Yesterday Telltale revealed to the world that The Walking Dead The Game will be released in five episode bits starting in “late April.” Today they released the below trailer which not only lets us know how much each episode will cost but also a way to save some money and win a neat contest.
Those who wish to buy each episode separately will need to pay $5 on PSN, PC and Mac, 400 Microsoft Points on XBLA or they can purchase the full $25 season pass from Telltale’s store. However those who pre-order it for the PC and the Mac will receive a 10% discount and only have to pay $22.50. Those who pre-order will also be entered into a contest that will allow players to be drawn into the fourth episode as a human survivor who won’t live very long.
Digital Leisure must have decided that they wouldn’t allow anymore information to be leaked out by lowly ratings boards and have today revealed that not only is Dragon’s Lair coming to the XBLA, it is also going to be using the Kinect.
According to PlayXBLA the game will be the very first XBLA game that will allow players to play with either the Kinect or the traditional controller set up. As seen above players can perform various actions to avoid dangers, though some will obviously choose to play with the normal controller. Good to see that even an ancient title like Dragon’s Lair can still see some new features.
Remember Gears of War 3? It brought an end to a long running series exclusive to the Xbox 360 last year, unfortunately as the months have gone past and new games have been released, it has fallen by the wayside. However Epic Games is doing their best to keep the game in headlines as today they have revealed a new major title update that will be released for the game tomorrow.
The update will add in some new features to the game as well as fix various balancing issues and glitches that have plagued the online mode of the title. It seems relevant enough that they handle this update now as the Forces of Nature DLC package that comes out next week may bring some lost fans back to the herd for a few matches.
Azkend 2 HD: The World Beneath Developer:10tons Ltd Publisher: 10tons Ltd Platforms: iPad (Reviewed), iPhone, iPod Touch Release Date: March 14, 2012 Price: $3.99 Available Here
Overview
Azkend 2 HD takes the classical match three gameplay and adds a short story line, beautiful artwork, and great music. However, is this enough to cover up flaws associated with the difficulty level of the game and interruptions to gameplay?
Visuals
Azkend 2 features hand drawn artwork that is second to none. This game needs to be played on the iPad to truly appreciate exactly how beautiful the art is. Although the Retina screen on the iPhone 4/4s and iPod Touch Fourth Generation is a great screen, short of holding your device four inches from your eyes, there is simply not enough screen space to fully enjoy the graphics.
The developers promise for an update in the near future to support the new iPad’s Retina screen. If they can maintain the quality of art they currently have, they can easily have some of the prettiest art on the new screen. Animations are simple but smooth. Azkend 2 is a visually flawless game fitting its mood perfectly.
Audio
The audio feature that stands out the most is the top notch voice acting job featured in Azkend 2. The game is narrated by a female voice that provides the background story for Azkend 2. Considering most games on iOS lack a voice acting component, let alone such a well done and professional job, Azkend 2’s audio is impressive on that fact alone.
However the rest of the audio experience lives up to the standard set up by the voice acting. Sound effects are bright and varied, while the music is airy and pleasant to listen to for long periods of time.
Gameplay
Azkend 2 at its core is a puzzle game using the match three format. Players draw a line with their finger to match three or more of the same tile to destroy the tiles and cause a variety of effects. There are several different variations to the gameplay, ranging from destroying bugs on the play area to fighting fires spreading across the board. Games are limited by time, providing short intense burst of puzzling fun. Challenge mode has two modes, Time Challenge and Medals.
Time challenge mode provides a short burst of gameplay, pitting players to rake in the highest score possible in a set period of time. Medal mode allows players to replay levels from Adventure mode to earn medals for high scores. These modes add an element of replayability to Azkend 2,
The Adventure mode provides a simple storyline and a strong entry point into the game. Each chapter seems to focus on one variation of game play which I find to be extremely disappointing. Although I appreciate the very slow ramp up of difficulty in the beginning, playing a similar level three times in a row can become boring quickly. The slow ramp up of difficulty suddenly ends at around the seventh or eighth chapter when the game suddenly becomes extremely difficult.
Suddenly I found the requirements to beat a level suddenly goes from simple skill to quick thinking, smart inventory decisions, and most importantly sheer luck and tenacity. The biggest issue is the constant lack of moves, forcing the game to pause gameplay to shuffle the board. This inability to properly balance the difficulty ramp up is not only extremely annoying but can be a frustrating turn off for the game.
The spot the hint mini game in Adventure mode is an interesting choice for an intermission mini game. The game tests players’ observation skills by providing small hint of the hand drawn scenery and requires the player to correctly identify the area where the hint is located. This mini game can become extremely challenging when hints are turned upside down or sideways. The mini game is a novel distraction and a great excuse to appreciate the beautiful hand drawn scenes in Azkend 2.
The controls in Azkend 2 are responsive, however I strongly recommend playing this on the iPad over the smaller iPhone or iPod Touch screens. The size of the tiles on the smaller screens can cause selection errors and hinder game play. I consider myself to have very small hands and I found myself having trouble once in a while. I suspect those with much larger fingers will find Azkend 2’s small size on the iPhone and iPod extremely difficult to use.
Overall
Azkend 2 HD: The World Beneath is a solid puzzling game with some quirky game play issue that may plague some players. The game’s difficulty suddenly ramps up steeply, starting from a casual puzzling game to an extremely difficult game mixing luck and skill. Patient puzzlers and those looking for a high quality casual game will find a gold mine in Azkend 2 HD. However the price of $3.99 USD may scare off some buyers. I strongly recommend Azkend 2 HD as a buy on sale game until some of the game play issues are ironed out.
Based on the miniature wargame of the same name, Confrontation features comprehensive tactical decision making and a solid roleplaying experience. It is developed by Cyanide, who are also working on the Game of Thrones RPG, and looks very good indeed. Not long ago, we got our hands on a preview demo of the game, which you can read all about here.
The game will be hitting shelves and online stores for PC April 5th, 2012. Along with this announcement, Cyanide have released a selection of new screenshots, featuring the wolf-like Griffin squad. Be sure to check out more details on the game, including screenshots and videos, on the Confrontation site.
This Spring, Frogger is coming back for it’s 30th anniversary and it’s way bigger than its original release. Frogger Hyper Arcade Edition is set to be released for Xbox Live Arcade, Playstation Network, WiiWare, and smartphones, Frogger: Hyper Arcade Edition takes it way further than just hopping across ponds and roads.
Adding all new modes including but not limited to Tile Capture, Battle Royale, and Freak Out as covered in a press release from Konami. Competitive is also in the cards for the game as it will allow players to go against friends or the CPU in up to 4 person play matches. But, the game goes even father than just new modes and also allows for different skins ranging from the original Frogger, to a neon style epitomizing Hyper Acade, to other Konami mainstays like Castlevania and Contra.
The latest issue of Magazine Special announced that it would be starting a new series in the next issue, out April 20th. The series will be titled Puchi Puchi Tan Tan Puchi Tan Tan. While the title doesn’t give away much about what the series could be yet, the creator is Tozen Ujiie, known for Seitokai Yakuindomo, a continuing manga series that began in 2007 and received a single season anime in 2010.
For those that don’t know, Seitokai Yakuindomo is the story of Takatoshi Tsuda, a high school boy, who is one of the first boys to attend the newly co-ed Ōsai Academy, formally an all-girl school. Joining the student council mostly as a male representative, he finds the girls on the council to be very dirty minded and becomes the butt of their playful teasing.
An amazing series itself, it sets a high standard for Puchi Puchi Tan Tan Puchi Tan Tan, that hopefully it can live up to.
You may know Halfbrick as the Australian studio that made the well-known Fruit Ninja game, that has spread from mobile to Kinect, or even their more recent Jetpack Joyride. Well, they’ve just bought Onan Games, which you shouldn’t kick yourself for if you don’t recognize it off the bat.
Onan Games is a company based in Spain whose major claim to fame is Mandreel. Mandreel is a special piece of work that lets users write in a single code base, but still allow support for multiple platforms, instead of having to work at porting it from one platform to another after the fact.
What does that mean for Halfbrick? That they can now more easily spread their games from mobile apps to the web and continue to do so for future releases.
What does it mean for us? That pretty soon we might not need Android, iOS, or Kinect to go ninja on some fruit or joyride on a jetpack.
In what would be a victory for Sony, the Playstation Vita has picked up the Red Dot Award in Innovative Product Design. The award is given out by Design Zentrum Nordrhein Westfalen of Germany and it is internationally recognised award. The judges of the award consist of people in the fields of product design, communication design, and design concepts. The PS3 Wireless Stereo Headset, PS3 Wireless Keyboard and PS3 3D Display had also won awards in design quality.
The announcement that the Playstation Vita will receive these awards were accompanied by a comment by SCE President Andrew House:
To be recognized for our commitment to product design by leading industry experts is a fantastic achievement for SCE. We are particularly thrilled with the reaction and expectation to the recently launched PS Vita in North America, and Europe, the ultimate portable entertainment system, especially the introduction of innovative new ways to play and interact. Winning a red dot award for product design further establishes PS Vita as the must-have portable entertainment system across the world.
To bring in the scope of the Vita winning these awards, the Red Dot Awards brought in 4,515 entries from 58 countries. Only 67 products were given an award in design and Sony has picked up four of them, with their new handheld gaming device the highlight. A great achievement by Sony Computer Entertainment and the designers behind the Vita.
For those who still remember Final Fantasy Versus XIII and are waiting for news on the game, Testuya Nomura has some bad news. In the latest issue of Famitsu, Nomura reveals that there is a demo that is nearly ready for demonstration, however, the original timeline in that demonstration has been shifted, delaying the reveal due to an “unrelated circumstance.” An interesting reason for a delay, which will certainly frustrate some fans of the game, who have heard nothing since last year’s trailer at the1st Production Conference.
This is the last of the Fabula Nova Crystallis games that needs to see a release. So far, three games have already been released under that banner. Kingdom Hearts fans would also be frustrated at the announcement since the game development team’s next project happens to be Kingdom Hearts 3. Hopefully this delay will not be long since many would want his game to be out the door some in the next year or so. Final Fantasy Versus XII was announced alongside Final Fantasy XIII and Final Fantasy Type-0 (known as Final Fantasy Agito XIII) back in 2006 at that year’s E3. This will be the sixth year the game has been languishing in development.
