Category: News

Lara Croft

Rise of the Tomb Raider won’t be so exclusive in 2016

Highly controversial XBOX exclusive Rise of the Tomb Raider won't be exclusive for too long. Square Enix has revealed in a press release that the game will be available for Windows 10 and Steam in early 2016. For PS4 owners the wait will be a bit longer since it will remain console exclusive for a year.
"REDWOOD CITY, CA (JULY 23, 2015) – Square Enix today announced its latest title in the critically acclaimed and award-winning Tomb Raider® series, Rise of the Tomb Raider ®, will be available for Windows 10 and Steam in early 2016. The game will be a console exclusive to Xbox One and Xbox 360 for one year after its initial launch, coming to PlayStation® 4 (PS4) in Holiday 2016. Renowned developer Crystal Dynamics, a Square Enix studio, is leading development in the latest entry in the iconic series for additional platforms."
Last year the announcement of this exclusive title was Microsoft's ace under the sleeve fueling the flames in the console war. It looks like the PS4 won't be having an exclusive of the caliber of Tomb Raider to compete against Microsoft this holiday season. If you're a PS4 owner, what games are you looking forward for the rest of this year?

Humble Jumbo Bundle 4

There's a new Humble Jumbo Bundle in town. Pay one dollar and you'll get Mercenary Kings, Outland and Fallen Enchantress. Pay above the average, $4.20 as of this writing, and you'll also get critic's favorite The Stanley Parable along with Endless Space and The Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing 2. If you want to go the extra mile you could pay $18 or more and also get Space Engineers (Early Access).More games will be added to the bundle next Tuesday.

(Source)

New Steam Store Releases: Gunbird

Gunbird has come to Steam. A bastardized version of it, anyway. The original Gunbird was a 1994 vertically scrolling Arcade shoot 'em up created by Japanese developer Psikyo. This Steam release, unfortunately, is the cut-down Americanized version, retitled as Mobile Light Force (for some bizarre reason). In spite of that, it still manages to be a really good shooter. During the '90s, Psikyo was one of the best shoot 'em up developers around. And this week actually features a double dose from them, as their 1997 side-scrolling Arcade game, Sol Divide, is also newly available.Also, also newly available, a fantasy strategy game from Stardock, a pretty cool looking space strategy indie game, and the first non-management football game I've seen on Steam. Take one great Arcade shoot 'em up, hack it up and repackage it nonsensically, then jump past the break to see more of this week's new releases.

  • Gunbird (Mobile Light Force) (Psikyo, Single-player, $4.99) (Controller Support, Steam Achievements)
  • Sol Divide (Psikyo, Single-player, $4.99) (Controller Support, Steam Achievements)
  • Sorcerer King (Stardock, Single-player, $39.99) (Steam Achievements)
  • Interstellaria (Chucklefish, Single-player, $9.99) (Steam Achievements)
  • Axis Football 2015 (Axis Games, Single & Multi-player, $19.99) (Controller Support, Steam Achievements)
  • Odallus (JoyMasher, Single-player, $14.99) (Controller Support, Steam Achievements)
  • Luckslinger (Duckbridge, Single-player, $12.99) (Controller Support, Steam Achievements)
  • Card Hunter (Blue Manchu, Single & Multi-player, Free to Play) (Steam Achievements)
  • Executive Assault (Hesketh Studios, Single & Multi-player, $12.99)
[Image: Psikyo]

Andrew J Amideo

Farewell, Mr Iwata (New Nintendo eShop Releases)

This past Sunday, Nintendo was the unfortunate bearer of some very disheartening news. Satoru Iwata, Nintendo's charismatic and widely-respected CEO, had unexpectedly passed away due to cancer-related complications. You can say what you want about Mr Iwata's particular successes and failures during his thirteen year tenure as President, but all that really matters is that he was a kind, humorous, and visionary leader, who's untimely departure from this world has surely been felt by many. This is a sad time for Nintendo and it is an uncertain time as well. Let us hope that they can find a worthy replacement sometime in the near future. Until then, we will continue to remember Mr Iwata as the great man that he was.In terms of new games this week, there is really only one worth mentioning, so I won't even put it beyond a page break. It is a curious oddity from my youth. A fun and challenging little title that I spent many hours playing at various friend's houses. Blaster Master. You probably won't enjoy it as much if you don't have that same sense of nostalgia, but I would invite you to give it a try anyway. It's one of those games that has a little bit of something for everybody. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go relive some of my youth.

Wii U

[Original Image: Nintendo]

Andrew J Amideo

Oh My God Emperor! *UPDATE*

*UPDATE 1* It looks like all three games are having serious issues right now. Personally I got Shadow of the Horned Rat and it crashed when loading the first battle. Apparently everyone is getting this and there is no known work around yet without the physical disc. Final Liberation and Chaos Gate are also having audio issues, lag issues, and crashing issues. Looks like these three weren't ready for recruitment. Hopefully GoG.com will step in and actually update and fix the issues present, if not it's back to looking for a physical copy of Shadow of the Horned Rat for me. *Three new games have appeared on Gog.com, and I am so excited right now I can barely type this. Everyone knows by now that I am a Warhammer fan, so my excitement should come as no surprise now that Warhammer is on GoG! Hit the break for my thoughts and some more ramblings.

I'm sitting here in my home office, surfing the internet before I go to my normal job. Now, though, now I see that Warhammer 40,000: Chaos Gate, Epic 40,000 Final Liberation, and Warhammer Fantasy: Shadow of the Horned Rat are all available for the first time digitally on GoG. Why must I leave for work? Why can't I stay and play these epic games? I can look up at my video games and see the two prominently displayed boxes of Chaos Gate and Final Liberation. I bought them as part of my Warhammer video game collection, partly because I figured they would never come out digitally. I was still searching for Shadow of the Horned Rat...one day I'll have it in my grubby little hands.So what kinds of games are these anyway? Well, Chaos Gate is very much like X-Com. I know I mention X-Com alot, but this game is a turn based tactical RPG with an isometric view. You control a squad of marines that you outfit as you see fit, with more options available the farther you get. It's great fun,  but can be a bit buggy. Shadow of the Horned Rat is kind of like an early Total War game, though I haven't actually played it yet. Just watched a lot of videos online. Still, the graphics might turn a lot of people off from Shadow of the Horned Rat as they are...interesting. Finally we come to Final Liberation, and how best to explain it? Imagine X-Com or Chaos Gate but ramped up to 11. Squads of soldiers for every unit, tanks everywhere, walking battle mechs, this game is about the biggest and baddest from the Warhammer 40k universe fighting it out.

I will be checking these GoG versions out soon, as soon as I can, and I'll be posting my thoughts about those versions here. I'll also be streaming them because everyone should experience my joy when it comes to Warhammer. Are you excited about these releases? Are you curious how they got the rights squared away after all this time? Leave a comment below and let's discuss.

Author: Billy C
Source: GoG.com

Batman: Late Knight on PC

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Yep, still broken.
Still waiting for the PC version of Arkham Knight? I hope you’re patient, otherwise you might be better off with switching to a console.
Kotaku Australia got their hands on a supposed EB Games memo, which states that the game will not be fixed until Australian Spring, which is in about 2 months.

“As previously advised, we have stopped sales of Batman: Arkham Knight PC while Warner and Rocksteady work on addressing performance issues with the game. The latest information from Warner is that the updates won’t be available until Spring. Due to this we have made the difficult decision to recall all PC stock from stores to return to the vendor until an acceptable solution is released.”

So what about the people who already bought it? Well, you’ll probably get to beta test some more and as a thank you Warner Bros. will NOT release the DLC until the game is available for sale again. Why is that a positive? Because the DLC is about as good as the frame rate of the PC version.
Source: Kotaku Australia
Picture: Batman - Arkham Knight (PS4, because that version isn't without bugs either)

New PlayStation Store Releases: God of War PS4

God of War has come to the PlayStation 4 this week with the release of a remastered version of the PlayStation 3 classic, God of War III. I'm not exactly sure why Sony decided to port over III, and not Ascension, but I'm sure the fans will gladly take whatever they can get. Also out this week, the first EA PGA golf game in over 15 years not to feature Tiger Woods in the title. To give you an idea of how long it's been, PGA Tour 98 was released on the PlayStation 1 and Sega Saturn! Also, also out this week, a Prototype collection, a Godzilla game, and a pair of decent indie games. Murder the gods in an unspeakable fashion, then jump past the break to see more of this week's new releases.
PlayStation 4

[Image: Sony]

Andrew J Amideo

New Steam Store Releases: Battle Fantasia (GTFO F1 2015)

This week, Battle Fantasia, a 2007 Arc System Works (Guilty Gear, BlazBlue) Arcade game has arrived on Steam. Battle Fantasia is yet another competent fighter from the renowned Japanese developer. What sets this one apart is the unique and interesting fantasy setting. If you're a fan of fantasy action or well-crafted fighting games, you really can't go wrong with it.Also released this week was the new Codemasters Formula 1 game, F1 2015. You won't find it listed below, however, because similar to the recent Batman: Arkham Knight release, this game is also broken beyond all reasonable playability. In fact, the only real difference between Arkham Knight and F1 2015 is that Warner Bros was kind enough to pull their game shortly after release, while F1 2015 still remains available for purchase. This, despite the fact that it currently has received over 70% negative user reviews! Bang up job, Codemasters! That's quite an achievement. I hope you are proud of yourselves.

Also, also released this week, the popular sequel to a PlayStation-only soccer game with cars, a very cool-looking and original Japanese fighting game that was supposedly inspired by Street Fighter III, and a pair of classic, futuristic real-time tactics games. Bring a sword to an arcade fight, then jump past the break to see more of this week's new releases.

  • Battle Fantasia (Arc System Works, Single & Multi-player, $14.99) (Controller Support, Steam Achievements)
  • Rocket League (Psyonix, Single & Multi-player, $19.99) (Controller Support, Steam Achievements)
  • Yatagarasu (Nyu Media, Single & Multi-player, $14.99) (Controller Support)
  • Ground Control (Massive Entertainment, Single & Multi-player, $4.99)
  • Ground Control II (Massive Entertainment, Single & Multi-player, $4.99)
  • The Red Solstice (Ironward, Single & Multi-player, $24.99) (Steam Achievements)
  • Coffin Dodgers (Milky Tea Studio, Single & Multi-player, $10.99) (Controller Support, Steam Achievements)
  • The Amber Throne (Joshua Missile, Single-player, $14.99) (Controller Support)
  • Knee Deep (Prologue Games, Single-player, $29.99) (Controller Support, Steam Achievements)
  • Timeframe (Random Seed Games, Single-player, $7.99) (Controller Support, Steam Achievements)
  • Gunpowder (Rogue Rocket Games, Single-player, $9.99) (Steam Achievements)
[Image: Arc System Works]

Andrew J Amideo

PSA: F1 2015 is broken on the PC

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It's no coincidence that the official media pictures still feature a “Work in Progress” tag.
I’m a bit of a racing nut and F1 2015 was on my “most anticipated” list since it got announced. That quickly changed today. The game is now released and not only is it missing a career mode and co-op, according to early Steam reviews and forum posts, it’s also broken as can be.
People complain about constant crashes, blurred graphics, freezes and massive frame rate drops, even on high end hardware.
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The users clearly aren't happy about Codemasters newest release
Seriously AAA game developers, what is going on? Is 2015 the year of broken PC ports?