Warp Zoned Presents
Video Game Canon- Jordan Minor’s “Boss Fight Books: Super Mario Galaxy” is Now Available for Pre-Order
- Angry Birds, Dragon Quest, FIFA Soccer, and Silent Hill are the World Video Game Hall of Fame’s Class of 2026
- 2025 GOTY Scoreboard: In Progress
- 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
Warp Zoned Presents
- Video Game Research Library
- With Grand Theft Auto 6 poised to take over the world, I reached out to Jack Thompson and it did not go well – PC Gamer (2026)
- Vib-Ribbon: An oral history – Design Room (2026)
- How a Second-Grade Teacher Revived a Beloved Video Game – The New York Times (2026)
- Spore: An oral history – Design Room (2026)
- Diablo IV PC Cooled With Real Human Blood Is Still Going Strong Two Years Later, Says Guy Who Won It – Aftermath (2026)
Author: John Scalzo
“Get Lucky” today with a trio of new songs on the Rock Band 4 Music Store
I won’t be able to hear Daft Punk’s “Get Lucky” ever again without first thinking of Stephen Colbert and his celebrity-packed dance party set to the song. And can you blame me? When you watch Jeff Bridges boogie down the stairs, or Henry Kissinger get testy in his office, or Bryan Cranston put on a disco roller skating showcase, it tends to stick with you. So that’s why I’m thrilled that Harmonix has added “Get Lucky” to the Rock Band 4 Music Store this week… though sadly it won’t include any celebrity cameos.
Two additional songs are available to download today: Kelly Clarkson’s “Heartbeat Song” and Outkast’s “Hey Ya!” All three tracks can be purchased for $1.99 apiece.
Harmonix also revealed ten artists who will contribute songs to the Rock Band 4 Music Store in February including Bruno Mars, Five Finger Death Punch, Generation X, J. Geils Band, Joan Jett and the Blackhearts, Masaya Matsuura, Motorhead, Orleans, Royal Blood, and Zac Brown Band.
A video preview of today’s new songs has been embedded above.
Posted in News, PS4, Xbox One
Tagged Rock Band 4
Nominate your favorite game for the World Video Game Hall of Fame’s Class of 2016
The International Center for the History of Electronic Games (ICHEG) at The Strong Museum is once again seeking nominations for its World Video Game Hall of Fame. The Class of 2016 will be announced on May 5, but the museum will solicit suggestions from the general public until February 29. Anyone interested in nominating their favorite game should visit the Hall of Fame’s website, and they should also keep the selection criteria in mind:
- Icon Status: The game is widely recognized and remembered.
- Longevity: The game is more than a passing fad and has enjoyed popularity over time.
- Geographical Reach: The game meets the above criteria across international boundaries.
- Influence: The game has exerted significant influence on the design and development of other games, on other forms of entertainment, or on popular culture and society in general. A game may be inducted on the basis of this criterion without necessarily having met all of the first three.
Six games were selected for induction in 2015 (Doom, Pac-Man, Pong, Super Mario Bros., Tetris, and World of Warcraft), and a similar number of titles will likely make the cut in May. That means nine games from last year’s shortlist failed to be inducted (Angry Birds, FIFA International Soccer, The Legend of Zelda, Minecraft, The Oregon Trail, Pokemon Red/Blue, The Sims, Sonic the Hedgehog, and Space Invaders), but they’ll likely be at the top of the suggestion pool again this year.
This year’s finalists will be chosen by an internal advisory committee from the ICHEG, and will be revealed to the public on March 29. The new class of inductees to the World Video Game Hall of Fame will be selected by an international selection committee made up of journalists, scholars, and other individuals familiar with the history of video games and their role in society.
Superhot will be released for PC on February 25 and Xbox One in March
The Superhot Team has announced that their upcoming first person shooter, also known as Superhot, will be released for the PC on February 25. An Xbox One release will follow in March. Said to “[blur] the lines between cautious strategy and unbridled mayhem” by the developer, Superhot is a time-bending FPS where time moves only when the player moves.
To celebrate Superhot’s impending launch, the Superhot Team recently released a brand new gameplay trailer, which has been embedded above.
Superhot is up for several awards at this year’s Independent Games Festival Awards including the “Seumas McNally Grand Prize” and “Excellence In Design.” So it might be known as “the award-winning Superhot” in the not-too-distant future.
Madden NFL 16 predicts Panthers will beat Broncos in final seconds of Super Bowl 50
Gamblers everywhere surely appreciated Madden NFL 15‘s on-point prognosticating as EA’s annual Super Bowl prediction completely nailed the winner, final score, and Super Bowl MVP last year (Patriots, 28-24, and Tom Brady). With this year’s “Big Game” less than a week away, EA is ready to deliver their prediction for Super Bowl 50.
Using Madden NFL 16, EA has declared this year’s game will go down to the final seconds with the Carolina Panthers getting the W in the end. According to the simulation, Peyton Manning’s Denver Broncos will fall behind 17-0 at the half, but the quarterback will orchestrate a masterful comeback and put his team on top 20-17 in the fourth quarter. However, if real life matches Madden, Cam Newton will drive down the field and scramble in with the winning score (and a 24-20 victory) as time expires. Newton’s heroics, along with another touchdown in the air and 216 passing yards, will win the Panthers quarterback the MVP award.
Other highlights from EA’s Super Bowl 50 prediction include touchdowns for Greg Olsen, Jonathan Stewart, Demaryius Thomas (who added 98 receiving yards), and Emanuel Sanders. Defense should also keep the game close with interceptions from Carolina’s Josh Norman and Denver’s Aqib Talib.
While EA’s Madden Super Bowl Prediction has picked the winner in nine of the last 12 Super Bowls, they’re not always on the mark. Peyton Manning’s last Super Bowl appearance, Super Bowl XLVIII, was supposed to be a big win for the veteran quarterback. Instead, the Seattle Seahawks stomped the Denver Broncos 43 to 8.
Keep that in mind before you place your bets.
Bayonetta and Corrin will be available to download for Super Smash Bros. 3DS/Wii U this week; See them battle it out in a new trailer
The final downloadable characters for Super Smash Bros. 3DS/Wii U, Bayonetta and Corrin, will be available to download from the Nintendo eShop on February 3. But if you want to get a sneak peek at the two fighters in action, then be sure to check out this new gameplay trailer from Nintendo UK.
Both characters will be available in several different packages. Corrin will be priced at $4.99 (or $5.99 to receive access to the character on both the 3DS and Wii U), while Bayonetta is slightly more expensive ($5.99 individually or $6.99 on both platforms) as she comes bundled with the Umbra Clock Tower stage.
And speaking of the Umbra Clock Tower, Nintendo UK uploaded a second new gameplay trailer that takes place on Bayonetta’s home turf. It’s been embedded after the break. (more…)
Posted in 3DS, News, Wii U
Tagged Super Smash Bros. For 3DS, Super Smash Bros. For Wii U
Here’s our first look at Kim Wu and The Arbiter in Killer Instinct Season 3
In a fighting game that already features a living skeleton, a dinosaur/human hybrid, and multiple deranged cyborgs, a spunky teenager might have a hard time standing out. But then, Kim Wu isn’t just any spunky teenager. As she says in this brand new Killer Instinct trailer, she’s got “a friggin’ dragon” on her side.
In addition to Kim Wu’s debut, Killer Instinct fans are also now able to peruse the patch notes for the upcoming Season 3 update. Both Kim Wu and the Season 3 update should be available to download in March.
Finally, Iron Galaxy teased one more Season 3 character last night… and it’s The Arbiter from the Halo universe. You can see a teaser starring the crossover character after the break. (more…)
Posted in News, PC, Xbox One
Tagged Killer Instinct
Weekly Warp-Up: EA Has a Big 2016 Planned… But Probably No New Star Wars Game
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…
EA delivered their quarterly financial report this week and the megapublisher announced big plans for the rest of 2016. First they confirmed that Battlefield 5 is on track for a Fall 2016 release and that Mass Effect: Andromeda and TitanFall 2 will launch shortly after. Could be late this year, or early next year, but both games will be available before April 1, 2017.
Though what you likely won’t see from EA in 2016 is another Star Wars game as the publisher said that Visceral’s Star Wars project is “a few years out,” even though the company shipped more than 13 million copies of Star Wars: Battlefront.
Elsewhere this week, UK Correspondent Andrew Rainnie filed another entry in his long-running Kickstart This! series. This time, he shined a spotlight on Consortium: The Tower, Dragon of Legends, and Wandersong. And finally this week, Contributor Sean Weiland turned in a review of Random Seed’s TimeFrame.
More news from the past seven days can be found after the break. (more…)
Posted in News
New Releases: XCOM 2, Gravity Rush Remastered, Megadimension Neptunia VII, More
Are you ready to save the world soldier? This week’s new release report kicks off with XCOM 2, a PC-exclusive sequel to 2012’s XCOM: Enemy Unknown. Things didn’t go so well for humanity after the end of that game and the aliens took over everything. So it’s up to you, and a merry band of rebels, to ignite a worldwide revolution and take back the Earth. Dismissed!
Also available this week is Gravity Rush Remastered, a PS4 remake of a Vita adventure first released in 2012. Players will take control of Kat, a woman who can manipulate gravity, to save the world from an invading force.
The remainder of this week’s new releases feature a quintet of titles that is each more Japanese than the last…
For example, did you know that Idea Factory has produced six games in their Hyperdimension Neptunia series? The seventh game in the series, Megadimension Neptunia VII, will be released for the PS4 this week. The RPG franchise will actually be making the jump to the PS4 for the first time, and players will be asked to save “Gamindustri” once again.
Nitroplus is a popular producer of visual novels in Japan, and the company recently teamed up with developer Examu and publisher Marvelous to bring their many characters together in a fighting game known as Nitroplus Blasterz: Heroines Infinite Duel. It’ll be released for the PS4 this week.
Similar to the Go-Bots/Transformers split, the Digimon series has always existed as a budget-priced alternative to Pokemon, but the venerable franchise keeps trucking along and that includes the latest entry, Digimon Story: Cyber Sleuth. Available next week for the PS4, players attempt to take down a band of hackers in cyberspace with the help of their Digimon companions.
Speaking of popular anime franchises, Bandai Namco will release Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm 4 for the PC this week. The latest game starring the foxy ninja (and I mean that literally, the main character is part fox) will also be available for the PS4 and Xbox One next week.
Finally this week, Bandai Namco will also release Tales of Symphonia for the PC. Originally released for the GameCube in 2003, Symphonia will be one of the first games in the Tales series to make its PC debut.
Posted in News, PC, PS4
Tagged Gravity Rush, Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm 4, Tales of Symphonia, XCOM 2