Conan O’Brien took his late night show on the road to Dallas, Texas last week, and while he was there he paid a visit to AT&T Stadium, also commonly called “Jerry’s World” by sports commentators. But instead of getting into shenanigans with the Dallas Cowboys or perving out on the team’s cheerleaders, Conan did the first thing any of us would do if given the opportunity. That’s right, he hooked a PlayStation 4 up to the enormous DiamondVision scoreboard to play some video games for the latest installment of Clueless Gamer.

Watch along as Conan plays Madden NFL 25, Flower, Need for Speed: Rivals and Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix on a 72’x160′ 1.2 million pound screen. His final recommendation: Go rent an NFL stadium to play games on, or at the very least a basketball arena. Thanks for the advice, Coco.

Clueless Gamer: AT&T Stadium Edition [Team Coco]

Feeding the fanboy console war fire, EA has released dueling gameplay trailers for Need for Speed Rivals. One shows the Xbox One version. One shows the PlayStation 4 version. They both look pretty damn great to me, and that’s all that matters to me. But if you’re one to compare console graphics capabilities down to the tiniest of details, compare away.

After first launching for PC, PS3 and Xbox 360 on November 19th, Need for Speed Rivals is slated for a next-gen release on PS4 and Xbox One later in the year, whenever Sony and Microsoft decide to ship their respective consoles.

Criterion Games and new EA studio Ghost Games are collaborating to develop Rivals, an open-road take on cops and robbers within a game world that seamlessly integrates single-player racing with online multiplayer using a feature called AllDrive. From the press release:

In Need for Speed Rivals, gamers play as either a cop or racer, where each side of the law has its own set of high stakes challenges, rewards and consequences. As a racer, the goal is to become infamous for taking risks behind the wheel and capturing your most intense escapes on video for the world to see. The more cops players evade, the more Speed Points they collect, enabling them to unlock new cars and items. Keep raising the stakes race after race to become an ever-more valuable target to the cops – but risk losing it all if busted. As a cop, players work together as part of a team in pursuit of racers, earning prominence and rising in the ranks of the Police Force with every bust. Achieving higher ranks unlocks new police only cars and more powerful pursuit tech.

At the heart of Need for Speed Rivals is AllDrive, an innovative new online feature that allows gamers to seamlessly transition from playing alone, to playing with friends, eliminating the line between single player and multiplayer. Players will have to keep one eye on their rearview mirror as friends will be able to enter and exit races on-the-fly, creating a world where no two events will ever be the same.

Sounds pretty similar to what the Test Drive Unlimited games have done, but hopefully the team of Ghost and Criterion can execute the open-world online racing model with greater polish and attention to detail.

Need for Speed Rivals will additionally feature dynamic weather effects (Redview County is a rainy place judging by the screenshots, unless those cars are sweating), hyper-realistic visuals powered by the Frostbite 3 engine, Autolog support for comparing stats and challenging friends on the fly, robust car customization and a host of “pursuit and evasion” gadgets like EMPs and shockwaves and helicopter air support. For the first time in seven years, Rivals also marks the return of Ferrari automobiles, like the F12berlinetta, to the Need for Speed franchise.

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Hey look, another big third-party game coming to Wii U months after appearing on the other consoles. Can someone please tell me again why I’m supposed to be excited about buying into this new console?

OK, sorry about the snarkiness. I kid because I love…

In all seriousness, it’s always a good thing any time a good game spreads onto as many platforms and reaches as wide of an audience as possible, so this week’s announcement from EA that Criterion’s 2012 holiday season open-world racing hit Need for Speed: Most Wanted is bound for Wii U glory deserves a welcoming embrace from owners of Nintendo’s latest gaming machine.

Need for Speed: Most Wanted will be “enhanced” for Wii U to boot, featuring a new Co-Driver local co-op mode in which one player drives the car using a Wii Remote or Wii U Pro Controller while a second player taps away on the Wii U GamePad to provide real-time map navigation assistance, control traffic flow, change the time of day, distract cops and activate performance boosters.

The Wii U GamePad will also be utilized for off-screen gaming as well as intuitive touch-screen interaction for things like equipping mods, changing vehicles and tracking stats and secrets.

The perks don’t stop there either. Out of the box, the Wii U edition will include the Ultimate Speed Pack, a content bonus containing five additional cars, including McLaren’s F1 LM, Lamborghini’s Aventador J, the Pagani Zonda R, the Bugatti Veyron Grand Sport Vitesse and Hennessey’s Venom GT Spyder.

Another cool touch for existing Need for Speed: Most Wanted players is how earned Speed Points on Wii U will be shared with a player’s profile from another console. Of course, I’m not sure why any one would want to buy the same game again just to play on another console, but maybe that’s just me.

Need for Speed: Most Wanted is due to cross the North American retail finish line on March 19th. Wii U owners, start your engines.

Digital downloads of full retail PS3 games are becoming more and more common on the PlayStation Network, but it’s still very rare to see games simultaneously distributed on Blu-ray and the PlayStation Store on the first day of release. Mass Effect 3 and Borderlands 2 come to mind, but there haven’t been too many others that I can recall off the top of my hand. Sony’s changing that, at least for one month.

Eight of this fall’s top third-party games, all bunched up for October launches, will be releasing day and date on PSN and Blu-ray as part of a new program called PSN Day 1 Digital. So, for example, when Resident Evil 6 drops on store shelves next Tuesday, you’ll be able to download the game from home without having to hit up the nearest GameStop, Best Buy, or Walmart (or wherever you buy your games from) or order online and have to wait for the shipping. You’ll be able to do the same with other games like Dishonored, Medal of Honor: Warfighter and Assassin’s Creed III, to name a few.

Here’s the complete Day 1 Digital schedule:

· Resident Evil 6 (Available for download on October 2 – $59.99)

· NBA 2K13 (Available for download on October 2 – $59.99/$53.99 for PLUS members, with pre-order)

· Dishonored (Available for download on October 9 – $59.99/$53.99 for PLUS members, with pre-order)

· DOOM 3: BFG Edition (Available for download on October 16 – $39.99/$35.99 for PLUS members, with pre-order)

· 007: Legends (Available for download on October 16 – $59.99)

· Medal Of Honor: Warfighter (Available for download on October 23 – $59.99)

· Need For Speed: Most Wanted (Available for download on October 30 – $59.99/$53.99 for PLUS members, with pre-order)

· Assassin’s Creed III (Available for download on October 30 – $59.99)

As you likely noticed, select titles will be available to pre-order, and during the first week of availability those same titles will be available at a 10% discount for PlayStation Plus subscribers. That’ll knock six bucks off the price tag.

Sony’s slyly using the Day 1 Digital program to push its new PS3 models as well:

“Additionally, with our new PlayStation 3 models on the horizon offering up to 500GB of storage, there’s never been a better time to experience PS3 games digitally through PSN,” says Jack Buser, Senior Director, PlayStation Digital Platforms, SCEA.

Whatcha think? Will you be buying any of these games digitally or are you sticking with Blu-ray?

Building up to its November 16th launch on PC, PS3, Wii and Xbox 360, Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit is preparing to embark on a nationwide, seven-city tour beginning July 14th at the Manhattan Classic Car Club in New York City hosted by DJ Z-Trip. The tour will stop in on “hot local venues” from coast to coast, culminating in a launch-day party in LA, with each tour spot headlined by stars of hip hop and rock, exotic cars and, of course, kiosks with Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit available for attendees to take for a test drive before the game’s release. PlayStation is the tour’s official partner as well, so I wouldn’t expect to see the game playable on anything but a PS3. EA sure seems smitten with Sony at the moment, huh?

Anyway… these are the tour dates and locations:

* New York, July 14
* Chicago, Aug. 5
* Seattle, Sept. 4
* San Francisco, Sept. 11
* Austin, Oct. 7
* Miami, Oct. 21
* Los Angeles, Nov. 16

Attendance at each tour stop is limited, so if it’s dropping by a city near you and you would like to attend, you need to register to secure an invite.

“Need for Speed Hot Pursuit puts players and their friends at the heart of the game. This game is about the heat of competition, cops versus racers, taking down your friends and showing them who owns the streets. These events celebrate that spirit of one-upmanship by getting friends together to play together, even before the game is released,” said Keith Munro, VP of marketing at EA.

In the wee hours of the morning — 4AM EST to be exact — Logitech took the wraps off of its latest gaming product, the Speed Force Wireless Racing Wheel for the Wii. This is actually pretty significant, as this is the first force feedback wheel made for Nintendo’s lead console. This isn’t some cheap, flimsy Wii Wheel dealie that you just slap the Wii Remote into and tilt around in the air in front of you. Oh no, this is a sturdy, one-piece, full-featured racing wheel sporting Logitech’s award-winning force feedback technology, gas and brake controls built into the wheel and 2.4 GHz wireless support. The Speed Force is also being designed in partnership with EA Black Box to showcase its functionality with Need for Speed Undercover when both the game and wheel ship in November. Like all Logitech wheels, the Speed Force will be a bit pricey at $100. That price will surely get you a high-quality product, though. As the adage goes, you get what you pay for.

Check out a full gallery of Speed Force pics on the jump.