While Final Fantasy XIV: Heavensward won’t be released until June 23rd, fans of Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn won’t have to wait that long to sample a small bit of what the expansion will offer. Over the weekend Final Fantasy XIV producer/director, Naoki Yoshida, revealed a brand new trailer showing off benchmark software that will allow players to test their PCs before release and now Square Enix has made that benchmark software available for download.
The benchmark software can be downloaded here and it not only allows players to see if their PCs can handle the game, but also try out the DirectX 11 graphics and create various characters including the new dragon-like race, the Au Ra.
Madman has announced that they will be bringing the Attack on Titan live-action movie, which is set to debut in Japan on August 1st, to cinemas in Australia and New Zealand in 2015. It is worth noting that Madman did not have any exact dates to reveal at this time but they did promise to provide futher details in the future.
What they did release for now is a trailer for the live-action adaptation that shows a few glimpses of the titans as well as the main characters and you can check that out below. The company also provided a brief story description: “100 years ago, titans suddenly appeared on Earth. Soon, human civilization veered on collapse due to the titans. Humans then built a giant wall to defend themselves. Within the giant walls, humans lived in peace, but, 100 years later, the giant wall is broken.”
That’s right guys. Not a special. Not a spin-off. An entirely new Dragon Ball series! A press release out of Tokyo from Toei Animation has revealed a few tidbits of information about this now heavily anticipated new anime series being produced in Japan. The series will go by the name of Dragon Ball Super. For now it seems like there will not be an accompanying manga, but it is very likely one will be produced at some point as even the new movies have received one.
First off, the story and any new characters are being designed by original series creator Akira Toriyama. It is the first new anime series for Dragon Ball in 18 years and will first air in July. Taking over the time slot of Dragon Ball Kai on Fuji TV, where the Majin Buu arc of Dragon Ball Kai is finishing off its run. The one and only Japanese voice of Goku, Masako Nozawa, will be reprising her role. Toei Animation will be responsible for the production of the series.
No timeline has been set for this new arc except that it will take place in a time of peace after the Majin Buu saga and thus the two most recent movies. It’s anyone’s guess if the series will take place after Dragon Ball GT (which takes place five years after the end of the Buu Arc) or effectively replace it within the series lore. It could also take place before the end of Dragon Ball Z. The official words straight from Toei Animations press release are below.
Toei Animation has announced production on Dragon Ball Super (Japanese title; tentative for English release), the first all-new Dragon Ball television series to be released in 18 years. Following the recent events of the hit feature film, Dragon Ball Z: Resurrection ‘F’, Dragon Ball Super will debut in Japan in July 2015.
Reuniting the franchise’s iconic characters, Dragon Ball Super will follow the aftermath of Goku’s fierce battle with Majin Buu, as he attempts to maintain earth’s fragile peace. Overseen by Dragon Ball’s original creator, Akira Toriyama and produced with Fuji Television, Dragon Ball Super will draw on its historic past to create a bold, new universe welcoming to fans and endearing to new viewers.
There has been no news of an international release regarding this new series but judging by how fast Funimation was able to pick up the new Frieza movie Revival of ‘F’, I’m guessing that news isn’t far away. Toei Animation even posted on their official Twitter about the new series and the effort was made to get this press release out into the English speaking community. Anyone who follows the site knows I am a huge Dragon Ball fan so this is fantastic news. Let’s hope im saying the same thing when I’m reviewing the series sometime in the future. Are you excited for this new series or do you think maybe it was best to just let sleeping dogs lie? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below
Last December, Valve’s Steam platform removed Destructive Creations’ indie shooter from Steam Greenlight. After being reinstated along with an apology from Gabe Newell himself, Hatred became one of the most popular games on Steam Greenlight and is now set to be released onto Steam on June 1, 2015, making it the first AO-rated game released on the storefront.
Check out the new trailer for Hatred below:
“Initially we were planning to announce the release date for Hatred on May 19th, but… well honestly speaking we will be playing The Witcher 3 then. 😉 So we’ve decided to announce today that the game will launch on June 1st 2015,” said Jarosław Zieliński, Destructive Creations Creative Director.
Hatred is an isometric twin-stick shooter where players control The Antagonist, a cold-blooded anti-hero with a strong scorn of all humanity. Now nearly complete, The Hatred will be released for Windows PC on Steam on June 1 and is available for pre-order on the Hatred website along with the soundtrack and a t-shirt.
Deep Silver announced that they are partnering with Keiji Inafune to publish his new company’s side-scrolling action game Mighty No. 9. The partnership between Deep Silver and comcept will bring the game to PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Xbox 360, Xbox One, Wii U, Linux, Mac, and Windows on September 15, 2015 in the Americas and September 18th for the rest of the world. A Nintendo 3DS and PS Vita launch will follow later in the year.
The partnership is not strictly a publishing deal. Deep Silver is providing localization and subtitles in eight languages and voice overs in both Japanese and French. Extra resources are being provided to comcept to develop the “Ray” DLC that will allow players to fight Ray in hopes of unlocking him for the entire game.
Mighty No. 9 is created by Keiji Inafune, the father of Mega Man, and Inti Creates. The game was originally Kickstarted back in October 2013, with development code being completed in January 2015.
When Square Enix and Avalanche Studios released the “Firestarter” cinematic trailer for Just Cause 3 in February — which was seemingly inspired by the True Detective season 1 opening credits — we only got a sense of the chaos that players will be able to create as Rico Rodriguez in this new console generation. Luckily, today brings a new gameplay trailer:
This trailer is captured entirely from gameplay footage and looks to be even bigger than the open-world sandbox that was Just Cause 2.
Also announced today, if you pre-order Just Cause 3, players receive the Weaponised Vehicle Pack:
The Weaponised Vehicle Pack includes 3x exclusive luxury vehicles primed for action and fully loaded with the firepower to kick start a revolution.
Just Cause 3 does not have a solid release date, but is slated to release for PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Windows PC by the end of this year, Holiday 2015.
Sigh. The other day when the rumor of Silent Hills being cancelled emerged on the internet, I was still kind of optimistic. Sure, we knew it was more than likely true due to the recent Kojima debacle, but there was still hope that the big K would clear the air and state that they were moving forward anyway – which may or may not have been a good move in the long run.
Today, Konami sent word to Kotaku that the rumors were in fact true, and that Silent Hills is in fact dead, but the franchise would still move on in the future. This is a huge blow for not just Konami who have obviously lost a ton of money on the current production, but fans who thought this one title would bring horror into the next generation. I played P.T. and I enjoyed it for the most part, but if you stop and think about it – what did we really lose? As titles like Slenderman and Five Nights at Freddy’s continue their success, its obvious fans want the same jump scares and that is all P.T. really displayed.
I hope with this news comes a lot of regrouping so we can see a new Silent Hill rise with both soul and tension, as jump scares only do so much when you’re playing a game and trying to tell a story at the same time. Oh yeah, Konami should be fine – despite the online rumors as they still have plenty of solid franchises to bounce back from. Kojima defined Konami’s legacy, but he did not define what they can do so the future could still be very bright for reboots and so on down the road.
Assassin’s Creed Chronicles: China is a 2.5D platformer based on the long running Assassin’s Creed franchise. The story stars Shao Jun, one of the few remaining members of the Assassin Brotherhood in China. The game picks up after the events of short film Assassin’s Creed: Embers, which was bundled with certain editions of Assassin’s Creed: Revelations.
Story
Shao Jun returns to China after training with Master Assassin Ezio Auditore in Assassin’s Creed: Embers. She is looking to rebuild the Brotherhood in China, but first she must avenge her fallen comrades by slaying the Templars that were responsible. The relatively short length of the game, especially compared to the full retail titles, does hinder the plot’s development, as there is only so much that can be covered. The plot boils down to a pretty standard Assassin’s Creed plot except it is set in China. If you’ve played another title in the series, there really won’t be any surprises.
Gameplay
Assassin’s Creed Chronicles: China has a lot of gameplay elements that will be familiar to veteran Assassin’s Creed players. Shao Jun can run, jump, climb, and take leaps of faith as good as any other assassin in the franchise, except she is doing it on a 2D plane. The movement controls are buttery smooth, which is a shame because there are so few opportunities to really experience a long interrupted free run in the game.
The stealth mechanics of the game is good, although nothing ground breaking. Guards have a line of sight and a standard patrol path. They can be distracted using a variety of tools to give Jun a second to dash into the next hiding zone. Using the Assassin’s Eagle Vision, players can scout ahead just a bit and detect a guard’s pathing, to allow them to plan ahead. If the player is desperate, they can use a limited Helix ability that allows them to leap from hiding spot to hiding spot undetected for a short period of time. Unlike the original games, Jun’s ability to deal with dead bodies is gimped due to the lack of physical space in a level and the inability to just toss or drag a body off a ledge. Instead, they must be placed in pre-determined hiding spots or containers in the level.
Shao Jun is definitely one of the most fragile Assassins in the series. The game emphasize combat as an absolute last resort due to Jun’s low health. Jun has a pretty simple combat skill set. She can dodge/block a few enemy strikes and either counter with a kick to get more room or roll over the opponent to attack from behind. On the offensive, she can do a quick strike that can be chained or use a heavy finisher. Once the enemy is stumbled, Jun can quickly end the fight with an execution kill.
The levelling system further pushes players away from combat. Each section awards players points based on their execution, with the most points awarded for staying completely undetected and only killing the necessary targets. Fighting or killing early in the game will keep Jun’s health points low, increasing the difficulty as the game progresses. Once the game is completed, players can take a second or third go at the game with their previous experience intact. For an even greater challenge, players can use all their unlocked skills, but are only limited to one bar of health the entire game.
Combining the game’s combat and stealth mechanics, level design, progression system, there isn’t much room for creativity. One of the things that has always drawn me to the series is the multiple ways of approaching a situation. In Assassin’s Creed Chronicles: China, the freedom of choice and creativity is severely gimped by design. Mixed with the linear levels, the game could be any old stealth platformer if the characters were changed.
Visuals
Assassin’s Creed Chronicles: China is drop dead gorgeous. The game just oozes with style, mixing traditional Chinese paintings with modern 3d graphics. The colour scheme is reminiscent of those paintings with the game’s use of brown as the main colour interspersed with inky blacks and reds. The UI is adapted from other Assassin’s Creed titles and translates very well to the 2D space. The 2.5D designation really comes into play when the entire level rotates 90 degrees when Shao Jun climbs around certain corners or during levels that have sections overlapping each other, requiring Jun to swing across chasms or dash across bridges.
On the PC side, the game has a pretty low hardware requirement, which will allow it to run quite nicely on older computers. Throughout my playstesting, I did not run into any issues with the game.
Audio
Assassin’s Creed Chronicles: China’s audio quality is exactly what you would expect from an Assassin’s Creed title. The sound effects are high quality and the voice acting is solid. I am a little confused on why the guards speak Mandarin Chinese, but the main characters all speak with a pseudo-English accent. The music is much like the graphics, deftly mixing traditional Chinese instruments with video game orchestral music.
Overall
Assassin’s Creed Chronicles: China isn’t a particularly bad game, but it isn’t great either. The audio/visual presentation is superb, making it deserving of the franchise name. The game has some solid stealth mechanics and a really smooth movement system that is unfortunately under-used in the game. The biggest problem with the game is that it’s simply too restrictive and linear, making it feel more like a generic stealth platformer with a very nice Assassin’s Creed paint job on top of it.
Capsule Computers review guidelines can be found here.
The new trailer for Batman: Arkham Knight — titled “All Who Follow You” — shares a new aspect of the game that had not been released. In this game, The Dark Knight will not be fighting alone:
As you can see from the first trailer we have seen since February’s “Gotham Is Mine”, Batman will be fighting alongside Robin, Nightwing, and Catwoman as he works to save Gotham from the Scarecrow. And this time, players will be able to switch between the characters on-the-fly. Here is what Warner Bros. says of the new move in the press release:
For the first time ever, watch Batman: Arkham Knight’s exciting new “Dual Play” feature in action, which will allow players to seamlessly switch between The Dark Knight and his allies including Robin, Nightwing, and Catwoman in FreeFlow Combat.
Considering how brilliantly the Arkham series’ FreeFlow Combat system has worked for their last two games, Rocksteady has a lot to live up to as they add a new aspect to it in the final game for the series.
We also get a surprise visit from Azrael, who narrates the latter half of the trailer. DC Comics fans might remember Azrael as the vigilante whom Batman trained to replace him should Bruce Wayne ever be unable to don the cowl. Azrael ended up doing this when Bane crushed Batman’s spine.
Upon watching this trailer, many may get a sense that Batman may not survive this battle to save Gotham in Arkham Knight? With this being Rocksteady’s final game in the series, it sure would be one hell of an ending to kill the main character. Considering the game is titled Arkham Knight, both Nightwing — who took over as Batman when Wayne was presumed dead a few years ago — and Azrael seem to play significant parts in this story, and the trailer lends a certain air of finality onto the viewer, players may be playing the final battle of the Caped Crusader here.
I suppose we will certainly find out this summer when Batman: Arkham Knight is released for Xbox One, PlayStation 4, and Windows PC on June 23, 2015.
Mother’s Day is around the corner! With the Indie GalaEvery Monday Bundle #57, you won’t need to decide between buying video games and getting an awesome gift for your mom! This week’s bundle contains six indie games.
Musclecar Online – A community oriented top-down racer where the daily race track is designed by a member of the community.
One Late Night: Deadline – Your boring office work job is about to go very wrong. You’re pulling an all nighter at the office, but the paranormal activity in the office won’t let you do your job until you get to the bottom of the mystery.
Beyond Gravity – A procedurally generated platformer that is perfect for your coffee break.
Mighty Dungeons – A highly moddable RPG that mixes HeroQuest and DungeonMaster into one game.
bit Dungeon II – A retro rogue-like inspired by Legend of Zelda, Diablo, and Dark Souls.
Orbit HD – A space exploration game that challenges players to travel the cosmos by using gravity to fling themselves to their destination.
For the first 24 hours of the sale, the entire bundle will only cost $1.89. Grab your copy at Indie Gala before the price rises!
Mother’s Day is around the corner! With the 
