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
Wolfenstein: The New Order launches May 20 with Doom 4 beta access
Bethesda has announced that Wolfenstein: The New Order will be released for the PC, PS3, PS4, Xbox 360, and Xbox One on May 20 (May 23 in Europe).
Wolfenstein: The New Order is in development at MachineGames and will skip the seemingly mandatory multiplayer mode for a renewed focus on the game’s alternate history storyline. In this New Order, Hitler won World War II through the use of “mysterious technology” and has goosestepped across the world, slapping swastikas on EVERYTHING. Enter B.J. Blazkowicz and the rest of the resistance heroes introduced in the new trailer above. Like Captain America, they plan to sock Hitler right in his stupid face… in a Mature-rated style, of course.
As a special bonus, all players who pre-order Wolfenstein: The New Order will receive access to a Doom 4 beta test. Now known simply as “Doom,” Bethesda has promised to reveal more details about the fourth enrty in the Doom series at a later date. However, a beta FAQ is available at the publisher’s website.
Progress on Doom 4 has experienced several starts and stops since it was first announced in 2008. Last year, Creative Director Tim Willits said that id Software started over on Doom 4’s development because the game lacked “soul” and “personality.”
Posted in News, PC, PS3, PS4, Xbox 360, Xbox One
Tagged Doom (2016), Wolfenstein: The New Order
PS Store Today: Strider, EDF 2025, Assassin’s Creed: Freedom Cry, a lot more
Sony has just uploaded another big update for the PlayStation Store and while it doesn’t have something as tantalizing as the TitanFall open beta, it’s still chock full of impressive downloads. But speaking of betas, an open beta for the PS4 edition of Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn was included in today’s update.
As for this week’s new games, current-gen and next-gen gamers will be able to download a rebooted version of Capcom’s beloved side-scroller Strider, which was developed by the now Amazon-owned Double Helix. PS3 and PS4 owners will also get a chance to try out Assassin’s Creed: Freedom Cry, a standalone expansion to Assassin’s Creed IV that doesn’t require players to own its parent game. In addition to Freedom Cry, Ubisoft released a PS4 edition of Rayman Legends.
Finally, the PS2 Classics section is now home to Neo Contra, an odd entry in Konami’s Contra franchise, but one worth checking out all the same.
More information on all of these titles (and a few others) can be found after the break. A complete rundown of this week’s new game add-ons can be found at PlayStation Blog. (more…)
Posted in News, PS3, PS4, Vita
Tagged Assassin's Creed: Freedom Cry, Earth Defense Force 2025, Rayman Legends, Strider
Supergiant’s Transistor will be playable at PAX East 2014
Supergiant Games has confirmed that Transistor will be playable at this year’s PAX East expo:
@StrifeCross We're planning to go to PAX East and have Transistor playable there.
— Supergiant Games (@SupergiantGames) February 18, 2014
Transistor made its public debut during last year’s PAX East show. In addition to touting one of the longest lines of the entire expo, the game’s booth featured visits from Logan Cunningham (the voice behind the titular Transistor), Darren Korb (Supergiant’s in-house music man), and lead developer Greg Kasavin during the weekend. In June, Sony revealed that Transistor would exclusively launch on the PC and PS4 in early 2014.
While we know that Transistor will be playable at PAX East 2014, whoever is behind Supergiant’s Twitter feed has so far ignored tweets asking if the game will be released before or after April 11, the first day of the convention.
Posted in News, PC, PS4
Tagged PAX East 2014, Transistor
Irrational Games will close as Ken Levine wants to focus on a smaller studio
Ken Levine, the Creative Director of Irrational Games, has announced that he has begun “winding down” operations at the studio “as [we] know it.” Since completing work on the BioShock trilogy, Levine has begun writing the screenplay for a Logan’s Run remake for Warner Bros. He has also thought long and hard about the games he wants to make in the future:
While I’m deeply proud of what we’ve accomplished together, my passion has turned to making a different kind of game than we’ve done before. To meet the challenge ahead, I need to refocus my energy on a smaller team with a flatter structure and a more direct relationship with gamers. In many ways, it will be a return to how we started: a small team making games for the core gaming audience.
In time we will announce a new endeavor with a new goal: To make narrative-driven games for the core gamer that are highly replayable. To foster the most direct relationship with our fans possible, we will focus exclusively on content delivered digitally.
So what does this mean for Irrational Games? First, the majority of the studio’s staff will be laid off in the coming weeks. Many will move to different teams within Take-Two’s corporate structure and Irrational will hold a recruiting day for developers interested in catching on with an outside studio. According to Levine, about 15 members of the Irrational team will remain with the studio after the layoffs are complete. As for the BioShock series, Levine has revealed that it is now fully in the hands of Take-Two. What this means for the currently-in-limbo BioShock Vita or the eventual BioShock 4 is unknown as this time.
There’s no timetable on when Levine will announce what he’s up to next. But hopefully it’s sooner rather than later. Levine’s complete letter can be found at Irrational’s homepage.
Posted in News
PS4 install base has surpassed 5.3 million
Another month, another update from Sony on the sales statistics for their PlayStation 4 console. According to internal reporting, which is current as of February 8, the company has now sold 5.3 million PS4 systems worldwide since the console launched in November 2013.
“I am thrilled that so many customers around the globe have continued to select PS4 as the best place to play throughout and beyond the holiday season,” said Andrew House, President and CEO of Sony Computer Entertainment. “We are delighted that according to the NPD Group’s latest data, PS4 was January’s top-selling console in the United States. The PS4 system’s momentum just keeps growing stronger, and we are extremely grateful for the continued passion and support of PlayStation fans.”
Sony’s new PS4 sales total is an increase of 1.1 million consoles over their last announcement in January (for sales through December 28, 2013). And the system’s acceptance should only grew from here as the PS4 is scheduled to launch in Japan this Saturday, February 22.
Harmonix is developing Chroma, a music-based arena FPS
Back in 2012, Harmonix began hiring developers to work on a “combat game.” Today, they lifted the lid on Chroma, a free-to-play, first-person, multiplayer shooter for the PC. If this sounds a bit out of Harmonix’s wheelhouse, then you should also know that in Chroma, “Music is Your Weapon.” Hopefully, Harmonix will explain what that means sooner rather than later.
Harmonix has partnered with Hidden Path Entertainment (Counter-Strike: Global Offensive) to bring the game to Steam sometime this year. Players will be able to choose from multiple from character classes and form a “band” with their teammates to take on their opponents. Also, a “Change Up” system will unleash major moments that “dramatically alter the landscape of the battlefield in real time both physically and strategically, raising sniper towers, adding cover, and more in sync with the music.”
“Chroma has been a dream project of mine for some time,” said Harmonix co-founder and CEO Alex Rigopulos. “Watching the teams at Harmonix and Hidden Path begin to bring this vision to life has been tremendously exciting. We’re also thrilled to release an alpha version of this game and to evolve it in collaboration with our players. We can’t wait to hear what people think of this new approach to both first-person shooters and music games.”
Harmonix plans to offer players early access to Chroma through a closed alpha later this year. You can apply to enter the alpha right here.
Transformers: Rise of the Dark Spark will be released this Summer
The continuity snarl that is the Transformers franchise makes the last half-century of Marvel and DC storytelling look neat and ordered by comparison. The series is rife with alternate universes and the executives in charge of this narrative morass have attempted to merge, split, and remerge the storyline since the 1980s.
The latest attempt at building an all-purpose Transformers universe is Transformers: Rise of the Dark Spark, the latest game adaptation of the long-running series from Activision. According to GameSpot, Rise of the Dark Spark will merge High Moon’s War For Cybertron/Fall of Cybertron continuity with Michael Bay’s Transformers films to tie-in with this Summer’s Age of Extinction. Sadly, High Moon won’t be developing the game. Instead, Activision has enlisted Edge of Reality to create the PC, PS3, PS4, Wii U, Xbox 360, and Xbox One game. WayForward Technologies will develop a handheld version of the game for the 3DS.
Transformers: Rise of the Dark Spark will be released this Summer to coincide with the theatrical opening of Transformers: Age of Extinction.
SteamWorld Dig shovels its way onto the PS4, Vita in March
SteamWorld Dig was one of the biggest surprises of 2013. The game, from Swedish developer Image & Form, was a smash hit on the 3DS eShop (and got quite a good review from our own Mike Ryan) before making its way to Steam in December. And on Friday, Image & Form announced that SteamWorld Dig will soon find itself available on the PlayStation Store as a downloadable game for the PS4 and Vita.
SteamWorld Dig is a steampunk-ish platformer set in a mining town and starring an “Eastwood-esque” robot named Rusty. Venturing into the abandoned mines, Rusty must unearth gemstones and materials while doing battle with hordes of underground creatures and ensuring that he still has a way back to the surface.
“We are thrilled to present SteamWorld Dig to the PlayStation community,” said Image & Form CEO Brjann Sigurgeirsson. “This is our first release ever on a stationary console, and a long-standing dream of ours. So many PlayStation gamers have asked us to bring the game to their hardware, and we can’t wait to join the community both on PS4 and Vita. We have a fantastic following on 3DS and Steam, and now we will reach a whole new audience. We are really very excited.”
SteamWorld Dig will be available on the PlayStation Store in March (at a price of $9.99) as a Cross-Buy title.
Posted in News, PS4, Vita
Tagged SteamWorld Dig