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Weathering the Storm

In these uncertain economic times, even the formerly recession proof gaming industry has to adapt to protect itself. After the success of Mario and Sonic at the Olympics, many other publishers are attempting to get in on the act, cross pollinating genres and characters into new concepts. Below we have an example of three of the sort of games you’ll be playing in 2009.

Cooking Mama has been a big hit for minor publisher Majesco and now they are teaming up with Microsoft, fresh of taking Halo into the TRS genre with Halo Wars. One of MS’s stated aims is to broaden the 360′s audience so their first attempt should be looked at in much the same way we look at Web TV, Zune and Windows Vista.

Cooking Masterchief offers plays to not only coop cooking lessons, but enables you to compete in 16 player Multiplayer cook-offs on Xbox Live. Create your own recipes in the Forge and share them with other players.

Sony, not to be outdone has taken two of their iconic characters and put them together in a brand new title.

Snake and Kratos in the Modern Pentathlon sees some beloved characters compete in fencing, shooting, sneaking, loving wenches and codec quicktime events. With over 30 hours of cutscenes directed by Hideo Kojima, this is one game that could only be made on a Blu Ray disc.

and lastly, Madden NFL 09 may not be on PC but there is at last one new Madden title on PC. Madden Flight Simulator

Despite his mortal fear of flying, John Madden has put his full weight behind this project. Your job is to get John to the game by hook or by crook. In order to prepare himself for the possibility of flying, John attempted to board a flight to Las Vegas but his phobias got the better of him, causing an ‘incident’ onboard. Luckily the moment was captured and has become the cover image for this innovative title.