Earlier today Atlus USA announced that Attack on Titan: Humanity in Chains will be released digitally in North America on May 12th for the Nintendo 3DS. When the game is released it will be priced at $39.99 but will also come with a special Attack on Titan Nintendo 3DS theme.
To go along with this announcement the company also released a new gameplay trailer for Attack on Titan: Humanity in Chains that focuses on highlighting the various playable characters in the game, including Eren, Mikasa, Armin, Levi, and Sasha.
Due to a copyright claim, the European release for the game is now being changed back to the original Japanese title Shingeki no Kyojin: Humanity in Chains and has been delayed to a currently unannounced date.
Now that most of the Investigation Team has been introduced, Persona 4: Dancing All Night‘s latest character trailer turns to Nanako Dojima, the protagonist’s young cousin. While visiting the city with her father Ryotara Dojima she meets up with Rise’s rival idol, who was briefly discussed at times in the original Persona 4, Kanami Mashita who wants to help her out.
After meeting Kanami she asks herself if she can be like Rise and even gets a chance to dance like everyone else. Currently Persona 4: Dancing All Night is set to be released in Japan by Atlus on June 25th for the PlayStation Vita.
The sequel to Cyberstep‘s popular 3rd person shooter CosmicBreak is now available to play in Japan. CosmicBreak 2 has been designed from the ground up with a number of new features and systems to give the title a smoother more open-ended feel while also creating destructible environments. CosmicBreak 2 includes a large number of playable characters, with each one having a unique outfit, armament, and customization options that players will be able to try out in 10 vs 10 arena matches.
A trailer for CosmicBreak 2 can be found below though it is worth noting that since this is the Japanese launch, the title is region locked so PC players in other regions can currently not access the title without a workaround but can download the game from CosmicBreak 2’s official website. Cyberstep is planning on releasing the game in the US, Europe, Brazil, and Asia within the year.
It always seems like Microsoft is under-utilizing the Rare team, which acquired the developer back in 2002. Rare was a popular developer known for the Donkey Kong Country series for Nintendo and creating the Banjo-Kazooie and Conker series. As of late, Rare has been tossed aside, making Kinect titles for the publishing giant. This has led to a number of Rare team members leaving the company and starting up their own indie developers. One such indie developer is Playtonic Games, who just launched a Kickstarter for their spiritual successor to Banjo-Kazooie called Yooka-Laylee (formerly Project Ukulele). Check out the video below:
Crowdfunded games have become a huge — albeit sporadically successful — enterprise in our gaming industry. With that said, Playtonic Games managed to reach its funding goal within an hour and has already more than quadrupled its funding goal at the time of this post on its first day of launch.
Yooka-Laylee is a 3D platformer starring a chameleon — Yooka — with a bat — Laylee — on its back. Like Banjo-Kazooie, the game will feature special combat abilities suited to the characters, like Yooka’s tongue grapple and Laylee’s sonar blast.
“When we first announced our project earlier this year it was as much about gauging interest from fans as anything, and it’s fair to say that the response has been massive,” said Gavin Price, managing director and creative lead at PLAYTONIC.
“Until now our development has been self-funded, but Kickstarter presents us with the amazing opportunity to deliver YOOKA-LAYLEE at the level of scope and scale that fans demand – and on their games platform of choice. Our team has decades-worth of ideas that we hope we’ll now finally have the resources and freedom to bring to reality.”
Yooka-Laylee is looking to be released sometime in 2016 on PC, Mac, Linux, Wii U, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One. Check out the funding and stretch goals on the game’s Kickstarter page.
When the new trailer for Terminator Genisys was released last month, the internet blew up with the news that John Connor — the human who is supposed to save us from our future machine overlords — has become a human-machine hybrid sent back to kill his mother, Sarah Connor. Now, since everyone already knows (if you did not, my apologies and kudos on holding out this long), Paramount and Skydance Productions have released the all new one-sheet that you’ll be seeing at your local multiplex soon.
Here is the new poster for Terminator Genisys:
Personally, I’m okay with the John Connor news. All I really want to know now is who or what is Matt Smith (the Eleventh Doctor from Doctor Who) playing in this movie. They have spoiled everything else, so I just need to know at this point.
Terminator Genisys will reach theatres on June 25, 2015, directed by Alan Taylor from a screenplay by Laeta Kalogridis & Patrick Lussier. It stars Emilia Clarke as Sarah Connor, Jai Courtney as Kyle Reese, Jason Clarke as John Connor, J.K. Simmons as Detective O’Brien, Arnold Schwarzenegger as the Terminator, and Matt Smith as someone named Tim. And, if you haven’t seen the new trailer, check it out after the jump.
It has been a pretty rough week for Steam and modding, but there’s a bit of a bright patch at the end of tunnel. Today, Sega and Creative Assembly launched the modding tools for Total War: Attilaand flipped the switch on Steam Workshop support. The new mod tools should be familiar to those with experience modding Total War: Rome II and Total War: Shogun 2.
The Assembly Kit mod tools can be downloaded under the “Tools” menu in the Steam library. The tools contains:
DaVE: enables editing of the game’s database entries.
BOB: enables processing of raw data such as textures, models and animations.
TeD: enables the creation of individual battlefields for land, sea and sieges.
Terry: enables the editing of campaign map aesthetics such as the height-map, lighting and props. Unlike previous Assembly Kits, Terry now grants access to Terrain Raw Data, which means modders can determine which battle maps load in for specific campaign map locations. Go mod those cities!
The Assembly Kit also comes with a hard drive consuming 60 GB of resources, including the Terrain Raw Data resource pack. Budding modders can learn about how to use the Assembly Kit at the official Total War wiki.
Overview A little over a year and a half ago, Undead Labs released State of Decay on the Xbox 360 and it turned out to be a pretty big hit as it dropped players in a zombie infested valley with limited resources, permanent death, and the responsibility of taking care of a group of survivors. Now Undead Labs has returned again and this time they have brought State of Decay: Year One Survival Edition to the Xbox One. Featuring the original game plus the Breakdown and Lifeline DLCs with various other upgrades, is it worth entering Trumbull Valley once more?
Story The story throughout State of Decay: Year One Survival Edition remains very much the same as it was before as players are put initially dropped into the shoes of Marcus and Ed. These two have just returned from a long fishing trip only to run into a group of zombies shortly after making landfall. After managing to survive their first encounter, they encounter a group of survivors at a Ranger’s Station.
With only a short rest here, Marcus and Ed scout the area for supplies only to return to find everyone at the station dead and with their only hope being a voice on the radio guiding them further into town to a church where a new group of survivors are located and it is here that the handholding of State of Decay’s storyline comes to an end.
You see, while players are guided to the church and their group of survivors, there really isn’t much of a core storyline to follow here as the player is instead tasked with surviving more than anything else. Couple this with the perma-death mechanic and you will find that even your favorite characters can quickly fall to a horde of zombies or freak type. This means that players will have to pay close attention to their community of survivors as it is entirely possible that a new face may be the next hero.
There are a number off side-stories that do appear over the course of the player’s survival, usually solved by simply driving to a surviving group’s location and performing simple tasks for them or even just talking to them. These side-stories don’t have much focus unfortunately and many simply just end with no real payoff. That being said there is an end goal for State of Decay’s story, even though it isn’t exactly a very solid ending as it leaves the title open for a sequel, it does answer a few questions raised during the game but of course never explains the origins of the zombies.
State of Decay: Year One Survival Edition includes the Lifeline DLC that actually does contain a bit of extra story as it follows a group of US Soldiers that make up the surviving Greyhound One as they are tasked with rescuing various VIPs as well as standard civilians in a completely different map than the core storyline and gives players not only a fresh area to explore but a bit of a different storyline to explore, especially since this time around there are multiple endings to help change things up.
Gameplay The core of State of Decay remains very much the same throughout all of the DLC and very little has been changed in this re-release. Players will be have control of one character at a time, though you can bring an ally along by using influence which is gained by completing side-missions, returning with resources, rescuing survivors, and gathering various supplies such as guns, melee weapons, consumables and more. You see, it is all about community and keeping the base well stocked while also trying to keep everyone happy and secure about their survival, which means players will occasionally need to help cool someone off by taking them out for a quick zombie hunt.
What makes this a challenge is that while you are free to scavenge essential resources such as medical supplies, ammo, materials, food, gasoline for the home base alongside weaponry, food/pills for health and guns for yourself, once you have searched an area and cleaned it out, there will never be anything in that house again. This means that if you clear out all of the areas close to your home base, you will have to venture further and further away each time to acquire more necessary resources.
The same thing can be said about vehicles. Not only does the game track every vehicle you come across and let you know how many are actually left, they never respawn. This means that if you happen to completely destroy or empty an area of every vehicle this means that you will need to be running quite a long ways at times. This of course is never a good idea, especially since players can now store large amounts of equipment, including rucksacks full of the necessary resources for keeping your group alive, and also because if you happen to run into danger on the way back home and die, that character will be gone forever, meaning you may end up being left with only a group of weak ragtag playable characters if things go south quickly.
The way that the survivors are handled in this game is unique as well. They will grow tired from scavenging for supplies to long, fall sick due to lack of medicine or improper home facilities, become injured from missions and more. The reason for this is that you are simply a part of a community and the world itself is still revolving around you. This means that other survivors can become trapped or may require your assistance in dispatching zombies and if you ignore their cries for assistance, they can survive and be angry with you, be hurt in some way and be temporarily put out of commission or worst of all, die.
There are quite a few zombies in the title, to the point that it is occasionally best to run away or sneak around. There are your basic zombies that can be dispatched easily on their own but they can quickly become dangerous in close quarters, especially when they begin to swarm you. You see, the zombies in State of Decay can hear quite well, to the point where searching a place too quickly can draw every Zed in the area to your vulnerable survivor. This doesn’t even touch upon the fact that there are numerous special zombies that can make things difficult, including vicious Feral that are incredibly fast and strong, Bloaters that explode and drain the player’s health and stamina, Screamers that stun survivors and draw more zombies to an area, and even Juggernauts that are capable of heavily damaging vehicles and absorbing large amounts of punishment.
Players will need to make sure that they have plenty of weapons at their disposal to put away the undead horde including a number of special skills that players learn once their survivor becomes a veteran zombie slayer. Thankfully, a large batch of new weapons, including powerful incendiary shotgun shells, have been introduced in this new release giving players more variety than ever before to dispatch the zombie hordes they come across. That being said, every weapon in the game features a durability level and can be lost forever, but through proper inventory management players will be able to carry not only a melee weapon, but a firearm with plenty of ammo, snacks to restore stamina, and healing items to stay alive. Of course, properly training and making sure to upgrade certain stats, and aiming for fallen zombies with finishing moves is the best way to keep your favorite character around for a while.
There does come a point however that being simply too well prepared can be a bit of a problem however, as it eventually turns State of Decay‘s tense survival moments into rather mundane affairs. If players manage to properly plan their community’s layout, build necessary facilities, keep a safe stock of vehicles, manage a well-trained and well equipped character, and secure enough resources it is entirely possible to find yourself feeling a little bored at times, especially since certain storyline advancing quests only appear after a certain amount of time has passed.
Outside of the core game, the concepts remain very much the same. Breakdown places players into a sandbox like mode where they can choose a certain “Hero” character they have unlocked or start as a random character and try to survive, locate an RV, and escape with each successful escape resulting in a more dangerous environment the next time through. Thankfully the Lifeline DLC adds an entirely new area to explore as well as a variety of new weapons and vehicles to use to keep things fresh while also introducing a few extra twists to the core formula of defending your base during zombie sieges.
Visuals & Audio While State of Decay: Year One Survival Edition does feature a decent visual improvement to the environment, building interiors, and the character models from the original game, the chances of actually noticing most of these improvements is minimal. Instead the most noticeable change comes in the form of different vehicles now having unique paint jobs which is a nice touch and the appearance of light from flashlights and headlights has also been improved.
Unfortunately despite having an upgrade in textures, the game is still plagued with terrible graphical issues from time to time. While the pop-in rate has diminished it has not gone away and players will still occasionally find themselves driving too fast for the game to keep up with resulting in various pop-ins and this also is the case with some zombies which can become a real issue at low health. Clipping is also prevalent as zombies will often find themselves traveling right through walls and gates. The worst example I saw of this was during a house siege with closed doors resulting in entire swarms of zombies, including a large Juggernaut glitching through a closed door leading to near disaster.
The voice work feels the same sounding as before which is a good thing since it worked well enough and thankfully it seems Undead Labs took the player’s complaints to heart about corny jokes being overused as the joke appears to have been removed entirely from the game and now character lines sound far less repetitive. The title also features great atmospheric music and great sound effects to really raise the tension during dangerous situations.
Overall The fact that there are still such a large number of glitches in State of Decay: Year One Survival Edition at this point, most of which were prevalent in the original game, is an issue to be wary of especially since the graphical upgrade is only a minor improvement. That being said this is a stellar title that puts a unique spin on the zombie genre as players micromanage a group of survivors all while battling hordes of undead with the constant fear of perma-death haunting their actions and now that all the DLC comes with the package there is more content than ever to be enjoyed here.
Capsule Computers review guidelines can be found here.
Project CARS is promising the ultimate racing experience and to deliver that, you of course need cars. Hailing from a wide variety of vehicles from the world of Open Wheel, GT, Le Mans Prototypes, Supercars, Track Day cars, Karts, Road cars, Historic Touring, US Trans-Am and Stock, Project CARS wants to represent global car culture and motorsport with something for everyone. This is only the initial car list as we already know more cars are planned for the game both of the paid and free variety. After you skim the list, make sure to check out the newly released screenshots of the game as well.
PROJECT CARS STANDARD EDITION
Alpine A450
Ariel Atom 300 Supercharged
Ariel Atom 500 V8
Aston Martin Rapide S Hydrogen Hybrid
Aston Martin Vantage GT3
Aston Martin Vantage GT4
Audi R18 TDI LMP1
Audi R8 LMS Ultra
Audi R8 V10 Plus
BAC Mono
BMW 1 M CoupÈ (E82)
BMW 320 Turbo Gr.5 (E21)
BMW M3 Gr.A (E30)
BMW M3 GT (E92)
BMW M3 GT4 (E92)
BMW Z4 GT3
Caper Monterey Stockcar
Caterham Seven Classic
Caterham Superlight R500
Caterham SP/300R
Ford Capri Zakspeed Gr.5
Ford Escort RS1600
Ford Focus RS
Ford Mustang Boss 302R1
Ford Mustang Cobra SCCA TransAm
Ford Sierra RS500 Cosworth Gr.A
Formula Gulf 1000
Ginetta G40 Junior
Ginetta G55 GT3
Ginetta G55 GT4
Gumpert Apollo S
Lotus 49 Cosworth
Lotus 72D Cosworth
Lotus 78 Cosworth
Lotus 98T Renault
Marek RP219D LMP2
Marek RP339h (PM 06a) LMP1
McLaren 12C
McLaren 12C GT3
McLaren P1
Mercedes-Benz 190E 2.5-16 Evo2 DTM
Mercedes-Benz 300SEL 6.8 AMG
Mercedes-Benz A45 AMG
Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG
Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG GT
Mitsubishi Lancer Evo X FQ400
Oreca 03 Nissan
Pagani Huayra
Pagani Zonda R
Palmer Jaguar JP-LM
Radical SR3 RS
Radical SR8 RX
Renault Clio Cup
Renault MÈgane R.S. 265
Ruf CTR3
Ruf RGT-8
Ruf RGT-8 GT3
RWD P20 LMP2
RWD P30 LMP1
SMS Formula A
SMS Formula B
SMS Formula C
SMS Formula Rookie
SMS Kart 125cc (Kart01)
SMS Superkart 250cc (Kart02)
ANZ LIMITED EDITION CAR PACK
Sauber C9 Mercedes
Mercedes-Benz C-Class Coupe DTM
McLaren F1
Ford Mk. IV
BMW M1 Procar (E26/1)
Ariel Atom Mugen
Ruf CTR3 SMS-R
Pagani Zonda Cinque Roadster
FREE CAR
W Motors Lykan HyperSport – Free Car #1
In terms of numbers this is nothing on the likes of Gran Turismo and Forza but still an impressive list none the less considering the development process, graphics quality and the number of tracks and race modes the game will have. Project CARS releases May 7th on the PS4, Xbox One, PC and some time in the future for the Wii U.
This week has a bonusXbox Newsbeat! I’m a huge fan of almost anything with the word “bonus” in it, so I’ve booted Andrew off his keyboard for this edition. Microsoft wanted to slip a few major announcements at the tail end of the week involving Halo 5, State of Decay: Year-One Survival Edition, and some Games with Gold deals.
Halo 5: Guardians Cover Art Revealed in ARG
Microsoft has been running the #HUNTtheTRUTH ARG on several social media platforms, with the eventual goal of revealing the cover art for Halo 5: Guardians. This week, amateur gumshoes cracked the mystery behind several images posted on several websites, revealing the final cover art for the game along with a video highlighting the Spartan fireteams.
The cover art is not the last of the ARG. By the sound of it, the flow of information through puzzles will continue until the game’s official premiere at E3 2015.
State of Decay: Year-One Survival Edition Launches on Xbox One
If you missed out on possibly one of the best new takes on the zombie genre on the Xbox 360, but you have an Xbox One, you’re in luck! State of Decay: Year-One Survival Edition launched on Xbox One this week, bringing an HD remaster bundles the “Breakdown” and “Lifeline” DLC along with some tweaks to the game. Most important of all the tweaks, all unarmed characters now carry a knife that can be used as a stealth weapon or a last resort in case you’re out of ammo.
May’s Games with Gold Announced
There will be three free games for all Xbox Live Gold members this month. CastleStorm: Definitive Edition will be available on Xbox One throughout the entire month of May. Xbox 360 owners will be able to snag Mafia II from May 1 to 15th. After that, F1 2013 will be available for free for Xbox 360.
That’s all for this week folks! It has been a pleasure, but I’m sure you’re all looking forward to having Andrew back next week.
Overview Over the last few years we have seen two extremely popular anime series utilize the concept of being trapped in an MMO as their core focus. With both series putting their own unique spin on the idea, there was plenty to enjoy but there are many who remember the early 2000s when a series debuted in the West that was completely fresh and brought with it a series of video games, numerous spin-offs, and various continuations. I’m talking of course about .hack//SIGN series.
Despite the series’ popularity, it has been an extremely long time since the .hack//SIGN series was made available for purchase in North America, mostly due to the fact that the previous license holder Bandai Entertainment went under. Now thanks to FUNimation rescuing the license, old fans and newcomers have the opportunity to purchase the complete .hack//SIGN series for the first time since 2006. That being said, is the series still worth picking up?
Story The extremely popular MMORPG called “The World” allows players to immerse themselves into a virtual world where they can play with others and take on quests, fight monsters, explore dungeons, and more. However there has always been a mysterious feeling to “The World” including a certain item called the Key of the Twilight. When .hack//SIGN begins a male wavemaster awakens at the end of a dungeon with no recollection of how he managed to get there. Shortly after waking up, a female heavy blade named Mimiru comes across him and tries to speak with him before he uses a Sprite Ocarina to leave the area.
This wavemaster, named Tsukasa, soon finds that he is incapable of logging out of the world. Even stranger, he has no recollection of how he even entered The World or even being logged into a computer anywhere. Strange occurrences continue to happen around Tsukasa as a floating cat-like player gives him a strange but powerful guardian capable of causing harm to players in the real world and, guided by the cat and a disembodied voice, Tsukasa finds a young girl floating above a bed, asleep and clad in white in a mysterious hidden area that changes throughout the series.
Due to the appearance of Tsukasa’s guardian, the strange cat-like character capable of manipulating the game he is seen with, and his inability to log out of The World draws the attention of not only a few characters that try to help him out, but also the mod-like Crimson Knights that patrol The World in order to try and uphold justice. With Tsukasa trapped in the virtual world and numerous mysteries mounting, .hack//SIGN is a series that is slow paced but tells an intriguing and deep story.
While .hack//SIGN may take place in an MMO and most of the time the characters are in field or dungeon, the amount of action that actually takes place is kept to a minimal level as the focus is instead on developing the numerous mysteries surrounding Tsukasa while focusing on him and the various characters that he interacts with. As I mentioned, this does mean that the series has a very slow pace as it utilizes its two cour length to flesh out every character in the series and allow for the story to unfold at a natural pace.
The story may focus on Tsukasa, who starts as an aimless and generally unlikable character that slowly develops as we learn about his past through flashbacks to the real world and through the help of those closest to him, especially the veteran player Bear, the leader of the Crimson Knights Subaru who grows close to him, and the persistence of Mimiru, we see him grow and open up his heart.
Every character surrounding him is given a large amount of focus as this is a story with multiple moving pieces and plenty of character development for most of the side-characters. This means that there can be numerous episodes where Tsukasa is merely a bit part while the rest of the characters deal with issues of their own, discuss the current situation and exchange information, and move forward with their own interests and motivations, some of which just so happen to coincide with Tsukasa’s issues.
By focusing so heavily on a character driven storyline there is a lot of content here but unfortunately this also means that there are quite a few episodes that simply feel like they contribute next to nothing to the actual storyline which only makes the slow pace all the more annoying to deal with. However when the story is focused on, there are multiple layers to delve through and that makes even some of these less important episodes important to watch as the mystery of what is actually happening in The World and to Tsukasa, the origin of the floating girl, and more are all wrapped in a tangled web that slowly unravels as the series approaches the finale.
While many questions are eventually answered, there is plenty of misdirection at play due to many of the characters having no clue what they are actually dealing with, especially since there are numerous secrets within The World that have been hidden away by the creator. That being said, while Tsukasa’s part in the story and his connections with certain characters are developed and wrapped up in a satisfying manner, there are many aspects of the story that are still left hanging in order to be solved through games that were released shortly after the series ended and require a dusted off PS2 to revisit.
Visuals This release of .hack//SIGN comes exclusively on DVD which means that while the series does look a bit better than we may remember from when it aired on television, there isn’t a significant upgrade outside of a cleaner looking picture. Considering .hack//SIGN was originally created in 2002, the character designs and environmental artwork are as memorable as ever thanks to the extensive amount of detail put into making the environments vary wildly in design and fit the fantasy theme while many of the characters remain clearly memorable years later.
As mentioned before, the amount of actual action in .hack//SIGN is minimal which means that the actual animation is also very limited or fairly stiff looking for certain scenes. This means that most of the time characters will simply be idly standing around talking or include close-ups and cut-aways from the action to minimize the amount of movement actually taking place in any given sequence.
Audio It is worth noting that while FUNimation is releasing the series, they have not re-dubbed the anime in any way and this means that the series retains the original English dub that many fans will remember as well as the Japanese voice track. The English voice cast does an okay job handling their characters but a number of the more dramatic situations sound very flat either due to the age of the recording or poor performances by the original English cast, meaning this may be the time to see how these memorable characters sound in Japanese now that the option is available.
One thing that is stellar about .hack//SIGN is the series’ soundtrack. Not only are there numerous background tracks with mysterious folklore styled vocals backed up by orchestral tunes that appear numerous times throughout the series. As far as the opening and ending themes, an English techno song titled “Obsession” by See-Saw serves as a fitting and memorable opening for a series such as this one while the ending “Gentle Dawn” also by See-Saw works as an emotional orchestral closing song.
Extras This release of .hack//SIGN includes clean versions of the opening and ending themes, a character art reel, and original Japanese promotional videos, commercials, and trailers for the series.
Overall A full twelve years after debuting in North America, .hack//SIGN still holds strong despite a number of other similar series appearing in recent years. While this iconic series does have its flaws in the form of a slow pace and less than stellar dubwork, this is the best way for longtime fans of .hack to obtain the series and relive the mysteries of The World while also serving as a great way to introduce newcomers to a well-crafted story featuring memorable characters that began a multimedia franchise that lasted for over a decade.
Capsule Computers review guidelines can be found here.
