The New Xbox One Experience, an overhaul of the user interface and menus, is out today. Microsoft says the software redesign makes the console the “fastest and most social Xbox experience ever.” There’s a new home guide system that lets you check messages and futz with settings without leaving your game or media app. A new community section offers a ton of stalking and social media one-upmanship opportunities. Avatars, those virtual dress-up doll microtransaction sales catalysts, are back. Controller buttons can now be remapped. Finally, Microsoft has revamped the Game Hubs and the storefront to be more user-friendly and community focused.
Some of your old Xbox 360 games should also work in the Xbox One now. The list of compatible titles isn’t that long, but Microsoft assures us that more games will be added to the backwards compatibility feature in the coming weeks.
You can even enjoy multiplayer with friends playing Backward Compatible titles on Xbox 360. To start playing your Xbox 360 games on Xbox One after 12pm PST today, refresh your Game Collection to see your pre-purchased, digital Xbox 360 titles from the Backward Compatible title list in your ready to install queue or simply insert the disc for a supported Xbox 360 title and download the game to start playing it on Xbox One.
For now, the New Xbox One Experience is an optional download, although if you don’t update, you won’t be able to access some of the revamped services. On the 23rd of November it will be a mandatory update. It’s about 1GB in size and there is also an update for the wireless controllers.
Konami is working with a prosthetics artist to create a bionic arm for a gamer. James Young, a 25-year-old Metal Gear aficionado, lost his arm and leg in a metro rail accident. Sophie De Oliviera Barata is an artist who specializes in creating personalized artificial limbs for amputees that want something more than the standard solution. Konami’s Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain features a main character that has a badass robot arm. This sounds like the makings of a documentary. Oh hey! It is. The Phantom Limb Project seeks to get James Young his Venom Snake arm in a three-part video series.
The Phantom Limb Project was born out of a desire to create something innovative, on the cusp of future technology, which would explore the themes present within the series and more specifically, the themes and ideas referenced in the latest incarnation: Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain. We also wanted to tell an uplifting human story of what it means to be an amputee, to feel phantom pain, to overcome loss and how technology can change our perceptions of ‘disability.’ Moreover, the story of how one gamer known as James Young, never let his condition get in the way of his passion as a gamer.
On the subject of phantom pain, players of Metal Gear Solid V may be interested to know that the latest patch allows them to get a certain silent someone back on their team that they may have been missing.
I hate to call out a developer making informal comments to his fans about a work in progress, but I’m going to call out a developer making informal comments to his fans about a work in progress anyway.
One of the boldest boardgame designs I’ve ever played is Quartermaster General, a sleek and grand presentation of World War II for six-players (review here). It uses simple rules — you can teach Quartermaster General in ten minutes and then finish a six-player game in well under two hours — and unique decks of cards for each nation to express broad but familiar historical guidelines. The pacing is snappy. The asymmetry is deeply gratifying and a minor miracle given the simplicity of the rules. Japan plays nothing like Germany which plays nothing like the United States which plays nothing like Russia. Designer Ian Brody has created a masterpiece of rich minimalist gameplay.
Brody posted on Boardgame Geek that he’s playtesting the next expansion, called Alternate Histories.
[Alternate Histories] adds 100 new cards and 8 substitute cards. There are pieces for France and China, and the 8 substitute cards are largely to reflect the new pieces. So cards that represented the French with UK pieces and the Chinese with Americans now bring in pieces from their own country.
The idea is that you shuffle the news cards into each nation’s decks, but then you have to discard from your hand more frequently, forcing difficult choices as you play. Brody also said he considered actual deck building for each nation, but it raises difficult balancing issues.
You can read more here, including a tantalizing description of a couple of new cards for Germany and Russia. There is currently no announced release date for Alternate Histories.
Microsoft has published the list of Xbox 360 titles that will be backwards compatible on the Xbox One. Ever since Microsoft announced a plan for backwards compatibility, people have been frothing over which games will make the cut. Since only a fraction of games would be included in the initial rollout of the feature, gamers were asked which old games they wanted to see on the service. Unfortunately, for the majority of voters, Call of Duty: Black Ops II, Skyrim, and Red Dead Redemption (the top three choices) did not make it. Neither did any Halo games, Grand Theft Auto IV, or older Forza games. Some other popular titles like Fallout 3, Mass Effect, and Gears of War 3 are included in the full list, so all is not lost. Microsoft says the list will be expanded with more games in the coming months, including all future Games with Gold offers.
Xbox One backwards compatibility will officially begin on November 12th, with the launch of the New Xbox One Experience system update.
That’s the trailer for Legendary Pictures’ Warcraft, based on Activison Blizzard’s long-running MMO. Directed by Duncan Jones and starring a lot of expensive-looking computer graphics, the Warcraft movie looks like a prime example of “Be careful what you wish for.” How many times has someone watched a Blizzard game cinematic and wondered how awesome it would be if someone made a movie exactly like that? Starting on June 10th, 2016, we may all find out how awesomely wrong things can go. Worlds will collide where the uncanny meets the valley.
Rust has rolled out a Steam storefront for in-game items. Not a big deal you say? Certainly, it’s not the first Steam storefront to offer virtual gewgaws for money. What makes this notable is the fact that unlike the Team Fortress 2 or Counter-Strike: Global Offensive workshops, Rust’s store is not curated by Valve or modders. Facepunch Studios owns the content and gives a cut of sales to Valve, while sharing revenue directly with modders. The items featured in the store can be obtained through random drops in the game, but varying levels of rarity make some items more desirable than others. These items can be used by the player or bought and sold between players, with Valve again taking a portion of the sale. Studio head Garry Newman explained why this was a good deal for everyone, including the players that don’t have a lot of ready cash.
So you’ve got the poor guys with no money. They hate traditional microtransactions because it’s a paywall. But on Steam they play the game and get random drop items, and can then sell and trade those items on the marketplace. It’s not unfeasible that a player will make more money selling items than the game itself cost.
They’re happy because they can sell the stuff they get randomly for free, buy games from Steam.
They’re making people happy because they can buy stuff from them.
Newman added that not offering the items in the store would be “screwing” the community.
Two high-profile sets of gaming numbers will no longer be reported. Microsoft will no longer divulge Xbox hardware sales numbers, and Activision Blizzard will no longer give out World of Warcraft subscriber data.
Microsoft announced that they will no longer be sharing Xbox One hardware sales in their investor reports. In their latest earnings release, Microsoft folded Xbox One sales under More Personal Computing and stated only that gaming revenue grew 6%, and that Xbox Live transactions were healthy. When pressed on the change in reporting, Microsoft told GameInformer that they feel Xbox Live engagements are more relevant to the business. No doubt Microsoft would be crowing about hardware sales if the gap between sales of the PlayStation 4 and the Xbox One weren’t so far apart and getting worse all the time.
Activision Blizzard’s executives told investors listening to the company’s latest quarterly conference call that World of Warcraft current subscribers hit 5.5 million, and that it would be the last time they reported that data. According to them, subscriber numbers do not adequately tell the story. “There are other metrics that are better indicators of the overall Blizzard business performance.” Surely, the fact that 5.5 million subscribers represents a 100,000 loss of players since the last quarter, and makes this a nine-year low for the MMO had nothing to do with that decision? To Activision’s credit, the news about their impending acquisition of Candy Crush developers King Digital had more impact.
99 cents for five lives? $1.99 for a bomb cooler? That’s nothing. Nothing! Activision Blizzard is spending $5.9 billion (that’s with a “B”) on Candy Crush Saga. Activision announced the purchase of King Digital Entertainment, the company behind the free-to-play mobile title. The deal is subject to approval in Ireland, where King is based, but the acquisition is expected to go through by early 2016. Since the publisher already owns some of the largest gaming franchises on the planet, why do they need Candy Crush? CEO Bobby Kotick explained the purchase to investors.
The combined revenues and profits solidify our position as the largest, most profitable standalone company in interactive entertainment. With a combined global network of more than half a billion monthly active users, our potential to reach audiences around the world on the device of their choosing enables us to deliver great games to even bigger audiences than ever before.
Current King CEO Riccardo Zacconi will be staying with the company under the terms of the deal, as will CCO Sebastian Knutsson and COO Stephane Kurgan. King’s shareholders will receive $18.00 in cash per share when the deal is completed.
Warner Bros. Interactive is again offering the PC version of Batman: Arkham Knight for sale, but they are also offering unconditional refunds to disgruntled owners. After Warner Bros. launched the PC version of the game in June to widespread criticism regarding bugs and poor performance, the publisher pulled it from sale, vowing to not return it to digital shelves until the game was improved to an acceptable standard. Apparently, that standard is low enough that the current build of Arkham Knight still has streaming issues, recommends 12GB of computer memory, and does not have full weather effects enabled. In their newest notice, the publisher admits that this may not be up to their customers’ level of tolerance.
We are very sorry that many of our customers continue to be unhappy with the PC version of Batman: Arkham Knight. We worked hard to get the game to live up to the standard you deserve but understand that many of you are still experiencing issues.
Eurogamer’s Digital Foundry did an analysis of the relaunched Batman: Arkham Knight, and found that there was little noticeable change from a September patch. The PC version of Batman: Arkham Knight is available on Steam.
Rockstar has added a Halloween event to Grand Theft Auto V’s online game. The Halloween Surprise adds a spooky hearse and a monstrous hot rod to the vehicles available for purchase, new holiday-appropriate masks and makeup, and an eight-player Slasher adversary mode.
Run, hide, and fight to survive in the darkness as the player designated as the Slasher stalks their prey with a Shotgun. Use your new Flashlight to navigate if you dare, but be careful not to reveal your position or you’ll quickly become prey. Survive for 3 minutes and you’ll get the chance to return the favor with a Shotgun of your own.
Shotgun? In a slasher? Hey, Rockstar! You have a survival knife, hatchet, and machete in your GTA Online weapons list. You could’ve gone with any of those.
That’s 25,000 Swarovski crystals glued to a life-size replica of Master Chief’s helmet. Xbox Taiwan has an auction up right now for it. They hired cosplayer Hsu Chia-Hao and designer Jenny Manik Mercian to create this piece of wearable art and you can own it, if you’re willing to outbid everyone else by November 6th when the auction ends. The current high bid is $3,350.00. Pimp cups are old hat (pun intended) when set against this ode to excess. The upside is that all proceeds from the sale will go the Make-A-Wish Foundation. Imagine the looks you’ll get at the next gaming event with this on your noggin!
Larian Studios made good on their promise to release an Enhanced Edition of Divinity: Original Sin on Tuesday. People that already owned the original Original Sin got the newer version added to their Steam libraries for free. What was a great RPG romp last year is now a terrifically polished experience. Besides full controller support, the enhanced edition adds voice work for all the dialogue in the game, revamped combat encounters, more cinematics, split-screen co-op, and a bevy of fixes. (Check the changes here.) Matching the humor in the game, the developers pulled a fast one in the EULA – that thing you mindlessly agreed to so you could start the game. Buried in it was this gem:
16. Special Consideration. A special consideration in material or immaterial form may be awarded to the first 100 authorized licensees to actually read this section of the EULA and contact LARIAN STUDIOS at [email protected]. This offer can be withdrawn by LARIAN STUDIOS at any time.
Larian says their lawyers feel good that they got the requested 100 responses. Kudos to the sharp-eyed legal eagles that actually scrolled through the wall of text! There’s no word yet on what form the “special consideration” will take.
Divinity: Original Sin Enhanced Edition is available on Steam, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One.
Custom matches with mutators are coming to Rocket League. Psyonix announced that a free update in November for their multiplayer car arena sports title will add game-changing modes in the style of Unreal Tournament’s infamous mutators. Options shown in the video include replacing the normal ball with a square one, a low gravity setting, and a slow-motion mode.
Unfortunately, since these cool modes will only be available in custom matches or a separate playlist, it means almost no one will play with the new options enabled. Sad, really. Multiplayer games that only award XP in vanilla ranked matches incentivize the audience to never play in the most interesting battles.
Along with the November update, Psyonix left a little teaser at the end of the video for the December update. Hockey!
In my review of Spintires, the game of survival horror in which mud tries to kill various real-world driverless Soviet trucks, I wrote the following:
You as a driver, as a person, as a foot on a gas pedal and a pair of hands, dont exist. Whether its because [developer] Oovee didnt want to fuss with character models or because its an intentional effort to focus on the element of machines vs nature without mere humanity in the middle to muck it all up, the world of Spintires is like Maximum Overdrive, that dopey horror movie where trucks come alive and drive themselves around. Not for the cheese factor, of course. You wont find Emilio Estevez servicing a semi with a carnival mask on its grill. Its Maximum Overdrive for the basic vibe of trucks having to rely on themselves. These trucks are on their own. They have no drivers. You cannot angle the camera to look into the cab and see an expressionless character model with his hands perched fingerlessly on the wheel. You will never see a person in this game. People simply dont exist anymore, or theyve gone far away. These wildernesses are as empty and still as a crashed server.
Today, a year and a half later, my review is obsoleted with this news:
The biggest update to the game so far that…finally shows the driver behind the wheel. An animated physical driver [is introduced for] all vehicles. You can watch him turning the steering wheel, changing gears, operating hand-brake and reacting to the forces affecting the truck.
Thanks, Spintires. Just what I didn’t want. But the update, available now, also adds five new trucks. Now you can drive the B-66, the B-131, the C-4310, the D-537, and even the K-700. I don’t know what those are either.
David Cage’s Quantic Dream studio has built their reputation on movie-like experiences with a bit of gameplay mixed in. Depending on your tolerance for that kind of thing, Heavy Rain and Beyond: Two Souls were groundbreaking works, or frustratingly non-interactive stories. Today, Quantic Dream announced Detroit, another game that seems to have its feet firmly planted in cinematic tropes. In futuristic Detroit, androids are everywhere, doing everything humans don’t want to do. Into this cliche-ridden world, enters Kara, a synthetic humanoid that escapes her factory to explore what it means to be human. The story sounds like well-trod sci-fi ground, but just as recognizable is the game’s protagonist. Kara starred in a PlayStation 3 tech demo back in 2012.
