As any good Star Wars fan knows, on December 20th (USA), Star Wars the Old Republic will be released. Lucas Arts, EA, and BioWare have once again teamed up to bring the Star Wars experience to the MMORPG generation. Now, this post may not have any new information for those who have been following The Old Republic since it was announced nearly a year ago, but hopefully this will be some insight into some of the features not many have gotten to experience. Continue Reading
Gaming
The Resident Evil franchise has been one that has held its fan base over the years. With the first Resident Evil game in 1996, Capcom became the pioneers of the survival-horror genre. Stellar graphics for the time, a very unqiue story line, combined with smooth gameplay helped build a game that pulled the player in, and Capcom didn’t stop there. With the success of Resident Evil, Capcom continued to build on the story that started as the foundation for this amazing game, Resident Evil 5 being the latest addition to the franchise. In December, Capcom will be adding yet another game to the survival-horror collection it has created, however, this game will be unlike any Resident Evil game we have seen in the past.
Resident Evil – Operation Raccoon City takes us back to 1998, a time between Resident Evil 2 and 3. Instead of rehashing the story from the already known perspective, Capcom and Slant Six Games have decided to retell the story from the Umbrella Security Services point of view. Yes, that’s right, in Operation Raccoon City you are thrown straight into the mix as one of Umbrella Cooperation’s very own.
When a person thinks of an X-Men game they are excited! Mutant powers, evil villains and an awesome story! What else could a person want? Most of the X-Men games have been appealing because of these aspects and now Silicon Knights has taken on the challenge of creating one themselves.
X-Men: Destiny takes place in a new world in the X-men universe where Professor X has been killed whilst defeating an evil robot from the future who has the mission of destroying all the mutants in the past. The game begins at a rally in support for the alliance of humans and mutants together lead by Cyclops and Luis Reyes. However, as the rally is being held it is interrupted by a chaotic storm of what seems to be powers of the mutants in The Brotherhood. At this point you choose from three different normal human characters to control that suddenly realize they have the amazing power of being a mutant, how convenient! Though this is where we see the main focus of Destiny, the power of choice. Continue Reading
In keeping with the Holiday spirit and with the nearing of Hallow’s End, here are ten games, some new and some old, to play in the dark and give yourself a scare. While some of the graphics on these games may be a little out-dated they are still pretty decent and are suspenseful enough to keep you wondering what is around the next corner and make you jump when you least expect it. So, dust off that old console, turn out the lights, and get ready for some heart pounding, scream inducing video games. Continue Reading
I’ve been playing F1 2011 for the past week and it’s taken a little getting used to all the different changes including the tyres, controls and new menus. However, here are my thoughts in the video below which was taken in the 2011 Lotus F1 car and based at the Kuala Lampur F1 track, Malaysia:
AJ
Dead Island is the survival-horror game of 2011 about four people on a glorious holiday to the fictional island of Banoi, a bright and vibrant place where almost everyone has been turned into zombies, and you help the other survivors by fetching items and doing various quests for them.
The game received good reception when the original trailer was shown off, which involved a lovely family whose little girl gets turned into a zombie, and it was played backwards with the girl flying up and back through the broken window, and then being thrown around the room by [assumedly] her own parents. Though this has no bearing on the actual game, save for the zombies, and the expensive resort – the family are nowhere to be seen. Continue Reading
After months of teasing, City of Heroes has gone free2play for everyone, with the ability to pay for extras, and if you have paid for it in the past, then you get “Premium Status!”
The Cryptic Studios game now runs under a “Paragon Rewards” scheme, meaning you get reward tokens for purchasing a subscription, which means you will earn reward point when you pay for things.
With the new rewards scheme, you will earn 1 point for every month of subscription, plus another one every 12 months, and another one for every 1,200 Paragon Points you buy (which is approximately $15), these points are spent on account-wide benefits, like XP boosters, temporary powers, and enhancement unslotters and boosters.
It has been designed this way so that it is everyone can see how much of a veteran everyone else is, so you can see who are the real veteran players around as they will have lots of bells and whistles on their cape. Though it’s a little odd, to unlock things like powers, and it seems even classes, by paying for them, this is an interesting method not many people have adopted.
City of Heroes is yet another game to fall to the free2play model, along with DC Universe which was announced last week, but City of Heroes has been going a long time, since 2004, and it has held out quite well until now.
This is one of the few games that has had good content constantly dished out, in the form of “issues” – like a comic book – there has been over 20, with this one being the 21st, changing the game name to City of Heroes: Freedom.
You can play the game for free as of today, and if you have paid for the game in the past, then you should be upgraded to Premium Status straight away, so a warm welcome to returning players.
Eidos Montreal recently released their newest game Deus Ex: Human Revolution, the prequel to Deus Ex, which was released in 2000. To sum the game up in a few brief words, its Thief meets Dragon Age with a futuristic twist. DX:HR brings to light a new style of Action Roleplaying Games.
Set in the year 2027, DX:HR puts you behind the controls of Adam Jensen, an ex SWAT commander and the head of security for Sarif Industries. The game’s tutorial mission brings you right into the thick of the plot as Jensen is told to brief his security plans for the upcoming trip to Washington D.C. to unveil Dr. Reed’s newest development in the human augmentation industry. Of course, as anyone could predict, things don’t quite as expected and you soon find yourself learning to quickly maneuver through the office space, while trying in vain to save scientists from gunman. A few dead henchmen later, you find yourself being thrown through a thick plate glass high-tech monitor as you cling to consciousness, you watch them take Dr. Reed just before you take a bullet to the brain. Que the opening credits (which is an awesome little cut scene).
While this doesn’t really explain anything about the game, the opening mission/scene gives you a storyline that is just informative enough to make you wonder what the hell is going on. When you wake up, you are now an augmented human, complete with a retinal display. Continue Reading
I’m away from home at the moment Dog/House sitting so anything I was writing about is more or less on hold. John Walker’s article for Rock, Paper, Shotgun on Blizzard’s insistence* on turning single player games into MMO’s needed reposting however, if only to get as many people aware of this nonsense as possible.
You can’t pause. In fact, in most ways, the game acts like an MMO. For instance, quit it, and you’re given the optional cooldown to have your player clear the server properly. But it’s not an MMO. It’s not even close to an MMO. So when I’m playing the single-player game, and I’m in the middle of a frenzied mob, and there’s a knock at the front door, there’s nothing I can do. As happened to me yesterday. Twice. On another occasion I was surprised by a phone call that led to my having to do some other things. I’d safely left my character in a cleared area, but long between checkpoints. When I came back to the PC, I’d been idle for too long and the game had logged me out. – John Walker
Anyway, here is the link to the full article, if you are considering buying Diablo III you really should read it before placing that order…
How Diablo III’s DRM Will Affect You.
Diablo III has been delayed until the early part of next year, so there is a while for Blizzard to go back on this ridiculous decision, and a while for you to decide if it is enough to stop you buying the game.
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* In my opinion because it gives them more control and money rather for any of the reasons they claim about making the game better.
Carrier Command: Gaea Mission is a game scheduled for release in Q1 next year. There seems to be something of a trend in reviving old Strategy game IPs for modern games, first with X-COM and then Syndicate. Carrier Command is slightly different though as with those first two I mentioned they are keeping the name and theme only, deciding that first person action will sell better presumably. Carrier Command has me interested because it seems they dare to release something that hasn’t been on the market for quite some time, it looks to be keeping the strategy of the original and only updating the graphics and interface (though the trailer does not seem to suggest this, but then trailers always have extra explosions).
Have a watch of the teaser trailer and keep an eye out for more news. I certainly will be and will keep you updated when I hear more.
Read more about the game here.
Gaming and Tech Network 