Saturday shorts: Minecraft things, Kinect hacks, Zelda, other minutiae

By Patrick Garratt

All those little pieces of weekend news. OCD sufferers could go spare. We’re here, luckily.

• You can now buy the PC version of Battlestations: Pacific half price at $15.
• Some dude’s made the first two levels of Dark Descent in Minecraft.
• And someone else has made a really sketchy Minecraft version of Halo.
• A man called roboczar has hacked Kinect to make a virtual musical instrument based on a piece of paper.
• A chap who was publishing old Activision games on Sarien.net was told to stop it, then allowed to do it again.
• EverQuest II’s getting a mobile app, allowing you to access in-game mail, look at a map of Norrath and more from wherever you happen to be.
• This week’s Left 4 Dead 2 Mutation is Nightmare. “This Survival Mutation was inspired by Karma Jockey.” You may know what this means. We don’t.
• ESA’s confirmed to Gamasutra that SVP and general counsel Kenneth Doroshow has left the trade group.
• SEE Virtual World has bought MMO Planet Calypso for $6 million.
• Monty Python’s Cow Tossing is to be made available for iPad and iPhone at the end of the month. In it, you’re a French knight. Watch a video here.
• An add-on for Patrician IV has been announced. Called Rise of a Dynasty, it’s out March 31. Screens are here.
• David Jaffe has compared NGP to the excitement one feels over getting some “new p***y,” but his studio will stick with PS3 for while longer yet. Jesus.
• CrimeCraft is getting a new update on Monday called Bleedout. Get the patch notes through the link.
• There’s some shots of the Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time actually running on 3DS through the link. It’s pretty, obviously.
• Watch to watch a cinematic into to a game you can’t play unless in Japan? Here’s one for The Last Story, then.
• Here’s a handy dandy spec chart comparing Nintendo 3DS, NGP, iPhone, the Xperia Play (PSP Phone), and more. Granted there’s tons of these out there, but this one is rather good.
• There’s a screenshot over on Cubed3 for Pokemon Typing’s DS bluetooth wireless keyboard. It looks like a keyboard, obviously.
• 1C Company announced that on March 15, multiplayer support for NecroVisioN will be canceled. However multiplayer support for NecroVisioN: Lost Company will continue.
• The first World of Warcraft: Cataclysm patch of the year is in development and now available for testing on the Public Test Realms. It’s minor, but contains class balance changes.