And so the Dirt Phenomena continues with Codemasters release of their new trailer Boost to Win, showcasing some gameplay from the upcoming extension to the Dirt family, the aptly named Dirt Showdown. We have already seen some footage from the game and from the latest video its clear that morals and ethics are thrown out the window as players are encouraged to destroy the oppostion and do anything in order to beat off the competition. The environments and terrains are wide, varied and brutal and from snow to dust players will have to manipulate their way through pin point turns, over jumps and through barrrels on the road to victory. Just to reiterate the 3 main events included in Showdown are Domination, where players have to set the fastest sector times throughout the track, Eliminator, which is stock standard dropping of the last car at certain points and Face Off, which is an all out manic race where anything goes. Another totally new addition is the inclusion of a nitrous boost system which adds a new element to the Dirt experience.
Showdown has a emphasis on the online component of the game, being what Codemasters describe as their most “connected” game ever, featuring split screen multiplayer action, 8 player online races as well as quick fire party games and Youtube integration.
and…
a special for all those Australian and NZ residents, as Codemasters have announced the HOONIGANS edition featuring all the content of the stadard edition plus bonus MONSTER and HOONIGAN liveries as well as a Head Start Pack, chock full of goodies.
Dirt Showdown edition will be available May 2012 for the XBox 360, PS3 and PC, and the Hoonigan edition which is only available to Australian and NZ residents will only be on sale for a limited period of time for $79.95AUD and $99.95 for New Zealand residents.
Aksys Games, publisher of really cool and obscure video games, and in particular the Guilty Gear and BlazBlue games, have shared some more information and screens for their upcoming Nintendo 3DS adventure game, Shifting World.
The story of this game revolves around a man who gets invited into a mysterious dimension by the ‘The Duke of Shadows’. The game has a rather cool black and white graphic novel look to it and will be a visual novel style adventure game filled with clever puzzles. The puzzles make use of this rather interesting mechanic where you can change the colour of the in-game world between Black and White. 3D functionality of the Nintendo 3DS will also add some depth to the puzzles.
The game is set to arrive for the Nintendo 3DS in North America this month.
Could you perhaps be a fan of Simon Belmont? Or perhaps you frequent a world filled with Creepers? If so, I may just have something that may be of interest to you. Renowned Gamer ‘Nario’ has uploaded a video to youtube, revealing his latest creation – a Castlevania map.
The video can be seen below. It features ‘Nario’ showing off his Minecrafted homage to the legendary Castlevania. He has even made the map available for download here, the texture pack is downloadable here and the Simon Belmont skin is available here.
Be sure to let us know what you think of this awesome video-game mash-up in the comments section below. Also if you are interested in seeing more videos from ‘Nario’ you can check out his youtube channel here.
Coming in with the new 1.2 “Legacy” major content update for Star Wars The Old Republic is the latest Warzone, Novare Coast. This warzone is set on the war-torn planet of Denova and players will have to work together to control the beach-head, which is a major strategic point and pivotal for both sides to gain ownership of.
Players will be battling the opposing faction for control over three mortar cannons placed on the arena to help control the enemies numbers by pounding them with artillery fire. The warzone is going to be inserted into the game on the 12th of April with the coinciding server downtime for Patch 1.2’s insertion into the game. Yes this means that Patch 1.2 “Legacy” will be going up in a couple of days.
Bleach The Movie 3 – Fade To Black Studio: Studio Pierrot Publisher: Madman Release Date: March 21, 2012 Format: Blu-Ray Disc (Reviewed), DvD Price: $29.95 (Buy Here)
Overview
What would your life be like if someone in your life was removed from your memory? What if that person was removed from the worlds memory? How many events would have not occurred between you and other people that you met through that person? This is the main premise behind Bleach The Movie 3 – Fade To Black.
Bleach is one of the longest serving Anime series in Japan. The series is also being aired in the US and AU regions and is an incredibly popular series with an incredibly large fanbase in these regions. The series follows the adventures of Ichigo Kurosaki who is a reaper in the Soul Society. The movie however, has the Soul Society acting against Ichigo thanks to the circumstances within the movie.
Story
The Soul Society is attacked by an unknown enemy with the power to remove the memory of a person from the collective memory of everyone they have come into contact with. This is a story of friendship, compassion and bonds that go beyond just friendship.
While the major elements seem to be friendship based, it is often apparent that this movie was an excuse to see the members of the Soul Society battle each other. This is often evidenced by the people fighting having very little amounts of logic when it comes to dealing with certain plot elements but instead opt to beat each other to death with swords and other mystical powers. And just when another character turns up, you kind of hope that they’ll bring in some sense, but instead they join in on the brawl and just exacerbate the problem. It isn’t until right near the end where, if you weren’t familiar with the series, some unknown characters turn up and get everyone to be friends again and work together.
What I particularly enjoyed about the story though, was it’s concept. The whole idea that the memory of a person can be removed from the collective consciousness of everyone that they’ve met is quite fascinating. The story also tries to deal with the elements that come into play when this kind of thing occurs, and it succeeds in getting you to think about these things. While some liberties had been taken on the whole concept in order to get the story to actually work, I felt that it tackled the theme quite well, even if it was an excuse to get all the main characters to do battle with one and another.
Visuals
Visually Fade To Black is quite amazing. I mean, it definitely looks like the visuals either had a really strong studio behind it, a lot of money behind it, or a bit of both. While watching the movie, it was very difficult to find any flaws in the animation, heck I couldn’t find any tells of visual shortcuts being taken either.
Some of the most impressive aspects of Fade To Blacks animation comes from the visual quality of the characters and their designs. What I found most impressive about the characters was the fact that they have aged throughout the series and that the movie reflects this, instead of focusing on an era where the characters were younger in order to draw in a larger audience. I also like that the character designs reflected the characters ages appropriately and when that one part of the movie plays with a flashback from past scenes, it really emphasises the amount of growth that the characters have undertaken. This not only applies physically, but mentally as well.
The fight scenes in this movie are amazing, as someone who has only really seen the first season, I can see why this series still has such a strong fanbase today. Like really, even the background mooks that are there only to serve as fodder are pretty cool in their own right. I mean, combat-wise, you’ve got attacks flying everywhere, massive swords, awesome special-attacks and some fairly well design characters doing the fighting. It really felt like the weight of the battle was being shown in the flow of the animation.
Audio
Audibly, Bleach The Movie 3 – Fade To Black wasn’t an example of a movie with a poor audio quality. Conversely, it wasn’t a work of art, sent down by God themself either. This is a point that’s hard to talk about because the audio worked in all aspects of the movie and it worked well, but it also felt very standard.
It’s not like the movie was poorly voiced or anything, considering both the English and Japanese dialogue were incredibly believeable (however I am not a native Japanese speaker, so I can be the authority on Japanese voice acting), but I do have to say that I enjoyed the English Dub much more than the Japanese.
One thing I really wanted to bring up from the Audio was the song that plays in the menus and at the end of the movie. I’m not entirely sure if I love the hell out of it, or if I want to be removed from the collective consciousness of humanity. What did everyone else think of it? I’m really on both sides of an ever-extending pole on this one.
Extras
Unfortunately for us people that love bonus features, Fade To Black seems to be pretty light on them. Included with the package are only three features and two of them are trailer related.
Here are the Special Features listed on the disc –
Japanese Movie Trailers
English Movie Trailers
Production Art Gallery
While the Special Features are scant, the production art gallery is a pretty cool extra that I’d suggest everyone take a look at.
Overall
Bleach The Movie 3 – Fade To Black is a definite must-have movie for all die-hard Bleach fans. It has a lot of interesting plot points and some really decent action that make it ideal for the Bleach fanatic to own and watch. Even if you’re not a massive fan of the series but want something that you can watch, be entertained and possibly even get you to think about, then this movie is also for you.
One of the biggest complaints people may have about today’s gaming generation is the fact that the games are becoming easier and easier. Even the shmup genre has been toned down from time to time, with some recent releases offering barely any difficulty level for those who like a challenge.
However there is a game that will be coming sometime this spring season that doesn’t want you to forget about its difficulty level. In fact, Rising Star Games has released the below trailer for said game that introduces us to three of its gameplay modes which are Arcade, Climax and Slash mode as well as a co-op option for two people.
However these modes all have one key feature… the amount of projectiles flying your way. These types of games aren’t called bullet hell shooters for no reason!
The wait is finally over as ArenaNet and NCsoft open the floodgates for gamers to pre-purchase Guild Wars 2. With three potential products to purchase, players will decide what copy best suit their needs as the launch day approaches. Here are the following prices: Digital Edition ($59.99 US / $69.99 AU), Digital Deluxe ($79.99 US / $89.99 AU), and Collector’s Edition ($149.99 US / $199.95 AU).
For additional information about each edition, please check out our (Pre-Purchase for Guild Wars 2 Announced) page. Additionally, pre-purchasing the game today will provide gamers with exclusive bonuses no matter what edition is bought. Each edition will contain access to all Guild Wars 2 beta events, three day head start, and an in-game item called Hero’s Band. Save your copy now by buying one of the three products at the (US) or (AU) site.
GAMEVIL has just released ADVENA onto Google Play, but even better is that it’s available for free. Already on the iOS, ADVENA finally makes its way to Android with it’s Party Play system that puts players in charge of 3 characters in a raid team, who can switch out at any time to change up the combat. With different classes of fighters and casters, all with 18 skills, and hundreds of armor and costume items, ADVENA gives players plenty of choices and freedom to customize.
ADVENA tells the story of Urus, who must band with others to put an end to the war between the Tems Alliance and the Nabe across more than 200 stages. The game features both PvP and PvE, so players can go for glory or work on leveling their team up. Even more, players can hire other users’ characters via the Mercenary system to aide them in healing, defending, or attacking. Download it today HERE.
Konami have announced that Pro Evolution Soccer 2012 have reached one million units sold exclusively in Latin America and now to celebrate, the price of the game will drop as of April 10.
The price drop will apply for Xbox 360, PS3 as well as the PC versions of the game. With all the top leagues around the world heading into the final stretch, with top spot still up for grabs in most, not to mention the semi finals of the UEFA Champions league approaching, PES 2012 allows new fans the chance to pick up a controller and get in on the action.
The price will still naturally vary across retailers as well as of course across different countries.
We already know that Pokémon + Nobunaga’s Ambition will be released in North America under its new title, Pokémon Conquest but what about the rest of the world? Well at least Australia will be getting the title because even though Nintendo hasn’t announced a PAL version of the game, a rating for Pokémon Conquest has appeared via the Australian Classification Board.
The North American release of Pokémon Conquest is on June 18th so one can expect the European and Australian release dates to follow shortly after, but for now this can be seen as a 95% true rumor. Seems like even SRPG versions of Pokémon games get worldwide releases, to bad other series don’t receive the same love.
