Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment today announces Mortal Kombat – most recent iteration in the Mortal Kombat franchise which made its way to Xbox 360 and PS3 earlier in the year – has sold in excess of three million units worldwide, making it the highest-selling fighting game this year.
Martin Tremblay, President of Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment, said: “We are very pleased with the success of Mortal Kombat, as it surpassed our expectations in becoming the #1 fighting game in North America released so far this year”.
NetherRealm Studios delivered a high quality game which has exceeded our sales goals. We’d like to thank our entire team and all of our partners for their innovative campaigns and tremendous support of Mortal Kombat, as the game sales continue to grow.”
Ed Boon, Creative Director, NetherRealm Studios, said: “All of us at NetherRealm Studios are very excited that players have embraced Mortal Kombat. The game was a labor of love for us and we could not be more pleased with its performance. Fan reaction to this latest installment has made all of our hard work worth it.”
Today at their Tokyo Game Show press conference, THQ revealed some details for their upcoming game Saints Row The Third. The first glimpse into the game came in the form of a short trailer, which features the Saints infiltrating a group of cyber criminals called the Deckers. Characters delve into a virtual reality world (ala the Matrix/Neuromancer) in order to defeat the team of cyber criminals. I thought this idea of a virtual world within a virtual world was rather interesting, especially when the phrase: “in the real world you’re just a bitch with the keyboard” was uttered. But lets steer away from that and onto more announcements!
Even bigger news came when celebrated Japanese Game designer, Tomonobu Itagaki graced the stage, revealing his fondness for the game after watching the trailer at E3, and another 14 viewings following the first. It was then announced that Itagaki himself would be a playable character in Saints Row The Third, featuring his trademark leather jacket and sunglasses. THQ showcased the high levels of customizability the game will have, before allowing us to get a hands on look at the game itself.
While the characters were already pre-designed by the time I turned up, some a little more appropriate than others, I still had the chance to edit the character. Built into the game are clothing shops, tattoo parlors and even a plastic surgeon, that allow for players to design and modify their playable character in amazing new ways.
Picking up where the player before me left of, with a guy in a green and blue superhero outfit, I roamed the streets getting the feel of the controls. Volition studio manager Eric Barker gave me a few pointers that helped make the game a lot more enjoyable than my initial roaming the streets throwing grenades.
Firstly, while walking around, you are able to sprint. While this feature may not seem like the most exciting news, it does mean that with a press of a button, your character will spring into a randomly generated melee attack and ground what ever poor victim is next to you. The maneuvers are clearly inspired by wrestling games, including power bombs and some rather aerodynamic jump kicks. I should also note that you are able to jump from tall buildings (in a single bound) and land safely, with the help of a parachute. While it isn’t ever visible until deployed, I am willing to accept this paradox mainly because the game is designed to be very out there, not to mention I am happy my character is able to land safely from dangerously high jumps. Another handy game element branching from sprinting includes being able to jump through car windows while running in order to steal them.
After rocketing through a glass window and driving away from the scene of the crime, I noticed a few other handy little game elements that stood out. Most notable was the GPS system, which as you can imagine, is accessible from the map and gives you directions to locations within the game world. I used this to find my way over to Professor Genki to par take in his Super Ethical Reality Climax. This is basically a little side game in the form of a shooting gallery. I didn’t have the time to develop the shooting skills to make my way through without being killed, but still really enjoyed the challenge. This and a few weapons developed by the Professor, such as the octopus gun, are some of the few new elements that are coming to the Saints Row Franchise.
At first I was unimpressed by Saints Row The Third. I am a bit of a stickler when it comes to the rules of games, and prefer a solid story line grounded in set rules and boundaries. After roaming around and conducting some open play, I found myself easily bored, but that is just me. When I started to get into the missions and the side quests, I found the game pretty enjoyable. Granted, I only played a demo and didn’t get to cater the experience to my personal taste as much as the developers allow you too so I can’t comment on what the increased player agency might bring to the formula in terms of game experience. Regardless, the anticipation for the release of Saints Row The Third is high, and with the release date set for the 15th of November in North America and the 17th in Japan, it won’t be long until you can experience Saints Row The Third too.
38 Studios and Electronic Arts have revealed a few of the items you will be able to receive if you preorder Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning. Depending on your choice of retailer, one of the 3 packs below will be yours. Which one will you be getting?
The Destinies Choice Pack: Offers a unique “Twist of Fate” card to enhance the beginning of your gameplay experience, the Compass of Fate and three unique armor sets. Each armor set is tailored to a specific class which players will define and redefine during their time in Amalur.
The Fate-Touched Weapons Pack: Players can enter battle as fully prepared as ever with an arsenal of rare Fate-Touched weapons including a longbow, hammer, staff, faeblades, daggers, scepter, chakrams, longsword and greatsword. The weapons will help satisfy every player’s combat style with Reckoning’s on-the-fly weapon swapping in combat to take down even the most dreadful of foes.
The Ultimate Treasure Hunter Pack: For treasure hunters who will dive into every nook and cranny in the world of Amalur, the Dowsing Rod will seek out all reagents for concocting potions on your in-game map. A worthy companion tool for any adventurer, the Dowsing Rod will help players get the most out of their alchemy skill.
Harmonix has revealed 7 new tracks that will be available on the Dance Central 2 disc. In addition to these 7, over 40 songs will be included for you to shake it to. Plus, you’ll be able to import your Dance Central 1 disc music, and we expect to see some DLC for this game too. The 7 seven songs that were announced at TGS are as follows:
Mary J. Blige – Real Love
Chingy – Right Thurr
Missy Elliott – Get Ur Freak On
Kevin Lyttle – Turn Me On
New Boyz – You’re A Jerk
Atlantic Connection and Armanni Reign – Reach
Remy Ma – Conceited (There’s Something About Remy)
At TGS 2011, Turn 10 has said that they are bringing some Japanese racing tracks to the next game in their series. Forza 4 will include “four legendary Japanese tracks – Motegi, Fujimi Kaido, Tsukuba and Suzuka.” Which track is your favorite?
Forza 4, which continues the critically acclaimed realistic racing series, will launch exclusively on the Xbox 360 on October 11 for the USA, October 14 for Europe and October 20 for the rest of the world. Considering that the previous games in this franchise have been silky smooth and awesome, we expect nothing less from Forza 4.
Today at Tokyo Game Show, I had the opportunity to speak to Jonny Plumb, producer over at Microsoft Studios and got some one on one time with both Kinect Disney Adventures and also Kinet Star Wars.
Both titles were announced at this years E3 for the Xbox 360 Kinect and I was eager to try out the updated builds.
With Disney Adventure I got to experience first hand two Disney attractions out of the possible 30, Alice in Wonderland and Peter Pan. Along with being able to navigate through an amazing looking recreation of Disneyland filled with all the Disney mascots, like Donald Duck, Mickey, Peter Pan and Alice just to name a few. The park is also filled with people walking around making it look and feel even more authentic and real.
Using the Kinect once you find a special character such as Donald you can greet him and perform all sorts of gestures, such as hugs, dances, posing for a picture with the Kinect camera and even perform a high five. It’s an absolute ball for the younger kids.
The two attractions I tested out was Peter Pan, here you fly through obstacles along-side Peter Pan whilst collecting coins and collectibles along the way. In Alice in Wonderland you’re thrown into the Croquet scene from the movie, but this time you’re not hitting the ball, you are the ball. Alice will whack you with her pink flamingo and you’ll have to navigate through obstacles once again and collect more coins. Both mode’s control systems reminded me of Kinect Adventures with its maneuvering, which works really well as players and younger children who have already played that game should feel right at home here.
Next we jumped in to Kinect Star Wars and tested out two new modes. Pod Racer and Rancor mode. Testing out Ranco mode honestly reminded me of the old classic RAMPAGE. You move the Rancor by walking on the spot, then with your arms you can pick up enemies and throw them, smash the ground and even destroy buildings by walking into or punching them. It’s good old fashioned clobbering time that I think we all need once in a while. Also in Rancor mode you get given objectives to do like destroy 10 enemies or plow through set amount of buildings, if you do you get bigger bonuses if you complete them. But you don’t have to if you don’t want to, and just walk around and cause all sorts of mayhem my destroying everything in your path.
Next we tested out the Pod Racer mode, and was instantly impressed with how it worked. Using both hands you maneuver the pod left and right depending on what hand you’re leaning towards. Pulling back together breaks, and pulling forward thrusts you forward very quickly. Jonny advised that Pod Racer has a huge amount of gameplay and will take up to 10 hours to go through and complete, very impressive for a game with in another game.
All in all both titles were great fun to play and should keep you and the children busy for hours on end.
Along with the great announcement of the Razer Arcade Stick mentioned at this years TGS 2011, Razer have also been working together with DICE to bring us the Battlefield 3Â Keyboard and Xbox 360 controller.
Hilmar Hahn, product Evangelist runs us through our hands on preview on the Battlefield 3 Blackwidow Ultimate keyboard and Xbox Onza Controller. No major differences or tweaks in terms of functionalty have been made to either products apart from the lights on the Blackwidow are now changed to Orange to suite Battlefield 3 and of course the Battlefield 3 skins which look great on both the products.
Enjoy the video preview and the pics, leave a comment below and let us know what you think.
Welcome to Capsule Computers’ first ever Monthly Member Rewards Giveaway!
On the 15th of every month we will announce a member and send them a PRIZE from our lucky dip draw! Just think of it as our own way of saying thank you for making us your #1 stop for video games and pop culture news and reviews. We love to reward members by giving away games and other cool prizes to those who stick by us! This month’s WINNER is:
ITz Jok3R
Congratulations! Our Editor-In-Cheif MasterAbbott will be contacting you shortly. Be sure to check your E-mail, we hope you enjoy your prize! 🙂
WANT TO WIN COOL GAMES AND STUFF LIKE ITz Jok3R?
We’re giving away various X-Box 360, PlayStation 3, Wii, P.C., iPhone, X-Box Live Arcade and PlayStation Network games as well Amazon Vouchers and we can’t wait to give them away!
All you got to do is register as a member of Capsule Computers to be in the running for a chance to WIN! For hints, tips and the rules go here for more info.
BONUS AWESOME GIVEAWAY!
Miss out and STILL want to win? We’ve got ANOTHER give away going on RIGHT NOW! We’ve got 20 copies of the IOS game Little Dreamer to give away! Go here for more details! The competition ends in 3 days on the 18th of September, 11:59PM EST, so be quick!
Today we spoke to Hilmar Hahn, Product Evangelist for Razer at this years Tokyo Game Show 2011. Hilmar walks us through the Razer Ultimate Arcade Stick for the XBOX 360 and PC. The Ultimate Arcade Stick is co-developed by Razer and the arcade stick community. The Arcade stick is being developed with real pro-gamer feedback from over 200+ specially selected top-seed Street Fighter IV pro-gamers, influential modders and members of the arcade enthusaist community. Currently in prototype stage the Razer Arcade Stick, even in its early stages is looking very impressive.
Check out the video preview below with Hilmar and let us know what you think of it. Will it have what it takes to take down the other great arcade sticks out there.
Competitive gaming in the UK has never been more popular – that’s the news to emerge from the recent insomnia43 event, as organiser Multiplay unveils the show audit.
Insomnia43 took place over the August Bank Holiday weekend (26th-29th August) at the Telford International Centre. Organisers have revealed that over 5,060 gamers passed through the doors to compete for a total prize pot worth in excess of ÂŁ50,000.
insomnia43 broke the world records for biggest ever Team Fortress 2 tournament (in terms of prize fund and total number of players) and the event also set a new UK record for the highest number of gamers on one network, as over 2,500 players were connected at one time.
The UK representatives for the World Cyber Games were picked for Star Craft II and League of Legends. Samayan ‘Bling’ Kay triumphed at Blizzard Entertainment’s real-time strategy game, whilst Joe ‘Moojuic3’ Hill, Mark ‘Kaution’ Dennett, Scott ‘Terrroronyou’ Musgrove, Iain ‘mrunhappy’ Sully and Ben ‘Tempestra’ Farrimond won League of Legends – all bagging-expenses-paid trips to represent their country in the European final in Poland, and the world final in South Korea.
“insomnia43 exceeded our expectations,” says Craig Fletcher, MD, Multiplay. “With over 5,000 through the door, over a quarter of a million viewers watching the live streams online and some real spikes in all-round activity, we’ve shown again there is a real hunger for a large-scale competitive gaming event. In the last 30 days alone, the insomnia43 site has had close to five million pages views, and over 1.1 million visitors. The videos from the event have already been viewed over 100,000 times.
“We’ve already announced insomnia44, which we expect to be the largest winter event of its kind.”
Insomnia43 also boasted the first ever UK consumer appearance of Battlefield 3 on PC as part of an exhibition space which included stands from Currys, PC World, Samsung, Medion, liyama, ASUS, Riot Games, Aquatuning, ESET UK, Sapphire, Anthony Nolan, Kingston, Pro Class TV, Quiet PC, Razer, Ttesports, Kustom PC and Antec, to name but a few, making it the biggest insomnia exhibition space yet.
Today at Tokyo Game Show, I had the opportunity to speak to Jonny Plumb, producer over at Microsoft Studios and got some one on one time with both Kinect Disney Adventures and also Kinet Star Wars.
