Yesterday EA announced the open beta of the upcoming, free-to-play FIFA World title and has just shared a trailer to go with it. Be sure to see it below.
Featuring over 30 different leagues with 600 different clubs it seems like this free version won’t be short on content at launch. Users can create their own custom team as well as buy, sell and trade their players. Seemingly taking cues from the likes of Battlelog, the game is also built on a social platform, allowing players to share and connect with friends.
You can register for the open beta to play for free on the official site.
Gran Turismo 6 has had players racing around tracks, tackling wicked S-Bends and speeding down Mount Panorama for a few weeks now, and the guys over at Sony and Polyphony Digital have proudly launched the latest update for their impressive racer. Just in time for the holidays, players can grab themselves two new Red Bull Cars as well as the Red Bull X Challenge.
The Red Bull X Challenge is an innovative collaboration with the Infiniti Red Bull Racing, and includes 2013 Formula 1 World Champion Sebastian Vettel mentoring players on how to perfectly handle a formula racing machine. The two cars; the ‘Red Bull Racing Kart’ and ‘Red Bull X2014 Junior’ will arrive in dealerships in-game via the update, while the Red Bull X2014 ‘Standard’ and ‘Fan’ cars can be expected to join them at a later stage.
This is a free update, so if you have GT6 then there is no opportunity to not download this bad boy today! Remember to put pedal to the metal and to always stay tuned to Capsule Computers for all the Gran Turismo news as it becomes available.
The latest Humble Bundle has brought Wadjet Eye Games’ Gemini Rue to Android, Mac, and Linux for the first time. The dystopian point and click has been the best selling game for the studio so far, but had previously only been available on Windows PC and iOS.
Android hounds can pick up the stand alone game from the Google Play store for $4.99, whilst Mac and Linux users will have to wait out the exclusivity period on the Humble Bundle. That would be something of an odd plan, given that the PC and Android 8 bundle nets gamers Gemini Rue and up to four other games for a 100% negotiable price.
If this excellent neo noir mystery has eluded you so far now is the time to grab it as a self indulgement yet still charitable Christmas present – the current average to beat in order to scoop up the entire bundle? $4.16.
Madman Entertainment have just announced the next acquisition in their announcement promotion #12AnnouncementsOfXmas. The announcement is that they have acquired the license for the anime series Aesthetica of Rogue Hero.
Aesthetica of Rogue Hero follows Akatsuki after he saved a fairy-tale kingdom. He returns to the real world and brings back his prize, the Demon King’s daughter Miu.
Madman plan to release the series on DVD in 2014. Not only that but they plan to stream the series on their Madman Screening Room in the near future. Stay tuned for more information on that release and the #12AnnouncementsOfXmas promotion as Madman continues to reveal titles each day.
Indie studio Camouflaj has announced the release of its dystopian action-adventure game Republique, set to be the first of five episodes. The game is said to bring console-quality gameplay and graphics to the iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch.
Ryan Payton, designer at Camouflaj, puts it rather simply, ““We’ve spent the past two years crafting stealth action that doesn’t require 17 buttons, or even a controller.” The title received a large portion of its funding through Kickstarter and backers get a free season pass valued at AU$18.99 for all five episodes of Republique.
In République, players assist Hope, a desperate young woman struggling to escape from a secret, Orwellian state. Communicating using a stolen phone, Hope contacts the player and asks them to hack into the nation’s surveillance system, assume control, and guide her out of the clutches of the omnipresent Overseer.
The stealth game is inspired by classic literature such as 1984 and Brave New World, along with recent geopolitical events such as global surveillance and internet censorship.
Surprisingly, the game features industry heavyweights. Voice actors such as Jennifer Hale (Mass Effect) and David Hayter (Metal Gear Solid) breathe life into the characters while the studio itself is founded by the former Halo 4 creative director and Metal Gear Solid 4 producer (Ryan Payton) along with other veterans from titles such as F.E.A.R. and Red Dead Redemption.
You can see the launch trailer below and grab it from the App Store for AU$5.49. Republique is due to make its way to PC and Mac in 2014.
Viz Media will be kicking off the new year by releasing a new print manga starting on January 7th and it just so happens to be called Nisekoi. While volumes one through six are available as digital downloads, this is the first time that a physical version of the manga has been released.
The manga will cost $9.99 in the U.S. and $12.99 in Canada. For those who don’t know, Nisekoi translates into False Love and follows the story of Raku Ichijo who meets Chitoge Kirisaki after she knees him right in the face. After this unfortunate meeting, Raku’s gangster father has arranged a marriage between him and the daughter of a rival gang, which just so happens to be Chitoge.
There are a few problems however, not only do these two not get along but Raku has a crush of his own and is still searching for his childhood sweetheart from ten years ago and his only hint happens to be a locket he wears around his neck.
Colossatron: Massive World Threat Developer:Halfbrick Publisher: Halfbrick Platforms: iPhone (reviewed), iPad Release Date: December 19, 2013 Price: $0.99 – Available Here
Overview
Every once and a while a game comes along with such a colossal amount of hype that it comes into question, can it live up to the hype or does it result in a colossal failure? Such was the situation that Colossatron: Massive World Threat finds itself in. Coming from Halfbrick, the studio behind some of the greatest mobile games to ever grace the platform, all eyes have been on Colossatron to be the next big thing. Unfortunately that is not to be, Colossatron: Massive World Threat turns out to be nothing more than a massive disappointment.
Gameplay
What made Halfbrick’s other games so very good was the addictive gameplay that could be played by anyone. Halfbrick was generally light-handed when it came to in-app purchases making them an option rather than a necessity to enjoy the game. The reason why Colossatron is so disappointing is because it is the complete opposite of those things.
As far as gameplay goes, it is incredible difficult to find some sense of enjoyment in this game. It is a truly passive experience that gives you next to no control over what plays out on screen. All you are tasked with doing is moving coloured blocks onto Colossatron to make him bigger. You don’t control Colossatron at all, instead taking a deciding inactive role in what happens on screen. The player effectively moves coloured blocks onto him until he eventually destroys everything on screen. It is far from fun and barely feels like an actual game at times.
The fact that you cannot control Colossatron is a major misstep by Halfbrick. If the game allowed you to control the monster snake it would’ve proved to be a much more enjoyable experience, unfortunately you are nothing more than a bystander helping Colossatron occasionally.
To make matters worse, the game is very heavy-handed with its in-app purchases. It pushes the purchases at every turn and forces you to either pay to revive Colossatron upon death or start over from the very beginning of the game, almost forcing you to actually pay to maintain your progression in the game. It is just bad and completely disappointing from Halfbrick.
Not only that but during my time playing Colossatron I was subject to several crashes and freezes, with the game being barely stable at times. God forbid you did an in-app purchase at the time of a crash as you would’ve lost all progress, something that happened to me multiple times.
This is clearly not a game that Halfbrick thought through very well. It is half baked at best and flat out terrible at worst. This is a disappointing effort by Halfbrick and one that is ultimately best to avoid.
Visuals and Audio
Cluttered is the best way to describe the visuals for Colossatron: Massive World Threat. At times there is simply too much happening on screen that its near impossible to tell what is even going on. The only highlight in the visual experience is the anime styled cutscenes telling the ‘story’ of Colossatron.
The soundtrack however is actually quite a decent foray of tunes that stands out as a highlight in this overall weak gameplay experience. There is also some solid voice work here for the news reporter characters that is impressive for an iOS game to say the least.
Overall
This is about as half baked as mobile games get and the fact that it shoves in-app purchases down player’s throats does it no favours. Halfbrick made a colossal mistake with this game. It just isn’t fun, it is plagued with bugs and it pushes micro-transactions with heavy hands. Basically it is everything you’d expect not to see in a Halfbrick game and that is a damn shame. Colossatron: Massive World Threat is a massive disaster.
Capsule Computers review guidelines can be found here.
Starting today Viz Media has placed the anime series K on the free version of Hulu and Hulu Plus. The complete thirteen episode series will feature an English dub and it will be available on the servicefrom now until January 15th.
Those who find themselves liking the series will want to keep an eye out for the series when it is released in North America on February 25th where they can buy a basic version of the release as well as a $69.99 limited edition bundle that will come with an 80 page art booklet featuring individual episode synopses, character profiles, poster art, translated song lyrics, an exclusive KANAME☆ K cosplay photo gallery, and more.
Fightback Developer: Ninja Theory Publisher: Chillingo Platforms: iPhone (Reviewed), iPod Touch, iPad Release Date: 19th December 2013 Price: Free – Available Here
Overview
Ninja Theory are a game developers studio that have done a great deal of good within the gaming industry in the past. Their most recent project, and by far one of my most favoured games, DMC remade the world of Devil May Cry in a way that gamers around the world really loved despite not taking to the idea of a remake in the first place. Well the team behind DMC have decided to hit mobile devices with a game that has just been released at this point in time and that game is titles Fightback. Fightback is a beat-em-up title that doesn’t take itself too seriously and borrows a lot of its themes and settings from cheesy 80s action flicks, something that I think Ninja Theory can do extremely well. We’ll soon see wont we?
Story
Within Fightback you play as a man named Jack; he’s cool cat with a short temper and a “rockin’ bod” that he seems to have developed while serving time as some sort of military man, that much wasn’t really too fleshed out. It seems as though this Sylvester Stallone look-alike has had his sister kidnapped by a gang that apparantly has a great deal of control in the city where the game is set, the gang is lead by a mysterious man named Drago who has a fairly deep connection to Jack that seems to stretch back way into his past. Clearly Drago wants revenge for something that Jack did to him and has targeted his only weakness which just so happens to be his younger sister.
Jack gets suited up with a plain white singlet, worn-in jeans, some tough boots and one mean pair of sunglasses which is all he needs to both save his sister and clean the streets of these maniacal gangs. The story is obviously very tongue-in-cheek and I don’t believe it’s meant to be taken that seriously, fact is, Ninja Theory didn’t lay it out in a way that would force you into taking it seriously, everything that the character of Jake does is so very much over-the-top and extremely reminiscent of those 80s action flicks that I mentioned above. The great thing about the story behind Fightback is that it is very basic, very cliché, fairly silly and it is just enough of a story to justify you playing the game because, at the end of the day, even though it doesn’t seem like you’re really heading anywhere you actually are.
Gameplay
Now this is where Fightback really began to shine as in incredible mobile game. It’s your typical beat-em-up/sidescroller but with a major twist so, despite the fact that it is quite basic, it is actually very clever…clever enough for me to call it clever. Basically you’re met with waves of enemies, you tap both the right and left sides of the screen separately in the respective direction you want to attack, so if your enemy is coming from the left…you tap the left side of the screen and vice versa, I probably didn’t need to go over that but I like to be thorough. Swiping up will have jack jump, swiping down will have him crouch and swiping diagonally both up, down or across will result in different forms of attacks. Very simple. I love that about this game, it’s so easy to just pick up and play then put down once you’re finished and you don’t feel bad for doing so partway through a level because of how easy it is to just pick up from where you left off. There are a great deal of upgrades, equipable items and weapons for you and Jack to use throughout the game, some can be picked up and used while in a fight and others like a bulletproof vest are purchased beforehand and used within.
What else ruled about this game was the upgrading system, EVERYTHING could be upgraded and if you were actually half decent at the game it wasn’t that hard to grind for money. The game play in and of itself was absolutely fantastic but here comes the kicker…ads and in-game purchases were like a plague on this game. You could not even open the game without having three floating bubbles with adds for other games drifting across your screen, it constantly badgered you to link the title up to your Facebook and continuously asked for real-life money for in-game items. All that stuff was semi-avoidable and I understand that, to most people, this isn’t a big deal…for me it was.
I would honestly be a great deal happier with this being a game I could buy for more than the standard $0.99 and have NO ads or in-game transactions at all than to constantly be bother with this little annoyances that interrupt me from actually becoming immersed in this game. Dying in-game then having to wait five minutes to be healed is quite silly, you can revive yourself with in-game money but if you have no in-game money you can be sure they’ll ask if you want to use real money, so get good at the game and get good quick. It would have been a straight up perfect release if not for that.
Audio AndVisuals
Fightback looks freaking fantastic, the graphics are actually fairly good but what looks the best about this game to me is the way that the characters move while in action. Jack as a fighter is incredibly kick-arse, the way they animated his movements were, pretty much, the coolest part of this game and considering Ninja Theory seemed like they were going for the “cool” factory, THAT’S the biggest compliment I could give. The animation was so fluid yet rough much like Jack’s character, each enemy moved around in a different way and actually looked good. Look the designs for the characters were fairly basic but it fit in with the whole “cheesy 80s” theme so I’m going to give them the benefit of the doubt and say that they were intended to look a little basic.
There wasn’t a great deal of voice acting in this game so I can’t really focus on that, what I heard of it was great so no complaints there but I’d like to focus more on the music and how it tied in with the overall theme of the game: It was basically all dark, synthesizer music much like what you’d hear in the game Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon, the music was great, not because it was just god music but because it fit in so damn well with this gangland setting and Jake himself. I also did enjoy the in-fight sound effects, they were very well done and extremely satisfying especially when you pummel an enemy who has just finished beating the crap out of you.
Overall
Fightback is an absolutely fantastic game, there’s no doubt about that at all. The action is good, the visuals are great and, as a whole, it really holds up and stands its ground against other games of its type. With Fightback, as I mentioned, I believe it should have been a paid game instead of a free game that has you consider paying money to do simple things that should be doable regardless but, like I also said, they are ignorable and you can easy bypass them by just not caring, it does take away from the game though, it isn’t entirely without its faults. Either way the game is great for anyone that loves 80s action, cheesy characters and a game that knows what it is and likes to make fun of itself through what it does, just be ready for a few little annoying things to tick you off. I beg that you do give this game a good go because, once you get past those little things, it is actually a very enjoyable game.
Capsule Computers review guidelines can be found here.
Last week Capcom announced that the first piece of DLC for Dead Rising 3, Operation Broken Eagle, would be hitting the Xbox One on December 24th. Well it seems that that is no longer the case. A Capcom representative has stated that the DLC, where players will play as a Spec-Ops agent searching for the President, is now going to be released on January 21, 2014.
In the statement about the delay, the representative stated “Adding new content to the massive open world of Los Perdidos is a major undertaking, and to ensure we provide the best possible experience for players, we are putting a few additional weeks of polish and testing into the episode before it’s released.”
