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
Final Fantasy Type-0 HD will be available through Steam on August 18
Square Enix has announced that Final Fantasy Type-0 HD will be available for the PC (through Steam) on August 18. More than a mere port, Final Fantasy Type-0 HD on the PC will include “an improved in-game battle camera, full Steam Achievements and trading cards, scalable motion blur settings, and a customizable dynamic screen shot mode.” Expanded resolution options will also make the game’s graphics better than ever before.
The publisher has also teamed up with Valve to offer a special pre-order promotion that will reward DOTA 2 players with some Final Fantasy-inspired gear. All players who pre-order Final Fantasy Type-0 HD before its release will receive a Master Chocobo Courier and Moogle (Class Zero) Ward in DOTA 2. A special Final Fantasy Type-0 HD loading screen for DOTA 2 will also be included.
Square Enix has also released the minimum and recommended system requirements for Final Fantasy Type-0 HD, which are available after the break. (more…)
Posted in News, PC
Tagged Final Fantasy Type-0
Bethesda literally CANNOT make any more Fallout 4 Pip-Boy Editions
Bethesda set off a fanboy frenzy when they announced Fallout 4‘s special Pip-Boy Edition. The limited edition, which was priced at $120, will include a smartphone cradle shaped like a Pip-Boy. Best of all, the publisher is also developing a Pip-Boy app which will control various in-game functions. But I hope you’ve already placed your order because Bethesda literally can’t make any more.
Bethesda’s Vice President of Marketing, Pete Hines, told GameSpot that the factory they contracted with to produce the Pip-Boy Edition has reached manufacturing capacity. While the company would love to produce more, they literally can’t.
“We reached a point where we’d go back to the factories and they were like, ‘[G]uys, this is it, sorry. This is as long as we can run the lines and as many of them as we can make.'”
He continued: “They’re being made today, it’s not like they’re done and sitting in a warehouse. [The factories would tell us,] this is what the yields say. I mean, we don’t make [the Pip-Boy Editions], and we’d go back to [the factories] and say, ‘Demand for this is insane, we’ve got to make more.’ And they’d move other projects off or shift stuff to other factories and it just came to [them telling Bethesda], ‘Final answer: sorry, this is as many as we can make.’ And we sold every single one of those that we could.”
Hines wouldn’t elaborate on exactly how many Pip-Boy Editions will be produced, but he did say that “a shitload” are currently being manufactured. In fact, Hines is confident that more Pip-Boy Editions will be produced than any other collector’s edition Bethesda has published.
Fallout 4 will be released for the PC, PS4, and Xbox One on November 10. If you missed out on the Pip-Boy Edition, I’m sure they’ll appear on eBay before too long.
Capcom postpones first Street Fighter V beta test
Street Fighter V‘s first beta test began last Thursday, July 23, but players struggled with poor connections and server issues. Yesterday, Capcom announced (via the Capcom-Unity blog) that they would postpone the rest of the test due to these issues:
Capcom offers its sincerest apologies to everyone who participated in this first beta test. While the purpose of a beta is to work out these type of issues, it was very clear that the issues we faced were more severe than we were prepared for. After three days of testing, while we were making progress and collecting valuable data, we felt the majority of players were not having a good experience, and the best course of action would be to take the servers offline for extended maintenance. We will be postponing our first beta phase until we believe the experience is going to be a positive one for players.
After they get the kinks worked out, Capcom plans to offer at least three more beta tests before Street Fighter V’s Spring 2016 release. As a further apology, Capcom will also offer every player who missed out on the beta a “worthwhile in-game incentive.” Capcom will announce dates for future beta tests and more information about the “worthwhile in-game incentive” sometime in the future.
Posted in News, PC, PS4
Tagged Street Fighter V
Mafia III announced; full reveal coming on August 5
After years of rumors and innuendo, 2K Games is finally ready to drop a dime on Mafia III. A post on the game’s official Twitter account has confirmed the game’s existence and promised that a full reveal will take place on August 5 during this year’s Gamescom expo:
See the worldwide reveal of the #Mafia3 announcement trailer on 8/5/15 here: http://t.co/sZ71Hl24i5 pic.twitter.com/1T4bdzBFIq
— Mafia Game (@mafiagame) July 28, 2015
As expected, Mafia III is in development (for unconfirmed platforms, though a PC/PS4/Xbox One launch is likely) at Haden Blackmon’s Hangar 13 studio. That’s about all we know right now, so be sure to tune your browser to YouTube.com/MafiaGame at 8:00 AM (Eastern Time) on August 5 to find out more.
Posted in News
Tagged Gamescom 2015, Mafia III
Dragon Quest XI: In Search of the Departed Time announced for 3DS, PS4, Nintendo’s NX
Square Enix announced the next game in the long-running Dragon Quest franchise today, while also kicking off the frenzy for more information on Nintendo’s NX system.
Dragon Quest XI: In Search of the Departed Time is the name of the next game in the series and its in development for the 3DS, PS4, and Nintendo’s NX system. The announcement event was held in Japan, and currently, Square Enix has only confirmed that the game will receive a Japanese release. However, we Dragon Quest fans in America should remain hopeful as the eleventh entry in the series will drop the MMO style of Dragon Quest X and return to the franchise’s single-player roots.
Dragon Quest XI: In Search of the Departed Time will be directed by Yuji Horii, with character designs by Akira Toriyama, and music by Koichi Sugiyama. A development house by the name of Orca will assist with the game’s production.
We don’t know much else about the game at this point, though we do know that the 3DS version will include a 3D game world on the top screen and a 2D sprite-based world map on the bottom screen. It’s a pretty neat effect and could make the handheld version of Dragon Quest XI the one to get. We also know that Toy Logic will assist in the development of the 3DS version.
A release date for Dragon Quest XI: In Search of the Departed Time wasn’t announced, but you can watch the reveal presentation above (apologies, but it’s entirely in Japanese).
Posted in 3DS, News, PS4, Switch
Tagged Dragon Quest XI: Echoes of an Elusive Age
CD Projekt will add New Game Plus to The Witcher 3 soon
CD Projekt has been supplying The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt with a steady stream of downloadable content since the game’s release in May. And the developer even has two major expansions planned… one for this Fall and one in 2016. But first they plan to add a New Game Plus mode to the main game.
Writing on Facebook, the developer says that New Game Plus is on the way, but it won’t be available this week. And as with the rest of the recent DLC drops, it’ll be available for free.
CD Projekt must have listened to a lot of fan requests for New Game Plus as the NPD Group recently confirmed that The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is the ninth-best-selling game of 2015 so far.
Posted in News, PC, PS4, Xbox One
Tagged The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt
Final Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare DLC pack, Reckoning, will be available next week
Activision and Sledgehammer Games have announced the fourth and final downloadable expansion for Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare, the Reckoning Pack, will be available for the Xbox One and Xbox 360 on August 4.
I’m sure you know the drill by now. The Reckoning Pack will be available for free to everyone who has previously purchased the Season Pass. A standalone download will also be available for $14.99 through the Xbox Games Store. For their investment, players will receive access to four new multiplayer maps and the concluding chapter of the Exo Zombies co-op campaign:
- Overload: Enjoy the grand view of downtown New Baghdad from this exotic compound, complete with fountains, gardens and decorative plasma lamps. The map’s multiple levels and long perimeter site-lines highlight medium to long-range combat, and firing a shot at the lamps will send enemies flying in a burst of energy.
- Quarantine: Following a deadly viral outbreak, the island has been converted into a biological testing center. This medium sized map’s tight corners dial up the speed and open areas combine to allow for any style of gameplay. Activate the map-based scorestreak to unleash a devastating ship-fired missile strike.
- Fracture: Discover what secrets are locked in the ice in this arctic excavation site. Take refuge behind wind turbines and heavy equipment through large combat areas cradled on the shelf of a glacier. Stay alert as the timed event cracks the ice sheet, sending one lane sinking to the depths.
- Swarm: Reconstruction is underway in Seoul, South Korea, congesting narrow corridors of this small to medium sized map with vehicles and equipment. Take position in war-scarred storefronts that provide plenty of cover over the streets or flank the enemy through close quarter interiors in the center of the map.
And in the final episode of Exo Zombies, “Descent,” John Malkovich’s Oz will rise from the dead to do battle with Bill Paxton, Bruce Campbell, Rose McGowan, and Jon Bernthal during their escape from the Atlas aircraft carrier.
PC, PS3, and PS4 players will likely be able to get their hands on the Reckoning Pack in early September.
Nintendo details Splatoon’s big August update
Nintendo has been talking about Splatoon‘s big August update since before the game’s May 29 launch. Today, they finally detailed exactly what’ll be included in the update (see below) and when it’ll be available (August 5).
Most importantly, the update will include two brand new matchmaking modes: Squad Battle and Private Battle. In Squad Battle, players can join up with their friends in all of Splatoon’s Ranked Battle modes. These two-to-four player Squads will then be randomly matched against other Squads. Private Battle is, as the name implies, a private battle between friends. Two-to-eight players can join up to battle it out on any map, in any game mode, and with any combination of players (1v1, 4v4, 4v1, 3v2, etc).
The August update will also add two new weapon types to the game for those looking for a fresh style of play. The Slosher is a grenade launcher-like weapon that will allow players to “hurl ink straight ahead at an impressive range” with a bucket. If you’d rather go “Full Arnold,” the Gatling-like Splatling can produce short blasts of “all-powerful ink” when its fully charged.
Finally, Nintendo will add more than 40 pieces of Gear to the shops in Arowana Mall and raise the level cap in both Regular Battle and Ranked Battle. Players can now reach Level 50 (raised from Level 20) in Regular Battle and S or S+ (both higher than A+) in Ranked Battle.
In case you missed it, Nintendo is still adding content to Splatoon ahead of the August update. This weekend saw the release of the Camp Triggerfish map and a pair of new weapons (E-Liter 3K Scope and Neo Splash-O-Matic). Not only that, but additional maps, weapons, and at least one new game mode (Rainmaker Ranked Battle) will be added to the game throughout the Fall.