Warp Zoned Presents
Video Game Canon- BAFTA Games Awards: All the Winners from 2003 to Today
- Clair Obscur Completes the Sweep by Winning “Best Game” at 2025-2026 BAFTA Games Awards
- Boss Fight Books to Get a New Look for Richard Moss’s “Age of Empires”
- GDC Awards: All the Winners from 1996 to Today
- Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 Wins “Game of the Year” at 2025-2026 GDC Awards
Warp Zoned Presents
- Video Game Research Library
- We Pitched a Museum a 1993 Game Hint Line (And They Actually Said Yes) – Yarn Spinner (2026)
- The History Of The Word “Metroidvania” And How It Spread – A Critical Hit (2025)
- Creator of Hit Game Shovel Knight Is at a ‘Make or Break’ Moment – Bloomberg (2025)
- Shadow of the Colossus: An oral history – Design Room (2025)
- In 2005, games started rewiring our brains – The AV Club (2025)
Author: John Scalzo
NFL Blitz coming to XBLA on January 4
Microsoft’s Major Nelson has revealed that EA Sports’ revamped and rebooted NFL Blitz will be available to download from the Xbox Live Arcade on January 4. As expected, it has been given a price of 1200 Microsoft Points ($15). If history is any guide, the game should be available on the PlayStation Network on January 3, but right now only the XBLA release date is official.
Major Nelson has also supplied us with a septet of new additions to the Games on Demand service. Four of the games were released today while the remaining three will be available next week:
December 27
Child of Eden
Resonance of Fate
Transformers: Dark of the Moon
Wipeout: In the Zone
January 3
Backbreaker
Naughty Bear
Super Street Fighter IV
Oddworld: Stranger’s Wrath HD, Splinter Cell trilogy, more added to PS Store
Sony has pushed out the last PlayStation Store update of 2011 and it’s full of HD remake goodness.
Getting a high definition gloss of paint for the first time is Oddworld: Stranger’s Wrath HD. The odd first person shooter will be joined by HD versions of the first three games in the Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell series (Splinter Cell HD, Splinter Cell: Pandora Tomorrow HD, and Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory HD), which will be released separately on the PSN for the first time.
Also available this week is All Zombies Must Die!, a twin stick shooter for the zombie-killer (that loves Zombies Ate My Neighbors) in all of us; Carnival Island, a Move-ing experience where players will “toss, roll, throw, spin, and slam” their way to victory in various carnival games; and MotorStorm Apocalypse, an off-road racer that takes place in a city beset by earthquakes!
More information on all of these titles can be found at the PlayStation.Blog.
Posted in News, PS3
Tagged All Zombies Must Die!
Weekly Warp-Up: You’ll Shoot Your Eye Out Edition
No, that’s not a typo. Welcome to the Weekly Warp-Up, your weekly wrap-up of the biggest and the best articles posted at Warp Zoned this week…
Merry Christmas to all! Thanks for passing through Warp Zoned on the slowest Internet day of the year. But don’t forget to say thank you first to Santa/Mom/your Grandma/your girlfriend/whoever for your great gift of Skyrim/Arkham City/a 3DS/whatever.
Get Warp Zoned!
But with Christmas crossed off our calendars, it’s time to start thinking about 2012. I know, I know, but we have to get a jump on the new year since the world is going to end in less than a year (the Mayans told me so!). So that’s why we’ve compiled a handy report on New IPs to Play Before the End of Days to help you plan which new franchises to invest in in 2012.
Of course, this week’s biggest story is actually in the past. More specifically, 25 years in the past. After years of begging and pleading, Nintendo has released an official timeline for The Legend of Zelda franchise. As part of the gorgeous Hyrule Historia book, this timeline was translated by the great GlitterBerri, and it revealed that the Zelda series is now made up of three separate timelines. Needless to say, this is heavy.
Hit the jump for the rest of the Weekly Warp-Up. (more…)
Posted in News
Official Zelda timeline is officially official
Behold, the official timeline of the Legend of Zelda franchise in all its translated glory (click to enlarge)!
With Hyrule Historia now available in Japan, Zelda translator extraordinaire GlitterBerri has unveiled a more complete English language version of the timelime, confirming the three-way split in the timestream. GlitterBerri also said that longtime Zelda producer Eiji Aonuma is listed as the Supervising Editor of Hyrule Historia, so that’s as close to an official stamp of approval as you can get.
Nintendo obviously isn’t going to stop making new games in the Legend of Zelda franchise anytime soon (in fact, a new Zelda game is in development for the 3DS as we speak), so it’ll be interesting to see where future titles fit into the timeline.
Posted in News
Tagged DS, Game Boy, Game Boy Advance, GameCube, NES, Nintendo 64, Super NES, The Legend of Zelda, Wii
First Modern Warfare 3 DLC coming January 24
To your left, you’ll find a screenshot from “Park” (click to enlarge), a Central Park-themed map that’ll be included in the first round of DLC for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3. According to Infinity Ward Community Manager Robert Bowling, the DLC pack containing “Park” will be available for Xbox 360-owning Call of Duty Elite users on January 24.
But here’s where things get interesting. Activision signed an agreement with Microsoft to release all Call of Duty DLC on the Xbox 360 first. But, the publisher has also promised all Call of Duty Elite subscribers that they will receive DLC before the general public. As those two statements can’t be easily reconciled, somebody (probably PS3-owning Elite subscribers) is going to get screwed.
PC and PS3 gamers had to wait a month after the maps were made available to Xbox 360 owners to play Black Ops DLC. Who knows what a staggered release schedule with five separate groups will look like?
We’ll have to wait until 2012 to find out more, as Activision confirmed that more information on “Park” and the rest of the DLC pack will be released next year.
Posted in News, PC, PS3, Xbox 360
Tagged Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3
Everything you ever wanted to know about the Vita’s US launch
With the launch of the PlayStation Vita exactly two months away, Sony has released a detailed outline of the handheld’s launch plans including day one games, launch window games, and prices for every announced peripheral.
As you know, the Vita will be available in three different packages. A “First Edition” bundle will be released on February 15 (which is less than two months away) that includes a carrying case and Little Deviants. February 22 is the official launch day, which will see the release of a Wi-Fi model available for $249.99 and a 3G/Wi-Fi model available for $299.99. All Sony-published launch games will be available on the 15th to support the “First Edition” bundle.
In addition to the system itself, every Vita system includes six Augment Reality Play cards and one voucher to download a handful of augmented reality mini games from the PlayStation Network.
Hit the jump for the complete list of every launch day and launch window game. (more…)
OK senator calls video game museum “wasteful”
Oklahoma senator Tom Coburn has released his annual “Wastebook,” a detailing of the 100 worst spending decisions by the US government.
Number nine on this document is a $113,277 grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services to the International Center for the History of Electronic Games. The grant will be applied to a preservation survey of the museum’s current collection. The goal is to eventually make their collection available to “visitors, researchers, and a broad public audience.”
Let me just say that as a gamer, a librarian, and a patron of the International Center for the History of Electronic Games, I think Senator Coburn wasted a lot of taxpayer money compiling this list.
Jon-Paul C. Dyson, the Director of the ICHEG, also disagreed with the senator’s claim that the museum is wasteful and offered up his own response for why games are worth preserving on the CHEGheads Blog:
Game designers are also creating great art. Games charm, captivate, and amaze us, from the awe-inspiring wonder of Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, to the whimsical fun of Angry Birds, to the subtlety of The Sims. Video games are influencing society just as much as novels did 200 years ago or movies did 100 years ago.
Or perhaps Seantor Coburn would like to see what the IMLS’s Mamie Bittner said when she awarded the grant:
Future innovation springs from the hard work and inspiration of the past. Technology changes quickly, and with changes, the work of entrepreneurs can be locked away and inaccessible. Can we imagine how researchers in the 22nd century will view the earliest groundbreaking interactive video? Without the work of institutions like The Strong’s International Center for the History of Electronic Games the vitality and imagination of early gaming would be lost to future generations.
Can’t really say it any better than that.
Game Boy Tetris comes to 3DS eShop
Well this is just the greatest Christmas surprise ever!
Nintendo has announced that the Game Boy version of Tetris is now available on the 3DS eShop. Hardcore Tetris geeks have long claimed that the original is still the best as it eschews later “innovations” to the formula like infinite spin, the hold piece, and other nonsense. The Game Boy version is good, old-fashioned Tetris… like Mom used to make play.
If, for some reason, the release of Tetris doesn’t leave you jumping for joy right now, here’s what else is new to the Nintendo Download this week:
Mighty Switch Force! (3DS eShop) – Space Hooligans have escaped custody and are wreaking havoc all over Planet Land. HQ calls on cybernetic peace-keeper Patricia Wagon to bring these renegades to justice.
Chronicles of Vampires: Origins (DSiWare) – Discover a secret that has been hidden for centuries in this supernatural Hidden Object Adventure. When Investigative Reporter and Super Sleuth, Linda Hyde, sets out to cover a rare book exhibition, she receives an offer she can’t refuse – to search for lost manuscripts on the behalf of a mysterious collector. However, Linda will soon find out, she is not alone in this quest. A secret world of vampires slowly reveals itself…
Doodle Fit (DSiWare) – Doodle Fit challenges players to fit sets of blocks into a given shape. The game features more than 100 different levels with a variety of unique shapes and nearly 550 solutions in total.
Rytmik Retrobits (DSiWare) – Rytmik Retrobits is an application for creating rhythmical and melodic themes and for composing whole songs. Its user interface blends the fast and well-arranged interface of classic drum machines with flexible pattern interface of popular trackers and with modern sound library.
Soccer Up! (WiiWare) – Soccer Up! is a funny soccer game that allows you a total control of any action of your team players: Control the ball, dribble and shoot with effect to confuse the goalkeeper and score a goal!