Monthly Archives: July 2009

Risen is coming to PC and Xbox 360 on October 2, and to get you pumped for it, Piranha Bytes has released a new video for the game.

It shows off the environments, a bit of gameplay and has Nightwish jamming in the background.

Granted, the music seems to fit the theme of the trailer, until Emppu Vuorinen’s speed riffs kick-in.

Still, the game looks lovey so far.

Watch it after the break courtesy of Gamespot.

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Activision sent us a mailer announcing that Garbage’s Shirley Manson has lent her likeness and vocal stylings to Guitar Hero 5.

Apparently, she will be preforming Only Happy When it Rains in the game.

God no, Shirley, not you too.

Game’s out September 1.

Update: We have bowed down to peer pressure and added the video featuring herself chatting about being in Guitar Hero 5. We must say, the folks there did a grand job of rendering her. Watch after the jump.

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Preorder goodies are being offered through UK retailers for Champions Online.

Play UK is handing out Beta access with a game headstart code so you can get to playing a week before the rest of the masses. Also, the following in-game item unlock codes will be handed out for:

• Neutronium Shoulder Generators – Twin shoulder generators for power-armored heroes, which emit only trace amounts of toxic radiation.
• Insectoid Airfoil – Flaps up to 90 times per second, and is ideal for the high-flying hero.
• Inborn Tenacity – Damage resistance to Physical Damage types and small chance of a 10′s effect that will improve your damage resistance.

Amazon UK is also running a preorder incentive program, which also nets you access to the Beta, early game play, and exclusive in-game items,

Game, Gamestation,and HMV are also taking preorders.

Champions Online will be available on September r4 and the Beta starts August 17.

MotorStorm Pacific Rift Game Launching functionality and loads of MotorStorm stuff is planned for the coming weeks on Home, according to Sony.

However until that happens, Home plans to pacify you with sweets via the Fat Princess event “Quest for Cake”.

Based upon the PSN title, the redecorated events space contains eight pieces of cake, locked away in cages. To unlock the cake and feed your Princess you need to search the space high and low for clues, these clues will “give you access to the finest gateaux and, eventually, her majesty’s waistline.”

Should you unlock all eight pieces of cake, you are rewarded with the Princesses throne for your PS apartment.

More over on the EU PS Blog.

Michael Pachter has said StarCraft II could sell 4 million units during its opening quarter.

Priced at $40 wholesale and $50 retail, that would put $160 million in Activision Blizzard’s coffers with operating profit hitting $80 million or 4 cents per share.

In response to yesterday’s MarketWatch report, where analysts were citing a StarCraft II release delay due to the late Beta testing, Pachter seemed more assured of the product.

“Nobody knows how long the StarCraft II beta will take,” he said. “It’s highly likely that the game is polished, with few or no bugs. The issue is balance, and until there is a large scale beta, Blizzard won’t be able to test every single weapon, defense, et cetera, in order to ensure that the three races are perfectly balanced.

“They did a phenomenal job with the World of Warcraft beta (as I recall, it was around four months), and they will have no issues at all in attracting 30,000 supremely knowledgeable beta testers, so my bias is that the beta will take less time than most expect.

“The Blizzard guys are perfectionists, and if they want to take six months, nobody at Activision is going to challenge them.

“So the bottom line is that StarCraft II will launch when Blizzard says so.”

More over on Gamasutra.

Sony has released the European PSN update list a day early.

This week, Fat Princess, Watchmen: The End is Nigh, Part 2 along with the demo arrived in the playable content category.

Add-on content included Fight Night Round 4, Rag Doll Kung Fu, Buzz! Quiz TV AFL pack, Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10 Cogg Hill, 4x Dynasty Warriors 6 armor sets and the usual Rock Band and Guitar Hero World Tour DLC.

Full thing is over on Joystiq.

Atlus has detailed the preorder swag a bit more for the Standard and Deluxe versions of Demon’s Souls over on the US PS Blog.

All preorders come with a full-color, 40-page art book featuring sketches, designs, and renders that show off the game’s “gritty medieval aesthetic” along with the soundtrack.

In short, the Deluxe edition will include the above along with a 150+ page strategy guide, a collectible slip case, the game’s complete musical score, and a premium art book and the Standard gets the game and the above referenced swag.

The game arrives in North America on October 6.

According to recent NPD data, World of Warcraft has sold 8.6 million copies since its launch in November 2004.

Average sale price for all versions was not provided, but Gamasuta has figured that with an average $30 for each unit sold (core retailing at $19.95; expansions for around $39.95), ActiBlizz has netted $258 million total from the US end alone.

This does not take into account the numbers over in China, nor the $15 a month that users pay for a subscription but with 11.5 million subscribers – that’s a bog load of money right there.

Due to a technical glitch on Xbox Live, the leaderboards for Halo Wars has been wiped clean.

All stats are now back to launch day status, and this includes all singleplayer, multiplayer and Trueskill leaderboards, as well as all matchmaking data.

According to a post on the official Halo Wars website, it’s unknown if the data can be restored. However, the Xbox Live team is investigating the cause, and will provide an update to the situation as soon as possible.

Robot Entertainment issued a statement apologizing for the mess and “any frustration players have experienced in having their statistics disappear from the Leaderboards.”

Grab the link for more.

BioWare’s Casey Hudson has told Computer World that players will notice Commander Shepard is not as powerful in Mass Effect 2 as he was towards the end of the first game.

Apparently, stats for the character have been reset to basic abilities so that an improved system could be implemented, but to compensate for the lack of prowess, his storyline will delve into the reasons why he is weaker than before.

“There’s something that’s happening with the story that explains what happens with your abilities,” said Hudson. “It’s something we can’t go into detail about for obvious reasons, but it actually happens the other way around. Our goal with the story, in terms of getting the game started quickly and players into really compelling story situations…that dictated and allowed us to do certain things including changing the way that your abilities work and the way you develop your character.

“Part of it, too, is the fact that we’ve gone in and improved literally every system in the game, your powers, the controls, aiming, the way that your character stats work and how you build a character, the inventory system, weapons, and so on. All of those things have been dramatically improved, so there’s no direct way to map the stuff you had in Mass Effect over to Mass Effect 2 anyway.

“That said, we’re taking into account all of your accomplishments in terms of building a character from the first game. So things you’d expect to be acknowledged, like if you were a level 60 character, or you were highly Renegade and don’t want to start out at the middle again. If you import your save game from Mass Effect, these kinds of things will be acknowledged in ways that map across to the new system.

“You will feel, even in terms of the character that you build, that you are continuing as that character.”

Hudson goes on to chat about the new vehicle and other ME2 details, and talks a bit about emotional attachment in games like ICO through the link.

With the release of All Fronts and Dark Corners, Epic is hosting another Double XP session for Gears of War 2 players.

Only instead of a weekend, it will last all week long and be available to the public playlist and private games as well.

The Double XP week ends August 3, so long into XBL and get to fragging.

British psychiatrist Dr. Richard Graham has relayed to Telegraph UK that he is concerned over MMO player addictions and is offering to help by providing in-game help online.

Planning to use World of Warcraft as a starting point, Graham contacted Blizzard to see if it would provide him a free or discounted subscription to the game so he can more easily offer assistance to players.

“We will be launching this project by the end of the year,” he said. “I think it’s already clear that psychiatrists will have to stay within the parameters of the game. They certainly wouldn’t be wandering around the game in white coats and would have to use the same characters available to other players.

“Of course one problem we’re going to have to overcome is that while a psychiatrist may excel in what they do in the real world, they’re probably not going to be very good at playing World of Warcraft.

“We may have to work at that if we are going to get through to those who play this game for hours at end.”

A solution to this, he suggested, is for other players to act as virtual mentors as gaming addiction is hard to indentify due to the self-imposed isolation of the subject.

“Those effected don’t exhibit the same outward warning signs as most teenage anti-social behavior issues do because they’re in their bedrooms most of the time, seemingly out of trouble,” he continued. “Because of this we can’t get through to them in the traditional educational environment or intrude on their actual bedrooms, we need to turn to the internet itself to tackle these problems.”

More through the link.

DreamWorks has began negotiations for a new videogame licensing deal which will last until 2011.

The news was revealed during a conference call after the company’s Q2 financial metting by CEO Jeffrey Katzenberg.

DreamWork’s deal with Activision expires next summer, and it has a contract with THQ to make a single game, which is based on next year’s Oobermind – after which it will be without a games partner.

According to the financial reveal, a $24 million benefit was logged during Q1 due to an amended contract with Activison, which must provide extra payments for games based on previous DreamWorks films.

Without the Activision deal, DreamWorks’ revenue would have been $108 million (24 percent), and net income would have fallen by a third to about $17.1 million.

More through LA Times, GI.biz.

Microsoft has released a partial track list for Lips: Number One Hits, which is expected to land in store this fall.

Coldplay, Rihanna, Tokio Hotel, Timbaland feat. OneRepublic, Extreme, Culture Club, MC Hammer, Roy Orbison and Marvin Gaye are all included and can be mixed with the original disc for your very own caterwauling fun.

A free 5-track download pack will be made available through Xbox Live for those who purchase the karaoke game. Good thing is – you can pick an choose from the following:

• California Love by 2Pac feat. Dr. Dre and Roger Troutman
• Barbie Girl by Aqua
• Just Dance by Lady Gaga
• Everybody Wants to Rule the World by Tears for Fears
• The Fear by Lily Allen
• Don’t Phunk With My Heart by Black Eyed Peas
• I Don’t Feel Like Dancin’ by Scissor Sisters
• Heartless by Kanye West
• Touch My Body by Mariah Carey
• Hey There Delilah by Plain White T’s
• Always On My Mind by Pet Shop Boys
• I’m Yours by Jason Mraz
• Push the Button by Sugababes

Thanks, CVG.

Telltale Games has announced that the fourth and final chapter in their episodic series, Wallace and Gromit’s Grand Adventures, arrived today for PC.

In The Bogey Man, Wallace finds himself invited to become the newest member of the Prickly Thicket country club. Instead of being able to play golf though, Wallace and Gromit get involved in an ancient dispute involving ghostly figures.

Neato.

More over on the official site.

Oh, daddy. Sega’s released a marine reveal trailer for Rebellion’s AvP, and it’s looking pretty dashed sweet.

You’d have to go a long way to fuck up kicking an alien in the face before getting stabbed in the head by a predator; let’s hope Rebellion can pull the beans out of the can, or whatever your mother used to say.

It’s out for PC, PS3 and 360 next year.

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ACE Team has released the SDK for Zeno Clash.

Those interested in creating their own levels and mods for the game can now do so.

To help you out, ACE has created a Wiki page which should help walk you through it a bit.

Thanks, Shack.

After the break there’s a video of Bill Roper detailing Champions Online’s character creation tools, and it really does look bonkers. It’s cool stuff.

The MMO’s out in September for PC, with a 360 version to follow. The beta starts August 17.

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Foundation 9 has cut back on staff, closed its Fizz Factor studio and merged Amaze and Griptonite due to the slowing market.

“It’s important to F9 to remain a strong and profitable studio, so that we can continue to provide the best possible services to our publishing partners and employees,” read a company statement. “From time to time we make decisions to grow or shrink capacity in relation to market conditions, and we do not make public comments on these decisions.

“We can confirm that we recently merged the operations of our two Kirkland studios, Amaze and Griptonite. Having separate ‘console’ and ‘handheld’ studios under the same roof simply didn’t make sense in light of the convergence in capabilities of modern game hardware.

“J.C Connors, studio head of Griptonite, will lead the combined studio. As part of that restructuring, and our normal practice of monitoring business conditions, we made the decision to close our Austin, TX handheld studio, Fizz Factor.”

Currently working on Assassin’s Creed II and Where the Wild Things Are, Foundation 9 plans to make addition cuts at Double Helix Games and suspend matching payments to the company 401K fund.

More through GI.biz, VentureBeat.

Frozenbyte has revealed that Trine will not be released on PSN this week as originally planned.

According to a post from the developer over on the official forums, a small bug needs to be fixed first.

“Unfortunately, Trine isn’t coming to PSN this week, and this time it’s our fault as there was discovered yet another small bug which needed to be fixed,” read the post. “I can’t tell for sure when the release is coming, as no-one really seems to know. Also, I have no idea are EU and NA releases timed differently.

“For us, not knowing is also a bit tough, but I hope it’s eventually worth all the waiting.”

Bit of bad news there, but it’s best to have a working game than a broken one.

Via PlayStation Lifestyle.