In an article on Mantan Web it was confirmed that legendary voice actor Shuuichi Ikeda, known for his performance as Char Aznable in the Gundam series, will portray the role of Kite in the Hunter x Hunter anime series.
Kite is a contract hunter who was trained by none other than Gon Freecss’ father Ging. When Gon was a young child he was attacked in the woods by an animal, Kite slayed the beast saving Gon’s life. He then told Gon about his father Ging and thus inspired Gon’s dream to become a hunter.
Interestingly enough much like their onscreen counterparts Shuuichi Ikeda and Megumi Han (voice of Gon) have a mentor-student relationship. Upon the premiere of the Hunter x Hunter anime series, Ikeda send Han a letter thanking her for bringing back memories of his debut. Since sending the letter Ikeda has become a mentor to Han giving her advice as well as praise for her work on Hunter x Hunter.
Megumi Han herself has since went on to state that Ikeda is like a second father to her and is very grateful for him to play a similar role in the anime series as he does for her in real life. To make it even more interesting, Megumi Han’s mother Keiko Han who plays Aunt Mito in Hunter x Hunter portrayed the character Lalah in Gundam who is the love interest of Ikeda’s character Char.
Kite is undoubtedly one of the most important characters in the Hunter x Hunter series and is set to debut on April 21st along with the beginning of the Chimera Ant arc.
What do you think of Ikeda voicing Kite? Do you think it is a good choice? Let us know in the comments section below.
A new trailer for the latest Army of Two is out and this coupled along with previous examples of the game make the title look, dare I say it… decent?
The previous two games in the series were met with a mixed reaction from both fans and critics alike but with the new direction from developers Visceral Games, who are best known for their work on the critically acclaimed Dead Space series, EA is hoping that will all change in favour of some quality action. Army of Two: The Devil’s Cartel follows the story of Alpha and Bravo, two Trans World Operations (T.W.O.) operatives tasked with bringing down a ring of drug dealers and warlords in the hope of stabilising a divided Mexico. How do they accomplish this you may ask? Well, they go in and blow stuff up.
Although not widely considered a critical or commercial success, Army of Two has never failed to provide some great fun and havoc for two players to team up in, boasting split-screen (which will continue to feature in this title), online and LAN for some true “Bro” moments.
Army of Two: The Devil’s Cartel will explode on to store shelves on March 26th for North America and the 29th for Europe; look out for it on the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3.
The Japanese website for Playstation All-Stars Battle Royale has been updated and showcases several new costumes and minions that will available for download. According to the site the DLC will be available to download from the 14th of March in Japan, no international release date has been set but its safe to say it will not be far away.
The DLC is not free and if the current pricing model in Australia is anything to go by costumes will cost $2.95 and minions will cost $0.65 cents.
Players can currently download two characters for free until the 26th of February, Gravity Rush’s Kat and Emmett Graves from Starhawk. Other costumes and minions are also available for download along with a stage combining aspects from the worlds of Heavenly Sword and WipEout. More characters are expected to be announced for DLC in March.
You can check out the site showcasing all the new costumes and minions here.
This has been a sad time for many of our fellow gaming media types as many of them have recently found that the sites that they work for have just their major source of advertising and most probably funding. These sites are UGO.com, 1UP.com and Gamespy.com. Most curiously, the company behind these sites have withdrawn their funding because they want to focus all of their attention on their two biggest franchises, IGN and AskMen.
This once again proves that the biggest scourge on gaming media and journalism is and always has been, IGN. By cutting down on these other sites they hope to increase their coverage on their two leading sites, IGN and AskMen. One of the things they hope to obtain by cutting back is the coverage of eSport events.
Be sure to check out the sourcefor this news for more info.
Serious Sam Double D XXL Developer: Mommy’s Best Games Publishers: Devolver Digital and Mastertronic Platforms: Xbox Live Arcade Release Date: 20/02/2013 Price: 800 MS Points – Available Here
Overview
Firing up the Xbox rarely draws a crowd in my house. Most of my house mates are rather apathetic toward my video gaming hobby. Yet when I turned on Serious Sam Double D XXL they all looked across and stood perplexed for a few seconds by the events that were unfolding in front of them. And then they laughed. Hearty belly laughs. I couldn’t understand what was happening. Didn’t they realise that this was serious? To be fair, Serious Sam is only serious about one thing – guns. When it comes to the plot, characters & villain types however? Not so much. Serious Sam Double D XXL takes the popular side scrolling chapter from the franchise off of Steam and ports it successfully across to XBLA.
Extra content has been added in order to celebrate the transition. The clincher for this game is the core mechanic: strapping guns on to guns so you can strap a few more guns on top (don’t try to think of a Xhibit joke for that – they already got to it first). In the end you have a game that plays like an arcade classic similar to 1943 on a horizontal plane. Serious Sam Double D is a part of Croteam’s strategy of giving the Serious franchise out to indie developers to extend their universe. They are joined by Vlambeer and Be-Rad Entertainment, who have both done their own spin-offs individually.
Story
Any one who buys this game for the story is going to be in for a rude surprise. In regard to the rest of the series the plot varies only marginally from the others. The game itself lampoons the inanity of its own plot several times. It whole thing boils down to ‘a horde of bad guys are running at you heaps, they look a lot like your arch nemesis Mental’s creatures, so we should kill them.’ That’s about it. After every level the game’s antagonist, General Maxillia, has a one-on-one with an enemy and hilarity ensues. It’s not side splitting but there are a few grins to be had as you play through the campaign. If you want any more exposition, well too bad, this game is about the guns.
Gameplay
In a word – shooting. It’s a side scrolling shooter that has pretty decent execution but no more than that. If you’re familiar with the series then the enemy types will be recognisable and you’ll know how to react. Beheaded Kamikaze’s will rush you so blast them quickly, Biomechanoids are tanks and need large doses of explosives – there’s little to be surprised by here. It’s all pretty much the same if you’re a verteran, except for the addition of the Vuvuzelator which are about as annoying as their name implies. Other instalments the Serious Sam franchise really emphasised knowing which specific guns were needed to successfully take down enemy types – making huge gun battles frantic. The heat of the moment flipping between guns is lost here and with it much of the tension is gone too. I was actually kind of irked by this. One of the key features of the franchise is the difficulty, making it pop against other shooters that want to emulate war scenarios or throw massive cinematic pieces at you. Serious Sam has always been about the wave. With the focus on Sam so tight, there really isn’t enough space on the screen to get that pulsing, varied attack pattern. Half of the issue is that, as a side scroller, you’re missing a whole dimension to attack on. Yet, it does feel like the only way they’ve tried to include this mechanic is by synchronizing the enemy dumps. It works to an extent and that’s all I can really say for it.
Oh. My. God. I can’t believe I got this far into the review without detailing the Gunstacker. Achievements like this are the reason I play video games; to get that perfect blend of the awesome and the absurd. Fitting perfectly with the famously ridiculous tone, the core motivation in playing this game is getting more guns to strap to your guns. Throughout the game you can find hidden Gunstack Connectors, which allow you to join weapons in your arsenal to others. Add the individual upgrades for each weapon and you have a massively customisable roster of guns. Changing weapons around is a joy, if only because of the total ridiculousness of the whole affair. There’s something Macgyver-esque about the look of it. As if Sam had just got duct tape, haphazardly joining whatever weapon he could find together in a fit of desperation. The game gives you a few tips about good combinations but the core rule to remember is that explosives are for big dudes and the rest are for small dudes. Weapons like the chainsaw and the flame thrower have more practical applications than putting them to use purely for killing. Don’t avoid using them to kill though, burning and slicing stuff is one of the more visceral experiences the game offers. They also play well for when the rush is getting a little too close for comfort. Once you’ve got more than one complete gun stack and a few weapon upgrades the game devolves to a point where you’ll rarely struggle to wipe out the next wave.
The puzzles aren’t too complicated either but to their credit they’re at least interesting to pull off. You’ll usually be required to do something like slow down time to string together jumps or avoid long strings of death traps. Platforming in this kind of game can often feel like it was included because it had to be. Double D uses these opportunities really well in breaking up the pace. I think I would have been exhausted if it were just a continuous throng of enemies.
Outside of the main campaign there are some awesome challenges. Fighting for leader board positions among friends may become addictive. These levels seem to be far more spatially aware than the campaign missions, fully exploiting the vertical axis in a way that is not really utilised in game. Wave attacks are the more interesting of the challenges that are offered but there is also time trials and kill x dudes within y time courses that are interesting. There’s also a PvP mode which I didn’t get to test out. I fail to see how killing a friend would ever be boring though.
Visuals
The visuals in this game are freaking ridiculous. The aesthetic is consistent with the rest of the franchise in that it’s insane. From headless bombardiers, cybernetically enhanced flying chimpanzees to cat’s floating in beakers filled with poisonous liquid this game is nuts. This is the only game ever where I turned the parental controls on for blood. With this enabled all the blood is replaced with doughnuts and other delicious pastries. Oddly enough it perfectly matches the tone of the game and I felt it added a nice flavour. There are a few times you’ll lose Sam in the mass of explosions and bodies on the screen but you’ll rarely die as long as you keep holding the trigger. The bright pallet used never lets up, even in the cavernous levels.
Audio
Not too much can be said of the audio. The music suits the frenetic pace the game sets and isn’t all that bad as long as you like video game heavy metal. John J Dick is back voicing Sam but I could help but feel that the dialogue came across a bit flat. That’s not John’s fault, all the characters seem to struggle in pulling off the jokes. Most of the jokes that do work are sight gags and belong to General Maxillia, who has slightly more tonal variance than the rest of the cast.
Overall
If you like explosions and the idea of strapping guns to more guns you should probably give this a go. It certainly isn’t essential for fans of the franchise but it isn’t unwelcome either. If it weren’t for the Gunstacker then this game could have easily faded into the background. I think if they released a sequel to this that was zoomed out a bit more and refocused on the specificity of attacks then you’d have a really tight mechanic here. That being said there’s tonnes of challenges to unlock so this game has re playability by the bucket load. What can I say? I had a ball just looking at the screen fill with chaos, dealing infinite amounts of damage and watching the bodies pile up. For XBLA it’s hard to ask for anything more than an interest in coming back again and again, which it certainly sparked in me.
Capsule Computers review guidelines can be found here.
PopCap Games is pleased to present online gamers with their latest hidden object title – Hidden Agenda. And now for those that choose to sign-up to play the game on Facebook, PopCap Games is giving away 200 additional “Coins” to use during gameplay. Such currency can be used to upgrade buildings as well as to obtain new crime scenes. Having a little extra coin in your wallet should help you get ahead as an up-and-coming detective!
We at Capsule Capsule were fortunate enough to exclusively interview PopCap Games Hidden Object Executive Producer, Kurt Busch, regarding Hidden Agenda (here). Join the adventure now at Hidden Agenda’s Facebook page (here).
Free-to-play Car Town Streets is adding new content with an expanded licensing deal with the International Speedway Corporation. The content are events that tie into the real world racing events that racing fans love. The first event, the “Daytona Challenge”, has been released just in time for the 55th Annual Daytona 500.
Previously developer Cie Games has worked with NASCAR and ISC to bring licensed things to the Car Town Facebook game, but now they are more than glad to partner up again in a better way for the mobile sequel Car Town Streets. Every event will run for one week, starting the Thursday before the real world event, and during which the top scoring players will win a special in-game NASCAR that with 1200 horsepower makes it the fastest car in the game. For the “Daytona Challenge” the top 150,000 players will receive the National Guard Dale Earnhardt Jr. NASCAR.
Players that are interested in checking out the race events or the free-to-play game in general can download it from the iOS App Store for iPad, iPhone, and iPod Touch HERE.
With the release of Star Wars Pinball fast approaching and only one trailer for the announced tables revealed Zen Studios have put the second trailer up. This time for the Boba Fett-centric table, the trailer shows off the table and a glimpse of what kind of missions players will have to complete with everybody’s jetpack toting bounty hunter.
From the Sarlacc, to Hans Solo imprisoned in Carbonite, to Slave I, this table has everything a Fett fan could want, with missions that stem from both the Galactic Empire and gangster Jabba the Hutt. Players will be able to get it on slew of platforms from XBLA, to PSN, to Google Play, and the iOS App Store. Check out the trailer embedded below to see the table in action and get ready to download it when it releases February 26th, 2013.
Taco Graveyard, creators of musical runner game Four Hats, have announced that their newest game, Penumbear, will release next week. Penumbear is a puzzle platformer game coming to iPhone, iPod, and iPad devices and it will be available in the App Store on February 28.
In Penumbear you’ll take on the role of a small bear and his purple firefly companion in their attempt to escape a deep, dark castle. Between Penumbear‘s ability to walk the line between light and dark and the firefly’s ability to turn switches and lights on and off, you’ll have quite an adventure ahead of yourself!
The game features include:
The ability to walk on light and shadows, you’ll look at your surroundings in a new way.
Over 100 levels, full of exploration and danger.
Secrets: hidden levels, bonus bears, achievements, and an unlockable character.
Challenging – prepare to die many times as you learn your way around the castle!
Giant bosses blocking your path at the end of each area.
For more information you can check out Penumbear‘s website here, and be sure to check out the trailer for the game below!
Week 3 of Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment and DC Entertainment’s Injustice Gods Among Us ‘Battle Arena’ is now history. And here are the winners of this third batch of “Super Fights”, as voted by you, the fans:
First up we had the confrontation between Aquaman and Cyborg. Aquaman was only recently unveiled to the public through a story trailer and has been getting a lot of fan fare for his kick-ass representation in the game so far. Cyborg was one of the first characters to be announced for the game, and hasn’t really been featured since. Watch the battle video below to see if Cyborg blasted Aquaman out of the spotlight and back into the water.
Aquaman vs Cyborg
The second fight of the week was between the courageous, creative and fearless Green Lantern, and the seemingly immortal, yet not necessarily unbeatable (you tell me how that works!) Solomon Grundy. Many people have had a vested interest in this fight because the resultant battle video would be the first time we’d see the Green Lantern in action. And now it’s here…check out the battle results below to find out if he could stop the powerful and relentless Grundy.
Green Lantern vs Solomon Grundy
Remember to visit injustice.dccomics.comto cast your votes on all future battles. For those who are unfamiliar with the competition, its rules or the prizes at stake, go herefor more information.
In an article on Mantan Web it was confirmed that legendary voice actor Shuuichi Ikeda, known for his performance as Char Aznable in the Gundam series, will portray the role of Kite in the Hunter x Hunter anime series.
