The Week In Review: Super Slim FIFA Wub Wub Early Retirement Edition (with a splash of iPhone 5)

Good golly, it’s getting cold outside. But if you’re worried about getting a sniffly nose and a tickley cough, spare a thought for the poor BioWare doctors. Diagnosed with a fierce case of Frostbite earlier in the week, the pair have upped sticks and left, leaving a 20-year legacy in the hands of those wonderful folk at EA.

Greg’s off to drink beer, and Ray’s off to give a hand to entrepreneurs. We wish them well. Have a drink on us. Except maybe you, Greg. You’ve had enough.

One thing the world hasn’t had enough of, though, is PlayStation 3s. And now there’s another one for you to buy! Just look at it. It’s shiny, like the old fat PS3, but a whopping 50 per cent smaller. It’s a little like Kirstie Alley, but in reverse. Do we think it’s, ahem, drop dead gorgeous? (Get it, Drop Dead Gorgeous? Oh, never mind.) I’m not convinced.

If you want one, though, (and according to Sony, a fair few of you Xbox 360 owners do), you might do well to get a pre-order in at GAME. Trade in your old slim PS3 and you’ll get the new one for half-price.

But if you’d rather spend some money on games, rather than another version of a console you’ve (probably) already got, there are a tonne of big games out this weekend for you to get your mitts on. Borderlands 2 is the best of the bunch, although the annual updates from PES 2013 and F1 2012 put on a pretty good show, too. You can’t burn a maniacal midget to death in those, though.

If you want too, though, you can complain about the changes made to the tyre wear system in F1 2012. Just please don’t be a dick about it. Coincidentally, we also discussed the current ‘self-entitlement’ fad on this week’s podcast, hours prior to Steve Hood’s blog post. Are we psychic? Maybe. I’ve bought a lottery ticket this week to prove that theory either way. If I win, this will be the last Week In Review from myself that you’ll ever have to endure.

Something else everyone loves to complain about is Hitman: Absolution. I’ve been playing some of it this week, and while I can‘t tell you whether you’re right to be angry about some of the changes yet, I can show you this new trailer. I like the lady’s voice.

If I ever got to meet her, though, I probably wouldn’t take her sailing. Especially in the midst of a zombie apocalypse. Nor would I load the boat up with explosive barrels, but hey, what do I know? I’ll tell you what I do know, though: the CGI trailer for Dead Island: Riptide released earlier this week, and it hasn’t quite managed to make as much of a splash as the original, probably because there isn’t any kiddie death. Still, as far as CGI trailers go, it’s easily the best one I’ve seen this week. Mind you, I think it’s the only one I’ve seen this week.

From zombies to iPhone 5 buyers (not that they’re any different – ZING!), Apple’s latest goes on sale today, which TIGA thinks is great news for the games industry. One thing’s for sure, though – they’re bound to get hacked – much like if you were a Guild Wars 2 player with a ropey password at launch. ArenaNet’s admitted that 1.5 per cent of players’ accounts were hacked before the developer brought in new security measures, and considering the game’s colossal sales figures, that’s a pretty big number.

I wonder how many of those are looking forward to taking part in the Medal of Honor: Warfighter beta heading to Xbox 360 early next month? Not many, I’d wager. They’re probably looking forward to Carrier Command: Gaea Mission, though. I was a bit too, until I started playing the campaign mode. It’s like Halo, but unfathomably dreadful! Watch. Laugh. Cry. Hopefully the ‘strategy’ part is a bit better.

Looking ahead to next week, the FIFA 13 review! I’ll spoil the fun bit for you: FIFA 13 is better than PES 2013, but – according to our reviewer – not by much. TL;DR, you still score football goals, but defending has been improved, first touch can be a little frustrating and it’ll sell bazillions. No, seriously. But while everyone and his football hooligan brother is looking forward to FIFA, I’m a little bit more excited for/by Dead or Alive 5 .

This is why.

Happy weekend.