Dragon Quest XI was announced by Square Enix earlier this month and today the company has released the first screenshots for what will be called Dragon Quest XI: In Search of Departed Time when it is released sometime in 2016 for the PlayStation 4 and Nintendo 3DS to coincide with the series’ 30th Anniversary.
As you can see in the screenshots below, there is a rather stark graphical difference as well as gameplay style between the console and handheld versions of Dragon Quest XI: In Search of Departed Time though more details about that will likely be revealed in the upcoming months.
Back in June Sega and Sony released the first developer interview for Yakuza 5 and now the second interview, featuring Gio Corsi, Sony’s Director of Third Party Production and Developer Relations, speaking with Yakuza 5‘s General Director Toshihiro Nagoshi and Producer Masayoshi Yokoyama and now Sony has released the second video in the series of interviews.
This time around the video interview focuses primarily on answering questions from fans as well as talking about the hostess clubs, various locations in the game, character designs, and the street brawls. While no exact release date has been announced, Yakuza 5 will be released on the PlayStation 3 in 2015 in North America and Europe.
Inti Creates has revealed that they are working on giving Gal Gun: Double Peace a worldwide release. After testing the waters by asking their English speaking fans if they would like to see the ecchi rail shooter in English and receiving quite a bit of support, the company has updated their official websitestating that they are looking to try and bring the PlayStation 4 and PS Vita game to the West.
It is worth noting that the company has stated in their post that they are only “at the beginning stages of this project” and that they are “searching for a publisher to work with” to bring Gal Gun: Double Peace out to English audiences.
Earlier this year Viz Media announced that they had acquired the rights to release, in my opinion, one of the hottest new titles to recently appear in Weekly Shonen Jump in the form of My Hero Academia.
While the company has provided digital releases of the title so far, this week marks the first time that a print copy of My Hero Academia has been available for purchase in North America.
The first volume of My Hero Academia, which was released yesterday, can be purchased for $9.99 and all future English releases for the series will be published bi-annually through Viz‘s Shonen Jump imprint.
For those who haven’t followed the series so far, Viz describes My Hero Academia:
What would the world be like if 80 percent of the population manifested extraordinary superpowers called “Quirks” at age four? Heroes and villains would be battling it out everywhere! Becoming a hero would mean learning to use your power, but where would you go to study? U.A. High’s Hero Program of course! But what would you do if you were one of the 20 percent who were born Quirkless?
Middle school student Izuku Midoriya wants to be a hero more than anything, but he hasn’t got an ounce of power in him. With no chance of ever getting into the prestigious U.A. High School for budding heroes, his life is looking more and more like a dead end. Then an encounter with All Might, the greatest hero of them all gives him a chance to change his destiny…
Back in February Viz Media announced that they had acquired the license to release the sci-fi superhero action manga Ultraman in North America sometime later in the year. Well now that time has come as next week on August 18th the first volume of Ultraman will be available for purchase in print and digitally.
Ultraman Volume 1 is being rated ‘T’ for Teens and since it is being printed under Viz’s Signature imprint, the price will be $12.99 and from now on future volumes will be published quarterly since the original manga is still being printed in Japan for the Hero’s magazine.
For those who have somehow missed what Ultraman is despite being an extremely long running symbol in Japan, the story deals with humanity once again having to bring forth a new kind of hero to face off against the dangers that are approaching.
Decades ago, a being known as the Giant of Light joined together with Shin Hayata of the Science Special Search Party to save Earth from an invasion of terrifying monsters called Kaiju. Now, many years later, those dark days are fading into memory, and the world is at peace. But in the shadows a new threat is growing, a danger that can only be faced by a new kind of hero – a new kind of Ultraman… Shinjiro is an ordinary teenager, but his father is the legendary Shin Hayata. When he learns that his father passed on the “Ultraman Factor” to him and that he possesses incredible powers, nothing will ever be the same again.
Telltale Games has announced that fans can expect to see the fourth episode of Tales from the Borderlands, called Tales from the Borderlands: Escape Plan Bravo, to be released next week on August 18th for the PC and PlayStation consoles with the Xbox and mobile platforms getting it a few days later in the week.
To go along with this announcement for Tales from the Borderlands: Escape Plan Bravo, Telltale has released a handful of new screenshots to give fans a glimpse at what they can expect in the next episode, including a giant Butt Stallion statue, as Rhys and Fiona find themselves in an extremely dangerous situation as they are forced to head up to Helios.
Super Mario Maker for Wii U is just under one month away from launch and so developer Nintendo have released an awesome and informative let’s watch video detailing pretty much everything you would want to know about the game. You can watch the full video for yourself below but some of the more noteworthy points are listed to below.
– Shake some objects to change their properties.
– Combine objects such as the Super Mushroom and a Goomba to create new objects.
– Users will unlock objects over time as to not be overwhelmed. It will take 9 days total to unlock every object in the tool palette.
– You can add sound effects to the game once you progress enough. Some sound effects have accompanied visuals like the fireworks.
– If you shake a music note block it will become a musical block. You can place these at specific heights and they will play different notes allowing you to create songs with the right placements.
– Switch between the 4 main game themes (Original Super Mario Bros., Super Mario Bros. 3, Super Mario World and New Super Mario Bros.) whenever you like.
– Six world themes to choose from including above ground, under ground, water, castle and 2 unnamed ones.
– Levels must be beaten by you first before you can upload them.
– Levels can be downloaded from users online. You can follow a certain user to see when they upload new levels. You can edit downloaded levels.
– There are 100 and 10 Mario challenges. These pit you against a random selection of online levels with a certain amount of lives.
– Nearly every Amiibo will work with the game (when in the original game theme) allowing you to collect a costume Mushroom which will change Mario’s sprite into that of the Amiibo character you tied to that mushroom, complete with new art and sound effects!
Super Mario Maker is a celebration for the 30th anniversary of Mario and looks to be a very interesting title that could potentially provide infinite fun if you love the little Italian plumber. A number of bundles have been announced for the game released.
The Pokemon Trading Card Games newest expansion, Ancient Origins, is out now for fans to purchase from selected retailers. This latest set contains 100 new cards to collect and is the 65th set to be released. To celebrate, Nintendo have released a tie in Shiny Rayquaza event for the Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire Pokemon video games which is available now in most countries.
Ancient Origins contains new Special Energy cards, Ancient Traits, more Pokémon-EX, and special Shiny Pokémon! The cards will come in booster packs featuring 4 sets of art and two 60 card theme decks—Stone Heart and Iron Tide. New Ancient Traits arriving in XY—Ancient Origins include Θ Stop, Θ Max, and Θ Double.
This set also marks the first time Hoopa will be turned into a Pokemon card as Hoopa-EX. This Pokémon is a must-have for decks loaded with Pokémon-EX—with its Scoundrel Ring Ability, you can search your deck for three other Pokémon-EX when Hoopa-EX comes into play. Mega Rayquaza-EX, Primal Groudon-EX, and Primal Kyogre-EX return in Ancient Origins as Shiny Legendary Pokémon with brand-new Ancient Traits and new artwork.
Key Features of the Pokémon TCG: XY—Ancient Origins expansion include:
– 11 New Pokémon-EX, Including 3 New Mega Evolution Pokémon, and 14 New Full-Art Pokémon-EX Cards—Including Mega Tyranitar-EX, Mega Ampharos-EX, and Mega Sceptile-EX, plus full-art Shiny versions of Primal Kyogre-EX, Primal Groudon-EX, and Mega Rayquaza-EX!
– Half Art Cards— Many Pokémon with Ancient Traits have half art cards, where the art extends into and behind the text box.
– 14 Trainer Cards— Many brand-new Trainer cards, a full-art Trainer card, and two new Special Energy cards add new depth and tactics to the Pokémon TCG.
–Booster Packs—Packs of 10 additional cards selected from the expansion.
–Two New Theme Decks—These 60-card preconstructed decks are designed to introduce players to the Pokémon TCG by enabling them to play right away.
As with all the latest releases in the card game, XY—Ancient Origins theme decks and booster packs include an in-pack code card that unlocks virtual cards from the XY—Ancient Origins expansion for play in the Pokémon Trading Card Game Online at www.pokemon.co.uk/tcgo . This online version of the Pokémon TCG is also now available on iPad via the Apple App Store. The rules are the same for both the paper and online versions. Since the debut of the Pokémon TCG in 1996, more than 21.5 billion cards have been shipped to 74 countries around the world.
Activision and Treyarch have finalized their plans for the beta test of Call of Duty: Black Ops III multiplayer. Those who pre-order the game now will be able to get into the August beta.
The beta will consist of three maps. Hunted is a long distance map set in Ethiopia, Combine is a vertical map set in a farming and research facility in the Egyptian Sahara, and Evac is a map set on an overgrown rooftop. The maps will support of the most popular Call of Dutygame modes, like Team Deathmach and Search & Destroy. A variety of specialists, geared for several different playstyles, will be available for testing during the beta. The full list of available content during the beta can be found at the Treyarch community blog post.
Call of Duty: Black Ops III launches on November 6, 2015 for PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Windows.
Pillars of Eternity, the old school RPG developed by Obsidian Entertainment and published by Paradox Interactive, is receiving an expansion by the name of The White March Part 1 (which I had a gander at here). I got the opportunity to sit down with Justin Britch, one of the game’s producers, to chat about how the studio took the response to their game and what new features players can expect to find in the expansion.
So firstly, how has the reaction been to the release of Pillars of Eternity and how has that affected you guys at the studio? How has that affected development of the expansion?
The reception to the game was really high. We were… I don’t want to say “surprised” but you always hope for the best but kind of expect the worst and the reception was really really good for the first game and we were ecstatic about it. We just wanted to make a game that fans of the genre liked and we seemed to deliver on that for most people.
So the expansion for us is us really taking all the feedback from what players liked about the original game and adding in more content that the fans enjoyed.
That’s good to hear! So what is something that you got good feedback on and that you’ve expanded upon in the expansion?
Well something that players really enjoyed in the original game was our scripted interactions. We’ve made a huge effort to include more of those with more reactivity in the expansion. So now, scripted interactions will react to what classes you have going in to them and you cast spells (if you’re a spellcaster)… or they’ll react to what race you are and whether you’re a heavy or a light race.
‘Heavy’ or ‘light’ race?
Well so, we have ‘Aumaua’ which are these largely than human-
Oh! You mean physically!
Yes! So we have a variety of different races, all with different sizes and if you have a very large character trying to do some very nimble task then it is going to be more difficult for them. That’s the kind of reactivity we wanted to showcase in our scripted interactions. We really liked making them and hopefully players will like them as much this time around.
So can you tell us a bit about the White March?
So the White March is a new area to the North East of where the players are located in the main game. It’s a snowy region in the mountains. We took a lot of inspiration from Icewind Dale. We wanted to showcase beautiful exterior snowy environments that Icewind Dale and Icewind Dale 2 had and that was actually one of the first games that Josh Sawyer, our project director, worked on in the video game industry.
So this expansion is really our ode to those titles and also to provide us with new areas and quests for the players to go through. Obviously players got a lot of hours out of the base game and seemed to enjoy what was there so we’re just adding more of it.
Well that’s certainly good to hear. What has been the crowning glory for you guys in the game? What aspect of your game are you most proud of?
That’s a tough one. I don’t even know where to begin and everyone on the team has their own personal favourite.
What’s your personal favourite?
I love the combat. It’s so deep and rich with so many ways to play. Since the game has come out, I’ve made at least 16 new starts in the game. I go through and I’m like “I want to try an all-ranger party” and create the ‘Homeward Bound’ party where you have six different pets and they’re all doing different things.
Another one is that I created a group of all-chanter types and summon skeletons everywhere or I want to create lots of rogues and have a super sneaky party.
I think there was a story going around about an ‘all-bear’ party created by someone…
Yup! We passed that one around in the studio. We love seeing all the ways in which players interacted with the game and that’s a huge treat for us.
That’s good to hear! Thank you very much for your time, Justin.
The White March Part 1 will be released August 25th of this year.
Back in February Viz Media 
