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Video Game Canon- Angry Birds, Dragon Quest, FIFA Soccer, and Silent Hill are the World Video Game Hall of Fame’s Class of 2026
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- Clair Obscur Completes the Sweep by Winning “Best Game” at 2025-2026 BAFTA Games Awards
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- GDC Awards: All the Winners from 1996 to Today
Warp Zoned Presents
- Video Game Research Library
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- Spore: An oral history – Design Room (2026)
- 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)
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Most Recent: News
Nintendo continues to take steps to become the indie developer’s best friend
The fact that some major games are not coming to the Wii U has been making headlines recently, although in the case of the poorly reviewed Dead Island: Riptide and Aliens: Colonial Marines, this may prove to be a blessing. However, the lack of third party titles heading to Nintendo’s new console, whether they be amazing or awful, has meant many people are dredging up Nintendo’s past reputation for having poor relations with other developers. The company is clearly aware of this, and is taking steps to ensure their future by aiding indie developers who wish to produce titles for the Wii U eShop.
At the Full Indie Summit in Vancouver last week, Dan Alderman, Nintendo of America’s Manager of Business Development, explained the steps Nintendo is taking to ensure developing for the Wii U is an easier process than the stringent steps companies had to follow for its predecessor. Back in the days of WiiWare, developers were required to have a business office, rather than the bedroom some games are born from. They would also only receive payment if the game managed to sell above a certain target and concept approval was required. Developers were often encouraged to use the Wiimote’s motion controls.
All of this red tape has been thrown out, replaced with an easy questionnaire that studios can fill out if they are interested in attaining a license to develop for the Wii U. There are no other charges in developing for the eShop beyond obtaining a business license. In fact, Nintendo will gift the Unity Pro 4 engine to developers free of charge, something that could be very beneficial to the many Kickstarter projects who budget for the engine in their donation target.
Many critics have already ruled the Wii U out of the next generation race. Yet it seems that rather than worry about the AAA titles not coming to their console, such as EA’s Battlefield 4, Nintendo is fostering relations with the next generation of developers and programmers. This move may manage to spell success for its home console at a grass roots level, while larger developers buckle under the pressure of making games with overblown budgets.
[Source: Destructoid]
Call of Juarez: Gunslinger draws on PC, PSN, XBLA in May
Ubisoft has announced that the Wild West return for the Call of Juarez series, Call of Juarez: Gunslinger, will be released in May.
Call of Juarez: Gunslinger is a downloadable game and will be available on PC download services, the PlayStation Network, and the Xbox Live Arcade on May 22. If you’re interested in purchasing Gunslinger, the ante is $14.99 (or 1200 Microsoft Points).
You can find the game’s latest trailer, titled “The Code of the West,” after the break. (more…)
Posted in News, PC, PS3, Xbox 360
Tagged Call of Juarez: Gunslinger
Deep Silver revs up Ride to Hell: Retribution for a June 2013 release
Deep Silver has unleashed another trailer for Ride to Hell: Retribution as well as confirmed the game’s official release date.
Ride to Hell: Retribution follows the story of Jake Conway, all around badass, often found with either “a gun in his hand or a girl on his lap (and on more than one occasion both!).” Jake is hell bent on exacting vengeance on the biker gang known as The Devil’s Hand. Strap in and watch this action packed trailer, and see why there are “no rules” in Ride to Hell: Retribution.
Developed by Eutechnyx, Ride to Hell: Retribution is due out on the PlayStation 3, PC and Xbox 360 on June 25 in the U.S. and in Europe on June 28.
Posted in News, PC, PS3, Xbox 360
Tagged Ride to Hell: Retribution
Jak and Daxter Collection coming to Vita in June
Naughty Dog has confirmed that the much beloved duo of Jak and Daxter will be hitting the PS Vita this Summer in the form of the same HD collection that was released back in February on the PS3.
The Jak and Daxter Collection will include the following legendary adventures: Jak and Daxter: The Precursor Legacy, Jak II, and Jak 3.
The HD remakes of these classic titles will also incorporate some of the Vita’s major features, such as the touchscreen being used for minigames. The collection will even come with a separate set of Trophies from the PS3 version, so that the Trophy hunters out there (you know who you are) get to go for that Platinum on the Vita too, Huzzah!
The Jak and Daxter Collection will be launching on the Vita this June for $29.99.
Posted in News, Vita
Tagged Jak and Daxter Collection
Another Earth Defense Force 2025 gameplay video to get you through the weekend
Spring is in the air. I know this because I awoke to find an absolutely massive spider on my kitchen table this morning. Of course, it was just a little thing compared to the arachnids in Earth Defense Force 2025. D3 Publisher’s Japanese office has released another gameplay trailer for the game and if you need a little mindless bug stomping this Sunday evening, it’s certainly worth a look.
Earth Defense Force 2025 will be available for the PS3 and Xbox 360 sometime this year.
Posted in News, PS3, Xbox 360
Tagged Earth Defense Force 2025
More The Evil Within details revealed by Bethesda Japan
With less than 24 hours to go before IGN publishes their “exclusive” preview of The Evil Within, Bethesda Japan has revealed a few additional details about the game, which will be known in Japan as Psychobreak. Siliconera was able to translate all the details:
The two arrive at a gruesome crime scene and out there is a mysterious and powerful force lurking in the shadows. One by one, other police officers are killed right before Sebastian’s eyes. Suddenly, something attacks Sebastian and he’s knocked unconscious. When he comes to he awakens in horrifying world with monsters wandering around. Your goal in The Evil Within is to first survive and second solve the mystery behind this maleficent force.
Besides the monstrous beings, the world of The Evil Within will be populated with a variety of traps and “[background] elements like walls, hallways, doors, and rooms” will morph and change in real time. Finally, the game will be powered by id Software’s latest engine, id Tech 5, when its released next year for the PC, PS3, Xbox 360, and “next-generation consoles.”
Creator of EarthBound 2 fan translation has offered it to Nintendo for free
With the news that Nintendo is finally bringing EarthBound to their Virtual Console service, fans have once again begun asking the inevitable followup question, “What about Mother 3/EarthBound 2?”
As is typical of Nintendo, they haven’t discussed the prospect of a North American release of Mother 3 since the EarthBound announcement. But the team behind the Mother 3 Fan Translation wants to get a dialogue going. And their first shot is a big one: they’ve offered to let Nintendo use their translation of the game, for free, in an American release of Mother 3. And, if need be, they plan to go even further than that to secure an official release of the RPG:
I realize that localizing a game this size can cost a lot, so if it’ll help in even the slightest, I’ll gladly offer to let Nintendo use my text translation files for any use at all, completely for free. I’ll even edit the files to fit whatever new standards are necessary (content, formatting, memory size, etc.), completely for free. I’ll even retranslate everything from scratch if need be. Just whatever it takes to get an official release out.
While it’s unlikely that Nintendo would use a fan translation to bring the game to the US, the translators have pointed out that it has happened before. Most recently, XSEED used a fan translation as a starting point for the Ys: The Oath in Felghana localization.
The other major hurdle to a North American release of Mother 3 is the fact that the game was originally released on the Game Boy Advance, a system that is “dead” for all intents and purposes. Of course, there’s always the Virtual Console on the 3DS…
Weekly Warp-Up: All About Nintendo… Again
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…
When it comes to video game news, this week was all about Nintendo… again. We started things off with a look at the Wii U’s launch and it’s similarities to the Wii launch and the GameCube launch in The Wii U: It’s All Just A Little Bit of History Repeating. Then Nintendo themselves picked up the ball and ran off an impressive string of announcements during their latest Nintendo Direct presentation including EarthBound on the Wii U Virtual Console, The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past 2 for the 3DS, and release dates for Mario & Luigi: Dream Team, Shin Megami Tensei IV, Pikmin 3, and Game & Wario.
In non-Nintendo news, we sat down for an Interview with Switchblade Monkeys and posted a Hands-On Preview of their first game, Secret Ponchos.
More news from the week that was can be found after the break. (more…)
Posted in News