After a few attempts at the internet trying to divine the information based solely on tentative months given at the game’s original release. But, there is no more need to speculate now as Microsoft has officially stated that the first map pack will be coming to Xbox Live on December 10th, 2012.
The Crimson Map Pack comes with three maps: Wreckage, a map literally at a crash site made asymmetrically for a variety of modes form Slayer to objective; Harvest, showing off a recreation of the planet where humanity had its first contact with the covenant in the small to mid-size; and Shatter, a large map set in a crystalline mine built for vehicle or foot navigation.
Crimson will be available for 800 MS Points for those interested players that don’t already have them from the Halo 4 War Games Map Pass or the Halo 4 Limited Edition. Likewise players with the map pack will gain access to one new playlist featuring only the new three maps for a variety of 6 vs. 6 gametypes, including the brand new Extraction gametype. Pitting players to try and extract assets from around the map, Extraction has players move in to access these assets, but must defend during the extraction process as whoever is in control of the site will get the point for the asset.
Players looking to get the Crimson Map Pack can download it from Xbox Live on December 10th, unless owning the War Games Map Pass or Limited Edition who access the maps from inside the game. Check out the gallery below to see a few shots of the maps.
If you have been following the slow reveal of information for the 2013 Dragon Ball Z anime movie then you probably already know that the movie will be called Battle of Gods and would feature Goku and the cast fighting against Egyptian Gods.
Well today MangaNewsJapon revealed on Twitter that the name of the Egyptian god Anubis, or the purple hairless cat that appears to be the main antagonist of the movie, is now named the God of Destruction Bills. It is worth noting that the voice actor who is voicing Bills is the same voice actor who provided the voice for Spike Spiegal from Cowboy Bebop and Ghost in the Shell’s Togusa, Kouichi Yamadera.
It is also worth noting that the character to the right of Bills is named Wiss who will be voiced by Masakazu Morita who has handled Bleach’s Ichigo.
This last summer Atari started a contest to see what indie developer could bring the best fresh ideas to PONG for its 40th Anniversary. Well when we last heard from the challenge, Atari was still going through the finalists to figure out who out of the entrants was going to take the crown and today was the day they showed off the winner.
PONG World by zGames has gone live on the iOS App Store today as the first official PONG game to be released there. Featuring four different levels and five paddles to use, the game also features varying modes from Classic, to Blitz, to Hotseat players are able to experience old and new alike.
While details on the other finalists of the PONG Indie Developer Challenge wont be released until later, zGames as winners of the contest have won the $50,000 grand prize, and interested players can download PONG World from the App Store for free HERE.
One of the casualties of THQ’s financial issues was Guillermo del Toro’s action horror trilogy, inSANE. While very little was known about the game, it was being developed by Volition, the company behind the Saints Row franchise but with the cancellation of the game in August, the title was left in limbo.
However if a report by Bloody Disgusting is to be believed, a new developer has picked up the project. In fact, the very first studio he pitched the idea to agreed to develop the game. Currently it is unknown which developer picked up the game, though given this information we will likely know soon.
Today Sony revealed that they will be releasing a new PlayStation Vita bundle which will go on sale next week. The bundle is to commemorate the launch of the PlayStation Plus service on the PlayStation Vita and is being called the “PlayStation Plus Instant Game Collection PS Vita Bundle.”
As you can see in the image above, the package contains a 3G PlayStation Vita system, a 1-year subscription for PlayStation Plus, a Unit 13 game voucher and a 4GB Memory Card for $300. It is interesting to note that considering you are being given a downloadable version of a game, that the 4GB memory card is practically useless for anything involving PlayStation Plus and downloading the free games available to Plus members.
Remember that game that Splash Damage, the developer of games like Brink and Enemy Territory: Quake Wars, was teasing would be announced today? Well they have come out and revealed that the game will, unsurprisingly, be a new multiplayer shooter exclusively for the PC.
The game will be called Dirty Bomb and the company has released a teaser video which can be found below. In this teaser video we see what appears to be a modern day London which has been torn apart by various explosions and gunfights. Expect more details for Dirty Bomb to be revealed in the next few weeks.
Hitman Absolution Developer: I/O Interactive Publisher:Square-Enix Platforms: PC, PS3, Xbox 360 (Reviewed) Release Date:November 20, 2012 Price: $59.99 – Available Here
Overview:
Agent 47 has been making bald cool since he first set foot the gaming scene. With the red tie and suit ensemble, not to mention the barcode tattooed onto the back of his head, he’s looking a bit conspicuous to be an assassin, and easily recognizable once spotted. Yet here he is, back again doing what he does best – the agency’s dirty work, with no questions asked. Only this time his own feelings interfere, showing a strangely moral side to this cloned super-assassin.
Story:
Hitman: Absolution is easily one of the most story-driven Hitman games to date. It’s that classic tale of spy gone rogue, because after a change of heart Agent 47 abandons the assignments he was once loyal to, searching for answers and protecting young girl while he goes it alone – for ultimate dramatic effect. It’s overused and certainly lacking originality but this storyline allows players to see a different side of the stone-cold killer while the writers of the series tie up a few loose ends in the story and then pave the way for what will most likely end up as next gen Hitman.
It is helped along by well-animated cut scenes: high production values and convincing voice actors sell the story to you and make them more than just a watchable stop-gap between missions; the only downside being that they don’t take into account any disguise you were wearing. The way the game opens with the developer/publisher names rolling in-between frames shows that the creators clearly rated the story as one on a par with that of a film, and without want to inflate egos any further, it does give it the feel of blockbuster. I say if they’re good enough to pull it off then do it, as many other games have started to feature this technique as the lines between video game and film become more blurred.
Gameplay:
Gameplay takes a direction proving popular with players the past year or so – and that is giving gamers a choice of routes through the same level by having very flexible game mechanics. Like Deus Ex: Human Revolution or Dishonored before it, Hitman offers players a range of options at tackling different situations where before, in Hitman and in gaming generally, there was always a set way of doing things dictated by the developer.
You can use stealth or force in a number of different ways, utilizing different balances of the two. Avoid enemy casualties entirely by sneaking past unnoticed, distracting them with a thrown object, or waiting for them to turn away or move off of their own accord. Pick off enemies with your silenced pistol, garrotte unwitting henchmen then hide the bodies. Disguise yourself and make a move out into the open only to be questioned; then lure those who have realized into a secluded area and finish them off. Or go in guns blazing, assault rifle or double pistols in hand, taking out your target and many others.
IO Interactive has taken interactivity with the environment further for the series with Hitman: Absolution. There has always been something in terms of hiding bodies and contortion from your bullet impact, but now there’s more. You can shoot out someone’s feet from beneath them in order to get a clear shot at the kill, and as well as the many conveniently placed dumpsters, you can actually execute the ideas that come into your head by pushing a body over a wall or off a ledge to keep them out of sight.
Also, in touch of typical Hitman, AI aren’t dumb in the sense of badly programmed but have been purposely made to look stupid. For comic effect you’ll overhear conversations of someone trying to get out security work before it’s too late – last day before handing in the badge kind of jokes, among others – and it’s clear the developers enjoyed coming up with them by the creative scenarios they’ve devised to amuse you in this area. Plus the way in which you can strangle someone in the vicinity of his comrades while they all look the other way ensures gameplay ticks along, even though you have to ask why the wouldn’t be keeping in radio contact regularly in order to clock someone not responding and cotton on to 47’s infiltration.
The exception to this intentional stupidity is the check pointing system, which is really a bit stupid. You activate your own save checkpoints by approaching the appropriate beacons dotted around a level. Unfortunately, the result is an easier to miss save point making for further deductions in progress when you die and are reverted to last save. Its intentions were fine, because it’s obviously done to try to limit the saves to where you want them to be, hence avoiding any unwanted parts where you are trapped in by your most recent save…only it doesn’t fully eliminate this eventually either, so was done in vain.
One new feature is Instinct, which is a state of being activated by holding down the RB button. The explanation behind this is that your skills are so honed as an assassin, surpassing that of a normal human, you have a sixth sense which allows you to view the world in grey with your enemies highlighted in color.
Linking in with this Instinct mode is another addition called point-shooting, where you can break from cover and time stops while you line-up your shots in order to reflect your fast reaction times. Once you’ve marked the group of enemies for death you confirm your selection and an automated sequence plays where they are taken down one by one in quick succession. From a technical standpoint it isn’t flawless. A well worked development yes, but not without the minor issue of the camera juddering suddenly if you didn’t line up the targets to the game’s liking.
A lot of players, myself included, who played the Hitman: Sniper Challenge (given to most as a pre-order DLC bonus) were left wondering what relevance it had to the Hitman franchise and the then upcoming Hitman: Absolution. With Contracts mode I think these questions have been answered, through the clear parallels in presentation and score-chasing.
Contracts mode allows you to design a hit for others to attempt, or complete other people’s custom-built assignments. But there’s no level editor; creating an assignment is as simple as doing what you intend for them to do when on the mission maker mode, and the game makes a record of this and when they attempt it will score them based on how well they match your criteria. This means the better you do at your own mission, the more complicated it will make it for them, potentially sparking all sorts of competition among friends as they try to beat each others’ high scores.
Visuals & Audio:
Aside from negligible visual glitches that crop up when you give a player free reign to drag the AI bodies around, it’s a consistently good-looking game. From your surroundings to your costumes, it’s constantly being refreshed to give you something to look at. That said, female fans will probably have something to say about the over sexualization of all women featured on the game – a la that controversial trailer featuring the latex-clad, weapon-bearing nun assassins – which, frankly, is an unnecessary step to ship more units given the quality of everything else. Sound-wise it is also in good form, having scene-setting string instruments in the musical score when it need to create a tense atmosphere in addition to the previously praised voice-acting.
Overall:
While you can be as subtle as a rampaging bull smashing down a wall and goring the target with its horns if you choose (at least on the lower difficulties), you get more out of the game if you use the stealth elements. However, this has always been true for Hitman. Where Hitman: Absolution differs is that you can now do a mixture of the two and in more inventive ways than ever, leaning towards either side of the stealth-action divide as and when you see fit. Being able assess a situation then pick your own path through a level – a level which your friend might approach completely differently – means that not only are repeated play-throughs plausible but they’re actually enjoyable.
THQ has just released new gameplay footage for the sequel to their 2006 success, Company of Heroes.
The gameplay show large scale combat from the perspective of factions fighting on the eastern front. We’re shown combat in icy conditions, at one stage we see tanks falling through the ice (I hope that is a mechanic done well in the final product) due to enemy artillery fire, and the mayhem looks unreal.
Company of Heroes 2 looks to be staying pretty true its predecessor and not straying too far from the formula that made the original one of my favourite real-time strategy games of all time. Safe to say I am horrendously excited about this release.
Company of Heroes 2 is set to ship March of 2013, exclusive to the PC.
Beatshapers, a game development studio located in Kiev, Ukraine, have announced that their BreakQuest Bundle is now available on the Playstation Store in North America, Europe and PAL territories. The BreakQuest Bundle includes two games, BreakQuest, a 2009 Playstation Mini, and its sequel, BreakQuest Extra Evolution. The bundle is priced at €4.49 / £3.69. BreakQuest Extra Evolution is available separately for €3.99 / £3.49 in Europe.
BreakQuest can be described as a game that has a focus on breaking blocks, like Arkaniods. The bundle will feature over two hundred interactive physics action-packed levels and both games soundtracks for your listening pleasure, presumably during the game. You can check out the trailer for BreakQuest Extra Evolution below. If you want to buy the soundtracks to listen to while you travel or workout, you can purchase them at Bandcamp for $2.99.
NOTE: The following list is based on the opinions of the author
Traditionally, video game based films have performed rather poorly at the box office for a variety of reasons. Limited public interest in the subject matter; poor adaptations of the source material; or even the poor choices in casting and acting. However, it has not always been a case of doom and gloom for the video game industry on the big screen.
If the release and critical acclaim of Wreck It Ralph proves anything, it’s that a movie based on a video game CAN be done well. Its debut weekend takings have been the highest in Disney Animation Studios’ history. However, despite the hugely positive reviews amongst families and hardcore gamers alike, Wreck It Ralph was a film based on the game INDUSTRY in general and not the core lore or plots of the video games themselves.
So I asked myself, which game-based films did it right? For all the wrongs that have been done in the past, surely there were a few memorable diamonds in the rough. The best of the proverbial “worst”. And while it’s true that these films wouldn’t exactly be Oscar worthy, they’re still a damn lot of fun to watch for gamers.
To thin out the pack a little bit (and mostly to ignore the dozens of animate sub-par Pokémon movies out there), the only criteria I set for this list was that the movies in question have to be done in a live action format, as most serious Hollywood attempts are. So let’s take a look at the top five live action video game films!
Some honourable mentions go out to:
Dead or Alive, for being a martial arts movie with hardly any plot and lots of scantily clad women portraying a martial arts game with hardly any plot and lots of scantily clad women. A pretty damn accurate representation.
Doom, because that first person action segment was pretty damn cool. And it stuck to the plot of a universe pretty damn well.
#5 Lara Croft Tomb Raider: Cradle of Life
Action, adventure and fan service a plenty, this movie was actually quite popular amongst gamers in 2003. The movie had improved in key story and characterisation areas in comparison to the first Tomb Raider film, with significantly less goofiness and a lot more humanity to it. Angelia Jolie’s portrayal of Lara Croft was still spot on, and though it got a blasting by the “expert critics” it was the kind of action adventure film that viewers just couldn’t help be entranced by. There was definitely an Indiana Jones-esque appeal to it for the viewer that loves good old fashioned adventures. Plus, Angelina in a bathing suit, so, points given there. Let down by poor box office sales and a rather small target demographic, Cradle of Life has largely been forgotten. Still it’s a good film to consider viewing if you REALLY want to remember a time BEFORE Indiana Jones 4.
#4 Silent Hill
Still considered to be terrifying by today’s standards, Silent Hill the movie was actually very faithful to the source material, even going so far to use the original soundtracks from the game to capture the eerie settings and situations in that messed up little town. Of course the movie was far from perfect, plot points were confusing to the uninitiated, and some of the characters fell into horror movie cliché, (much like the modern standard of Silent Hill games.) However, the film was very good at adapting from the games, creating suspense, despair, fear and drama when necessary, each of which were central themes of the games. While a few obvious creative liberties were taken, such as using a female lead instead of a male one, the film still did a good job at doing what the games did: scaring the willies out of the audience, and giving us damn good reason to fear Pyramid Head, AGAIN.
#3 Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time
A pretty obvious choice for this list, as this film was one of the few video game based movies that actually performed well at the box office, and received better than average reviews. Adapting the video game of the exact same name, Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time took a great many number of creative liberties with the story. While the film makers kept the central lore of the PoP universe intact, characterisations and general story flow were completely re-written. The main character was no longer the stalwart serious prince, but rather a self questioning and sly rogue, fitting the Prince’s character into something of a maverick cliché. However, the film featured fantastic special effects, very well choreographed fight scenes, and was a thrilling ride from beginning to end. These features made the other complaints overlookable, and delivered a final film that was a pretty damn good adaptation of a video game.
#2 Mortal Kombat
Strictly talking about the first film ONLY, Mortal Kombat is perhaps the best aged example of a video game based film that captured its source material correctly. Released in 1995, Mortal Kombat the movie is still looked upon with fondness by gamers today. It had intense martial arts action, spectacular special effects for the day and age, as well as game references a plenty. While the film was criticised for not being as bloody or visceral as the games, it was able to capture the lore and plot of the games very well, which is saying a lot considering that fighting games usually have jack-crap for story. And let’s face it, even after all these years, that theme song still kicks ass.
And the number one video game live action film is:
#1 Halo: Forward Unto Dawn
Okay, so TECHNICALLY it’s both a series and a movie as a whole, and this will no doubt draw in snub nosed “Halo Fanboy” views from the opinionated COD playing masses, but it doesn’t detract from the fact that Halo: Forward Unto Dawn is the best example of how you do a video game live action movie RIGHT. The “film” was extremely faithful to the lore of the Halo universe, taking place in the very early years of the Covenant War. The film included appearances by multiple live action equivalents of characters from both games and novels, and did a fantastic job with special effects. Of course it is a film designed for Halo fans, but that doesn’t stop general action fans from enjoying it. The plot was well paced, mixing very strong themes of drama, action, and even a little bit of horror. The film crew were actually able to take those goofy looking coloured armor sets and weapons of the Covenant troops and turn them into something REALLY intimidating. And the moment the camera descends upon the Chief’s silhouette, you KNOW some ass kicking is about to go down. Sony can have Playstation Battle Royale All Stars, Microsoft and 343 KNOW how to treat their favourite series well. This film is still available for viewing on Machinama Prime and Halo Waypoint, with DVD and Blu-Ray releases set for release later this year.
Got your own opinions on a top 5 list? Share them below!
If you have been following the slow reveal of information for the 2013 Dragon Ball Z anime movie then you probably already know that the movie will be called Battle of Gods and would feature Goku and the cast fighting against Egyptian Gods.
