We now know what the price is going to be of the 3DS system itself and although Nintendo has yet to release a going rate for any 3DS games to come that hasn’t stopped retailers around the country from pricing pre-orders and giving estimates of their own to work from. Now while these prices are not confirmed by Nintendo it is worth taking note that these same companies had the prices of the Kinect nailed down before official word.
After a quick browsing, one can find Amazon and GameStop listing 3DS games between $39.99 and $49.99 for US stores. But GAME in the UK has listed all of the known launch titles at £39.99 and unfortunately for some, Amazon France has prices upwards of €59.95. Also Fishpond from Australia has listed one game so far and placed a price of $61.99 AUS on it. Again it is worth taking notice that these prices are tentative at best at this moment.
“Experience the next generation of shoot ’em ups with Zeit²! Travel through time to co-op play with a copy of yourself! Pull off amazing moves to defeat 8 massive bosses! Pace the game and improve your score with the powerful fast forward feature! Discover 6 unique game modes and beat 70 challenges in this innovative and action packed arcade game!” (Xbox.com)
There are many side scrolling and 2-D shooters on the market today. The Xbox Live Marketplace has reignited that type of gameplay and often, this has led to innovation. After all, with the glut of shooters out there, every developer must seriously think about how to attract buyers and a fan base. Zeit2 is one such game that tries to create a new idea. Does Zeit2 bring originality to the masses? What does Zeit mean anyway?
Gameplay
You are a floating ball of clear energy. And you can control time. For some reason, fossils are attacking you. Oh, and you also have a plasma gun. The gameplay is very simple to figure out. Fire at the enemy fossils and avoid letting them get past you. One unique part of the game is how the health system works. Not only do you lose points when an enemy slips by, but the enemy also drains health from you until they are off the screen. Also, shooting your gun when no enemies are present will also make your health percentage drop. While this adds a layer of strategy to the game, it is also very annoying. One other interesting feature is the way you shrink as your health drops. Starting out at 100% health, you area full size bubble. As you grow closer to 0% you slowly shrink until you blip out of existence. But we will talk about your existence as bubble a little later.
Of course, the most unique part of the game is the time travel element. If you miss an enemy, you can rewind time and watch your “time shadow” take out the enemies you just took out. At the same time, you can shoot up the enemies you missed beforehand. But what is a game without sweet combos?! Well, Zeit2 has that also. By shooting at your “time shadow” you can create all different kinds of explosions, havoc and chain moves. For example, when you shoot your “time shadow” it will spray the plasma everywhere, taking many enemies out at once. When the game adds in specialized weapons like a beam shot, you can create many different kinds of pretty fireworks that consume those dastardly time fossils.
The boss battles in the game are awesome. They all require creativity and reflexes to beat. And when you are finished beating the campaign, there are plenty of other options in the game. To illustrate, one of theses modes is called Tactics. Use your time traveling gifts and know-how to strategically and tactically get through each level. There are plenty of other modes too. And all you have to do is play each mode once to unlock the next mode.
Audio and Graphics
Weapon cues are a great thing to have in the game. When new foes approach, you also get a different sound cue. The soundtrack in the game may not be a symphony to your ears, but it will spice up the drab graphics.
Probably the most boring part about the game is the graphics. Bland blue backgrounds are absolutely awful. And except the bosses, all the enemies are white. In addition to the terribly boring colors, enemy variety is also lacking. While the game is graphically tepid, it does not quite ruin the game. The time travel mechanic is good enough to replace the terribly boring packaging. Another part of the game that really ticked me off was the small text. Sure, there were usually videos showed what the text said, but it is still great to be able to read the text. Most often, the text will explain much more than a video. Although many people do have HD television, it is ridiculous to assume that everybody will have one and will be able to read the small text in the tutorial.
Overview
Having a Bubble as a main character seems like an odd choice to me. I found it really hard to get excited about the game. I was confused about why these creatures were after me. But, I suppose a spaceship is generic. Time travel may be more flashy in the movies, but the 2-D space shooter implementation of time travel is well done. Controlling time is awesome in any game. And, you have control over your difficulty in the game at all times. In addition to the ability to rewind time, you can fast forward time. Trust me, by fast forwarding the game, the difficulty skyrockets. You may want to try the demo first, but a unique space shooter in this day and age is great. And with a name like Zeit,(which means Time) you can’t go wrong.
Breach has more than just the destructible environments that have been over-hyped about. It has a whole bunch of really cool gadgets as well! A large chunk of them are shown off in this following gadgets trailer.
I could continue here with a bunch of jargon describing each of and gadget seen in the video, but that would mean more reading for you, more typing for me, and a whole bunch more time before you can see the video. So just watch the video and enjoy.
You can enjoy the destructible military multiplayer when Breach launches on XBLA on January 26th.
Do like Tennis Balls? Do you like whacking them around a court? Do you actually play tennis whenever you pick up a Tennis racket, rather then pretending it is a rounded blade? Well, then you are probably not playing video games, but if you are then I am sure you are looking forward to Top Spin 4.
The player Roster has been revealed, and you can gander your eyes at it below. Maybe you even see one of your favorite tennis players on it. Below that is also a trailer for you to enjoy.Top Spin 4 is out in the United States March 15, 2011 and out in Europe on March 18, 2011
With the big reveals at Nintendo’s 3DS convention today we’ve seen plenty of new videos and new information regarding the 3DS and its games. But one thing that many players weren’t expecting was a cameo appearance of Metroid in Tecmo Koei’s Dead or Alive Dimensions. They’ve let this little cameo go unspoken in the past, but now it is in the limelight. This is quite obviously taking advantage of the fact that Team Ninja worked on Metroid: Other M last year and now they have put together a Metroid stage featuring Ridley and even a quick appearance of Samus Aran.
Also it appears that simply getting knocked off of this stage will result in your character losing well over a quarter of their health bar. But beyond the little cameo appearances we also get a brand new gameplay video that shows many different characters from the well known franchise battling with one another. Catch both that video and the one with Samus below. Now who thinks that Samus herself may become a playable fighter in Dead or Alive Dimensions?
Ready for some cute monkey action featuring the lovable Monkey Ball characters coming out of your console into full 3D? Wait are those boxing gloves? In the latest trailer for Super Monkey Ball 3D we see two different mini-games that will be featured in the upcoming 3DS game from Sega.
Not too much is known unfortunately about these minigames other than the fact that they will obviously be in the game when it releases sometime this year. Which leaves us with many questions, a number of which include how the monkeys themselves happen to breath if they are always stuck in the balls? Also why would monkeys inside of balls need to race around in cars to begin with; especially while they are still inside of their balls.
While it is good news that we have a brand new trailer with some gameplay footage of Resident Evil 3D: The Mercenaries, it is bad news that the game will unfortunately not be making the March 26th launch of the 3DS. Instead fans of the Resident Evil series will be able to get their fix sometime this Summer when Capcom is planning to release the game worldwide.
With this announcement they have also revealed a new trailer which shows off the different playable characters that you will be able to choose from, such as Hunk, Chris and Claire Redfield and even Krauser will be able to battle the undead hordes and get this, they will even be able to move and shoot at the same time!
Now that the huge 3DS is over Capcom has released two new videos for Super Street Fighter IV 3DS Edition which will release with the launch of the 3DS. One video features gameplay footage while the other is a simple trailer for the game, but both are great to see after the long drought of news regarding SSFIV3DS. Other than that though more information for the game itself has been revealed alongside these videos.
Super Street Fighter IV 3DS Edition will be using everything available in the 3DS regarding online multiplayer when the game launches; in what they are calling the only title to utilize the full capabilities of Nintendo’s online network at launch. StreetPass will use the Figurines that you can collect within the game to battle automatically with other Nintendo 3DS owners and you can even collect your winnings. This means that if you are in a crowded area with your 3DS then you could win countless battles without even knowing it.
The game will be sporting 35 different playable characters from the Street Fighter franchise and also utilize an easy to use Lite mode which gives players the ability to instantly map combination attacks to one button press or even a Pro mode which allows those who know the combinations to make things a bit easier for themselves.
Valve has released an update for Left 4 Dead (the first one, mind you). This update should patch any achievement progress you might have lost when downloading any of the latest DLC, specifically ‘The Sacrifice’. The update also fixes the glitchy ‘Sacrifizzle’ achievement.
Hopefully all progress lost because you picked up ‘The Sacrifice’ will be restored; however, Valve states on its Left 4 Dead Blog that in a few cases, some achievement progress might not be possible to recover.
Below is a full list of the bugs that have been patched.
• In Versus mode Tanks will spawn in stasis until a human player takes over. Tanks in stasis are invisible and invulnerable, and won’t move or attack.
• Tank speed is no longer reduced when on fire.
• Allow players on the Infected team to manually spawn during finales.
• Added a vote option to toggle All-Talk.
• Special Infected that causes a Survivor to stumble into a “ledge hang” situation will receive 50 points.
• Bullets that first pass through an infected character before striking a Survivor are now ignored as friendly fire.
• In Versus mode car alarms will now trigger anytime a Special Infected pulls or stumbles a Survivor into an alarm car.
• Survivor Bots no longer try to melee exploding barrels out of their way.
• Fixed the Sacrifizzle achievement.
Test Drive Unlimite 2 is only a few more weeks away. Atari and Eden games has some more videos to share. The game is looking quite promissing, and these two most recent videos show of the Mercedes brand within the game, as well as the large customization features.
While the videos may be on the shorter side, I’m sure they are appreciated for the readers out there who just can’t wait to get their hands on this sequel.
Just a few more weeks!
Test Drive Unlimited 2 comes out February 08, 2011 in the United States and February 11, 2011 in Europe.
