Electronic Arts’ EA Access membership deal offers all-you-can-play gaming on selected titles, discounts on digital purchases, and the ability to play games a week before their official retail release. All this for an affordable $4.99 a month, or $29.99 a year! Unfortunately, only Xbox One gamers will get this opportunity. Why isn’t EA Access on Sony’s PlayStation 4? According to what Sony told Game Informer, it’s because they don’t believe the publisher-specific subscription plan offers value to their customers.
“PlayStation Plus memberships are up more than 200% since the launch of PlayStation 4, which shows that gamers are looking for memberships that offer a multitude of services, across various devices, for one low price. We don’t think asking our fans to pay an additional $5 a month for this EA-specific program represents good value to the PlayStation gamer.”
It seems that for now, PlayStation gamers won’t be getting EA Access. Beta invites to EA Access are already being offered to selected Xbox One players.
When Zen Studios announced that all your tables on the Xbox 360 were going to languish in last-gen obscurity and you’d have to rebuy them for your Xbox One, it was like that moment when you see the ball teetering into the far lane leading to the drain. Play the sad trombone effect. And if you’re like me, you converted all your Zen Pinball habits to the Sony ecosystem while flipping Microsoft the bird. Maybe you even sulked about it online.
And guess what happened:
Microsoft and Zen Studios have taken your feedback to heart, and seeing that many of you were very upset with the news that table transfers between Xbox 360 and Xbox One would not be happening, we have some good news for you! We will be able to implement table transfers on Xbox One starting from Pinball FX2’s launch. Any available table on Xbox One that was previously purchased for Xbox 360 can be imported to the new version free of charge.
Well, there is one small price to pay. The launch of Pinball FX2 on the Xbox One will be delayed until next month.
Electronic Arts will be offering a membership that gives subscribers access to free games and exclusive deals. EA Access, through the Xbox One, will give subscribers the ability to play FIFA 14, Madden NFL 25, Peggle 2, and Battlefield 4 for $4.99 a month or $29.99 per year. More games will be added to “The Vault” for subscribers to enjoy, likely when their full price sales dwindle enough to qualify. Microsoft’s Games for Gold and Sony’s PlayStation Plus programs smirk at the latecomer. If the prospect of subscribing to older games doesn’t appeal to you, perhaps EA can entice you with a whopping 10% discount for select games in the Xbox One marketplace? Even upcoming titles like Dragon Age: Inquisition and NHL15 are included! No? Okay, what if EA gives you five full days of early access to games before they’re released? Sort of like breaking the retail street date on an upcoming game, but the publisher nods approvingly rather getting your account banned.
What if you’re a PlayStation 4 or Nintendo Wii U owner? Sorry! No deal for you. EA Access will be made available soon to all Xbox One players.
Microsoft has released a free beta of Catan Anytime which is an HTML5 multiplayer version of the popular board game Settlers of Catan. The Windows Blog explains that this web-optimized build of Catan was made in partnership with Mayfair Games and Bontom Games. The developers will be releasing the full ruleset, Development cards, Achievements, and Ports at GamesCon in August.
Catan Anytime is part of the Rethink Internet Explorer campaign that promotes Microsoft’s web browser. The beta for Catan Anytime is available now.
In case you’re playing Wargame: Red Dragon as a slightly upgraded version of Wargame: AirLand Battle, developer Eugen wants to remind you that there are ships in there. So today’s free “Millionth Mile” update, which adds more than 60 new units for the Eastern bloc powers (sorry other side of the Iron Curtain!), also adds very special trucks that will be useful if your opponent is playing with naval units.
…The Millionth Mile also introduces a brand new kind of unit, in the form of an AShM (anti-ship missile!) truck carrier. These units, whose main function is to engage ships over long distances from the land, increase the tactical depth of the game while redefining Wargame’s naval warfare!
Frankly, I find playing on maps composed entirely of land redefines Wargame’s naval warfare just fine.
You can read my anti-ship review here.
Since its launch last year, Stardock has updated Fallen Enchantress: Legendary Heroes with balance changes, DLC offers, and free content. Sometimes it’s hard to remember this with all the hubbub surrounding Age of Wonders 3 and Triumph’s crowd-funding story. The latest update to Legendary Heroes adds class-specific requirements to hero items, A.I. upgrades that change the way the computer opponents play the game, and banners that can boost armies in the field.
– Added the Banner of the Brave accessory, Army gets +1 Attack And +2 Defense, Commander only
– Added Walderon’s Banner accessory, Army gets +1 Moves and +2 Initiative, Commander only
– Added the Banner of Zad-Zabril accessory, Army gets +25% Fire Resistance, Commander only
Fallen Enchantress: Legendary Heroes is available through Steam or directly from Stardock.
The black market is coming to Titanfall. The latest update to Respawn’s mechs vs. parkour pilots shooter will add in-game currency that can be spent on rewards like packs of Burn Cards, and insignias for players’ Titans. The Black Market purchases work with credits that are rewarded at the end of matches for performance. Credits can also be obtained by selling Burn Cards back to the market.
Burn Card packs are just like booster packs for your favorite collectible card games. They contain a random assortment of Burn Cards, but players can purchase them in themes that limit the picks to certain categories. Want an amped-up weapon for a round? Buy an Ordnance pack. Want XP enhancers? Pick a Time Boost pack. Now Titanfall players can feel the same pain that Magic: The Gathering fans have known for years.
Titanfall players have voiced concerns that the new currency system is the beginning of a microstransaction system. Ever since the launch of the game, players have been on the lookout for publisher Electronic Arts to push real-world money purchases into the application. The Burn Card feature seems almost tailor-made for microtransactions, after all. Respawn’s David Shaver reiterated the studio’s stance on the issue, to allay those fears.
With the introduction of an in-game currency, some may worry that the next step is that we will let players spend real-world money to get an edge in the game. We have stated several times that Titanfall will not have micro-transactions. Fear not, for we plan to keep that promise – NO MICROTRANSACTIONS! The only way to get Credits is by playing the game!
Players will be able to access the in-game market once they hit level 11. Access remains open even after they regenerate from level 50 and start over at the beginning of the level system. Alternately, players can choose to remain at level 50 and additional XP gained from matches will be converted into market credits.
Dungeon Defenders Eternity launched yesterday on Steam for PCs and Android for the Nvidia Tegra. Surprise! If this isn’t Dungeon Defenders 2, what is this release? It’s a standalone re-release of Dungeon Defenders with a new multiplayer server system. It includes all the map DLC from the first game and an in-game microtransaction store, which requires players to be online at all times. Owners of Dungeon Defenders on Steam get a 40% discount on Eternity.
As you may imagine, the reaction from longtime fans has been less than enthusiastic. Here’s how Trendy Entertainment’s senior producer Brad Logston explained why they needed to make a new version of the game.
Player hacking was the biggest reported problem on the original Dungeon Defenders. To ensure players aren’t cheating in Dungeon Defenders Eternity, and for our future release of Dungeon Defenders II, we needed to create a connected, always online service hosted in a secure environment. This isn’t about DRM. We want to help players have positive experiences in our games where legitimate time and effort is rewarded and cheaters can’t negatively impact everyone else.
Let’s be honest with each other. There aren’t that many players that gave a damn about cheating in Dungeon Defenders. Playing offline or cheating in a co-op action tower defense game isn’t a problem for players. It’s a problem for the developer that wants to sell cosmetic upgrades and consumable boost potions.
Mode Seven’s tactical cyber-sports game has a new name. Instead of Frozen Endzone, it shall henceforth be known as Forzen Cortex. Along with the title change, Mode Seven has updated the look of the game’s user interface and some in-game assets. You can watch a video here, showing some of the new stuff. Why the changes? According to what the developers told Rock Paper Shotgun, they wanted to get out in front of a misconception that some prospective players had.
We wanted to address the fact that some people think the game is an American Football simulation when it’s a turn-based strategy game with entirely different rules from football that are much easier to understand. The word “endzone” probably wasn’t helping, so we thought we’d take care of that and get rid of a massively silly name at the same time.
Mode Seven expects to add the beta of the single player campaign in September. Frozen Cortex is available on Steam early access.
The International is over. Valve’s Dota 2 tournament has crowned a new grand champion team. Newbee, a five-man team from China, will take home a $5 million grand prize and the satisfaction of knowing they are the best at protecting lanes, killing creeps, and destroying towers. Newbee defeated fellow Chinese team ViCi Gaming by winning three straight games in the final set.
Besides inspiring kids everywhere to take up professional gaming as a legitimate path to riches, Dota 2 can claim the record for the largest eSports prize pool in history. The $10 million pool was raised mostly from players via Compendium purchases.
Unlike Pinball FX 2, Harmonix’s Dance Central Spotlight has no problem with the transfer of licenses for DLC tracks from the previous console. The Kinect-enabled Xbox One dance game will launch at the bargain price of $9.99 on September 2nd and come with 10 tracks to shake your money maker. Future DLC tracks will be offered at about $1.99 a pop. The important thing to note is that the DLC tracks for the previous Dance Central games on Xbox 360 will be transferrable to the new game. Getting crunk-style with Snow’s Informer is going to look so next-gen!
Even though Activision is spending a lot of money on Destiny’s server technology, the shooter with MMO roots won’t have cross-platform play because Bungie doesn’t want players to think one platform has a competitive advantage over the others. Bungie engineer Roger Wolfson spoke to Digital Trends and explained that even though Destiny is coming to the PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Xbox 360, and Xbox One, none of them will share their worlds because the developers didn’t want a perception of unfairness.
“I’ll speak for the hypothetical player. I have a disadvantage sniping across the map because [my opponent with a next-gen console] is only two pixels on my screen and I’m four pixels on his. You see that in the world of PC gaming, where people are always racing to the best video card to give themselves the advantage.”
“Regardless of where the reality is, there’s definitely a perception among gamers that better hardware means you have an advantage. We don’t want to have to enter that fray, so to create the best, most level playing field, both actually and perceptually, we separated it by platform.”
Bungie claims the gameplay on all four platforms is nearly the same, despite the obvious power differences between last-gen and current consoles. Destiny is meant to be a multi-year franchise, so whichever hardware players use to start, Bungie wants them to have a good technical experience.
Kerbal Space Program, the quirky but cunningly disarming rocketry sim, has gained a substantial upgrade to its career mode. The First Contract update adds consequences for failure besides spectacular high-altitude explosions. Players can take contracts from various in-game sources that will give them tasks like conducting tests of new technologies, rescuing stranded Kerbals, and getting to target locations via cobbled-together spacecraft. Success will net more funding, while failure can impact your reputation, making future contracts less lucrative. Squad’s Felipe Falanghe explained the progression.
“First Contract is a massive step forward for Career Mode. Finally, we’re starting to paint a clear picture of our original vision for the complete thing. Although there is still a lot to add on future updates, the new Career features should help new players pick up the game in a much more structured manner.”
Kerbal Space Program is available via the official site, as well as through Steam’s early access.
If you hadn’t heard, there are some big changes happening at Microsoft. New CEO Satya Nadella has stated his commitment to refocusing the company on working in a “mobile-first and cloud-first world” which leaves anything not in the core mission a bit superfluous. Part of that restructuring resulted in 18,000 job cuts today, mostly from redundancies in the recent acquisition of Nokia. Unfortunately, for Xbox Entertainment Studios in Santa Monica, those cuts also include their operation. In an internal memo to employees, Xbox head Phil Spencer said that programs already in development like the Atari documentary and Halo series would continue as planned.
The future of Xbox will not be in original TV programming. Since Nadella has stated that Xbox is not a core part of Microsoft’s business, many are wondering just where the console’s future is headed.
The Xbox One sold twice as many units in June compared to May. Although the full figures haven’t been made public, Microsoft specifically mentions the Kinect-less Xbox One offering as part of the reason for their improved sales. The Xbox One units without Kinect are $399 at retail, putting it on equal price footing with the PlayStation 4. Dropping $100 from the price of the console resonated with consumers, at least for the month of June.
Can Microsoft keep up the momentum into the holidays? The company seems to think that having critically acclaimed previews at E3 is an indicator that the Xbox One will find success during the latter half of 2014.
