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
Check out Hyrule Circuit, Mute City tracks from next week’s Mario Kart 8 Pack 1 DLC
The time is almost here. Nintendo has announced that Mario Kart 8‘s first downloadable expansion, The Legend of Zelda X Mario Kart 8 DLC Pack, will be released next Thursday, November 13. The pack will be jam-packed with four new courses, four retro courses, three playable characters (Link, Tanooki Mario, Cat Peach), and four new vehicles (including Link’s excellent Master Cycle).
We know all along that one of the new courses would be Zelda-themed while another would take its cues from Nintendo other big racing franchise, F-Zero. But in this new trailer, Nintendo has given us our first look at the officially named Hyrule Circuit and Mute City. And they’re just as awe-inspiring as expected.
The Legend of Zelda X Mario Kart 8 DLC Pack will be available for $7.99, but it can also be purchased as part of a season pass bundled with May 2015’s Animal Crossing X Mario Kart 8 DLC Pack for $11.99.
Posted in News, Wii U
Tagged Mario Kart 8
City of Alamogordo begins selling excavated E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial cartridges
As promised, the city of Alamogordo has begun selling some of the unearthed Atari 2600 cartridges found during this Spring’s landfill excavation. Nearly 100 titles are now up for bid on the city’s eBay page including E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial, Asteroids, Missile Command, Defender, and many others.
Bidding for all titles began at $50, but the price of the most sought after titles has quickly gone up. Unsurprisngly, the copies of E.T. are currently the most expensive games in Alamogordo’s auction with one copy garnering $520 in bids with eight days remaining (as of this writing). So if you want a piece of history, be prepared to empty out your piggy bank.
For those of you who’d rather experience the Alamogordo landfill excavation for a cheaper price, be sure to log in to Xbox Live on November 20 to stream a free download of Atari: Game Over, a Microsoft-produced documentary that explores the history of Atari and this Spring’s big dig.
Xbox Store Today: CoD: Advanced Warfare, Disney Infinity 2.0, MotoGP 14, more
Today’s Xbox Games Store update should look familiar to anyone that checked in on yesterday’s PlayStation Store update. Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare, the first Call of Duty title developed by Sledgehammer Games, leads the pack on the Xbox One and Xbox 360. Advanced Warfare stars Kevin Spacey in a pivotal role and includes a near-future storyline with plenty of advanced weaponry never-before-seen in a Call of Duty game.
Other games available today include:
- Rocksmith 2014, Ubisoft’s guitar tutor is now available on the Xbox One.
- The Wolf Among Us, Telltale’s Fables adaptation is now available on the Xbox One.
- Magic 2015, Microsoft’s latest digital adaptation of Magic the Gathering is now available for the Xbox One.
- Disney Infinity: 2.0 Edition, Disney Interactive’s virtual toy box can now be downloaded through the Xbox Games Store for the Xbox 360 provided you own some of the actual Disney Infinity toys.
- MotoGP 14, Milestone’s motorcycle racing game skids onto the Xbox 360.
More details about all of these games can be found after the break. (more…)
Posted in News, Xbox 360, Xbox One
Tagged Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare, Disney Infinity: Marvel Super Heroes, The Wolf Among Us
Kingdom Hearts HD 2.5 ReMix Collector’s Edition will include 1.5 HD ReMix too
If you missed out on Kingdom Hearts HD 1.5 ReMix when it was released last year, you’ll want to pay extra attention to the recently announced Kingdom Hearts HD 2.5 ReMix Collector’s Edition. That’s because the Collector’s Edition will include the first Kingdom Hearts HD collection as well as the second.
The Kingdom Hearts HD 2.5 ReMix Collector’s Edition has been priced at $99.99 and it will be available exclusively through Square Enix’s official website. In addition to both HD collections, it will include a Collector’s Steelbook Case, a Shadow Heartless plush Toy, an exclusive Sora/Mickey collectible pin, and a 30-page hardcover Art Book.
Kingdom Hearts HD 2.5 ReMix (which Kingdom Hearts II: Final Mix and Birth By Sleep: Final Mix, as well as a “Theater Mode” version of Re:Coded) will be released for the PS3 on December 2.
Posted in News, PS3
Tagged Kingdom Hearts HD 1.5 ReMix, Kingdom Hearts HD 2.5 ReMix
Development begins on Destiny 2 as Activision reveals Destiny has 9.5 million users
When Activision and Bungie signed their ten-year pact to produce Destiny, it was always assumed that the deal would extend to additional games in the series. Yesterday, during their quarterly conference call, Activision executives have confirmed that Destiny 2 is now in active development.
Eric Hirshberg, the CEO of Activision Publishing, told investors: “Work has also begun on future expansion packs [for Destiny] as well as on our next full-game release. We’re very pleased with the launch and continuing engagement, and we’ll update you on our progress on future calls.”
In other Destiny news, Activision has also announced that the game currently boasts more than 9.5 million users. These players appear to be putting a ton of time into Destiny as “active players” are averaging more than three hours of playtime per day. It’s unknown how that playerbase translates into copies sold, but the publisher said that Destiny has generated more than $500 million in revenue since its September 9 launch. Assuming $60 per copy, that roughly correlates to more than eight million copies sold.
And don’t forget, Destiny’s first expansion, The Dark Below, will be released on December 9.
CoD: Advanced Warfare, Binding of Isaac: Rebirth, MotoGP 14, more added to PS Store
Just like this week’s retail release slate, most publishers avoided the PlayStation Store this week because the juggernaut that is Call of Duty has staked a permanent claim on the first Tuesday in November. This year’s edition, Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare (PS4, PS3), adds Kevin Spacey and a near-future storyline to the mix.
But a few games have taken up the challenge, including Edmund McMillen’s procedurally-generated action RPG, The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth (PS4, Vita). This expanded and updated edition of the game includes redone visuals and tons of other tweaks. Sony’s own downloadable version of SingStar (PS4, PS3) was also released yesterday after a slight delay. Also available this week is Milestone’s latest motorcycle racer, MotoGP 14 (PS4, PS4, Vita); a standalone download of Disney Infinity: 2.0 Edition (PS4, PS3); and a handful of other titles.
More information on all of these titles is available after the break and a complete rundown of this week’s new game add-ons can be found at the PlayStation Blog. (more…)
Grand Theft Auto V is getting a first-person mode on PC, PS4, Xbox One
Rockstar hasn’t been shy in letting the world know that the PC, PS4, and Xbox One upgrade to Grand Theft Auto V will be no mere port. From “across-the-board graphical and technical improvements” to the wide range of bonus content for players who already own the PS3 or Xbox 360 edition, the latest version of GTA5 will be jam-packed with never-before-seen stuff. But Rockstar wasn’t finished as they recently told IGN that the game will also include a first-person mode:
Police cars are stacking up in the cul-de-sac below and a helicopter is hovering somewhere overhead. I can’t really see where it is, but I feel its presence, and the cops open fire. So I make a run for it, vaulting over a fence into a parking lot, where I jack a car, climb in, and as I look down to hot-wire it, I see there’s a bullet hole in my in my forearm and blood is running out.
I’ve never had a GTA experience like this before, and that’s because it’s all playing out in the first-person.
We’ve said before that Rockstar rebuilt Grand Theft Auto V for the new-generation consoles, but they really mean it now. Each animation in the game had to be redone to work in first-person mode. That kind of attention to detail is Rockstar’s trademark and they weren’t going to ignore it now. Of course, if you’d rather play in third-person mode, players can switch between the two views at any time.
Grand Theft Auto V will be released on November 18 for the PS4 and Xbox One, with the PC version following on January 27, 2015.
Posted in News, PC, PS4, Xbox One
Tagged Grand Theft Auto V
Insert Quarter: Is Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel’s Season Pass a Good Value or a Rip-Off?
Insert Quarter is our showcase for some of the best and most interesting writing about video games on the Internet.
Gearbox supported 2012’s Borderlands 2 with a bevy of downloadable content including four campaign expansions (which were included as part of the game’s Season Pass), five Headhunter Packs, two level cap upgrades, and two additional playable characters. It was the most ambitious post-release DLC schedule for a game ever.
Perhaps it’s due to the developer switch or maybe it’s because the latest Borderlands game is still living on the PS3 and Xbox 360 in a new-generation world, but Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel‘s DLC schedule isn’t nearly as expansive. 2K Games is once again selling a Season Pass for The Pre-Sequel, but Destructoid’s Darren Nakamura is concerned that 2K is being intentionally vague in their promotion of the Pass to hide its less-than-stellar value:
So even though no promises are technically being broken, and 2K plans to deliver four digital additions to Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel for the price of three through the season pass, I cannot blame any who bought it for feeling cheated. The content fits the requirements laid out, but the value is not there. Even if the plans were to change from here onward and the season pass ends up including one new Vault Hunter and three story DLCs, the value of the pass over purchasing content piecemeal hinges on the quality of all three packs, and the series does not have a perfect track record on that front.
You can read the rest of the article at Destructoid.
Posted in Insert Quarter, PC, PS3, Xbox 360
Tagged Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel