Gaming Thread 5/18/2014

So Operation Supply Drop's 8-Bit Salute charity drive came and went yesterday, raising a $250,000 to send videogame care packages to the troops. Considering they got besieged by douchebag script kiddies who completely shut down the site to donate (ended up having to do direct paypal deposits), that number is mighty impressive for just being the third annual event.

They are doing a makeup weekend next week so you can still donate during the charity drive.

• Oculus and Facebook continues building a dream team as Adrian Wong joined him. He was Google's lead electrical engineer on Google Glass and was a team member of Sandia National Labs.

• Slate: You are repressing your latent homosexuality if you're a dude who likes playing as girls in videogames.

• Want to watch Tim Schafer play Day of The Tentacle?

• I only link this Mario Kart review because in the second to last paragraph, the writer says that the Mario universe is racist. And Toadstool is totally human

• For a new console gen, the numbers are really weak across the board here in the States. The eye is on Xbox One only selling 115K units but that papers over that the PS4 also had a bad month with only moving about 200K units (no hard # but the range talked about is 198K to 203K units). Historically for an April post launch, that number is down outside of PS3. And physical software sales is still crap.

• This is so Japan that it kinda hurts. Trailer for Akiba's Trip 2

• Gaming wise, Sony did pretty good only losing $75m last year but the rest of the company, lol. When you're only bright spot is in an area where Japan is doing it's damn-ist to kill with their stimulus, it's not hot. Wonder if Japan is gonna bail them out as being too big to fail.

• I don't have a link as Amazon pulled the listing but the upcoming Senran Kagura Shinovi Versus is getting a limited edition called the "Let's Get Physical Edition" and that's just beautiful, man.

• Apple won't allow a game that is based around girls flicking their bean on the store :(

• So Far Cry 4 was announced and it didn't take long for people to go to Twitter and say that the cover art is a two-fer with not only being racist but also homophobic because the villian on it is wearing pink so they think he is gay, which frankly I think is homophobic in itself as why do a guy gotta be gay to wear a pink suit?

• Quick CG trailer for the upcoming Killing Floor 2

• So Halo 5 is coming out next year. Same with the Halo TV show. Makes sense to keep the 3 year dev cycle. And the other character who sports the ONI logo is new character.

• Which leads into that the long rumored Halo collection of the first four games is in fact happening and coming to Xbox One this fall.

• New trailer for the upcoming US release of Natural Doctrine for the PS4

• Other than the trees, Drive Club is looking good in the new direct feed 1080P vids. Still wish they pulled back to get 60FPS.

• The PC release of TitanFall may have bombed but pulling two game modes in a game that is light in content is a bit puzzling even if there isn't a lot of people playing it.

• They did release a trailer for the upcoming expansion pack titled Expedition

• NISA finally announced a release date for the vita release of Disgaea 4. Out on August 12th.

• So someone stole the DayZ source code. Dunno why someone would steal it but they did.

• Yep, it's Left 4 Dead alright. Footage of the upcoming L4D arcade game

• Still conflicted of Bruce Lee in the upcoming UFC game but he looks good in the gameplay trailer

• Non-existant details but during their financial call, Take Two announced that Rockstar isn't totally releasing GTAV for current gen this year. They also announced that they pulled in $2.35 billion in sales on the back of 33 million copies of GTAV.

Kinect-Less XBox One

Had to know it was coming after they reversed themselves with the mandatory Kinect but after just 6 months of being on the marketplace its a bit eesh. Though the $500 price was seriously hurting them and this is totally a desperation move but business wise, after a 115K April NPD, it makes sense. Of course the main question is if this will help them and I really don't think it will. An under-powered "me-too console" with no vision/message at $399 just isn't a compelling proposition without it's USP. And from the reactions on twitter, it's kinda obvious that they didn't tell any devs about this plan as Harmonix seemed bummed to say the least (wonder how Disney is feeling with paying for the dev of Fantasia, a Kinect only game). My initial kneejerk reaction is that hopefully Facebook announces that the Rift will be released this fall and I'll just drop kick the console (after playing Quantum Break, natch) to help augment a PC upgrade to go with it. I'm getting old and after 25 years of owning consoles, it just doesn't interest me anymore in owning one.

Paywall no more, for the most part.

For something that probably shouldn't have been erected in the first place, Microsoft has removed the need of Xbox Live to be able to use the apps on the 360 and Xbox One. They even made a token gesture of letting people cancel their Live Gold account which they will repay in credit on your Microsoft account. In retrospect, some of the stuff Nancy Tellem strongly alluded to it when they did the shindig about Xbox Entertainment's blowout of the first TV shows that they are working on. Couple interesting things: they didn't remove F2P games and MMOs from the paywall which frankly don't make much sense and it does open up the pathway for the long rumored 360 based set-top box. Still waiting to figure out what Blake Krikorian (Co-creator of the SlingBox) has been doing at Microsoft.

Games with Gold

Eh, they finally announced the plan for the XBox One. They're moving to a sub based program like Sony's PS+. So now they can offer free newer games. Didn't bother me either way.

Out of nowhere, the Japanese release of LoveLive! School Festival came out translated in English on the US iOS Store. It's an idol collecting rhythm game with an endurance bar and it's quite good and it gets pretty hard on hard and extreme difficulty. It's free but doesn't really nickle and dime you. Worth the download

Drakengard 3 (PS3) - Well, at least this one isn't dealing with incest like the last two games. This one deals with a girl who isn't satisfied with just one guy at a time as the 4 guys she travels with makes her say scream and I would expect some crying as well, the game is from Japan. Like the other games in the series, it blends in action combat with some dragon flying. From the import reviews, it's like the others, Access Games didn't rock the boat with this entry (Cavia is dead after Nier bombed) by making a game that doesn't have deep but fun gameplay but is really saved with a good story (who knew watching a brother and sister bumping uglies could be interesting but Cavia did it).

Mugen Souls Z (PS3) - I didn't play the first one so I have no clue on this other than it's a direct sequel to the first game and it's from Compile Heart so expect a mediocre game with huge...numbers and a strong cheesecake factor. Also, they cut out some stuff because it was too racy for America.

Wolfenstein: The New Order (PS3, PS4, PC, 360 and Xbox One) - Considering the first two games listed, it's somehow fitting that the big game of the week stars a man named BJ. It's a direct sequel to the under-rated Wolfenstein that came out a few years ago. It's 1960 and the Nazis have taken over the world. Time to shoot the greatest bad guys in videogaming. There is a couple of cool and interesting notes about this game. First, it's the first game to be released that is using id Tech 5. It will be interesting in seeing how far along it is with mega textures and what not. Second is that it's the first game from MachineGames which for the most part is the majority of Starbreeze Studios (ton of people bailed during the remake of Syndicate) who made the awesome Riddick games and the under-rated comic based game, The Darkness. Nothing else, it should be compentent on a technical level.

Transistor (PC & PS4) - No matter how much I tried, I couldn't stay awake when playing Supergiant's first game, Bastion. That game just bored me to no end. The trailers for this one make it look a bit more interesting and they kept the cool art style from Bastion. Depending on reviews, I might take a stab at it when it's in a bundle for $1 with 6 other games.

The Incredible Adventures of Van Hellsing 2 (PC) - Totally slept on the first game till last year's Christmas Sale on Steam and I really wish I didn't as it was one of the best loot whore ARPGs that I've played in a awhile. It played a lot like Titan Quest with enough wrinkles to make it interesting with the auras and spells. And throwing a tower defense mini-game was interesting.Now it wasn't a particulary a long game (though the end dragged quite a bit) but I'm very interested in this second game. I won't be sleeping on this.

Tropico 5 (PC) - The best dictator run city management series around. I totally got my fill with Tropico 4 on the series but this one adds multiplayer so it's gonna end up on my wishlist for a sale.

posted by Gang of Gaming Morons! at 03:09 PM

| Access Comments