Kitten pictures: One of Wire.VG's many aggregator innovations

So if you read us often, you’ll realise that we’re no news site.  When I first pitched the site to Mark I was always adamant that Armchair Diplomat didn’t need to be just another game blog, respewing news that we had no stake in just for the sake of attention.  We like to think of ourselves as a gaming opinion blog, and if there’s something going on in the industry that we genuinely want to talk about, that’s when we decide to make a post.  In this fashion, we very much hope to keep ourselves off GJAIF‘s radar.

But up-to-date news is still a very big commodity in the games industry, even if half of it seems to centre around rewording press releases and baseless rumour.  Everyone has their favourite site to check, but if you want to find out what’s really going on then you probably need to be monitoring many gaming news sites at once.

To this end, the founder of Negative Gamer NukeZilla and all round pretty cool guy John Kershaw (often better known as Wardrox) has started a gaming news aggregator site called Wire.VG.  As I explained it to a friend upon checking it out: it’s much like Reddit.Gaming except Wardrox rules it with an iron fist … so kind of exactly like Reddit.Gaming.  The key difference here is Wire.VG is not a user submitted aggregator.  It simply plumbs the RSS depths of the major players of gaming news, and delivers it to you in one easy to browse list.

The reasoning behind Wire.VG’s creation is a growing need amongst the community for news that’s free from spam and superfluous re-blogging.  I’m not entirely convinced that Wire will be able to live up to it’s aspiration of only delivering the source of news, as the big sites tend to source-link to each other before bothering with the actual source, but spam and re-blogging it can certainly take care of.

Simply put, it’s the complete RSS feed you couldn’t be bothered building for yourself, and now possibly one of the best and most concise ways of keeping abreast of gaming news.

At current the site is in it’s beta stages, so if you’d like to give it a try then you’ll need to apply for a beta code.  If accepted, then not onlu will it be up to you to assist with reporting any bugs and suggesting ways the service could be improved, but you’ll also have access the the site’s promotion features and play an active role in what Wire.VG features.  We’re not part of the feed itself, but our good friends at Gamer Limit are and I’m sure they’d appreciate any votes you sling their way.

No word as to when the site will be opened wide to everyone, but when it happens we’ll be sure to let you know!  Until then, check out Wire.VG, and if you dig it then apply for your own beta code.

An inkblot teaser. Scrawled below is "The nightmare is over but it will not end!"

News from the world of Electronic Arts, Visceral Games has confirmed that they are producing Dead Space 2!

“We’re thrilled to jump back into the series, making the next chapter in Isaac’s journey. The infection continues to spread throughout space and our hero Isaac Clarke is the only person able to contain it. There are still loads of necromorphs that need killing!” said Steve Papoutsis, Executive Producer of Dead Space 2. “In Dead Space 2, not everything is exactly as it seems. Expect plot twists that will surprise you and a huge cast of twisted, disgusting monsters that are sure to scare the daylights out of you.”

-Steve Papoutis, specifying it won’t be the ‘living’ daylights

I’ll be honest with you, I’m not 100% sure where they will be going with plot. The thing I liked about Dead Space was the idea that it was a contained, almost claustrophobic feeling while you’re running from a huge dead thing. I don’t know if it will be as scary in a broader environment.

The press release is here, at EA Press. You can also follow the fun on twitter http://twitter.com/deadspace