The Wii U, which is known in my household as the Lego City Undercover system that we sometimes use to play ZombiU multiplayer and that I would be playing Monster Hunter on if it wasn’t for the superlative and portable Soul Sacrifice on my Vita, just got the patch that supposedly makes it less of a sluggish beast at the front end. From Nintendo’s press release:
* The time required to start the Wii U console, launch built-in applications, exit software and return to the main menu, jump between applications, and jump between software and Miiverse has been reduced.
* While the Wii U logo is being displayed during the system startup, users can directly transition to the Wii Menu by holding down the B Button on the Wii U GamePad.
* Users can install games and applications from the Nintendo eShop in the background while other software is being used.
* When powering off during a download, Wii U will go into a standby mode, then power off when all downloads and installations are complete.
Unfortunately, it still takes crazylong for Lego City Undercover to actually load. The obvious solution — to just never stop playing — is an easy enough workaround.
Ambient Studios, developers of Monster Meltdown and Death Inc., is closing down. The UK studio failed to fund Death Inc. and keep the doors open. Their Kickstarter did not get funded and a direct $10 paid alpha offer apparently did not raise enough money to continue development.
Obviously we cannot deliver on the commitments we made in the various Death Inc. alpha tiers. If you’re one of the alpha backers, don’t worry – we will be issuing full refunds so you will not be in any way out of pocket.
Watch the original Death Inc trailer here to see what’s passed beyond the veil.
Game Informer has been told by their sources that EA Partners label is being shut down. The label, meant to provide publishing services for third-party developers, was responsible for publishing and distributing Bulletstorm, Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning, the Crysis series, and Valve’s Orange Box, Portal 2 and Left 4 Dead titles on consoles. There is no word on how the shut down would effect Insomniac’s upcoming multiplatform shooter, Fuse, which is using the Partners program.
The move is likely the result of EA wanting to trim expenses in the wake of their disappointing year-end results that forced CEO John Riccitiello to leave the company in March.
Capcom has announced some of the multiplayer modes in Lost Planet 3, the sequel to a grand shooter in which you could freely play the entire campaign cooperatively. It was almost enough to make up for the lack of a horde mode in a game that was so perfectly suited for a horde mode. Two of the four multiplayer modes in Lost Planet 3 are scenario mode and akrid mode (“akrid” is the name of the monsters in Lost Planet).
Scenario Mode sets each team a series of either offensive or defensive challenges and mixes them up with the extreme and unpredictable conditions of E.D.N. III. Players can compete in both third person on-foot action and in first person combat using the futuristic Vital Suits, making this a dynamic gameplay experience.
It sounds a bit like the dynamic team-based objectives that made Killzone 3 and Max Payne 3 such great multiplayer games. But here’s the one that really stands out:
Akrid Survival sees two teams of three players compete independently of each other in a series of encounters against waves of hostile Akrid before the teams go head to head in a final PvP elimination round.
I don’t know why you’d want to ruin a perfectly good horde mode by then making me fight the other guys, but I’ll take what I can get.
Lost Planet 3 comes out August 27.
For all the folks that held off from buying Skyrim to get the version with everything included, Bethesda is finally answering your requests. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim Legendary Edition will be coming to PCs, the PS3, and the Xbox 360 on June 4th. It includes “the most up-to-date version of the original game” and the Dawnguard, Hearthfire, and Dragonborn DLC add-ons.
Don’t be a dirty milkdrinker! If you haven’t FUS-RO-DAH’d at the banquest table in Dragonsreach, you haven’t lived.
Nintendo offically revealed that they will not host a large-scale press conference event at E3 this year as they have done in the past. Instead, there will be one closed event for American distributors, and another for the Western gaming media.
During the E3 period, we will utilize our direct communication tools, such as Nintendo Direct, to deliver information to our Japanese audience, including those who are at this financial briefing, mainly focusing on the software that we are going to launch in Japan, and we will take the same approach outside Japan for the overseas fans as well.
Newly promoted CEO for Nintendo of America, Satoru Iwata, will not speak at any of the E3 events.
Is there anything more predictable than executive moves after an underperforming fiscal year-end report? Nintendo published their disappointing FY2013 report today, but in a surprise move, rather than following it with firings and replacements, they announced promotions. Yay!
Tatsumi Kimishima, current chairman and CEO of Nintendo of America, will become Nintendo Co. Ltd. managing director and will assume the roles of general manager of Corporate Analysis and Administration, and general manager of the General Affairs Division. The current general managers are retiring as previously scheduled.
Global President Satoru Iwata will be promoted to take over as CEO of Nintendo of America and Reggie Fils-Aime will continue in his role as president and COO of NoA, reporting to Iwata.
The move will support the company’s unified global strategy, allow streamlined decision making and enhance Nintendo’s organizational agility in the current competitive environment.
There is speculation in the Japanese media that Iwata might resign from his position if Nintendo’s goals aren’t met in the next year-end report.
I made the mistake of not knowing enough about Monaco: What’s Yours Is Mine before playing it and therefore thinking it was just a game where you move dudes around levels to collect coins, sometimes alone, sometimes with friends. I’d played one of those recently on Xbox Live. It was pretty awful. I don’t even remember the name of it. It had bank robbers. You could give them hats and costumes and whatnot. I figured Monaco might be like that, but hopefully not awful.
Little did I know Monaco is the game I had hoped Introversion was going to make before they cancelled Subversion, their ambitious heist game about characters with different abilities getting into levels and then getting out again. And now here it is, but not from Introversion. It’s like Hotline: Miami, but with more gameplay and nearly just as much style.
I love how differently Monaco’s characters play. You’ll probably think any given character is overpowered at some point. At first, it was The Cleaner who I thought was overpowered for how he can sneak up behind guards and bean them. Most of the other characters need to find a weapon. Now it’s The Hacker, who can get a swarm of viruses crackling along the level around him without even hacking computers. Just get him to the wall outlets and he’s good to go. He’s a pet class! Speaking of pet class, maybe The Collector is overpowered for how his monkey Hector will automatically collect coins in the area, which directly pumps up your score. The scoring system records the time it takes you to finish the heist, but it adds a time penalty for all the treasure you didn’t get. That’s where Hector takes up the slack. Yeah, I’m going to say The Collector and his monkey Hector are overpowered.
But what I think I love most is the sense of discovery with the various missions and levels. Introversion’s game was going to feature procedurally generated office buildings, which sounds like about the most boring heists you could ever have. But Monaco’s imaginative locations are so lovingly built, with so many affectionate touches, and their own sense of flow. Take a look at that oceanographic museum above, which is rendered as a drawn map when it’s not in your line of sight. You know you want to see what’s under those labels.
Monaco: What’s Your Is Mine is out today for the PC. The Xbox 360 release has been delayed for an unspecified reason.
Larry “Major Nelson” Hyrb sends word that Microsoft will hold the next-gen Xbox press event on May 21st at 10 AM PST on the Redmond campus. The event will be livestreamed on Xbox.com, through your Xbox 360 console, and Spike TV.
On that day, we’ll share our vision for Xbox, and give you a real taste of the future. Then, 19-days later at the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) in Los Angeles, we’ll continue the conversation and showcase our full lineup of blockbuster games.
This is it folks! Will the rumors be true? Is the future of Xbox gaming an always-online required, no used games, TV streaming, mandatory Kinect hellscape? Will the console still require a Gold subscription to get anything done? Time to find out if I’m going to become a PS4 owner for the next-gen.
The patch that Playstation 3 owners have been enjoying in Skullgirls since last November is finally impending for those of us whose fightsticks are for the Xbox 360. If you have any intention of playing Skullgirls in the next few weeks, don’t read these patch notes. It’s basically a list of “well, no point playing until this stuff is implemented” changes. Of particular interest to me are reworked character-specific tutorials with strategy advice. Of particular interest to anyone playing is the dramatically tweaked gameplay.
That said, I really wish Skullgirls had more single player oomph. As much as I love the characters — Peacock was my pick for favorite character design of 2012 — it’s going to be a tough transition jumping back into vanilla versus matches againt the AI after spending time with Injustice’s generous bag of single-player shenanigans.
One of the most valuable videogames ever made was purchased in a North Carolina Goodwill store over the weekend for $7.99. An english copy of Family Fun Fitness: Stadium Events was found by an anonymous woman that was bargain-hunting. Only about 200 of Bandai’s 1987 NES Stadium Events cartridges were ever sold making it one of the rarest games on the market. In fact, the North American run of this game was so small that it was only ever shipped to Woolworths in the North-East part of the United States.
Unopened cartridges of the game have been valued at $38,000. The North Carolina copy of Stadium Events is currently up for auction on GameGavel for $12,000 because it shows signs of use, although a more worn copy was auctioned on the same site for almost the same amount so it is expected that this will close with a higher final bid.
I love old-school videogames, but $12,000 for Stadium Events? Does this even give you any cool Achievements? Where’s the DLC?
Pour one out for the Nintendo DS. The dual-screen powerhouse is being put out to pasture by Nintendo. Retired. In Nintendo’s most recent year-end financial report, it was revealed that production has been stopped and no new units will be manufactured. 153.87 million units were shipped over its total lifetime! That’s a lot of hand cramping!
We’ll always have Pokemon, little guy!
In related news, the fiscal earnings results were a bit grim. Nintendo posted a $366 million operating loss for the year citing slow sales and the depreciation of the yen. The 3DS and the Wii U missed sales projections. In both cases, Nintendo cited scheduling gaps of compelling software in overseas markets as a factor that hindered sales.
The RPG/shooter E.Y.E.: Divine Cybermancy might be best summed up as “What if Deus Ex had an even worse interface, full co-op, a metaphysics-punk setting, and required twitch skillz?” It’s vast and weird and often inscrutable. The fact that it’s made in France might have something to do with it. There’s nothing quite like it.
It’s also nearly two years old and now getting DLC. Blood Games adds four new single-player/co-op areas and a capture-the-flag mode that, uh, looks a bit overwhelming. So basically you respawn a lot? Since the scoring is based on each team having a limited pool of resurrectors, that makes sense. You can apparently hack away some of the other team’s resurrectors. More capture-the-flag games need hacking. If only there were terminals on the bottom floor of the Facing Worlds towers! More info here.
Also, Blood Games is free.
Adrian Chmielarz is one of the founders of People Can Fly and the lead designer of Painkiller, one of the greatest shooters ever created because it’s also one of the smartest shooters ever created. He has since left People Can Fly, but he was involved in the early design process for Gears of War: Judgment. In a conversation with Eurogamer, he had this to say about what he would have done differently with Judgment’s star rating system for the level unlocks, which is a pretty smart thing to do to a Gears of War game:
They still changed a couple of things I do not agree with…I wouldn’t have any headshot bonuses counting towards the three-star ratings…The reward for the headshot was supposed to be intrinsic not extrinsic. The reward was supposed to be, because the ammo was scarce, [okay] I only used one bullet instead of three. That was your reward in my version.
What a great point, Mr. Chmielarz. In a game like Gears of War, where the enemies are all huge honkin’ bullet sponges, headshots are already perfectly incentivized. They do more damage, and therefore save your ammo, and therefore keep you alive longer. In fact, they’re pretty much mandatory on the harder difficulty levels, where ammo management is arguably as important as aiming. The stars I earn should ideally be for things above and beyond the basic gameplay. Chmielarz also disagreed with stars for things like the executions, but I feel that’s a perfect system for earning stars. I see little need to do executions beyond the fact that they look cool. Why not attach a gameplay system? Which is exactly what Judgment did. I found myself actually trying to set up executions, which is something I’d never done in a Gears game. But headshots? I was already doing those, because I knew I needed to.
Besides, years of videogaming will train a guy to aim for the head. It’s such self-perpetuating gameplay that I almost always assume it’s what I’m supposed to do. I’ve come to expect some reward for headshots, whether it’s intrinsic, extrensic, achievement, or whatever. In Black Ops II, where the lethality is plenty high without worrying about the difference between three bullets and one bullet, I have to constantly remind myself to quit trying for headshots. Just put bullets on the target in the fastest and most consistently reliable way, Tom. Leave the headshots, quickscoping, and bellyflops to the power gamers who are already way better than me anyway.
But Infinity Ward smartly tied a completely independent reward system into headshots: weapon skins. You only earn the various camo schemes by racking up headshots with a weapon. Lucky for me, I don’t care one whit about weapon skins! Unlike the star scheme in Gears of War: Judgment, the developers at Infinity Ward didn’t just pile overlapping reward structures onto the same system.
Movie deals have been announced for both Ratchet & Clank and Heavenly Sword game properties. According to Variety the movies will be CG-animated films produced by Blockade Entertainment. The Ratchet & Clank movie will be animated by Rainmaker Entertainment which recently made the critically panned Escape from Planet Earth, while the Heavenly Sword animator has yet to be anounced.
“We’ve always thought ‘Ratchet and Clank’ would be a fantastic all-ages movie and are thrilled our intergalactic heroes will finally get their chance to shine on the big screen,” said Ted Price, founder and CEO of Insomniac Games. “Insomniac is especially honored to play a hands-on role with the film’s production, including the screenplay, consulting on character development and animation, and adding support to the film’s marketing.”
While the Ratchet & Clank movie is intended for a general theater premiere, the Heavenly Sword production is slated for a direct-to-video release.
