At this year’s Ani-Con the guys from Xbox HK showed off their new Kinect system at their booth. Ani-Con visitors could try out demos of either Dance Central and Kinect Sports. The dance game only had five playable tracks while the sports game only let gamers try the Hurdles track event.

At a special press conference held the day before the beginning of the Ani-Con Xbox invited celebrity idol models Chrissie Chau and Jessica C to help demonstrate how to “Kinect” with the new Xbox 360 add-on.

The Kinect works as advertised and watching Chrissie and Jessica C dance to Lady Gaga’s Poker Face was quite a spectacle.

The Kinect is a controller free gaming add-on for the Xbox 360 and allows players to interact with games just by moving your body and talking. At the Con there was some initial problems with the game frequently pausing on its but the Xbox guys said that this was caused by the frequent bright flashes from the photographers cameras.

At the present moment Microsoft Hong Kong hasn’t set the local prices yet, but they do have three months to tell us. However Xbox USA has announced their prices:

• Xbox 360 4GB (black) with Kinect add-on device – US$299.99 (about HK$2,340)
• Xbox 360 250GB (black)– US$299.99 (about HK$2,340)
• Kinect add-on device – US$149.99 (about HK$1,170)

Launch Games

Dance Central
Do we need to explain when the title has “Dance” in it.

Kinectimals
Basically a virtual petting zoo without the poop and the financial expenses of vets and kibble.

Kinect Sports
Again do we need to explain when the title has “Sport” in it.

Kinect Joy Ride
Hmmm… Will we be taught how to boost cars in this driving game?

Your Shape: Fitness Evolved
We think the title is self explanatory.

Kinect Adventures!
The game wasn’t demo-ed at Ani-Con so we have no idea what it is but we guess it must be tones of fun.

Zumba Fitness
OK, this one does need a little explanation this is a dance fitness workout game set to sexy, high-energy music!

SONIC FREE RIDERS
It’s a Sonic the Hedgehog game Sonic, we’re guessing a lot of high speed running and golden ring collecting.

It was a hot sticky Sunday afternoon, as we discovered not everyone is in line for an iPad, as hundreds of gamers came out in force to buy the new Xbox 360 console this past weekend.

The special first day sale took place in the Atrium of Langham Place Mall in Mong Kok and gamers had been queuing up since the mall opened its doors that morning for a chance to be among the first 200 people in Hong Kong to own the new Microsoft console.

The new Xbox 360 features a new slighter slimmer and edgier body that comes with a whopping 250GB hard drive and built-in Kinect hardware, making this Xbox 360 2.0 console a definite must buy for the hardcore gamer.

There to help launch the new 2.0 console was celebrity ??? and local super Halo gamer girl ??? (who only plays Halo with the best of the best in the world).

Those that attended and bought a console each received data transfer cable and a special coupon that will allow them to try out the new Kinect system at this year’s Ani-Con that is being held at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre in Wan Chai at the end of this month.

There was also a special deluxe package that was available for an extra HK$399 on top of the HK$2,369 for the console, which included an extra controller with re-chargeable battery and charging cable, a carry bag and two games (Forza Motor Sport 3 and Nier).

The new Xbox 360 2.0 console is available now at your nearest gaming retailer for the suggested retail price of HK$2,369. Kinect is coming in November so plenty of time to practice your skillz before jumping around with it.

Got an iMac? Then you should definitely consider buying this Mini DisplayPort Converter for 27”iMac from Belkin. This adapter takes an HDMI input at up to 1080p and squeezes it into a Mini DisplayPort connector at 720p for display, letting you enjoy graphics from your Sony PS3 or Xbox 360 on your lovely iMac. Audio signal is also split for stereo-out and it’s HDCP-compliant.

This device will require you to fork out US$150/HK$1170, which is an awful lot for a converter box with a single input. But in Hong Kong apartments it makes a world of sense if you want to keep all your toys together in your study and for you alone to play with! Bwa-hahahaha!

Ahem, yes well, there you have it. More info here.

On the road many days out of the year? Feel like you are neglecting your Xbox? Hate reading tweets from your friends declaring that they are almost finished Red Dead Redemption? Then here’s the answer to your prayers: GAEMS Portable Console Gaming and Entertainment system.

It’s a protective suitcase that securely holds your Xbox, making you look like an CSI agent, instead of a geeky road warrior. The GAEMS suitcase carries a 15-inch, 720p LCD in the lid, and “a whole mess of speakers”. Flip open your console and you’re good to go.

There’s just some glitch, though. There’s no place to put your power brick, and your controllers. Fortunately, it’ll still undergo some design changes. Price and availability you ask?  Probably about US$250/HK$1950 with an expected launch date of Q4 this year, and yes there are PS3 and new Xbox 360 versions coming too.

Register to pre-order it here.

We were supposed to cover E3 2010 live this year but somehow our plane took off without us so we’ve had to live it viacriously through blogs and websites and instead of enjoying the beautiful Los Angeles weather, had to sweat it out here in Hong Kong.

But its been a busy week – so here are a bunch of things that we liked/loved/loathed from the show floor at E3 2010:

XBox 360 Slim

Nintendo 3DS

• Game gallery images

Playstation Wave and Plus

Gears of War 3:

• Beast mode preview
• Horde mode to return
• Ice-T in GoW3

Previews of cool upcoming games:

• Twisted Metal
• Scott Pilgrim vs The World
• NeverDead
• Spec Ops: The Line (A wasted Dubai is the setting!)
• Portal 2
• Vanquish
• Final Fantasy XIV
• and of course: Metal Gear Solid: Rising

Gran Tourismo 5 using real cars as models

Silent Hill 8, yes EIGHT, coming to Xbox and PS3 in 2011

And all the E3 2010 Booth Babe photos you can handle!

This 3-day event is video game heaven and we’re still wandering around different sites looking at all the cool new stuff. Sometimes you wonder why bother going – you only have 2 eyes, but at the Neonpunch offices we have 4 monitors hooked up to each computer so we can catch the action from multiple viewpoints. The only thing we’re missing is the hands-on with the games.

For more news hit up our 2 favorite gamer blogs Kotaku and Joystiq.

If you saw things that we missed please post them below.

We get one holiday and the video game world explodes. We’ll try and catch you up on what you may have missed yesterday.

At the E3 Expo, Microsoft unveiled “Kinect“, the motion-sensing game system that plugs into Xbox and allows hands-free games and controlling the console with voice commands. It will begin selling in November 4, before the crucial holiday season, hoping to lure new and casual players to the Xbox and steal a march on rivals Nintendo Co Ltd and Sony Corp.

The world’s largest software vendor will also begin selling a smaller, same-priced version of the console this week. But the new Xbox 360 will not be able to read players’ motions without the Kinect add-on. Microsoft ambitions to make its Xbox 360 not just a gaming device but a hub of home video and Web entertainment,

Kinect uses a three-camera system and gesture recognition software to read a player’s body movements and then translates those actions onto the TV screen into the game to let people play videogames using natural body gestures instead of hand-held controllers. The platform, if it works well, takes gamers a step beyond Nintendo’s Wii.

Microsoft didn’t disclose how much Kinect will sell for, though analysts’ estimates range from $50 to $200.

On its launch day, Kinect will drop with 15 titles. Microsoft highlighted 6 of the 15:

• Kinectimals – Lets youngsters play with virtual animals, sort of like Nintendogs but with wild and impossibly cute animals.
• Kinect Sports – Soccer, bowling, beach volleyball, pingpong and boxing competitions, track and field games. A bit like Wii Sports.
• Joyride – a racing game, lets players use their hands to hold an imaginary steering wheel – “Thrill of high speed kart racing, with the joy of controller-free gaming”
• Kinect Adventures – an adventure that lets players raft down digital rivers.
• Your Shape: Fitness Evolved – an amazing looking fitness game that lets users track their personal fitness and do workouts with digital trainers. The game features running and aerobics.
• Dance Central – brings a So You Think You Can Dance experience at home, without needing to step on stupid pads or mats.

Microsoft also offered sneak peeks of a LucasArts game, in which Jedi Knights do battle with light sabers, something very enticing. In demonstrations, Microsoft employees showed how Kinect can also be used for video chats as well as to listen to music and watch movies with friends in other locations.

But that’s not all. Microsoft also struck a deal with ESPN network to broadcast live sporting events through the Xbox 360 games console, bypassing traditional cable providers.

Nintendo’s got Wii. Microsoft’s got Kinect. Your Move, Sony.

With the big Disney Summer blockbuster version Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time opening in Hong Kong today we thought we’d take a stroll down memory lane to have a look back at this classic video game to remember its roots as one of the classic games of the late 80′s.

For those of you who don’t know, Prince of Persia is a video game franchise created by Jordan Mechner. The first ever PoP game was released by Broderbund in 1989 that signified a great step forward in animation quality seen in computer games.

At first, it didn’t seem so complex. It revolved around a nameless traveler that climbs the palace walls of Persia merely to glimpse the Sultan’s daughter, more beautiful than a sunset. Mixing carnal lust with political ambition, the evil Vizier Jaffar imprisoned a beautiful Princess in a high tower and gives her an hour to marry him or die. Rather than go for an annulment, the Princess leaned towards Option B. Her only hope was her commoner-lover, the fearless Prince, who Jaffar left to rot in the lowest dungeon. One swift escape later, the Prince was running up the tower to beat the deadline, for the path to save his Princess is treacherous, and there is no time to waste.

And running was the only way to do it. Players had just sixty minutes to reach the top and defeat Jaffar, and a ton of pressure-plates to hit on the way. Guards were actually dueled in a patient series of retreats, advances, strikes and parries. If spike traps skewered you, or a skeleton warrior chopped you, or a section of floor collapsed under you, the game whisked you back to the start of the level while the clock kept ticking. Lost time compounded issues like loosing your soul, which cut the Prince’s health to almost nothing. Worse, that “Shadow Prince” played for the other team, harassing you at every turn. A real sense of danger permeated every moment, helped by seamless animations and rudimentary physics that gave the Prince real weight. It just felt like he was always about to be killed. Often enough, he was. That made his escapes all the more thrilling.

Prince of Persia started with players under the gun, and let the pressure build from there. Then Mechner added twists nobody expected; killing the Shadow in a duel killed the Prince, but simply walking into it merged them back together. Reaching Jaffar required a “leap of faith” over a bottomless chasm. Gamers were challenged to think about what they were doing in ways few other games did, but taking the time to simply stop and think ate into the precious few minutes you had left. This was how the first PoP game played out. It was wonderfully tense.

In 1994, Broderbund released Prince of Persia: The Shadow and The Flame which was similar to the first but had far more complex graphics. It was only in 1999 that the game was incorporated with 3D graphics with the release of Prince of Persia 3D under the wings of Red Orb Entertainment. Four years later, Ubisoft would take over and continued the series with Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time. In this 2003 game, the Vizier of the Maharajah tricks the Prince into releasing the Sands of Time contained inside the Hourglass of Time, using the Dagger of Time. The Sands wash over the kingdom, turning all living beings into monsters. On a journey to repair the damage he has caused, the Prince teams with Farah to return the Sands of Time to the hourglass, using the Dagger of Time. The game was developed for the PC, PlayStation 2, Nintendo GameCube, Xbox, and later a 2D-version for the Game Boy Advance and mobile phones.

The success of The Sands of Time led to two sequels, Prince of Persia: Warrior Within and Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones, in 2004 and 2005, respectively. Prince of Persia: Warrior Within picks up where The Sands of Time left off, adding new features, specifically, options in combat. Following Warrior Within, The Two Thrones is the closing chapter in The Sands of Time saga.

In mid 2007, Prince of Persia was remade and ported by Gameloft. The remake featured the same level design and general premise but contained 3D-rendered graphics, more fluid movements, and Sands of Time aesthetics.

Now fast-forward to 2010. Last May 18, Ubisoft released Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands as the latest installment in the PoP series. The game is an interquel, taking place in the seven year gap between The Sands of Time and Warrior Within. The Prince character is supposed to be a cross between the character models in these two games. According to a press release from Ubisoft, it’s available on all major gaming platforms and is to “feature many of the fan-favorite elements from the original series as well as new gameplay innovations. This latest offering from Ubisoft should definitely mark as one of the most exciting games to play.

Prince of Persia has taken the art of visuals and storytelling in video games higher and higher. Centered on a fearless hero who’s challenged and excited all comers. Different men may take up the mantel, but there will always be a Prince fighting the odds and the clock to save his lady-love. And we’ll always be there to enjoy the ride.

Take a look through the history of the Prince of Persia franchise from the original game in 1989 through its various incarnations on PC and Ubi’s versions of the game and let us know what you thought of the movie version that open today in Hong Kong.

One definite advantage that the movie has over the classic game: Gemma Arterton!

Tomorrow sees the launch of one this summer’s most anticipated games: Rockstar’s Red Dead Redemption.

The game can best be described as Grand Theft Auto 4 set in the last years of the cowboy era. Neonpunch was able to play one of the missions from the game and we have to say right now that we can hardly wait for May 20th to arrive and start shooting some sheriffs (but not any deputies)  on either the Playstation 3, Xbox 360 and Nintendo Wii.

Set approximately fifty years after the original game, Red Dead Redemption kicks-off at the turn of the 20th Century – a pivotal time in American history. The old west was dying, slowly being crushed by the rise of industrialisation and the growing presence of federal government, which was starting to assert its power and bring the lawless ‘Wild West’ into line.

Gamers take on the role of John Marston a partially reformed outlaw who, after years as a career criminal in a notoriously brutal gang, has hung up his six-shooters for a more peaceful life and started a family. Three years later John’s life is completely turned upside down when agents from The Bureau (the precursor to the FBI) arrive and threaten his new way of life. Forced to work for them, The Bureau were proving just as ruthless, lawless and evil as the gangs they were paid to hunt down.

After being told the back story, Rockstar handed over the controller to us and we began our mission to tame the “Wild West.” The mission objectives are simple we must find a drunk called Irish who will give us info on the where a bouts of a Gatling gun that we need. Unfortunately the weapon is being kept in a very secure location deep within a nearby mine guarded by dozens of well armed men.

We follow Irish to the Mine’s location and this is where the action starts, we shoot our way through the miner’s camp and enter the mine to be confronted with some more stiff opposition. As we wind our way through the labyrinth of tunnels killing miners with our shotgun or blowing them up thanks to conveniently place boxes of TNT we finally get the Gatling gun which we then have to load onto a mining cart and ride it out of the mine shooting anything that gets in our way.

Now that was an overly brief simplification of what we had to do, those who have played either Red Dead or GTA4 will know there’s a little more to it than that. All we can say is “It was freaking AWESOME!” it was like being in our Spaghetti western with a character that looks somewhat like a cross between John Wayne and Clint Eastwood.

Shooting the bad guys was fun, especially when you use the Dead-Eye function that lets you do some super human shooting, however this time you can use it in three different ways. The first is available with any weapon you’ll come across and it enables you to slow down time, giving you precious extra seconds to pan around an area picking off multiple assailants, or maybe just to hammer the one. The second form of Dead Eye automatically paints shot markers on target; while the most advanced way allows players to paint their own shot markers – perfect for shooting a bounty in the leg to take him alive or to scare off troublemakers by shooting their hats off.

As with the original, you’ll earn Dead Eye in a cumulative way by taking out enemies.

The guns that you can use in the game are based on real weaponry from the time, there are loads of weapons to choose from like rifles to shotguns, sawn-offs, snipers , pistols and different melee weapons such as axes, knives and lassos.

One of the most impressive things graphically was the 3D modeling of the horses, from realistic movements to the incredibly detailed musculature; gamers can even see the horse’s muscles undulating underneath its coat. There is a complete in-game ecology system, bigger animals hunt smaller ones, and the bigger ones have no problems coming after people either. There is a huge variety of wildlife in the game; bears, cougars, wolves, snakes, armadillos, rabbits, vultures to name a few.

Red Dead Redemption is running on a customised hybrid of both Euphoria Physics and the Rockstar Advanced Game Engine, which was developed by Rockstar San Diego specifically for this title. It has been used in Midnight Club Los Angeles and Grand Theft Auto IV. Euphoria enables the characters to take on much more realistic properties, their movement and the way they interact with each other, as well as the player. It doesn’t end with humans either and extends to the whole wildlife system.

The game is bigger than any of Rockstar’s previous titles with three distinct massive separate, but linked, areas forming a playing arena larger than GTA IV, including 2 states of the newly formed USA and an area in the north of Mexico. These boast dramatically diverse landscapes and varying degrees of civilisation in these places at the time – from remote ramshackle outposts to organised urban hubs.

If you’re a fan of westerns or GTA then Red Dead Redemption is a game that you should definitely get. It’s available on all console platforms tomorrow in Hong Kong – just in time for the long weekend! Yee-Haw!

Here is IGN’s review:

How old do you feel when we tell you its been 10 years since Marvel vs Capcom 2: New Age of Heroes was released? Well this video for the new Marvel Vs. Capcom 3 should be a virtual fountain of youth for you:

It’s been a decade since Marvel vs. Capcom 2: New Age of Heroes was first released and now the most popular Marvel and Capcom characters join forces again in a re-envisioned team fighting game for a new generation. Fill the shoes of legendary characters from the most beloved franchises in entertainment as you battle in the first VS. Fighting game powered by Capcom’s MT Framework.

“We are so pleased to be working with Marvel again. Marvel vs. Capcom 3 has been one of the most requested titles for us to produce by our fans,” said Christian Svensson, Corporate Officer and Vice President of Strategic Planning and Business Development at Capcom. “Our Capcom development studio is creating the most epic fighting game ever developed and Marvel’s input into that process has been invaluable.”

Get set for the ultimate faceoff when Marvel vs. Capcom 3: Fate of Two Worlds hits PlayStation 3 computer entertainment system and Xbox 360 video game and entertainment system from Microsoft in Spring 2011.

Key features
• Innovative graphics and gameplay bring the Marvel and Capcom Universes to life: Powered by an advanced version of MT Framework, the engine used in Resident Evil 5 and Lost Planet 2, now comes to Marvel vs. Capcom 3, bringing beautiful backgrounds and character animations to the forefront.

• Evolved VS. Fighting System: Wild over-the-top gameplay complete with signature aerial combos, hyper combos and other original systems. The evolved battle system takes the exciting mind-reading game to a whole new level!

• 3-on-3 Tag Team Fighting: Players build their own perfect team and use Assist Attacks and each character’s special moves to create their own unique fighting style.

• Living Comic Book Art Style: See the most adored characters from the Capcom and Marvel universes brought to life in a “moving comic” style, blurring the boundaries between 2D and 3D graphics.

Spring 2011? Maybe too far away to put on our calendar but at least we have a big game to look forward to next year alongside the next group of Marvel movies!

If this is just a trailer to the game, what would a movie look like?

Ghost Recon: Future Soldier is coming to the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, PC, PSP, Nintendo DS and Wii this fall, with an Xbox 360 beta arriving April 13, 2010 in North America.

And according to Kotaku, the duo behind the Academy-Award winning short film are making the Ghost recon short film too:

Francois Alaux and Herve de Crecy will be working with writer Tim Sexton (Children of Men) on the 20-minute short, which will serve as a prequel for the upcoming Ghost Recon: Future Soldier.

Ubisoft has set aside $8-10 million for the film, which is the latest in the studio’s ever-expanding line of movie projects, the last of which were based on Assassin’s Creed.

More at the official site here.