The season for shopping. It ’tis upon us. And on the greatest day of them all, Black Friday of course, there are many a gaming deal to be had. Be cautious though. There are those who wish to trample, steal and take away your cheaply gotten goods. If you wish to tread the dangerous walk of the darkest Friday of the year, you will be be henceforth rewarded though. Afterall, when else would you be able to nab a copy of Arkham City for a mere $28? Be sure to cast your eyes upon the Walmart Black Friday ad, page 8-9, for even more gaming goodness.
Not much to report other than the fact that it’s good news! Ubisoft confirmed that the next game in the Assassin’s Creed series will ship on PC without Ubisoft’s notoriously disliked ‘always on’ anti-piracy software.
The news comes from gaming site Rock Paper Shotgun, which played with the theory that because of the technical issues and widespread consumer revulsion associated with always-on DRM, Ubisoft may be turning its back on the practice. It can only be a good thing, as the strategy only caused more bad than good across the community.
So will Ubisoft continue down this path without the DRM for PC releases in future? Perhaps that is now the case.
Famitsu, one of, if not the biggest Japanese video game magazine in existence, has reviewed Ni No Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch, thanks to Andriasang. Now, if you are not familiar with how Famitsu scores work, basically there are four reviewers who give the game a score out of ten. Then each score is added together to give an overall score of forty. Quite simple, actually.
So how did Ni No Kuni fare in Famitsu eyes? Well here were the scores from each reviewer:
Reviewer 1: 8
Reviewer 2: 9
Reviewer 3: 10
Reviewer 4: 9
That’s a total score of 36 out of a possible 40, which is an outstanding score. Wow, one reviewer gave it a ten. Must have been impressed. Also, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 Subbed Edition was also released. It had received 10, 10, 9, 10 for a total of 39/40. This is very surprising as first person shooters are not popular in Japan, let alone Western developed games, save a fair few. Square Enix publishes Call of Duty in Japan.
Here are the other games reviewed in this week’s Famitsu, including Ultimate Marvel vs Capcom 3, Saints Row: The Third and even Battlefield 3:
If you have Vidzone for the Playstation 3 and has recently booted it up, then you may have noticed that the software has changed its look somewhat. That is because the video streaming service has received a user interface upgrade to allow a better way to enjoy the 1000s of music videos in amazing full-screen quality. Navigation isn’t the only update for the service. As a whole, the service has received an upgrade to allow a more simpler way to find your favourite music track. The upgrade comes with new features, such as:
Zones: Instead of browsing through thousands of videos, users can go straight to a Zone that suits them most. Zones categorise music videos by genre or theme and direct users to the type of videos they want to see the most – making is easier and more fun to discover new videos or artists – Rock Zone, Pop Zone, Hip-Hop Zone, Party Zone or Live Zone are just a few examples.
My Zone: Create a completely customized experience with the new My Zone feature. Music video lovers can add all their favourite playlists or TV channels and start building a library of only the music videos they love the most – then jump straight into the content from the VidZone home screen.
V-Mix: This smart playlist generator will play music videos by artists similar to what the user is watching at that time.
Social Connectivity: Confessing your love for a music video is simple. With Facebook integration users can share all their recommendations with their friends and with a few simple clicks they can invite PSN friends to join them in VidZone just as easily.
Optimised Search: Completely updated, VidZone now offers up-front shortcuts to the most popular content, as well as a redesigned search function including ‘similar artist’ functionality that makes finding videos quick and easy. Brand new progressive search instantly displays results of artists / videos by just typing a few letters. The more letters typed, the more defined the search.
Vidzone is available for download on the Playstation Network. If you already have it, then the update will have already be done, so just boot it up and enjoy.
Who the heck said mobile gaming was for casual gamers? Not all of us are n00bs, and Electronic Arts knows that! EA have been one of the leading publishers in IOS gaming for a while now, providing some of the most highest quality games on mobile devices and catering to the hardcore market in multiple genres while many are afraid to even attempt it.
This weekend, EA are celebrating this with many hit franchises such as Battlefield, Need for Speed, Fight Night, Mortal Kombat and Command & Conquer on for sale at really, really, cheap prices-up to 80% off! Check out the full list below to see what’s on sale.
Dead Space™ (iPhone)
Dead Space™ (iPad)
Battlefield: Bad Company™ 2 (iPhone)
Battlefield: Bad Company™ 2 (iPad)
Command & Conquer™ Red Alert (iPad)
Fight Night Champion (iPhone)
Mirror’s Edge™ (iPad)
NBA JAM (iPad)
NBA JAM (iPhone)
Need for Speed™ Hot Pursuit (iPhone)
Need for Speed™ Hot Pursuit (iPad)
Reckless Racing (iPad) – 60% off
Rock Band Reloaded (iPad) – 50% off
Need For Speed Shift 2 Unleashed™ (iPhone) – 67% off
Need For Speed Shift 2 Unleashed™ (iPad) – 60% off
TRANSFORMERS™: DARK OF THE MOON (iPhone) – 67% off
Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 (iPad) – 60% off
Many of these awesome titles are as cheap as 99 cents. So be quick, sale ends Monday!
Independent developer Casual Box Studio have announced that their point-and-click adventure game, Age of Enigma will be receiving a Special Edition for the Mac App Store in early December, with an iPad version soon to follow in January 2012. For those who missed out on the original release on Windows, Age of Enigma follows medium Ashley Reeves through exotic locales ranging from ancient Egypt to classical Japan to pirate-filled seas as she helps six unrestful ghosts find peace.
Combining a mixture of puzzle solving, mini-games, and an intriguing mix of casual and adventure gameplay, Age of Enigma offers a more story-driven experience in casual mode, and also a longer experience with more freedom in adventure mode. With a haunting soundtrack (which you can buy on iTunes here!) and striking cartoon artwork, this ghostly Special Edition will include an additional mini-game, brining the total to an exciting 26 mini-games!
These releases will be fully localized in English, French, Spanish, Italian, German, Danish, Swedish, and Portuguese. The Mac App Store version will see an early December release, with the iPad version seeing an early January 2012 release. For more information, check out the official website here, or simply watch the trailer below!
Kill3rCombo has just released its latest content patch for Elsword. The patch for the manga inspired MMO includes an increased level cap to 50; an enhanced PvP system allowing players to enter PvP battles anytime in the game with new and improved auto matching capabilities; the opportunity for players to earn more experience points by raiding dungeons with friends and purchase over 400 new equipment using Arena Points; and the highly anticipated release of the final two levels of Velder.
In the world of Elsword, the El Stone is a huge gem that was in the center of a miracle that gave life to the once barren and desolated continent now called Elios. With the stone apparently weakening in power, it has been stolen and now it’s up to Elsword’s gang to get it back! Join Elsword, the fast and swift knight; the elven Rena, whose great marksmanship can defeat monsters before they even realize they were in battle; Aisha, a mage of the highest order, specializing in destructive elemental damage; and Raven, a metal-clawed fighter; in their journey through the land of Elios to rescue the beloved stone. For more information on Elsword visit http://www.elswordonline.com/
The Sims 3, currently the best selling PC game of all time, has recently announced that it would allow any gamer a chance at a free-of-charge 20 minute trial. The demo includes the following of The Sims 3 add-ons:
The Sims 3
The Sims 3 World Adventures
The Sims 3 Ambitions
The Sims 3 Late Night
The Sims 3 Generations
The Sims 3 High-End Loft Stuff
The Sims 3 Fast Lane Stuff
Whether you are interested in talking to ghosts, traversing through Egyptian pyramids, or dancing with a group of vampires, The Sims 3 is the best choice for a full fledged fantasy life simulation.
Who wouldn’t want to try out a full game for free? The Sims 3 demo is available for free (HERE).
It will come as no surprise that Naughty Dog’s Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception sold a small country worth of copies on it’s very first day of release.
On day one alone 3.8 million units of the game were sold worldwide, making it one of the biggest selling titles of 2011 (within 24 hours of being on sale!). To put this into perspective, Uncharted 2 had sold 4.9 million units by October 2011- two years after it was first released.
Head of Communications at Sony Computer Entertainment Europe Nick Caplin had this to say about the game’s astounding success:
“Uncharted 3 is a blockbuster and these incredible sales figures reflect that. Consumers are clearly as eager to play the game as critics were to heap praise upon it, and the team at Naughty Dog deserve this fantastic reception at retail. The Uncharted series, exclusive to PlayStation®3, has redefined the third-person adventure genre and is now one of the leading franchises available.”
It’s an incredible achievement for Sony and the development team at Naughty Dog. Uncharted 3 will probably walk away with multiple game of the year trophies – as well as one for ‘highest ever use of superlatives in critical reception’ – and has already proved it’s worth in sales figures. Uncharted 4 anyone?
EA Sports will release a second, rather significant patch today for Xbox 360 and PS3 (PC/Mac patch already released). The patch extends through many areas of the game, including general gameplay, Career Mode, FUT, and online. The list was pretty substantial (seriously), so prepare for a long, yet promising read. Here’s what they fixed:
General Gameplay:
Issue when a user would call a second player to take a quick throw in, resulting in the game recognising it as the ball re-entering play.
Occasional problem where Manual crossing setting would reset
That wonderful misalignment of legs, albeit much more common in the demo, it still surfaced for a very small number of people in the full version.
Career Mode:
Weather conditions are now able to be chosen before a match
Salary suggestions for players will remain consistent when exiting and re-entering the negotiations screen.
Youth player salary returns to budget after releasing them from the Youth Squad
Fixed the problem when following through with a purchase option for a loan deal if it caused you to reach the maximum squad size.
No longer possible to sign a Youth Player with wages higher than your available budget.
Addressed a few rare situations where specific actions caused the controller buttons to become unresponsive.
When playing as a Player in Career Mode, your manager will be more likely to sub you off if your player is getting too tired
Fixed a strange situation where the commentary wouldn’t show up when playing a League Cup match involving Manchester United
Issues when editing and saving player positions and the subsequent console hang.
Removed the issue where your player’s team could enter a new season without a goalkeeper or the minimum squad size.
Resolved the issue where a player’s team would record a win despite the match being fore-fitted due to a lack of players
Recently signed Youth Squad players will enter negotiations with an accurate, consistent “Current Wage”, meaning they’ll be picked up more easily by CPU teams.
Game hanging issues when entering two controllers into a Career mode and then backing out.
Fixed the apparent random crashes experiences by some in Career Mode, where players would appear with a zeroed price
Made physical attribute growth more realistic, resulting in much more steady progression. (Neymar stamina issues anyone?)
Offer a new contract to a loaned out player who is on their last year of contract, instead of them just disappearing into free agency.
More noticeable progression and improvement for loaned out players
Most mid-week matches will be night-time lighting conditions
FIFA 12 Ultimate Team:
Using an outdated “Take Me There” link in the trade feed FUT hub will no longer result in your coins not being returned if you lose an auction.
Trade feed notification for a newly signed GK Coach will no longer cause game hanging.
Fixed disconnection issues when creating a new squad then immediately deleting an old one to apply an item.
Real-time information will be displayed during active auctions to prevent you being unknowingly outbid.
Fixed crash issues experienced on Match Setup before games
EAS FC XP and news feed will update after playing a single-player or play-a-friend game
Fixed struggle issues when paging through auction pages
Fixed various crash issues including the situation after downloading the latest FUT update after creating a Virtual pro, or when not signed into a gamer profile on the download page.
FIFA 12 Clubs
Camera settings will be saved for subsequent Club games after changing.
Penalty kick taker can be changed via Team Management
Accomplishments are now fully tracked in online matches.
AI difficulty has been decreased to Professional in order to stop people from not fielding defenders in order to let the AI do the work for them.
My Live Season, EAS FC and FIFA 12 Online
Injured or suspended players will now be automatically moved to the reserves rather than the subs bench.
Stopped the game from making too many calls for Support Your Club information upon entering the EAS FC hub.
Functional issues with the back/select button when returning to the EAS FC hub.
Enhancements made to loading in the pre-match arena before a EAS FC Challenge.
All Career Mode activity will now display correctly in the EAS FC news feed.
Fixed the occasional problem saw users fail to match up online due to mismatching squad files, despite re-downloading the online squad file.
Resolved stat tracking issues for Online Friendlies.
Creation Centre:
Crash problem when downloading a PNG image over the maximum file size.
Issues when trying to enter the CC Gallery after bookmarking numerous items to download.
Rare occurrence where your CC team would have a man missing on the pitch.
Changing kit sponsor images will no longer cause problems on the console.
Improved the way FIFA 12 handles large numbers of CC downloads in order to increase performance in the team-selection screen.
EA Sports Arena:
Enabled private sessions within the EA SPORTS Arena.
Turned on our in-game podcasts. You can access our regular five-minute chunks of audio news and information by turning the option on in the Game Settings > Audio menu. [English only)
Fixed loading and disconnecting issues for people with many save files on their hard drive.
[PC only] Corrected a problem where, after scoring a goal, custom music would stop playing for around two minutes. Also have added an option to the FIFA 12 launcher to disable some Windows settings, improving the framerate for people with lower-spec PCs.
