E3 2013 saw a lot of games for both consoles, but even though the show has been over for a month Microsoft seems eager to ensure that fans don’t forget all the games coming to their new system. So, Microsoft has gone ahead and compiled a nice video montage showing off some of the best games on their way to the Xbox One.
In the video embedded below players can check out all the top games Microsoft have deemed worthy of being the best from E3, which means plenty of their exclusives like Kinect Sports Rivals, LocoCycle, and Titanfall. It’s not all exclusives though as top games from Activision, Bethesda, EA, and Ubisoft all make the montage as well. Really there’s just too much to list, so just check out the trailer for yourself already.
The Xbox One is set to launch sometime in November, though a full release schedule for all its games has not yet been announced.
Ubisoft have just released a brand new trailer which highlights the gameplay experience that comes with being a pirate instead of just a plain old assassin. You can check out the pirates trailer for Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag below. Are you ready to hoist your black flag high and live by the creed of pirates that have beards instead of being assassins? Get ready to rumble on the big blue in high-octane pirate action with Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag.
In a month’s time, Sydney’s Darling Harbour will once again become host to the wild world of manga and anime culture as it invades the Sydney Convention Centre when the Sydney Manga and Anime Show takes place on August 10th, 2013. This year may just very well be the biggest year in SMASH! convention history, with a plethora of major anime guests heading down under for the show.
Not only will you be able to see these great guests, but there will also be a lot of activities to partake in, panels to attend, vendors to check out and much much more.
The grand-scale of SMASH! is without a doubt unmatched in Australia, with the event having quickly become the number one destination each and every year for anime and manga culture. SMASH! President Ray Elinon commented on what sets this event apart from the pack:
“Believe it or not, our followers have incredibly high expectations of SMASH! bringing well known Japanese talent to the convention every year. In the past, we’ve had animation director Shinichiro Watanabe and major voice-actors such as Sakura Tange and Shinichiro Miki. This year, we have proven ourselves worthy again and to have a diverse palette of guests from art director to pop-idol to voice-actors, we can’t wait for everyone to meet these guests.”
SMASH! 2013 is slated to take place on August 10th, 2013 at the Sydney Convention Center in Darling Harbour. It will undoubtedly be a great day out for anime and manga fans of all ages. You can purchase tickets now to the event online at the official SMASH! website here.
It was only a matter of time, wasn’t it? When Minecraft first arrived on the scene we knew it held wider applications than the original build was offering. We quickly saw the emergence of numerous mods, a great deal of community involvement and before long the concept quickly gained a huge cult following. So when I saw that Exato and Reverb were looking into pushing out a standalone, Modern Warfare styled, Minecraft based MMOFPS, I must admit to “having a bit of a baby” somewhat. It’s a very clever idea approach to reinventing the concept and reeling in the remaining fanbase that may have lingered at the edges of the Minecraft world, but never quite worked up the time or interest to dive in. As a die hard FPS player, I was sold by this title’s very nature. The concept was more persuasive than Minecraft on its own, and this is only emphasized when you jump in and give it a go.
Gameplay
Now it would be easy to assume that Guncraft leans more in the direction of Minecraft than any FPS, but to make that assumption would be to miss the point slightly. Guncraft is a shooter from the ground up, and any resemblance to the original Minecraft game is there by proxy, to compliment the experience rather than to remind you that you’re using the Minecraft engine. Destructibility is a huge part of the sheer level of satisfaction present here here. Where high concept titles such as Modern Warfare boast engaging visuals and sharp textures, Guncraft gives players all of the next gen functionality required of a shooter, but with all of the visual/performance draining elements trimmed away and in it’s place, full destructibility is offered as the trade off. It’s a price worth paying and the performance benefits are clear and satisfying. Bonuses that have become flagship elements of the modern online FPS such as Killstreaks, the ability to build and deploy mounted weapons mid game, level and weapon editors, custom loadouts, all make an appearance. Fans of the modern FPS scene won’t be disappointed here.
Building is an excellent addition to the gameplay as it allows players under fire to dig their own cover, construct bunkers or even (if desired) an entire tunnel system beneath the enemy position. Grenades, C4 packs and RPGs demonstrate the scale of destruction as near limitless. Sniper in that tower? Then take out the whole tower. Simples. The ability to strategically expand or reduce the environment adds a strategic element that you currently can’t find in any other online FPS. For that alone, this game made a big impression.
The level design feature is expansive and simple to use. After saving your map file, head over to the lobby, make a server, upload your map, and there you have it. You’re sharing your map with the Guncraft community, and it took all of three minutes. However the Smithing feature, as discovered when Joe and I ended up live-streaming the Beta, is more comprehensive and regulated than we were once led to believe. Finished weapons need a custom created Iron sight image as well as developer approval before being added to your arsenal, so take your time with this feature if you want to make the most of what’s on offer. In terms of what’s on offer, Exato have generously given players all of the tools used by the development team.
Visuals
Visually, it has all of the charm of Minecraft. There’s a lego-ness here that affords the title a nostalgic property and yet, it’s most definitely a modern FPS. Latency is barely a problem here due to the engine;s visually lightweight nature and all in all, it works. The menu design, navigation and background images all feel distinctly Modern Warfare, and it’s clear that Exato are treading a fine line between parody and pastiche here. It works to a tee, so there’s no chance of the Modern Warfare crowd throwing a hissy.
Audio
The audio is tight, lightweight just like the visuals, but exceptionally well produced. The menu track rings faintly of Unreal Tournament, GOTY Edition, which only furthered the sense of nostalgia. However, the weapon sound effects could have had more depth. They feel monophonic, slightly flat, and at times it does remind you that what’s being played is, however high concept in feel, quite barebones in terms of presentation. But such is the style of the engine, indeed the world of Minecraft. To alter this would be to make it something different entirely, so it’s not a bad move per se.
Overall
Overall, Guncraft is full of surprises, packs a ton of replay value and customization and as far as I can tell, is set to gain as big a multiplayer following as any high concept title. I expect a dedicated player base to emerge in appreciation of this title, and with any luck, the servers should still be up, running, and full to the brim for a few years to come. Exato have created a deeply satisfying, highly lightweight and well produced title that should not only pleasantly surprise die-hard Minecraft fans, but bring in scores of new players to boot. A truly excellent title.
Capsule Computers review guidelines can be found here.
A little more than two weeks after England got their limey mitts on Lost Planet 3‘s multiplayer suite (they won’t see this as they’re still celebrating Andy Murray’s Wimbledon win), we here at Capsule Computers got our own time with the four multiplayer modes of Capcom‘s upcoming prequel.
I spent a couple hours playing multiple matches of each game type: Team Deathmatch, Scenario, Akrid Survival and Extraction. Playing system linked across eight consoles, we started our session with the tried and true Team Deathmatch. This plays out as you would expect, with a kill goal that you must attempt to reach within the given time limit. We were split – as was the case in every mode – into teams of NEVEC Soldiers (ironically adopting the generally ‘force for good’ blue) and Snow Pirates (identified in orange). Before each match, you can customise your Weapon Kit and Character choice.
There are four base Weapon Kits to choose from, each attuned to a specific play-style, such as the archetypal support or assault character type. However, the great thing here is that they are extremely customisable, giving you the ability to change every aspect of the load-out. They therefore become four slots for your own personalised preferences, and are in no way set-in-stone options for how to play. I personally liked the first pre-set Kit, consisting of slightly futurist versions of an assault rifle and crossbow, but made a change to one of the two abilities, replacing the default selection with Survivor – a trait that enables faster health regeneration.
One of the first things I noticed was the character’s inability to climb walls, no matter how manageable they should be. Waist high cover they can vault over, but for anything taller, they’d much rather use their handy grapple hook, which is a tool synonymous with the series. There’s a good sense of functional verticality in these maps, and the action can get frantic, so it definitely becomes useful to just tap ‘LB’ (we played on Xbox 360’s) and zip out of the fire and maybe into a good strategic position. Each player has their own gadgets as well, which can be deployed with the left and right button the D-Pad. The automated turret is probably the most favoured, and for good reason; they are a pain to destroy!
It was during our inaugural Team Deathmatch that we discovered that when you are dying, you have more options than you’d expect: you can button mash ‘B’ to hold out for a (hopefully) nearby buddy who can then revive you, “tap out” with ‘X’ to just accept the death, and in many cases steal away the satisfaction of an enemy finishing you with a curb stomp (ala Gears of War), or press ‘Y’ to release a deadly, toxic gas that will quickly suffocate any opposition in the vicinity. That functionality is an ability much like the above-mentioned Survivor, and is called Noxious Demise. That’ll teach ’em not to respect the dead!
Scenario Mode alternates in tasking teams with achieving a series of objectives, with the opposing team simply trying to halt their progress; offence versus defence. Though there are 5 game-types within this mode – Plant/Defuse Bomb, Escort, Courier/CTF, Seize/Control and Disable/Repair – we only truly indulged in Courier/CTF and Seize/Control. Courier requires you to obtain canisters of Pure T-Energy and deliver them to a drop-off point, hence the CTF designation. Seize/Control is reminiscent of King of the Hill in that you must successively enter and hold an area for a period of time until it becomes under your control, with a total of three for each map.
Specifically, and dependent on the map, Seize/Control can be very tough to succeed at, but in a good way that tests your skill and strategic thinking. In our case, having the opposition occupy the targeted space, setting up turrets and sniping from its cover to keep us at bay was challenging, but there is a hole in the ground level that can be utilised to sneak through or throw grenades into to flush them out. We wish we could have sampled all that Scenario Mode had to offer, but what we did play was well varied as it was, which is a great sign for the full-featured retail version and its level of content.
Next we tackled Akrid Survival, which is a take on the popularised Horde Mode (another Gears reference!), except with a twist. This game-type is comprised of two stages: first, the namesake, where you earn T-Energy from eradicating the map of two waves of Akrid, and then a PvP round against the other group of 3 players who have been doing the same thing on the opposite side of the map. The difficulty of the A.I. Akrid will ramp up as waves pass, but also depending on which map you are on of the 6 available. Spitters, for example, will only appear on certain maps and so theoretically, there is a unique difficulty level that can be attributed to specific maps.
Finally we got into Extraction, which pits teams of up to 5 against each other as they endeavour to plant and protect their T-Posts, which extract T-Energy from well-springs of the orange goo. Basically, these hotspots will be identified on the map and have a finite amount of the energy source to be extracted. Once it has been depleted, a new location is specified. This continues until time runs out, and the team with the highest score (most T-ENG) wins. Vital Suits (those large mechs) can be piloted when found and aid in your defensive line against usurpers attempting to destroy your post and plant their own. This mode feels like a scramble at times, but is a lot of fun.
And that concluded our play session. All unlockable bonuses, weaponry, skins, etc., were unlocked from the beginning for the purpose of giving us the best taste of the suite possible. In the final release, your individual points earned translate into credits which you can then spend on these attributes, weapons and more from the Progression Sphere – a neat hexagonal unlock system that also includes unlockables granted by completing certain challenges. All in all, the multiplayer was a lot of fun and very competitive amongst us in attendance. We already gave oursingle-player impressions, and hope people give Lost Planet 3 a chance. It has, so far, shaped up to be a significant package content-wise and a massive improvement upon the last entrant in the series.
Lost Planet 3 comes out August 27 in the U.S., August 29 here in Australia and August 30 in Europe.
Metal Gear Solid: The Legacy Collection has jumped out from under its cardboard box hiding places and onto store shelves across North and South America today.
From the esteemed mind of Hideo Kojima and the video game powerhouse that is Konami, comes the complete collection of every Metal Gear Solid game to date, all in one box (Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance isn’t a MGS game, it is an MGR game). It is a great collector’s item for fans of the series, and for newcomers it is easily the best source of Metal Gear goodness.
That is eight massive games all in one box, no matter which way you slice it, that is a good deal. The first five games in the set (Metal Gear through to Peace Walker) are all included in the Metal Gear Solid HD Collection (check out our review here).The collection is perfectly timed, with Metal Gear Solid V set for release later this year now is your chance to bring your self up to speed with, and to re-play the entire award-winning stealth shooter franchise.
Whether you are new to the franchise, or are looking for a way to replay all of the Metal Gear Solid series, then make sure you pick up the Metal Gear Solid: The Legacy Collection. For all the Metal Gear news as it becomes available, stay tuned to Capsule Computers.
It has taken a bit longer than the other versions of Crazy Taxi that have been released so far, but it looks like Sega has finally been able to get their iconic arcade game to the Google Play store which means it is now available for purchase for Android devices.
This Android version costs $4.99 and is available for purchase here. They say that the game features two modes of play, the Original and Arcade versions, and sixteen different mini-games and even the original soundtrack has returned, but considering the XBLA version was lacking the iconic Offspring song everyone knew the game for, this might be the superior version if that is true.
Today Deep Silver revealed their DLC plans for Metro: Last Light and good news, the first DLC will drop next week. The DLC is called the “Faction Pack” and will be available for purchase on July 16th on 360, PC and PS3 in North America while everywhere else gets it a day after that. The DLC for this great title will cost only $4.99 or 400 MSP.
In the Faction Pack you will play as a Redline sniper trying to infiltrate a Reich Outpost, a Reich “Heavy” defending the frontlines and finally a Polis Ranger going through a training mission. The company also detailed their future DLC plans which can be seen below, and all of which will be available for a one time purchase of a Season Pass that will cost $14.99.
The Tower Pack presents a unique experience for seasoned Metro gunslingers — a challenge based game mode, with online Leaderboard support, as players fight their way up the combat simulator known as The Tower.
The Developer Pack boasts a fully stocked Shooting Gallery, the AI Arena and Metro Museum… And a bonus solo mission — The Spiders’ Nest — offers some new tools for dealing with an infestation of the skittering Spider mutants.
The Chronicles Pack will feature original single player missions that cast the player as three of the game’s standout characters — Pavel, Khan and Anna — and explore their side-stories away from Artyom’s adventure.
It has been more than a few months since Etrian Odyssey IV: Legends of the Titan was released in North America by Atlus USA, but until now gamers in Australia and New Zealand had no idea when the title would be gracing store shelves.
Well today it was announced by NIS America that they will be bringing Etrian Odyssey IV: Legends of the Titan to those two countries on August 29th. It will be available for both physical purchase and digital download. A demo will also be released on the eShop sometime early this summer. To see if Etrian Odyssey IV: Legends of the Titan is worth purchasing, you can find my review of the North American release of the game here.
When we anime fans think of Akihabara, the thought of maid cafes occasionally slips into our minds. Well now we can imagine a maid cafe mixed with a bit of Treasure Island thanks to the strangely intriguing Grand Pirates maid cafe.
Located in Soto-Kanda (part of the Chiyoda Ward in Tokyo), the maid cafe adopts all the themes of the scurvy seven seas right down to the pirate themed costumes worn by the waitresses. As well as having an official website the cafe also has a twitter page which is updated daily with links to the cafes blog (each day called Voyages, currently on their 116th) and photos of their waitresses.
The cafe currently has 18 staff members and are still on the lookout for new members to join their crew, click here to see the Grand Pirates website.
Would you be interested in going to this pirate themed cafe? Is there any other themed maid cafe you would to see in Akihabara (or where you live, don’t lie now), let us know by leaving a comment down below.
