Did you wait til the last moment to buy your favourite mobile gamer a Christmas gift on the cheap? G5 has you covered. They have knocked down the prices of 26 of their biggest hits down with discounts up to 60% off. The games are for iOS, Mac, Google Play, Kindle Fire, and Nook devices. Check out the list of games below. More information on the sale can be found here.
Spirit Walkers: Curse of the Cypress Witch (iOS)
Tales from the Dragon Mountain: the Strix (iOS, Google Play, Kindle Fire)
CrossWorlds: the Flying City (iOS, Mac, Google Play, Kindle Fire)
Letters from Nowhere (iOS, Google Play, Kindle Fire)
Treasure Seekers 4: The Time Has Come (iOS)
Sinister City: Vampire Adventure (iOS)
Epic Adventures: La Jangada (iOS, Google Play, Nook)
Kaptain Brawe: A Brawe New World (iOS)
Masters of Mystery: Crime of Fashion (iOS)
Bigfoot: Hidden Giant (iOS)
Jack of All Tribes (iOS)
Fix-it-up: Kate’s Adventure (iOS)
Fix-it-up: World Tour (iOS)
Fix-it-Up 80’s: Meet Kate’s Parents (iOS)
Mushroom Age (iOS)
Jane’s Hotel 2: Family (iOS)
Virtual City 2: Paradise Resort (Google Play, Kindle Fire, Nook)
Bundle in a Box: Eclectic Delights announced that they are extending the sale of their bundle til this Friday, December 21st to celebrate the end of the Mayan calendar. Pay what you want to get five games, adventure thriller Shadows on the Vatican, Act:1, adventure/strategy game Delve Deeper & DLC, strategy game War of the Human Tanks, lovecraftian platformer Eversion, and first person horror game Fibrillation. Those who beat the average will receive platformer The Adventures of Shuggy, FMV fighting game Stay Dead, first person horror game The 4th Wall, top down adventure game Flibble, 3d platformer Skylight, and a pre order for adventure game Shadows on the Vatican, Act:II.
All games are available as DRM free downloads and an assortment of Desura and Steam keys. The bundle is in support of the Indie Dev Grant and The Hellenic Centre for Mental Health and Treatment of Child and Family. Purchase the bundle here and remember, if the world really does end on Friday, you won’t have to pay the bill.
Developer: Pendulo Studios Publisher: Bulkypix Platforms: iPad (Reviewed), iPhone, iPod Touch Release Date: December 13, 2012 Price: $4.99 Get it Here
Overview
Hollywood Monsters, also known as The Next Big Thing on the PC, is made by Pendulo Studios, the developers behind adventure game hits Runaway and Yesterday. The game is a reboot of the original Hollywood Monsters released in 1997 for the PC. Hollywood Monsters features witty writing, solid visuals, and an outstanding audio experience packaged at an unbeatable price.
Story
The game stars Liz Allaire, a young and slightly crazy reporter for The Quill looking to move up in the world and the legendary sports writer Dan Murray who has been banned from covering his usual beat for some mysterious reason. The pair cannot stand each other and on the surface has the same personality chemistry as water and oil. The duo have been sent to cover the a movie awards ceremony and party hosted by William A. FitzRandolph, a monster who has made millions by giving other monsters a job in the horror movie business. Liz spots one of FitzRandolph’s actors, Big Albert, breaking into the boss’ office and is sure she is about to hit the scoop of a life time. What starts as a small mystery over a break in evolves into a wacky story of monstrous proportions.
The writing is the real star of Hollywood Monsters. It is side splitting hilarious, with highly intellectual references sprinkled throughout. The characters are absolutely charming and instantly likeable. The story is long enough to make the game feel worthwhile for the price. Without spoiling too much of the plot, Hollywood Monster’s story is a home run, expertly mixing an interesting plot with a light hearted feel that is perfect for anyone looking for a fun game for a lazy Sunday afternoon.
Gameplay
Point and click adventure is a genre that translates well to the touch screen. Hollywood Monsters just happens to do it very well. The UI is simple yet well thought out. There is a button that lights up all the hot spots that can be interacted with and all hot spots are responsible. Item management is simple and intuitive. There are plenty of side items that can be interacted with that have no bearing on the plot, but reward players with a few witty lines.
I adore the hint system implemented in Hollywood Monsters. The narrator will speak a line to give a hint for the player. Clicking on the hint button a few more times will give the same line, but a picture of the item or person that needs to be interacted with will pop up in the corner. This hint system fits in seamlessly with the pace of the story and provides just enough of a hint to help players through tough spots without being too easy right off the bat. I found it was next to impossible to get completely stuck in Hollywood Monsters.
Visuals
Hollywood Monsters continues with the visual style Pendulo seems to favour in their recent games. It is a mix of 3d characters and 2d backgrounds with very distinct looking characters. The game itself is extremely colourful and reflects the tone of the game very well. There was a visual glitch where the main character would walk through the environment and would visibly clip through the prop. I noticed this in two places early in the game, so it will not take away too much from the game.
The frame rate was smooth throughout with no noticeable drops or laggy moments. The runs well on Retina screens and is optimized for the iPhone 5. However, anyone with an old iPad, iPod Touch Generation 3 or iPhone 3GS and below need not apply. Hollywood Monsters makes full use of the modern devices powerful graphic chips and CPUs.
Audio
The audio experience of Hollywood Monsters shows its roots as a big budget PC release. Every bit of dialogue has a voice actor performing the lines. The acting is extremely professional; the performance is believable and engrossing. The sound effects and music is both top notch. It is a disservice to play this game with the sound off. The game is definitely best enjoyed with headphones, though devices with slightly stronger speakers like the iPad will suffice. Hollywood Monsters is an excellent example of how audio should be done on iOS.
Overall
Hollywood Monsters is a must buy for all iOS gamers. Whether this is your first adventure game or you are a veteran looking for a great adventure game to take with you on the go, Hollywood Monsters fits your bill. Just be aware if you have played The Next Big Thing on PC, you are getting the same game for iOS. Considering the game is available for $29.99 on Steam, $4.99 is a fantastic deal for Hollywood Monsters. The game combines a wonderfully written, hilarious story with strong visuals, high quality voice acting, and a great audio presentation that is an absolute steal. Hollywood Monsters is a must buy.
The much-loved Sega Saturn classic, NiGHTS into Dreams, is now available via Steam for PC.
Previously released on Xbox Live Arcade and PlayStation Store for PS3 (check out our review for it here), this remake adds HD visuals, achievements and leaderboards to the Saturn original. As an added bonus, the game is playable in its original form, and the Christmas NiGHTS content is also included, quite fitting for the Holiday season.
NiGHTS into Dreams is currently available for $10 (BUY HERE), but with the Steam holiday sales quickly approaching, it might be wise to hold off on purchasing this, for another week or so at least. If you haven’t played any version of the game by this point, you can wait a little bit longer for the price to drop even further.
While Nintendo’s eShop in Europe and Japan already offer classic Mega Man action, Capcom has announced that it’s bringing all six classic NES Mega Man titles to the 3DS eShop next week beginning with the original Mega Man on December 27.
However if you were looking to play each Mega Man game on your 3DS in one go then unfortunately you’ll have to wait a bit. Capcom will be releasing each game in regular intervals throughout 2013, with Mega Man 2 planned for a February 7 release.
No price has been given for the games at this moment.
However if you’re looking for awesome game that mashes up Capcom’s most beloved franchise, Street Fighter X Mega Man is out for free today, and can be downloaded from Capcom’s official website.
Developed by fan Seow Zong Hui with support from Capcom publishers, Street Fighter X Mega Man features eight Street Fighter-themed levels and features Street Fighter characters as bosses.
While console gamers have been enjoying Resident Evil 6 for some time now, Capcom have officially announced a release date for the PC version of Resident Evil 6, of March 22, 2013 in North America, Europe and Australia.
The game will only be available via download, though a retail release has been planned for Europe. The Steam version of the game supports cloud saving, Steam Achievements, leaderboards, and game overlay. The PC version also comes with all previously released DLC and includes the “No Hope” difficulty.
The PC Specs have been release and go as followed,
Minimum specs:
OS: Windows Vista/XP, Windows 7, Windows 8.
Processor: Intel CoreTM2 Duo 2.4 Ghz or better, AMD AthlonTM X2 2.8 Ghz or better.
Memory: 2 GB RAM.
Hard Disk Space: 16 GB free hard drive space.
Video Card: NVIDIA GeForce 8800GTS or better.
DirectX: 9.0c or greater.
Sound: Standard audio device.
Recommended specs:
OS: Windows Vista/XP, Windows 7, Windows 8.
Processor: Intel CoreTM 2 Quad 2.7 Ghz or better, AMD PhenomTM II X4 3 Ghz or better.
Memory: 4 GB RAM.
Hard Disk Space: 16 GB free hard drive space.
Video Card: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560 or better.
DirectX: 9.0c or greater.
Sound: Standard audio device.
Capcom have also announced that Resident Evil 6 will also be available through Xbox 360 Games on Demand, however they haven’t released a date or a price at this moment.
The Wii U’s survival horror launch title ZombiU was met with lukewarm reception upon its release, despite its impressive and surprising E3 debut.
In an interview with Nintendo Life, ZombiU Producer Guillaume Brunier said that the development team did not expect such a harsh initial feedback,
“We were really disappointed with the early US reviews. We are aware of the strengths and weaknesses of the experience we created, but we did not expect so harsh a feedback. However, as more and more journalists and gamers played the game, these opinions proved to be a minority. So, right now, we’re rather pleased with the overall reception of the game.”
ZombiU is a first person survival horror game set in a zombie-apocalyptic London. The game makes full uses of the Wii U’s touch pad and features the unique gameplay mechanic of permanent character death.
Dark Souls is often regarded as one of the difficult games ever made and its sequel Dark Souls II will be no different; though it may be more accessible to newcomers. Speaking to Edge, Dark Souls II Director Tomohiro Shibuya said,
“Accessibility to players who haven’t picked up Dark Souls is definitely a key topic. Right in the beginning when players first pick up the game is something that I will definitely focus on. To not immediately throw them into Dark Souls but provide a good introduction in terms of what the game’s about and how the game should be played.”
Shibuya went on to say that the covenant system in the first Dark Souls was “difficult to fully absorb and experience,” and something that he would like to change in the sequel. Along with this change, vehicles will be added to the game including chariots and a boat.
The game was recently announced at the 2012 Video Game Awards and set to be released for Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC. A release date is yet to be announced.
“The hit nobody realized was a hit!” so said THQ president Jason Rubin on Saints Row: The Third reaching a new impressive milestone: 5.5 million copies sold, he took to twitter to announce the news.
@KaiOliverTaylor @game_charts 5.5 million people (pre Humble Bundle) can't be wrong. Saints Row was the hit nobody realized was a hit!
Oh and that 5.5 Million? That was before the game was included on THQ’s Humble Bundle; which by the way sold 885,362 copies, making $5,098,326 for Child’s Play and the American Red Cross.
Released in November 2011, Saints Row: The Third has become one of THQ’s most successful games. Originally labelled a GTA-clone the game series has since grown on beyond that to form its own identity.
A fourth Saints Row game is said to be in development. Planned DLC for Saints Row: The Third was shelved in favor of being integrated in to Saints Row 4.
Today Halfbrick have announced that for the first time ever Fruit Ninja will be free on the App Store. The sale is occurring during the approximate 24 hour period from 6:00am GMT on Monday December 17th, to 6:00am GMT on Tuesday December 18th. If that isn’t enough Halfbrick have also announced that every other Halfbrick game will also be on sale for free during the same period, including previous hit games Monster Dash and Age of Zombies. This amazing sale is available to everyone around the world so don’t miss out on your opportunity to download and enjoy all of Halfbrick’s games including the HD versions designed for iPad.
Phil Larsen from Halfbrick had this to say today :
“This is by far the biggest sale we’ve ever had,” said Phil Larsen, Chief Marketing Officer at Halfbrick. “Over the past three years we’ve given everything we have to make our games the best, and were rewarded a million times over with love and support from our fans. Now it’s time to give something back, kick some ass and start 2013 with more momentum than ever. Have a blast playing Halfbrick’s finest!”
Entire catalogue of Halfbrick games on sale can be seen on iTunes, click here to download them all!
