Last year’s Call of Duty left a lot to be desired as far as its online component went and it seems that Activision has learned from their mistakes if this multiplayer reveal trailer is anything to go by. Today’s trailer showing off the first multiplayer footage from Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare reveals the fast paced combat that makes use of numerous pieces of futuristic tech to give this title a unique feeling, albeit one that is hauntingly similar to a certain FPS released earlier this year.
Also announced today is the fact that anyone who pre-orders Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare will be automatically upgraded to the Day Zero edition which gives the player 24 hours of early access, an advanced arsenal featuring the bullet brass exoskeleton and EM1 Quantum directed energy weapon, two custom weapons in the form of the AK-12G Assault Rifle and Crossbow-B2, and of course double XP on November 3rd.
After the second season for Working!!, known as Wagnaria!! in its North American release, was created all the way back in 2011, fans of the series were left wondering if there would ever be a third season. Well, now that it has been announced that the next volume of the Working!! manga will be the last, a third season of Working!! has been announced.
While no details for the anime were revealed at the time, such as when it would air or if A-1 Pictures would continue to be the animating studio, one can hope that this third season will bring a proper close to the series. For those who haven’t been keeping up with series, NIS America has licensed and released both seasons in North America and our review for the second season can be found here.
Today Koei Tecmo released a new batch of English screenshots as well as some additional character art for Ar Nosurge: Ode to an Unborn Star which is set to be released in North America on September 23rd and September 26th in Europe.
This new batch of screenshots focuses on showing off the game’s battle system as well as the “Genometrics” system which represents the character’s inner self, or the world within their minds, which plays an important part in the game and how song magic will become available to the player. Similar to past games in the franchise, players can collect Dive Points by fighting enemies and entering into Ion and Casty’s psyches to help them resolve their concerns.
Indie Gala and Capsule Computers has rounded another big milestone with Every Monday Bundle #20’s release. This week’s bundle contains seven indie games for Steam and Desura.
Aeon Command– A strategy game inspired by tug of war. Players will gather resources, generate units, and do battle with the enemy in an attempt to control the Aeon Nebula.
The Sun at Night– An alternate history platformer that poses the question what if the Soviets won the Cold War. In the face of hopelessness, Laika the space dog falls from space to protect the people from the Soviet threat.
Dinner Date– Julian Luxemburg thought he would be spending the night on a lovely date, but soon finds himself stood up. Play Julian’s subconscious as he works through the anxiety and heart break.
Flight of the Icarus– The single player game that sparked Guns of Icarus Online. Flight of the Icarus will put the helm of an airship under the player’s hands as they attempt to ferry goods in a dangerous steam punk world.
Famaze– A retro rpuzzle adventure featuring randomly generated mazes and a soundtrack by chiptune master Disasterpeace.
Dead Hungry Diner – A casual time management game that will challenge players to feed the many hungry monsters at the diner.
Super Cyborg– Inspired by retro run ‘n gun platformers, Super Cyborg contains seven levels, 3 difficulty settings, and local co-op.
For the first 24 hours of the sale, the Every Monday Bundle #20 is only $1.89 for the entire bundle. Be sure to grab your copy at Indie Gala before the price goes up.
The Japanese Film Festival is said to be the largest outside of its homeland, drawing an audience of some 25,000 people last year in theatres across Australia. Although the full program of over 45 films is yet to be revealed, the two-part sequel to Rurouni Kenshin will be making an appearance as a full trilogy.
Set to return for the eighteenth time, JFF will kick off mid-October in Adelaide before continuing its tour in Canberra, Brisbane, Perth, Auckland and Sydney before coming to a stop in Melbourne in December.
For those of us living away from Sydney’s centre, the festival will screen in a closer city hub this time, “Last year we expanded our programming to Brisbane, Perth and Canberra. Building on these existing locations, we are excited to welcome four new cities onto our Festival map – Adelaide, Parramatta, Freemantle and…Auckland.” says Artistic Director Masafumi Konomi.
Adelaide, 10-12 & 17-19 October – Mercury Cinema
Canberra, 15-19 October – Capitol Cinema Manuka
Brisbane, 22-26 October – Event Cinemas, Brisbane City Myer Centre
Perth, 29 Oct-2 November – Hoyts Carousal & Hoyts Millenium
Auckland, 6-12 November – Rialto Cinemas, Newmarket
Sydney, 13-23 November – Event Cinemas George Street & Parramatta, Art Gallery of NSW
Melbourne, 27 November-7 December – Hoyts Central & Australian Centre for the Moving Image
Run by The Japan Foundation, Sydney, JIFF began in 1997 and has since seen great success in Australia and, soon, New Zealand. For more details and additional info head over to the official website.
“come on down, stop on by. Hop a carpet and fly” Get ready Disney fans, as two of the House of Mouse’s most beloved characters have been announced as additions to Disney Infinity 2.0. The riff-raff street rat himself Aladdin, and his strong, beautiful love Jasmine are joining the ever-growing ranks of the upcoming video game sensation. The Agrabah duo are joining the growing cast that includes The Avengers, The Guardians of the Galaxy and various other Disney characters like Maleficent and Tinkerbell.
It should also be mentioned that with Jasmine’s addition, the total count of Disney Princesses available in the Disney Infinity franchise has grown to 5. Girl power is very much a force to be reckoned with in Disney Infinity 2.0, which is something that the original game was missing out on in its early stages.
We have a brief trailer below that shows off Aladdin and Jasmine in action so be sure you check it out below and also remember to take a look at our recent hands-on preview of the upcoming game. As always, make sure you stay tuned to Capsule Computers for all the Disney Infinity news as it becomes available.
It is always interesting when Wizards releases a new type of Magic: The Gathering product. The Clash Pack are the newest introduction to the line-up, set to replace the classic Event Decks in every alternating set. The general idea is that a Clash Pack is a halfway point between Duel Decks and an Event Deck, providing players with 2 ready to play standard decks, that if the owner so chooses can be combined into one almost tournament-ready deck. It is an interesting design that while it suffers from its flaws, still manages to deliver.
Fate & Fury is the first Clash Pack from Wizards, and is initially separated into two decks; Fate, a blue/green scry-based deck (and we all know how much I love Scry-based decks) and a more aggressive-styled deck in Fury, which is green/red. The decks themselves are designed to be played against one another on relatively fair footing, but this sadly rarely turns out to be the case.
“Fate” is a control-deck that is focused on (you guessed it) trying to control the match up. Using cards to scry your own draws, or to counter your opponents spells is typically a pretty powerful strategy. Unfortunately the counterspells included in the Fate deck are just not good enough. The deck only has access to Negate, which is useful only against non-creature spells. Well (and I will get to this below) but most of the spells in Fury are creature-based, which means that Fate loses a lot of its oomph and versatility. The deck almost entirely relies on you winning with Prognostic Sphinx, which while not a bad card is just relatively weak against Fury’s big beefy beaters.
Fury on the other hand is a powerhouse. Red/Green is a dominate decktype currently in standard and this Clash Pack shows us why. It is able to use creatures like Elvish Mystic and lands like Nykthos, Shine to Nyx to get out its big win conditions like Hydra Broodmaster early on and make it almost impossible for the opponent to keep up. Not only that but Fury comes with Courser of Kruphix, which is probably one of the best rares from the entire Theros block and allows you to play lands off the top of your deck and keep an eye on what is coming next.
The pack also comes included with a decklist that allows you to combine the two together and create a standard-ready 60 card deck, and 15 card sideboard. The deck that you create is a Blue/Green deck that makes better use of some of the mana acceleration abilities like Kiora’s Follower to untap Nykthos and create a TONNE of mana for you to pump out giant hydras as early as possible and just smash your opponents in the face. However, due to the nature of the deck, there are a lot of singles in the deck which means consistency can be thrown right out the window.
So the decks themselves are unbalanced and a little unreliable at times, but as a mid-ground between Duel Decks and event deck it does its job more than suitably. It works doubly well as it is a control vs aggressive matchup which will give newer players a look at how different deck styles can play and hopefully spark their creative juices a little bit into creating something even better in the future. However, the decks aren’t the only important facet of the Clash Pack.
The Clash Pack comes with a bunch of rare cards, and of these there are 6 alternate-art, foil cards that will only ever be available in the pack. Here are the six cards that you can get;
Click to see these foil beauties in full size
So as you can see we have 5 rare foils (Prognostic Sphinx, Hydra Broodmaster, Temple of Mystery, Fated Intervention and Prophet of Kruphix) as well as one common foil (Font of Fertility). I don’t really understand the purpose of a foil common alternate art in the pack, but the art looks beautiful so I wont question it too much. In fact, the art looks beautiful on all of these cards, with special mention going to the Prophet of Kruphix and the Temple of Mystery. As a player who uses both of these cards, having access to these gorgeous alternatives really makes me smile. While they may not be the greatest value money-wise, they look great and are a great starting off point for newer players.
So in the end, Wizard’s first Clash Pack had a few problems, but that is to be expected with a new product. Due to the way that they will be releasing clash packs (they will be released in alternate sets) it wont be until early next year that we see if the mistakes can be fixed. When all is said and done though however, the pack itself is pretty great value for new players and the foil cards make it a great purchase for collectors, or people who just like shiny things.
Capsule Computers review guidelines can be found here.
Magic: The Gathering Intro Decks aren’t designed to win tournaments, or be unbeatable in any of the game’s formats. Their primary purpose is to provide a pre-made deck that new players can pick up and play, secondary to this is that they typically introduce and make use of the new rules implemented in the set they are from. In this way Intro Packs provide a great first stop for anyone jumping into Magic: The Gathering.
NOTE: Since Intro Decks are made for newer Magic: The Gathering players, I wrote the review to reflect that, and used some terminology that only Magic players will understand. This review was constructed using the Infernal Intervention Intro Pack with references to other standard-legal sets.
In Magic: The Gathering, Red/Black can be a really fun colour combination. Together they embody the philosophy of “cut off your nose to spite your face,” and have you sacrificing your own creatures and life total in order to deal large chunks of damage to your opponents. As such I was really looking forward to cracking this Intro Pack and seeing what it could offer. The results were a little disappointing to say the least.
Lets take a look at the cover card for this pack, Indulgent Tormentor:
He is a really powerful card under the right conditions. His ability is incredibly relevant in just about every matchup, and his 5 Power is nothing to scoff at. Unfortunately he is limited by his relatively frail Toughness (there is nothing worse than tapping all your mana on turn 5 to drop this guy and have him immediately be hit with Lightning Strike). As the focus of the deck though, you could do worse.
The deck’s other rare is an aura card; Burning Anger:
This is a great card, and easily playable in just about every deck that runs even a little bit of red. Being able to deal damage to a creature or player without ever having to attack is insane, and if you combo it off with some of the other creatures in the deck you can do some really cool stuff. Enchanting Indulgent Tormentor means that you put your opponent on a four turn clock before the game is over, or they deal with the Tormentor. Alternatively, you can chuck the anger on one of these guys:
“That’s only a 1/1, why would I put Burning Anger on that!?” You would put Burning Anger on one of your deck’s three Typhoid Raids because they have “Deathtouch.” That means any single bit of damage they do to other creatures is enough to kill them, even damage done through Burning Anger. Even if they have a 15/15 creature on the field, it will die instantly to your 1/1 rat, without combat ever happening, and the best part is that it is a repeatable destruction ability, allowing you to clean up the path for your bigger creatures.
Aside from these, the rest of the deck is pretty “meh,” although it is filled with damage-dealing burn spells, and kill spells, the deck more closely resembles something that players would use during a Booster Draft or Sealed Deck experience than a constructed deck. While Burning Anger is a great card, the deck also includes things like Profane Memento that are just…well they are just bad. Since this is a pack for beginners and they are designed to teach players the difference between good and bad cards, as well as a bunch of interactions then it makes sense for Memento to be included, it does work with a lot of the cards in the deck but all in all it is just not very effective at doing so.
All in all there is not much that can be done to improve the deck in any considerable way aside from pulling it apart and using some of the pieces. Typhoid rats are fun and unexpected in constructed play, and the Indulgent Tormentor is definitely playable in other formats like Commander and is just a fun card if you want to throw together something fun for playing against your friends. Not every Intro Pack can be a total winner, and Infernal Intervention seems to prove that.
Capsule Computers review guidelines can be found here.
Back before video games, people who wanted to let go of reality and live out their wildest dreams of slaying dragons and rescuing princesses had two options – read a book or use their imagination. To that end Dungeons & Dragons, the world’s first real RPG was born, and it is a game that has stayed the test of time, and grown bigger than anyone would have imagined. Wizards of the Coast recently released the new 5th Edition rules for this long-standing game, which has effectively overhauled the entire game from the ground up.
While the rules are largely the same, and anyone who has played any previous installment will be able to transition into the new game with relative ease, there are a few things here and there that have been changed. As part of the rules change, we now get a brand new Dungeons & Dragons Starter Set. This box of goodies has everything you will need to get you and your friends started on this long-running game.
The contents of the box itself are pretty basic stuff and include;
1x Introductory Rule Book
1x 64 Page Quest
1x Set of Dice
5x Character Sheets.
The rule book is only around 30 pages long but it is more than enough to give players a crash course in DnD lore and rules. It explains everything from how combat and exploration are done, through to interacting with NPCs, completing quests and levelling up (it shows you how to level up the included characters to level 5). If every person in your play group flips through this then they all all have an understanding of the game’s mechanics, and everyone will have a good time. The rulebook is a bit bare-bones, but it strikes a nice balance between giving new players the rules, and not flooding them with an abundance of information.
All of the rules and instructions present are applicable to the quest that comes included so players or DMs wont likely find a reason to look for outside sources for additional help. However, if you feel like the introductory book isn’t enough then Wizards have posted a more complete rule book online (which is almost 5x the size) which also includes instructions on how to level up your characters beyond level 5.
While the rule book is not as extensive as you might expect, this is only made as an introductory product so you can forgive the absence of more in-depth and obscure rules. However, for those who are looking for a larger rule book, then Wizards have posted a more complete version as an online PDF (it is almost 5x the size of the one included in the box).
As you would expect from an introductory product, the Starter Set has some pre-made characters that you can just pick up and play. The character sheets are really well set out, with all of the key information laid out in a clutter-free and almost elegant system. The characters are completely done aside from their names, and even include traits, skills, weapons, gear and faults to help the players really get into their character. Since there are only 4 classes currently available for DnD 5.0, players are given the option of picking between a:
Elf Wizard
Halfling Rogue
Dwarf Cleric
Human Fighter (Melee-Based)
Human Fighter (Archer)
The wide array of character classes and races gives players ample opportunities to experience all that the base game has to offer, even allowing for them to run through the included quest multiple times. If you have access to a photocopier (or better yet a laminater) I would run the sheets through, as it will help if you want to use them more than once. One disappointing thing was that there are no blank character sheets included in the box, meaning you have to go online to print out additional sheets if you wanted to make completely custom characters.
The quest itself; The Lost Mine of Phandelver, is really impressive for a starter product ands is broken up into 4 distinct chapters. In between each chapter, it is expected that the party will grow and level up so the first thing you notice is that the difficulty curve is pretty lenient. It isn’t likely that your new players will die in the first quest and never want to play again, but at the same time it isn’t so boring as to turn off players. Enough action keeps happening and with enough plot holes and varying ways to overcome the obstacles that the quests provide, there really isn’t a better quest to sucker people into the game.
Aside from just he quest itself, the book also contains maps, shopping guides, loot, and a list of monsters that the players will encounter. Not only do these help the Dungeon Master run the game, but will also allow them to create additional quests down the line while we all wait for the next expansion to roll out.
Lastly, the box contains a set of dice used in the game. You get one of every dice that the game requires; D4, D6, D8, D10, D12 and D20. Although it is a little disappointing to only get one D10 as they are typically used 2 at a time (to create a number out of 100). Other than the lacking D10, the dice themselves are great, they are a oceanic blue colour with a wave pattern running through them, and they are no different than the sets of dice you would buy separately from other brands. If you plan on playing with more than a couple people though, one set of dice absolutely wont be enough so you will need to further invest.
Dungeons & Dragons is more like video games than people expect and that is especially true today. The Starter Set has everything players will want to get into the game, but we still have to wait for the additional content (which come in the forms of new quests, rules, character classes, etc) to be released before we can really stick out teeth into it. Despite all this however, the Starter Set is still a killer way to get people into the world’s oldest RPG.
Capsule Computers review guidelines can be found here.
Disney Infinity is one of those gaming sensations that seems to just keep getting bigger and bigger. Its wide-appeal means that it is a great target for kids, adults (kids at heart), as well as hard core gamers and collectors. With the impending release of Disney Infinity 2.0: Marvel Super Heroes, I was lucky enough to step into the Disney Offices and get a guided tour of the new game with developer John Day, where he showed me a whole bunch of its features, some Play Sets, the new and improved Toy Box and of course the figures themselves. I learned a lot and I thought “Well hey, better share this great news with the world!” So without further adieu, lets talk about Disney Infinity!
THE FIGURES
The first thing I wanted to talk about was how great the figures all look. The guys over at Avalanche have done an incredible job to take the look of these world renowned comic and film characters and make them fit the aesthetic of the Disney Infinity franchise without losing any of their charm or uniqueness.
Every character has their signature look, be it Iron Man’s armor, Hulk’s bulging muscles, Nick Fury’s bald/eyepatch look or Rocket Raccoon’s jump suit and blasters, but they all fit in well with one another both on your display stand and in-game.
One thing I did notice was that with the fact that most of the currently announced characters are human this time around, the figures all look a lot more uniform. While they are all in different poses, and have different body shapes and sizes, standing them next to one another makes them all feel like they are part of one big team. While everything still keeps the standard Disney Infinity art style of the original, you can really tell the difference between the DI1 humans (like Jack Sparrow, or The Lone Ranger) and the DI2 humans like Star-Lord and Captain America. This is only true for the Marvel heroes however, and the figures for the Disney Originals all seemed to look more like the characters from the first game.
The way that the figures are built has changed a bit too. The first figures often had thin legs (or other appendages) that just barely connected them to their base. While this was fine for some older players, young’uns who handle their figures a lot could often find them breaking off of their base. Well now there are more connection points. Not only that but the figures and their bases are now made from a softer plastic which means they shouldn’t snap.
Disney Infinity 2.0 also brings a change to how the characters act in-game. If you have been following along with the Disney Infinity news then you will know that the game now has skill trees for each character. Each figure can be leveled up to Level 20 and you can pick and choose from a wide selection of skills and abilities to really customise your character the way you want. I was informed that skill selection is semi-permanent, with only a few options available for you to respect your character (the most readily available of which is to reset your character back to level 0 and start again). So there is a sense of importance to how you choose to outfit your characters. Just from looking at the wide array of skills available to characters, it almost feels like the skill trees in Disney Infinity are bigger than some MMOs, which is a feat unto itself.
Old characters will also have access to a skill tree, although it isn’t as robust as the new figures. It is a tad disappointing to see the older characters not getting the same amount of love, but the fact that they are getting skill trees at all is incredible.
THE POWER DISCS
Disney Infinity 2.0 currently has 80 Power Discs announced (40 Marvel-themed discs, and a further 40 Disney discs). The team have listened to the comments and criticisms of the players and revamped the Power Disc system. While you will still have Power Discs similar to the original game (ones that change the look of your environment, give a small skill buff or make an in-game weapon or vehicle appear) there are new types of discs. The new discs allow for costume changes, team-ups, pre-built games and even a S.H.I.E.L.D. Air Strike.
Costume Changes do exactly what you think they would; change the costume your character wears. Some characters have alternate costumes available to them in-game. Spider-Man is a great example of this as his costume allows him to don the famous black suit (it is up to you to pretend if it is the Symbiote itself or just the black suit he wore in the Back in Black story arc) as well as a small skill buff.
Team-Ups are some of the most powerful discs created and they allow you to summon an NPC fighter that basically acts as a second player. The cooldown time for activating this disc is massive because when you have another NPC in the game (like White Tiger) you are basically indestructible.
The last in the newest set of Discs actually have games pre-built onto them. They are a new blue colour and when placed on the Infinity Base will allow you to play through a game at your own leisure. These contain game-types like Tower Defence or Dungeon Crawler (that can be set to unlimited, randomly generated stages).
THE PLAY SETS
The game currently has three announced Play Sets; The Avengers, Spider-Man and Guardians of the Galaxy. Each of the three Play Sets plays very differently to one another. Each Play Set is designed to make use of the abilities of the characters that come included, and will each offer around 4 hours of play time. I got to try out the Guardians of the Galaxy and Spider-Man play sets (with more time spent on the former).
One thing that can be said about the Play Sets is that they are all HUGE. I mean… really big. In the Spider-Man Play Set, the whole of Manhatten is your play ground, while as in the Guardians you get to go all throughout Knowhere, and even onto Ronan’s ship: The Dark Aster.
Not only that, but there are certain characters that can cross-over between the Play Sets. Throughout the Play Sets themselves are “Cross Over Tokens.” Each Cross Over Character has 10 tokens scattered through the world and once you find all 10, you can then drop down the figure for that character and have them enter the world. I was told that Iron Man can go between all three Play Sets, while Nova can join up with the Guardians of the Galaxy, Hulk can help out Spidey and his pals, and Rocket Raccoon can leap into the Avengers set.
THE TOY BOX
This is probably where the most change has been done. There have been a lot of improvements to the Toy Box at both a technical and a user level. Firstly, optimisations and the next generation hardware mean that the game is now a whole lot smoother, with little to no frame rate issues. Not only that but the worlds you can create are now TONNES larger, and you can fill them with just an insane amount of objects and creative-toys. Not only that, but you have the ability to link multiple Toy Boxes together to create even larger maps.
One of the problems that many people had with the original Toy Box was how finicky it was to design some things. Originally if you wanted to build a castle, you had to use individual pieces and hope you put them in the correct spot. While you can still do this, it is now not the only design method available to you. There are now tools that allow you to draw a box anywhere in your world (you pick the length, width and height) and using game pieces, the world will generate your structure. I watched this happen in real time with a small castle (who’s individual pieces can then be moved and manipulated by the player), a race-track that wound its way around a pre-built city, and a grind rail.
As cool as Toy Boxes like these are, they will come short of the Toy Boxes you can create in Disney Infinity 2.0
Structures aren’t the only things that can be generated in an instant now, as entire Toy Boxes can be created to match the theme. You can stick to the basic empty box, or you can go one step further and have a pre-built city map appear, ripe for you to customise. It is things like this that make the fame feel much more friendly and accessible to fans of all ages and skill levels.
As for the toys themselves, I was told that players will start with practically everything from the original Disney Infinity, and that the Toy Spinner has been completely eliminated. In its place, players will buy toys with experience sparks that they have collected through normal gameplay (and from what I could tell, a LOT of sparks are available very quickly in the Play Sets). So now there is no random chance standing in the way of that awesome Tron Cycle you so desperately need to complete your playset. You will now just be able to pick and choose your toys at will, presuming you have the sparks for it.
So while all of this is great, it is nothing compared to the brand new INteriors feature for the game. For the first time ever, players can place a door on any door or all in the outside world, and this door will grant access to the inside of that building. Players can build, design and decorate their interiors however they want – from simple things like a treasure room for your awards etc, or by making a map for a super awesome dungeon crawler.
There is a limit to how many rooms you have available to you in a single INterior, however I was informed that this limit is way more than 20, and not only that but you can place an additional doorway INSIDE your building which will allow you to connect multiple INteriors together which will allow players to build and design absolutely enormous houses. I am already planning how to make an old-school Resident Evil style fixed camera survival horror game using the various INterior pieces and puzzles – and that’s just the start of it all.
FINAL THOUGHTS
Disney Infinity 2.0 looks to take all the good that the first Disney Infinity game did and just improve on it. The most notable changes are to the Toy Box where you used to be able to build mini-games, and now you can design and create entire gaming experiences with a few button presses. With all the new updates to the Toy Box, the Play Sets, the Power Discs and the figures themselves, the possibilities are now truly endless and I can’t wait to get my hands on the full game next month… Also Rocket Raccoon can ride on Groot’s back, which is just about the coolest thing ever.
