police?!

A very odd piece of advertising came through my google alerts the other day. Some dude or production company is looking for

…two female spokesmodels / on-camera talent that have no problem walking up to and interviewing people around the convention. Think of Joan Rivers at the Oscars, you ask people where they are from, what they are dressed as, etc. This would be a great gig for two friends that would like to attend the event, and make some money while having a great time!

Costume is not required but you will need to at least dress up for the affair. Preferably, I am hoping to have at least one person who can speak fluent Japanese. The finished production will be a series of shorts that will be aired on-line, and hopefully picked up by Japanese television.

I will pay for your admission to the event, plus food and drinks, plus $50 cash for each day we shoot. We will be working for no more than 4 hours each day, so this is a quick fun and easy way to be a part of this event!

My first thought is that even for $50 day, this guy needs to manage his expectations. No one speaking fluent Japanese is going to roll out of bed for less than union scale. Second of all, while Joan Rivers at the Oscars sounds like fun, you also might end up with Joan Rivers who rips celebrities a new one each week on Fashion Police (which I do watch on a regular basis). That kind of humour is gold when your talking about an ingenue chickie wearing a $20,000 dress she didn’t pay for, but not so much when you’re talking to a broke college student who spent 72 hours on her own palatial ball gown. And then there’s the issue that this is a craigslist ad. So what do you think, internet? Is this the beginnings of a cosplay documentary that the whole family will enjoy, or is it simply code for an escort service?
Source:Craigslist