Monthly Archives: July 2009

Square Enix has released some DLC for My Life as a Dark Lord today, with some paid content.

Players now have two new costumes based around FFIV’s Rydia and Palom which allow the character to cast fire and cyclone magic once per stage. Each will set players back 200 WiiPoints.

Also, FFIV’s Kaim and Palom appear as summonable monsters, with Kaim doling out physical attacks and Palom casting magic to slow down adventurers. Each runs 200 WiiPoints.

The Akumu no Tiara (Nightmare Tiara) accessory has been added with the “nightmare of execution” ability which gives players 50 NP extra at the start of each stage. The item goes for 200 WiiPoints.

Finally, two new stage packs are up for 300 WiiPoints each: a beginner to intermediate pack and an advanced pack. Both contain 8 stages and can also be purchased together for 500 WiiPoints.

Thanks, Adriasang.

Gearbox’s Randy Pitchford has told Eurogamer TV that he’s “totally terrified” over the release of Borderlands and the subsequent heavy titles the game is up against this holiday season.

“When people take risks and it’s not rewarded, in the case of Mirror’s Edge, it’s makes it harder for others to be comfortable taking risks,” said Pitchford. “Yeah, I’m terrified. And [Borderlands is] an original brand, too, so it’s even more risky.”

However, Pitchford stated that if the industry continued doing “the same stuff we don’t push ourselves forward anymore”, as used BioShock as an example of a new IP that did well with its release schedule and word of mouth.

“There are those of us that play everything and we’re begging for fresh stuff, so I’m hoping that helps,” he added. “And if it’s good, it’ll get noticed.”

Game’s out for PC, PS3 and Xbox 360 this October.

Aksys Games has confirmed through its website that niche PS3 JRPG Record of Agarest War will land on American PS3′s via PSN.

The Compile Heart-developed SRPG has been described by Joystiq as containing “suggestive sausage-eating imagery” with an “abundance of low-angle panty shots”.

A game feature in the titles called “Soul Breed” allows the player to form relationships with female characters.

No release date as of yet, but it will be one of the largest downloadable games on PS3.

More through the link.

Activision and id Software announced today that Wolfenstein is to be the title sponsor of Universal Pictures’ upcoming Quentin Tarantino film, “Inglourious Basterds.”

As an official sponsor, Activision will conduct a contest for two lucky winners to attend the Hollywood premier at the Grauman’s Chinese Theater on August 10.

The prize pack includes two roundtrip tickets for a four day/three night stay in Los Angeles, two tickets to the premier and two tickets to the “star-studded after party” at Mondrian in West Hollywood.

Contest begins today, and Gamespot has all the details on this you will ever desire.

Wolfenstein his shelves on August 18, and “Inglourious Basterds” arrives in theaters August 21, in the US.

Tecmo has released some screens for its third-person shooter Quantum, due on PS3 in 2010.

Some may look familiar to you, some may not. Either way, you may wish to have a look regardless.

It looks very “Gearsy”.

Kotaku has ‘em.

Quantic Dream founder and CEO, David Cage, has been confirmed to deliver a keynote at GDC Europe.

Cage will deliver an address entitled ‘Writing Interactive Narrative for a Mature Audience’, which will focus on the necessity of mature games that explore difficulties through interactive story-telling and solutions.

“I am excited to participate at GDC Europe and to represent France in such a well-rounded European keynote roster,” said Cage. “With the game audience maturing, we feel it’s important to share visions and ideas to define how our industry should now evolve.

“I am convinced more than ever that the most important next gen feature is emotion. How to trigger more complex emotions is our biggest challenge in the coming years.”

GDC Europe takes place August 17-19 in Cologne.

More over on GI.biz.

ShopTo bossman Igor Cipolletta has relayed that he is worried over the newest “trend” of pricey franchise games.

Speaking with Eurogamer, Cipolletta fears that publishers are following Activision’s lead in this respect, thanks to the announced price increase for Modern Warfare 2.

“Whether planned, or a case of jumping on the popular franchises bandwagon, we have seen Microsoft increase the price of Forza 3 to GBP 49.99 and Nintendo increase the price of Professor Layton [and Pandora's Box] to GBP 34.99,” he told the site. “I sincerely hope that not all publishers will follow this lead.

“The price increases that some publishers think the market can stand are, to say the least, a worrying trend, and appear to be more than just a result of currency fluctuations.”

Cipolletta commended Capcom for dropping the price of its games to GBP 39.99, but felt the price increase for Wii did not go over as well as Nintendo hoped.

“Subsequent to the price increase and as a result of the European ‘free market’ the console is in plentiful supply and some chain stores were forced to discount the machine to gain cash back,” he added. “I think this is a demonstration that the market was either unable or unwilling to stomach the Nintendo hardware price increase.”

Thanks, GI.biz.

Frontier’s David Braben, creator of Elite and the upcoming sequel to LostWinds, has defended Lionhead’s Milo & Kate and the reputed “smoke and mirrors” aspect of it.

“I think there is absolutely nothing to be ashamed of with good, complex smoke and mirrors,” he told Eurogamer during Develop. “With all of these things, we’re building interesting worlds, and there are so many different ways you can do that. Milo & Kate showed some of that, and some of the things we’re working on will show some of that too.

“There are so many different dimensions to it: I often bore on about film, but it shows how much more there is out there that we haven’t touched yet in the game space.”

Braben also went on to discuss how AI in games have improved by “degrees we haven’t noticed.”

Via KokuGamer.

Atlus has released some videos for its next Shin Megami Tensei game, Strange Journey.

Granted, these are not very long or in depth videos, but you get the idea.

In the assets, you will see vehicles whizzing through the snow in Antarctica with folks representing different nations exploring the wasteland.

The other two show the naming of the hero and a first-person view of the dungeons with a bit of action.

Numbering four in total, you can watch ‘em over on D’toid.

Game’s out for DS in Japan October 1.

THQ has hired former Midway exec Mark Cook as its new marketing manager for UK and Europe and plans to start marketing titles earlier as a new global strategy.

Cook will be in charge of marketing for Darksiders: Wrath of War, where he will spearhead the seven-month marketing campaign leading up to the January release of the PS3 and Xbox 360 action title.

“We decided early on that it was important to own a space with the release of Darksiders,” Cook told MCV. “Releasing in January allows us to build anticipation for the title, engage consumers with the Darksiders brand through the peak period and set the tone for 2010 as the first major release of the year.

“Key asset drops and events will be supported with targeted media across online, print, social networks & TV as we begin the Countdown to Armageddon.

“We will also be taking advantage of new and innovative ways to engage our consumers, like the VidZone activity we we will be using to support the Comic-Con drive this month.”

More through the link.

The Develop conference has added a new one-day event in Liverpool for studios in the North.

Develop Liverpool will be held November 5 with Merseyside ICT’s Software City event, and will feature tracks and networking events at the Arena and Conference Center Liverpool.

“With such an active and vibrant development community north of Birmingham it just makes sense to take the Develop conference to Liverpool,” says event director Andy Lane.

“We want as many developers as possible to experience the passion and energy that we saw in Brighton.”

Speakers and details are to be announced at a later date.

Via Gamasutra.

MTV and Harmonix’s parent company, Viacom, has reported that sales of the Rock Band franchise are down this quarter “due to the soft retail environment”, which has directly impacted revenues for the company.

Q2 revenue dropped 8 percent to $1.97 billion with a 41 percent decline in revenue blamed on poor sales of Rock Band which saw a 12 percent decline in profit to $671 million in the Media Networks division.

Besides the “soft retail environment”, the loss was also attributed to lower advertising revenues and $16 million in severance charges.

Overall, quarterly revenues dropped 14 percent to $3.3 billion, and profit dropped 26 percent to $586 million.

Chief exec Philippe Dauman assured shareholders that the decline is “short-term”, and with Viacom’s “aggressive” cost management and the pending launch of The Beatles: Rock Band in September, a “brighter future” is in the cards.

More through the press release below.

More »

It is being reported that Lionhead’s set to make an announcement at GamesCom in Cologne.

The news comes from German site Gamefront, which claims Peter Molyneux will front the Microsoft press conference at the event.

Molyneux was confirmed for earlier in the month as a keynote speaker, but this is the first we have heard that he will head the Microsoft presser, scheduled for August 19 from 10-11 am.

We have sent an email off to Lionhead for confirmation. In the meantime, hit the links for more.

Via CVG.

Namco Bandai Partners, the new publishing arm of Atari in EU, has slapped on dates for Champions Online and the multi-platform editions of Ghostbusters: The Video Game.

Champions Online will be released on October 9 for PC, while Ghostbusters will see a release on Xbox 360, Nintendo Wii, Nintendo DS and PSP on October 24.

The game was released earlier in the summer as a timed exclusive for the PS3 and PS2.

They also dated Cities XL for the PC, that will release for the PC on September 4.

Thanks, IncGamers.

Take a pinch of salt with this, but you may be seeing the first piece of info as to when a beta test is coming for MAG.

Community Team member and Moderator of the English SCEE forums, Yaster, has been snapped playing the beta. Right now, this is most likely internal, but it shouldn’t be before long until we hear something for the public.

Last year, Killzone 2, Resistance 2 and LittleBigPlanet had internal beta’s before either being publicly released or trialed through SCEE’s Beta Trial Member program.

Earlier in May, developer, Zipper Interactive, confirmed that there would be a public beta trial for the game before it’s impending autumn release.

Via PS3-Sense.

Team 17 boss Martyn Brown has said that claims of bribery from Microsoft over the timed exclusivity of Alien Breed: Evolution for Xbox Live Arcade, are “bollocks”, although understands there are PS3 owners who are pissed at the exclusivity deal.

“I understand that. It’s difficult. Obviously we’d like everything on every platform day one. The LIVE Arcade thing… we get accused of being bribed or we’ve took Microsoft’s money, and it’s all bollocks,” Brown told Videogamer .

“The reason is that we’ve got a long relationship with Microsoft’s first party unit. We get on great with them. In exchange for exclusivity we get a lot more promotion. We’ve got a closer deal with them. That’s just how it is. It’s unfortunate. That’s just how we work.”

The Team 17 boss further went on to cite PSN games, Super Stardust HD and PAIN, as examples of games 360 owners cant get their hands on due to exclusivity.

“They’ve [Sony] got their own exclusives. You look at Super Stardust, which is exclusive to PS3. It works the other way round. For people complaining, at the same time, people on LIVE Arcade can’t play Super Stardust or PAIN or a bunch of titles. It’s just the way the world works really.”

The game’s out on Xbox Live Arcade sometime this Fall with a PSN and PC release sometime later.

Silicon Knights has said that despite the accidental reveal of its latest project through Telefilm Canada, it is not prepared to discuss what it entails.

However, a company spokesperson did reveal to Eurogamer that “several” are currently underway at the firm.

“Silicon Knights is busy working on several exciting projects,” they said. “Unfortunately, it is too early to disclose any details.”

Listed as Siren in the Maelstrom, Eurogamer was quick to point out that that a previous approval note mentioned a psychological action thriller from Silicon was slated for a 2010 – but the outed title may or may not be connected with it.

Also, back in 2005, Silicon announced a collaboration with SEGA but that title has yet to be revealed as well.

Hit the links for the rest.

During Ubisoft’s financial call to investors, CEO Yves Guillemot revealed that new and back-catalog DS games sales dropped 67 percent compared to the same time frame as last year.

The blame was put on DS piracy in Europe and the company does not expect titles for the handheld to pick back up until summer roles around once more.

“Altogether our DS sales are down 67 percent versus last year and this has affected both the back catalog and the new releases,” he stated. “It’s important to note that we do lots of our DS game sales during the summer which is a period where people go for holidays and buy lots of those games. Because this market is slowing down it has a big impact on the second quarter.”

“Entering the second quarter we expect those trends to continue with much lower than expected sales of back catalog and new releases on DS games.”

Guillemot said Ubisoft is looking to boost DS sales in the meantime by including extras like figurines and premium packaging to lure customers into a purchase.

“What we are seeing in Europe, especially on the DS, is that the piracy is strong so we are working to put new figurines and new elements in the box that will change that for the future,” he said. “But in the short-term it’s affecting us. For example in Europe we have the same market share on DS as last year, so it’s really the market which is declining.

“Retail, because of that, is less active on the format.”

Thanks, GI.biz.

Curt Schilling’s 38 Studios, which purchased Big Huge Games back in May, has a target date finally set for its fantasy MMO Copernicus.

According to the Boston Globe, we can expect the game to launch sometime during December 2010.

This is if more funding can be attained for the project, as Schilling estimates it will take between $50 – $100 million to complete the game if it’s to contend with the larger MMOs on the market.

Raising money is “a challenge,’’ Schilling told the paper, “but that’s part of the attraction for me,” he admitted.

More through the link.

Thanks, BigDownload.

Forza 3 has exclusive cars that require a VIP membership, a preorder, or purchase of the Collector’s Edition.

Kotaku has posted pics of these automobiles, and they look quite spiffy.

Forza 3 itself will run you $60, the Collector’s Edition will set you back $80 and includes a 2GB USB drive and keychain, both “specially branded” with the Forza logo; Forza Motorsport VIP Membership, which gives players special privileges at the game’s auction house, community storefront, and official forums;- 5 cars, “available only through your VIP membership; “Exclusive Collector’s Edition Car Pack”, which includes five cars that have been shined up and specialized by Turn 10; a Forza 3 dashboard theme.

Game’s out in October.