America may still be in the dark for a release date and launch info for the 3DS, but over in Japan, Nintendo have announced all of the launch titles players can expect when the portable launches over there on February 26th. At Nintendo World eight launch titles were shown (10 if you count the other versions of the Nintendogs titles) and I am digging most of them.
Here is the full list of launch titles which will hit Japan when the 3DS releases:
Winning Eleven 3D Soccer
Super Street Fighter IV 3D
Samurai Warriors Chronicle
Tobidasu! Puzzle Bobble
Nintendogs + Cats
RidgeRacer
Battle of Giants: Dinosaur Strike
Professor Layton and the Mask of Miracle
While this now throws into question the eventual release dates of titles such as Kid Icarus, Paper Mario and many other titles that were shown at the 2010 E3, it is good to at least see titles like Street Fighter IV 3D and Layton already making their appearance on the system a bit earlier than expected. Without a doubt not all of these will be present in the U.S. or U.K. when the 3DS launches so now I guess the main question for us is what will be our launch titles. If I had to guess, I would say Nintendogs would be a front runner at launch here as well as maybe Street Fighter but until Nintendo announces anything, the rest of the world will have to go on pure speculation. Keep checking back though as when the U.S./AU/EU line-up gets released, we will be sure to cover it. Until then you can check out a video of the Japanese announcement below.
Looks like we finally have some more details about the mysterious Skyrim. You won’t have to wait until February to find out the details that will be discussed in that month’s Game Informer because all of the details have been leaked and are available for your reading pleasure.
First of all we now know that Skyrim will be set 200 years after the events that happened in Oblivion and you will be playing as one of the Dragonborn. Your main objective in the story is to stop the dragon god Alduin who is the world eater mentioned on Game Informer’s back cover.
Quests have changed as well, at least the way that you will be given them. Something that developers are calling a dynamic quest system will make it so that players may only receive certain quests if they have a certain level of proficiency in that quest-specific skill, or on your actions throughout the game so far. This means that you won’t be having any vanilla playthroughs of the same quests happening again and again in the same ways.
Also changed is the leveling system. The more you use a specific skill will level it up overtime as it did in Oblivion but the amount of skills to level has been cut to 18 which is down from the 21 used in Oblivion. But in a more interesting update, the Perk system from Fallout 3 will be returning as you level up your main character you will have the ability to unlock perks.
As you leveled up your player in the Oblivion you may have noticed that enemies leveled up just as much as you did. Meaning that a measly rat could pose just as much danger to a high level character as a Xivilai daemon. But that isn’t going to be the case anymore. Enemies will only be scaled up to when you first entered the area and then remain that same level even as you advance. Plus this will only happen in critical areas of the game which means that leveling up will help immensely this time around.
So we know about the story, the change in quests and the change in levels, but what about the combat? Well there is a new duel wielding weapon system as well. This means that you can assign any weapon or spell to each of your hands. This means that you can use two swords at the same time, or an axe and a sword, or a sword and a lightning bolt. The combinations are of course endless and a welcome addition to the game.
Beyond these changes there will be a weapon creation system, better graphics of course, better character creation, the ability to run faster, finishing moves for the brutality feel, and an NPC dueling system which allows you to hold a duel with any NPC that accepts. Now all of these changes and enhachments sound like exactly what fans of the series have been looking for, and I am most certainly excited to see all of these changes coming when the The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim releases on November 11th 2011.
Fresh from Tokyo -more specifically the Nintendo World 2011 event- details relating to the 3DS’ battery life from Nintendo themselves are beginning to emerge.
Reportedly, the system is said to able to last three to five hours whilst playing a 3DS game with the backlighting turned down. This figure could be even less with all the lighting settings maximised.
However, that figure increases to inbetween five and eight hours if you’re playing a standard DS game. Once out of juice, it then takes 3.5 hours for a 3DS battery to fully charge.
So what do you all think of this battery life? It hardly makes the handheld highly portable. Is this the cost of 3D gaming – a handheld that isn’t great on long journeys? That said, the DSi does about the same in terms of play-time, but the 3DS is a much more powerful machine.
Animal Crossing for Wii got a series of item downloads before the year was out, courtesy of Nintendo. And now, it looks like the set out to start 2011 as they ended 2010: with plenty of downloadable items.
The latest addition is this rather stylish Gold Bed. Items in the Golden Series cannot be bought or grabbed from anywhere else, so this is your one and only chance to get hold of a gold bed with a chunky, embellished headboard and cosy golden quilt.
All you need to do is bump into Pete The Postman between now and 31 January to get hold of this new item, making sure your WiiConnect24 settings are enabled. Also, as with all Animal Crossing downloads, the gold bed won’t count in your favour when it comes to having your home assessed by the good people at the Happy Room Academy.
Having a save game file of the original Dead Space on your hard drive will unlock the original plasma cutter in Dead Space 2 right from the beginning, as confirmed by a member of the programming team in a recent tweet on their twitter.
It is not yet known how this will differ from the Dead Space 2 plasma cutter. Whether it’s simply a cosmetic change or whether there’s more substance, such as it’s more powerful. The save file doesn’t have to be anything special. You don’t need to have completed the game, even.
Who’s going to benefit from this bonus then, or if it turns out to be useful, who’s going to get a Dead Space save file especially?
Xbox Live mourned the loss of 1 vs 100: we were all sad when it was announced 1 vs 100 wasn’t going to be returning for another season – if only for the unfinished achievements that would blemish some gamer’s gamercards forever.
However, it seems 1 vs 100’s metaphorical shoes are going to be filled, and the currently empty interactive live show slot busied with a Full House Poker season. Already, players have begun to receive invitations to join a Beta version. It looks like you better start practising that poker face.
Anyone excited by Full House Poker? By the sounds of it, it will be Texas Hold ’em rather than Blackjack, but will it have the accessibility of 1 vs 100?
Yep, it’s an announcement for DLC before the game has even been released. It’s a buyers worst nightmare. But alas there isn’t much we can do about it as Bioware has announced the first bit of launch day DLC for Dragon Age II. If you were to pre-order the Signature Edition you will be getting this DLC for free, however everyone else will have to pay 560 MSP or $7 depending on the console that they own Dragon Age II for. So if you are looking to pick up Dragon Age II you have only until the 11th to receive the free upgrade.
The DLC was announced alongside of a trailer which shows off what the content will be about. There will be entirely new content exclusive to those who download the DLC, as well as a new companion and new sidequests. Sure there may have been plenty of DLC for Dragon Age: Origins but it is a bit strange when a company announces DLC two months before the game is even released.
The latest game being developed by the game development studio ‘Kalypso’, Dungeons, has reached completion over the weekend and is currently awaiting it’s retail release in early February.
During the game, Dungeons, you will play as a cunning Dungeon Lord who’s main goal is to lure in adventurers and promptly eradicate them over the course of an elaborate dungeon.
Over the course of the 20 missions in Dungeons the player must work his/her way up the Dungeon Lord hierarchy until they reach the top and are able to get revenge on their evil ex-girlfriend. Players are also tasked with overthrowing the other Dungeon Lords located on the lower levels of the Dungeon. While planning to overthrow the other Dungeon Lords, players must also create elaborate and difficult dungeons to keep heroes and adventurers from advancing and possibly defeating them.
The game boasts many units and dungeon objects to use to achieve your goals, which include: Monsters, Objects, Workers, Prison Cells and Torture chambers.
Dynasty Warriors 7, the most fun you will ever have slaying hundreds of enemies at a time, is now ready to show off its good side. And what a good side it is. Just peep all the those glorious screenshots below! Also, the game will ship on Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 consoles on March 22, 2011. And remember, while playing this game, you DO have all the power, so feel free to start singing while slashing, dashing and otherwise dismembering your foes, while cleverly outwitting them as well. You clever devil you. Ready to prance to victory? I know I am.
Gears of War, made by the most epic studio of them all, Epic, is a series of games that are based around a crew of hardened soldiers that are a part of the Coalition of Ordered Governments (or COGS) that have to fight the Locust horde in order to save the planet for their human counterparts.
Recently EPIC revealed that they were launching a third entry into this series, Gears of War 3! This game appears to be shaping as the most epic of the three titles with the introduction of new characters, locations and of course, epic multiplayer.
You’re likely to play the game as one of the COG soldiers, Marcus Fenix – the buff leader of the team. The squad is likely to be named Delta as in the previous games.
The team consists of action hero cliché soldiers, Dom, Cole, Baird and the newest members of their ranks: Anya Stroud, Samantha Byrne and Bernadette Mataki.
‘But wait!’ You may be thinking, ‘Anya isn’t a cliché soldier name!’ Well, that’s because you’re right, it’s not. It is in fact the name of a woman, a woman who may very well be a part of Delta squad. If you’re someone who follows Gears of War’s canon closely you may already know that Anya is a love interest for Marcus and their relationship may very well be fleshed out over the course of the game. Of course, she probably exists for more than romance in the game and is likely to be in the front lines with the rest of Delta, killing line after line of Locusts and maybe even occasionally sawing one into many. Besides Anya there may also be another female member of Delta, ‘Samantha Byrne’. I don’t normally go for the militaristic/buff loo– ah who am I kidding, yeah I do and man who wouldn’t? She’s a rather attractive persona! And I also bet that she could mow down the locusts as efficiently as any of the male characters could, maybe even more so. She’s also going to be voiced by Claudia Black (of Pitch Black, Farscape, Stargate SG1 fame!). The last of the new female Gears is one ‘Bernadette Mataki’. Judging by her looks, she could be one tough character. I’m assuming that any Locust that comes between her and her goal will likely end up as mincemeat, or juicy steak… depending on the situation.
From left to right – Anya, Sam, Bernie
Like the previous games, the combat is where this game stands out. Like most epic games the battles are as intense as they are graphic, very. However, there is more to combat then just running in and gunning down enemies (and occasionally sawing one in half), the combat is more about the flow of the battlefield and how you use cover to your advantage. Running straight out into a nest of Locusts is likely to get you killed, even on the easier difficulties (unless of course you have a really good plan and running in is a part of that), so your best bet is to stick to the cover and act strategically. If the AI in this game is anything like the last two, they’re going to be quite capable of backing you up… or mowing you down, depending on how you’re looking at it.
What’s an EPIC game without competitive multiplayer? This is the strong point of any and all games released by EPIC. Just look at their lineup of games from their catalog: One Must Fall 2097 (Back when they were Epic Megagames), Unreal, Unreal Tournament (UT-UT3), Unreal Championship (On the Xbox), The upcoming Bulletstorm and last but certainly not the least, Gears of War (GoW 1-2). There was also an Unreal 2, but for some reason it originally didn’t ship with multiplayer… which was a strange deviation. Anyways, multiplayer in Gears of War is a combination of team work, dedication to the goal, strategic placement of yourself in comparison to the enemy and your allies and most importantly, a very decent aim with an even more decent firing reflex. I believe that this is why Gears of War is such a revered multiplayer game and what makes EPIC such a great company, they know how to make things balanced while remaining fun. You’re always concentrating on multiple things at once or you’re going to be killed, but it’s also the same in reverse! Spend too much time figuring out what’s going on and you’re likely to be killed. You need to be the best at both and there’s nothing more satisfying than besting some other player, especially if he’s the top guy on the other team it’s just so much fun! Let us hope that EPIC keep up with this tradition of competition in the multiplayer while maintaining the balance and fun and this game will be quite a success.
I know that I’ve talked greatly about the multiplayer but it is hard to deny that it will be the core of this game, besides the cover based strategy elements. The first two Gears of War games single player component were built around cooperative gameplay and having fun with your friends either in your loungeroom, or online (I’m sure you could also use PUGS, but I didn’t). I’m certain that co-op will be making a return, considering it’s what makes this franchise so great, and it is likely to great fun inviting over a few mates and going to town on the Locust horde.
Speaking of hordes, there’s a new spin on the Horde mode from Gears 2 called ‘Beast Mode’. In Beast Mode players work together (as Locusts) to mow down wave after wave of human soldiers within the wave time limit. Obviously this will become more difficult as you progress and the further you progress the more rewards you shall receive. The in-game reward for completing a wave will be ‘tokens’. Tokens can be used for upgrading your soldiers class within the Beast gametype. This gametype sounds like it could be really fun! I’m personally pumped for it as Horde mode was my favorite gametype in Gears of War 2, mainly for its arcade like feel as well as the cooperative component. Of course, there was always the competitive element of the scoring system which kept things interesting.
This is likely to be at minimum as fun as Horde was, but, knowing EPIC and CliffyB, it’s going to be more bigger, more awesome and it’s going to be a lot of fun!
All in All, this is going to be one of EPIC’s most epic games ever. It’s going to be bigger, better and offer more ass-kick than its predecessor. Knowing the staff behind this game and the way the previous games were handled you can expect this to be one of the best games to have ever been released on the Xbox360. Let’s hope that it does well enough to warrant a release on the PC as well (C’mon PC community! Let your voices be heard!).
