Logitech has unveiled what they are dubbing the “Possibility Machine”, the MX Master Wireless Mouse. The MX Master is their most advanced wireless mouse ever produced, able to work across multiple screens, devices and operating systems.
The MX Master adopts a similar sculpted form to the company’s recent offering, including the stellar Logitech G502 Proteus Core Tunable Gaming Mouse. Its speed-adaptive scroll wheel allows auto-shift between click-to-click and hyper-scroll control. The distinct thumb wheel enables side-to-side scrolling among other advanced gestures, and every button can be customised to your preference.
The mouse also features Logitech’s proprietary Darkfield Laser sensor, which enables it to track accurately on virtually any surface, and can last up to 40 days on a full charge! Last but certainly not least, users can utilise Logitech’s integrated EasySwitch technology to connect either via the included Logitech Unifying receiver or Bluetooth Smart tech, enabling pairing with up to three devices at a time, which can be switched between at the touch of a button.
The Logitech MX Master Wireless Mouse is a beautifully designed, customisable mouse with the versatility of control, precision and speed. The numerous navigation options and advanced features make it our best mouse ever. – Charlotte Johs, global vice president of computer peripherals at Logitech.
The Logitech MX Master Wireless Mouse will retail at $149.95, set for launch this April. Compatible with Mac OS X 10.8 or later and Windows 7 or later via USB connection. Mac OS X 10.10 or Windows 8 and later required for Bluetooth Smart use.
Rockstar is making good on their earlier promise to launch a steady stream of new information and media leading up to the April 14th release of Grand Theft Auto Vfor the PC. They will be launching the official trailer for the game next week.
Today, they released 15 new high resolution screenshots taken from the PC version of the game. The PC version has been hit with multiple delays as Rockstar put some extra development time in. As a result, PC players will be able to benefit from some eye catching visual optimizations designed with PC hardware in mind.
Those who pre-order their copy before Tuesday March 31st will get a bonus $500,000 of in-game cash for the single player mode and an extra $1,000,000 for multiplayer.
This movie looks like it will be absolutely badass! Not only that but with the likes of JK Simmons and Matt Smith joining the ranks, the star power behind it is tremendous!
The first episode of Life is Strange (full review here) was a pleasant surprise in the episodic narrative genre, focusing on relatable issues such as bullying and friendship with a touch of supernatural elements in an awesomely detailed world. Episode 2: Out of Time has now been released and I’m happy to say it manages to continue the fine example set by the first game as well as throw in some shocking surprises and fun gameplay twist. This review contains no spoilers.
Story
Episode 1 introduced us to the ‘small town’ vibe of Arcadia Bay, the school of Blackwell and Max Caulfield’s new time bending powers. Episode 2 expands on everything established in the first episode, delving deeper into the lives of other students as well as Max, your best friend Chloe and even the town itself. This world is so full and lovingly crafted and really feels lived in, a very important aspect of this game to help ground it and make the world feel believable. The game world is also littered with intractable objects you can make, all accompanied by Max’s thoughts, literally giving you insight to how Max thinks and interprets the world in her head.
Max is a very fleshed out character and best of all, she’s your character. The choices you make in this episode have some pretty big impacts on the world around you and the choices you made in the last episode really seemed to matter here, especially during character interactions. It might be the whole illusion of choice thing but it does seem like some parts of the game you hear or play through would never have taken place if you didn’t make some of the choices you did earlier in the game.
It’s hard to talk about the story further without spoiling it but there is an excellent, relatable tale to be told in Life is Strange. Themes many people have experienced in their life such as friendship, bullying, fitting in etc. are present here and it’s great you get to call some of the shots as you might not have had that ability in high school. Episode 2 doesn’t further the main threat we learned about at the end of the first episode or delve much deeper into Rachel Amber’s disappearance, but it deepens character relationships, expands on Max’s character and powers while also setting up a few more mini story lines that will most likely come to a head over the coming episodes. There’s also some big moments that bring the whole episode to a close.
The dialogue isn’t perfect as there are a few times that lines don’t really make sense within the context of the conversations they are spoken in or the writing seems out of place for that character however these instances are pretty sparse within all the dialogue in the game.
Like in the first episode, a fantastic addition to Life is Strange is all the optional story you can read up on through text messages, diary entries and character biographies. The game does a great job at providing you with the necessary information to understand the main story upfront, but for those who are interested in really delving into character histories and past events and Max’s thoughts on everything you can do just that. The journal is presented in this cool scrapbook style, really making it feel like an art students diary.
Gameplay
Life is Strange will rightfully have many people drawing comparisons between itself and Telltale games, as well as titles like Heavy Rain and Beyond: Two Souls. Life is Strange and those games are for the most part very similar, perhaps being more similar to the latter titles as you can freely move around your environment to interact with objects, people or move on to a new area. A small appreciated touch in Life is Strange is the ability to perform a light jog to help you move faster as opposed to being stuck in a slow walk all the time.
You make choices from up to four options in conversations (normally just two), some of which look like they will have a major impact on the story. The options you have in these conversations often change depending on past actions and you can often rewind them if you are not happy with your answer. While there are a lot of smaller decisions that simply alter dialogue or make your tree grow instead of shrivel (which are still fun in there own right), there are also some big decisions to make here and this is where your emotional investment comes into play and you get to feel like a big shot making all the calls.
When you’re not walking around interacting with the world, you’ll be using your time powers to solve puzzles that are well implemented into the story. There are a few of these sprinkled throughout episode 2 and I solidly enjoyed them. Some are challenging and will require you to rewind to remember something or pay more attention to a specific detail you may have glossed over earlier. There is no limit to the amount of times you can rewind time in these instances and some puzzles have multiple solutions allowing different approaches. There are also moments your powers will fail you and these moments are some of the most tense as you can’t rely on retrying. The game does a great job of making you become dependent on your time powers, so you really feel it when it isn’t there.
The time functionality has been implemented excellently by Dontnod. It is not only used to solve puzzles but allows players to reverse decisions they may wish to take back (within reason). People that love to see every possible dialogue option play out will love this feature. If you do rewind through a conversation, next time you have that conversation you can simply use the skip button so you don’t have to listen to the same line again. Another nice touch is an auto rewind for your most recent function you can activate with a simple button press. Also there is a big scene in the game where this feature is really fun to play with but I won’t spoil that for you.
Visuals
The visuals in this game are kind of like a 3D water colour painting with lots of soft tones and visible brush strokes. It looks great and details on characters and the environment are impressive for an art style that appears simplistic on the surface. Environments are incredibly detailed and have just as much personality as the characters within them. The PC version has plenty of options for visual settings and my version suffered no performance issues with my time in the game.
The interface is very clean and has this whole ‘Juno’ feel to it for those familiar with the film. White squiggly line drawings pop up to represent objects you can interact with and also when the game is saving or you have made a consequential decision. When you perform a rewind the visual effects used are really powerful, user friendly and aren’t slow or clumsy. The same can be said about performing a fast rewind or skip and put polish on the already near perfect time control system. The freedom of the camera movement is fun to play with and allows you to set up screenshots in lieu of a proper photo mode which seems like an odd omission for a game based around a photography student.
One big negative that is not easy to overlook however is the lip syncing. It does seem slightly better (or maybe I just paid it less mind this time around) than in episode 1 but is still a big issue for the game, especially as there are a lot of moments where the camera is focused on someone’s face a lot of the time. This is a ‘budget’ title but it doesn’t stand up to the standard set by similar story based titles such as Heavy Rain.
Audio
The game doesn’t have a big soundtrack, with most of the games music being diegetic and playing through headphones or a CD player, however the licensed tracks that accompany the games opening and closing scene as well as some parts in between is perfectly melded to the visuals. I mentioned Juno as a reference before and the audio here also takes some inspiration from the film, with the indie acoustic songs heard here giving off a pleasant, relaxing vibe that compliments the game perfectly.
The voice acting is really good for the most part, with lines delivered well and character’s voices matching their personality from the shy Max to the hard ass veteran security guard or creepy janitor. No sound effects are out of place and complete the wonderfully detailed world.
Overall
Episode 2 takes the great world and characters established in Episode 1 of Life is Strange and continues to expand upon them. The story has a great balance between intense moments and exploration with the highlight of the story definitely coming with this episode. The choices you make feel impactful to crafting your own story as well as the character of Max and the time bending tasks the game lays out for you are both challenging and fun to complete. Complete with beautiful graphics and a perfectly fitting soundtrack, Life of Strange manages to place itself right up there with some of the best of the episodic narrative genre. If you liked Episode 1 definitely pick up this one.
Capsule Computers review guidelines can be found here.
MangaGamer‘s latest localized visual novel, Princess Evangile, is now available for purchase, or download if you happened to pre-order it. There are two versions of the title available, an All-Ages version that is currently available on Steam for $34.99 where it is temporarily on sale for $31.99 and an Adult version featuring uncensored nudity and sex scenes that can be purchased on MangaGamer’s website (18+ Only) for $44.95.
This PC visual novel is described as a “massive” title that features twenty six different chapters with numerous event CGs as the story follows an entire year of school where the protagonist is enrolled in Vincennes Private Girls’ Academy as the school’s first ever male student as a test to see if they can integrate boys into the student body with there being a vote at the end of the year to determine whether or not the boy can stay in the school or if he will be removed from the premises.
Considering we haven’t seen anything about The Legend of Zelda for the Wii U in a long time, it should come as no surprise that the game has now been delayed. While no exact release window was ever set, Nintendo’s Eiji Aonuma has revealed through a post on the company’s Facebook page that the game will no longer be released in 2015.
No new release window was announced though it should be noted that he went on to say later in the day that the game would also not be appearing at this year’s E3 in any form. It should also be worth noting that most Legend of Zeldagames have suffered delays in the past so this is rather predictable.
Now that Idea Factory International has announced that they plan on releasing Omega Quintet in North America on April 28th and in Europe on May 1st for the PlayStation 4, they have now revealed that a special limited edition will be sold exclusively through their online store.
Pre-orders for the $74.99 / £59.99 limited edition will open on April 2 at 6 p.m. PDT / 12 p.m. GMT and those who purchase the copy will receive a copy of the game, the “Symphony of Art” hardcover art book, the “Symphony of the Verse Maidens” 21-track soundtrack CD, an autograph book, a set of six idol pins, a Collector’s box and a reversible cover sleeve.
Another week has passed and now we have a new character trailer forPersona 4: Dancing All Nightand this time around the trailer is focusing on Chie Satonaka and her unique dancing style where she implements various Kung-Fu techniques into her dance moves to create her own original style to try and captivate the audience.
In the trailer we see Chie in a number of different outfits as she dances to the song “Pursuing my True Self.” You can check out the trailer below while the game itself is set to be released in Japan on June 25th for the PlayStation Vita.
As the release window for Etrian Odyssey 2 Untold: The Fafnir Knight grows closer, Atlus USA has announced that anyone who either pre-orders a copy of the game or picks up a first print copy will be given a number of special launch bonuses. This includes a 22 page art book and a soundtrack CD all contained in a special outer box.
The full details about both bonuses can be found below:
The Official Staff Book – 22 pages of art, including early drafts of character concepts, introductions to the characters, with both explanations of their individual back stories as well as developer insight to the character creation process, and QR Codes that will unlock some beginner-friendly Grimoire Stones.
The Fafnir Knight Rough Sketch Soundtrack – CD soundtrack of early versions of the Etrian Odyssey 2 Untold music by series composer, Yuzo Koshiro. It also has a brief foreword by both Koshiro and Etrian Odyssey 2 Untold director Shigeo Komori. The CD packaging also has an Etrian Odyssey 2 Untold mini-comic!
A new English gameplay video for Operation Abyss: New Tokyo Legacy has been released by NIS America and this time around it focuses on introducing players to the dangers in the dungeons and how even if things look safe, you’ll need to keep an eye out for dangerous traps and swarms of enemies that can appear, especially since they grow stronger the longer you spend in a dungeon.
You can check out the trailer below and be sure to keep an eye out for Operation Abyss: New Tokyo Legacywhen it is released for the PS Vita in North America on June 9th and Europe on June 5th.
The MX Master adopts a similar sculpted form to the company’s recent offering, including the stellar Logitech G502 Proteus Core Tunable Gaming Mouse. Its speed-adaptive scroll wheel allows auto-shift between click-to-click and hyper-scroll control. The distinct thumb wheel enables side-to-side scrolling among other advanced gestures, and every button can be customised to your preference.
