Warp Zoned Presents
Video Game Canon- Clair Obscur Completes the Sweep by Winning “Best Game” at 2025-2026 BAFTA Games Awards
- Boss Fight Books Gets 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
- Silent Hill, Dragon Quest, Skyrim, and More Announced as Finalists for the World Video Game Hall of Fame’s Class of 2026
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
Pokken Tournament, the Pokemon fighting game, has a new trailer
Pokken Tournament, the Tekken-like Pokemon fighting game from Bandai Namco, will be available in Japanese arcades this Summer. We still don’t know if the game will ever be released in America or if a Wii U port is in the planning stages (though I’m pretty confident both will happen at some point), but the publisher has recently released a new Japanese-language trailer.
Watch Pikachu and the rest of his Pokemon pals battle it out in the game’s arenas and bask in the knowledge that Nintendo still has a few unannounced Wii U games planned for release this year. Yup, I would be utterly shocked if Pokken Tournament isn’t released for the Wii U this year or sometime in 2016.
Posted in News
Tagged Pokken Tournament
Xbox Store Today: Roundabout, IHF Handball Challenge 14
I don’t even know how to compare the two games being added to the Xbox Games Store today.
First up is Roundabout, a top-down limousine sim that’s set in the 70s and also includes live-action interludes of the passengers in the interior of the limousine. And did I mention the limousine is constantly spinning and that you have to gently nudge it around obstacles like a puzzle game? Because it is and you do. Roundabout is now available to download on the Xbox One.
Also available to download today is IHF Handball Challenge 14, which might be the first officially licensed professional handball game ever released in America. Handball is incredibly popular in Europe, but in America its typically relegated to that sport you play in gym class after basketball but before floor hockey. But if you’ve ever had aspirations of becoming a professional handball player, IHF Handball Challenge 14 is now available to download on the Xbox 360.
More details on both games can be found after the break. (more…)
Posted in News, Xbox 360, Xbox One
Tagged Roundabout
Bloodborne’s story trailer reveals a horde of beasts literally born from blood
From Software’s Bloodborne has been in the spotlight recently as the latest game featured in IGN’s IGN First showcase. This extensive look at Bloodborne’s development included a gameplay video showing the first 18 minutes of the game and now a peek at the story. Writing on the PlayStation Blog, SCE Japan Studio’s Masaaki Yamagiwa talked a bit about the source of the rampaging monster hordes and the unreliable reality that you’ll find yourself in:
When we revealed the first 18 minutes of the game a few weeks ago, I introduced how the game starts with the player arriving in Yharnam and receiving a blood transfusion from a strange doctor, which ends up clouding his memory. Is this all a dream? A nightmare? Where did all of the beasts come from? And what secrets does this Yharnam blood hold? Check out the trailer for just a small taste of the mysteries and horrors waiting for you in Bloodborne.
Are you coming down with a fever? The only cure is more Bloodborne, which will be available exclusively for the PS4 on March 24.
Posted in News, PS4
Tagged Bloodborne
Nintendo Download: Kirby and the Rainbow Curse, Pokemon Shuffle, more
Kirby and the Rainbow Curse brings its claymation-styled side-scrolling to the Wii U eShop this week… tomorrow to be exact. The pink puffball (Can clay be puffy? Probably a question for another time…) is joined by Axelay, a Super NES shooter that is now available through the Wii U’s Virtual Console service.
Over on the 3DS eShop, the free-to-play puzzler Pokemon Shuffle is available today along with the Flappy Bird homage Flap Flap and a pair of RPGs: Excave and Adventure Bar Story (and yes, it’s about saving a local bar from a greedy businessman).
Finally, the DSiWare Shop makes a return with a brand new pair of match-3 puzzlers: Fishdom and 4 Elements,
More details on all of these games can be found after the break. (more…)
Posted in 3DS, DS, News, Wii U
Tagged Kirby and the Rainbow Curse
Rumor: Harmonix is working on Rock Band 4 for PS4/Xbox One
Bloomberg‘s Danielle Burger is reporting that “a person familiar with the plan” has revealed to her that Rock Band 4 is in development for the PS4 and Xbox One at Harmonix.
This insider chose not to divulge any additional information about the project to Burger, but even though this is all we have to go on, Rock Band’s PS4/Xbox One debut feels less like a rumor and more like an inevitability. Harmonix dropped the curtain on the franchise in 2012 with Rock Band Blitz, but they’ve always seemed interested in a reunion tour on the new-gen consoles.
In recent weeks, Harmonix has even begun releasing new DLC tracks for Blitz and Rock Band 3. A trio of songs were added to the Rock Band Music Store last month and two more, Tenacious D’s “Rize Of The Fenix” and Weezer’s “Back To The Shack,” have been available since Tuesday.
You know, both of those songs seem to hint at a rebirth of sorts, don’t they? Maybe this is Harmonix’s take on the musical tradition of backmasking.
Posted in News, PS3, PS4, Xbox 360, Xbox One
Tagged Rock Band 3, Rock Band 4, Rock Band Blitz
Project CARS release fishtails its way into April
The highways and byways of the northeast are currently a mess, so it seems rather fitting that Slightly Mad Studios has announced that the release date for Project CARS has slipped once again. Previously set to get the green flag on March 17, the game will now be released for the PC on April 2 and for the PS4 and Xbox One on April 7. The Wii U edition of Project CARS still has a “TBA 2015” release date.
“Moving a release date was not an easy decision to make, as we know our fans are eager to get their hands-on on Project CARS,” said Ian Bell, the Studio Head at Slightly Mad Studios. “But we know that these extra days will allow us to provide the best game experience that our fans deserve. We assure you the wait will be worth it when the game does arrive early April.”
To keep your engine revving, Slightly Mad has teamed up distributor Bandai Namco to release a series of behind-the-scenes videos detailing the development process behind Project CARS. The first, which has been embedded above, will feature Creative Director Andy Tudor kicking the tires on the game’s Career Mode.
The Evil Within: The Assignment DLC will arrive in March
Bethesda has announced that The Assignment, the first downloadable add-on for The Evil Within, will be released in March.
The publisher isn’t quite ready to give us an expansive look at the game’s first expansion, so the teaser trailer above is all we get for now. The short scene depicts someone hiding in a locker (the slats obscure most of the screen) as some creature calls out the name “Leslie” over and over again. To Wikipedia to make sense of all this!
Once again, The Evil Within: The Assignment will be available to download in March.
Xbox Store Today: Dead or Alive 5: Last Round, Hand of Fate, Blue Estate, more
A handful of new games are now available through the Xbox Games Store including Hand of Fate, an action RPG/deckbuilder hybrid that also includes roguelike elements and a little dungeon crawling. That is a lot of genres. Hand of Fate is available to download for the Xbox One.
Also new this week is Dead or Alive 5: Last Round, an enhanced re-release of the fifth game in Koei Tecmo’s fighting franchise for the Xbox One. A free-to-play “Core Fighters” edition is also available.
Finally this week there’s Blue Estate (Xbox One), a rail shooter based on Viktor Kalvachev’s comic book series, and Trivial Pursuit Live! (Xbox One, Xbox 360), a game show-like version of the iconic board game.
More information on all of these games can be found after the break. (more…)
Posted in News, Xbox 360, Xbox One
Tagged Dead or Alive 5