Retro Gaming Australia

To celebrate their 20th anniversary, Epic Games are giving away a free soundtrack featuring 20 of the best tracks from their games of the past two decades.

Epic have personally selected and remastered the set, which includes tracks from such titles as Jill of the Jungle, Jazz Jackrabbit, Unreal, Unreal Tournament 3, Shadow Complex, Bulletstorm, and Gears of War 3. The entire set list has been included below – including the bonus track “Cole Train Rap”.

Head on over to Epic’s official blog to download the soundtrack.

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Track Listing:
1. Unreleased Theme – Unreal Tournament 3 (Rom Di Prisco, 2007)
2. Dan – Jill of the Jungle (Dan Froelich, 1992)
3. Main Theme – Unreal (Alexander Brandon/Michiel Van der Boss, 1998)
4. Armored Prayer – Gears of War 2 (Steve Jablonsky, 2008)
5. Vault of Tears – Infinity Blade II (Josh Aker, 2011)
6. Space – Epic Pinball (Robert Allen, 1993)
7. Main Menu – Unreal Tournament (Alexander Brandon, 1999)
8. Menu Song – Jazz Jackrabbit (Robert Allen, 1994)
9. They’ll Be Coming For You Now – Infinity Blade (Josh Aker, 2010)
10. Hope Runs Deep – Gears of War 2 (Steve Jablonsky, 2008)
11. Main Theme – Tyrian (Alexander Brandon, 1995)
12. Hyperblast Redux – Unreal Tournament 2004 (Kevin Riepl, 2004)
13. Hanover’s Favorite Son – Gears of War 3 (Steve Jablonsky, 2011)
14. Main Theme – Shadow Complex (Josh Aker, 2009)
15. 14 Years After E-Day – Gears of War (Kevin Riepl, 2006)
16. Lockdown – Unreal Tournament 3 (Jesper Kyd, 2007)
17. Theme – Bulletstorm (Krzysztof Wierzynkiewicz/Michal Cielecki, 2011)
18. Pull Back the Bass – Jazz Jackrabbit 2 (Alexander Brandon, 1998)
19. Transistor – Unreal Championship 2 (Kevin Riepl, 2005)
20. Finally A Tomorrow – Gears of War 3 (Steve Jablosnky, 2011)

Bonus Track: Cole Train Rap [EXPLICIT] – Gears of War (Mike Larson/Rom Di Prisco)

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Wolfenstein 3D is 20 years old, and Bethesda and id Software are celebrating by releasing the first-person shooter classic as a free browser-based game.

The iOS version, Wolfenstein 3D Classic Platinum, is also free on the App Store for a very limited time.

If free games were not enough, creator John Carmack has recorded a director’s commentary for a special The Bethesda Podcast where he reminisces about Wolfenstein 3D’s development.

You can play the browser game here, and watch Carmack’s video below. Happy birthday, Wolfenstein 3D!

Kirby’s Pinball Land looks set for release on the 3DS Virtual Console. The pinball game starring Kirby, originally released on the Game Boy in 1993, has been rated by the Australian Classification Board.

Kirby fans are in for quite a treat this year – with the release of both Kirby’s Pinball Land and 3D Classics: Kirby’s Adventure on the Nintendo 3DS eShop, and the upcoming Kirby collection disc for the Wii celebrating the series’ recent 20th anniversary.

Expect more details soon.

Britain’s best selling computer, the ZX Spectrum, celebrates its 30th birthday today.

The ZX Spectrum was the brainchild of inventor Sir Clive Sinclair’s Sinclair Research Ltd. The affordably priced computer took Britain by storm, and led to the creation of a number of great game developers, including Ultimate Play The Game, who would later go on to be renamed Rare Ltd. Australia’s Beam Software is also fondly remembered for its Spectrum hits like The Hobbit, The Way of the Exploding Fist and Samurai Warrior: The Battles of Usagi Yojimbo.

To be perfectly frank, Australia was firmly Commodore 64 country so we’re not too up on our Spectrum stuff, but we highly recommend The World of Spectrum for all your Spectrum needs.

If you didn’t already know, April 27 marks 20 years since Kirby made his debut on the Game Boy in Japan with the release of Hoshi no Kirby, better known to us as Kirby’s Dream Land.

Yesterday at the Nintendo Direct briefing, the company detailed their plans for the event which will involve the release of 3D Classics: Kirby’s Adventure for the 3DS and an as-yet undetailed anniversary collection disc for the Wii, not unlike the 25th Anniversary release of Super Mario All Stars.

No dates have been set, but suffice to say that if you enjoy Kirby games (which you should) then this will be a good year.

With Street Fighter celebrating its 25th anniversary later this year, Capcom is requesting fan submissions of art and music for future use in the commemorations.

Capcom have said that they are “planning some pretty cool stuff” for the upcoming anniversary and they want Street Fighter fans to get involved. Through either celebratory fan art focusing on reflection and nostalgia or a music piece (remix or new creation), fans have the chance for their contribution to be “immortalised” as part of the Street Fighter tribute.

Capcom has promised to reveal their plans for the anniversary celebrations (which includes a tournament) closer to time.

Nippon Ichi Software last week announced their development of an RPG to celebrate the company’s 20th anniversary. Apparently, this unnamed title is just the first part of the company’s year-long anniversary celebration.

Nippon Ichi Software has today revealed the anniversary logo (above), and teased NIS fans with confirmation of other original titles planned as part of the commemoration.

Nippon Ichi Software turns 20 on July 12.

Source: Andriasang

To celebrate the company’s 20th anniversary, Nippon Ichi Software is developing a new RPG as the first part of their “20th Anniversary Project”.

Little information has been revealed about the mystery title which made its first appearance in Dengeki PlayStation via some artwork. The title is being produced by CEO Shuhei Shinkawa, directed by Masahiro Yamamoto, and features character designs by Noizi Ito.

The artwork revealed three of the RPG’s characters; Renya (pictured), Ririel and Mizael. In an interview with Dengeki, Ito stated that she is designing approximately twelve characters, including main and sub characters. The character designs have an angel and devil theme with a comical twist, such as angels and devils wearing maid and butler outfits, Ito revealed.

The RPG’s platform is yet to be announced, but we expect more information soon as the title is currently planned for a 2012 release in Japan.

Source: Andriasang

20 years ago today, the Super Nintendo Entertainment System launched in the United Kingdom. The SNES was a lot more popular with gamers in the UK, taking a much bigger chunk of the market than its predecessor. Though the battle was hard fought, Sega still claimed victory in the 16-bit era in the UK.

Gamers from Old Blighty had to wait some 18 months from the Japanese launch for the SNES to hit their shores. Imagine the furore if that were to happen today (especially from us Australians, who had to wait another 3 months on top of that).

UK developers had quite a bit of influence on the SNES’s lifespan – the Super FX chip was developed at Argonaut and the company teamed up with Nintendo to develop Starwing and Stunt Race FX. Rare became a driving force behind Nintendo’s first party efforts following the release of Donkey Kong Country. DMA Design (now Rockstar North) became part of Nintendo’s “dream team” of Nintendo 64 developers following the excellent Unirally.

We recommend that you read a couple of issues of Super Play, the best UK SNES magazine in celebration.

10 years ago today, the Xbox launched in Australia for $649.95. It was actually a failure at first, selling less than 10,000 units on its opening week. Microsoft pulled the damage control lever, dropped the machine’s price by $250 just two weeks after launch, and sent out two free games and a free controller to everyone who bought one in the first two weeks.

And people thought the 3DS launch was bad.

The move worked for Microsoft, who sold close to 700,000 Xboxen in Australia – their best marketshare for the console in the world.

Why not share your experiences of the Xbox launch and your memories of the console with us in the comments section or in the forums.