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Xbox Store Today: Firewatch, Destiny Rise of Iron, Batman Episode 2, more

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Two influential titles from the new wave of first-person exploration games are now available to download for the Xbox One through the Xbox Games Store.

Firewatch comes from developer Campo Santo, and it takes place in the Wyoming wilderness. “You are a man named Henry who has retreated from your messy life to work as a fire lookout,” but as players scan the skies for smoke, a strange mystery draws them out of their tower and into the world. Firewatch is joined on the Xbox Games Store this week by Dear Esther: Landmark Edition, the first game from The Chinese Room. Players will explore beautiful environments on a deserted island as “a powerful story of love, loss, guilt, and redemption” unfolds before them.

An entirely different (but much more familiar) first-person game is also new to the Xbox Games Store this week. Bungie’s Destiny: Rise of Iron (Xbox One) will be the final expansion to the multiplayer shooter, and it asks players to fight back against Fallen mutants who “now scavenge the tombs of the Golden Age.”

And elsewhere on the Xbox Games Store… Batman and Bruce Wayne will continue their crusade to clean up Gotham City in Batman: The Telltale Series – Episode 2: Children of Arkham (Xbox One), while Microsoft collected the first three seasons of content for their free-to-play fighter in Killer Instinct: Definitive Edition (Xbox One).

More information on all of these games (and a few other new releases) can be found after the break. (more…)

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Daily Scoop: September 21, 2016 – Last day for the big Humble Store sale

There’s less than a day for you to get in on the Humble Store End of Summer sale! There are tons of great deals through lots of amazing companies, including Activision, Bandai Namco, WB Games, Telltale Games, and Capcom, among many, many others. Grab some games before it’s over!

The Daily Deal at Steam is Move or Die, which is $7.49 for one copy or $19.99 for a pack of four. Lots of other great games are on sale as well, like one of my personal favorites, Sleeping Dogs: Definitive Edition, for $7.49, and early access to Besiege for $5.59.

There are tons of shirts today. Hit the jump to check them out! (more…)

Posted in Daily Scoop |

Frank West goes back to the mall in two new Dead Rising 4 trailers

Poor Frank West. He’s covered wars, but he’ll always be remembered as the photojournalist who got caught in a mall with a horde of zombies. So ten years after the original Dead Rising, he’s decided to embrace his ridiculous claim to fame and return to the Willamette Mall. Unfortunately, the shops have once again been overrun by a zombie uprising.

The Capcom-Unity blog has the lowdown on the latest Dead Rising 4 trailer, which focuses on Frank’s many creative ways to kill a zombie:

Frank West is back and in cracking form, as today Microsoft and Capcom Vancouver revealed the new gameplay trailer for Dead Rising 4. Titled “Return to the Mall,” the trailer brings fans back to Willamette Mall, where a recon mission quickly goes awry. From cleaving through zombies in the food court to pausing for a few creative selfies, Willamette Mall is a key piece in Frank’s search for the truth behind a government conspiracy responsible for the outbreak. Check out the action for yourself in the video above!

If you’re looking for even more Christmas cheer on this final day of Summer, Microsoft and Capcom have also released an animated Cinematic Trailer for Dead Rising 4, and you can find it after the break. Dead Rising 4 will be released for the PC and Xbox One on December 6 as an Xbox Play Anywhere title. (more…)

Posted in News, PC, Xbox One | Tagged

If Link can cook, so can you in the latest Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild mini-trailer

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Link is going to have plenty of dinner options when The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild is released for the Wii U and Nintendo NX next year. In the game, players will be able to find food and cook it to restore Hearts, but certain foods will contain special ingredients that can temporarily boost Link’s resistance or stamina. Some of these superfoods are on display in the latest mini-trailer for Breath of the Wild:

To give you an idea of how food conveys bonuses in Breath of the Wild, Link received ten minutes of “Cold Resistance” after eating a Spicy Pepper in the trailer. But not all foods are recommended by Hyrule’s equivalent of the Food and Drug Administration. If Link adds a Hylian Shroom to his pot, he’ll scoop out a bowl of “Dubious Food” and receive the message: “Eating it won’t hurt you… probably.”

I don’t think Nintendo would send Link on a bad trip… but you never know. Maybe his buddy Mario can offer him some advice on the proper preparation of mushrooms.

Posted in News, Switch, Wii U | Tagged

Destiny: Rise of Iron, Batman: Episode 2, Dear Esther, more added to PS Store

This week, it is your destiny to play Destiny: Rise of Iron (PS4), the final expansion to Bungie’s interstellar multiplayer shooter. With Destiny 2 on track for a 2017 launch, the developer is closing the door on the first game with an earthbound episode that takes place in the Plaguelands, an area teeming with Fallen mutants who now “scavenge the tombs of the Golden Age.”

And speaking of new episodes, Telltale is back with another entry in their Batman saga, Batman: The Telltale Series (PS4). In Episode 2: Children of Arkham, Bruce Wayne is hounded by the knowledge that his fight might have been involved in Gotham’s criminal underworld, while Batman must deal with “an old friend [who is] now a dangerous adversary.”

Finally this week, the developer behind Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture, The Chinese Room, will bring their first game to the PS4. In Dear Esther: Landmark Edition, players will explore a “remote and desolate” island while a man reads letters to his deceased wife, Esther.

More information on all of these games (and a few other new releases) can be found after the break. And a quick stop at the PlayStation Blog will reveal all the details about this week’s new add-ons and discounts. (more…)

Posted in News, PS3, PS4, Vita | Tagged ,

It’s In Your Blood: A History of Horror Games (Part Four)

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We’ve all been scared at one time or another. While “normal” people may try to avoid it at all costs, the rest of us actively seek out that primitive, guttural thrill. Horror movies do this well enough, but why bother watching when you can participate? There’s nothing like a good survival horror game, from Dead Space to Alien: isolation — but diehard fear junkies know the genre began much earlier. If that’s news to you, it’s okay! Just sit down and quiet yourselves, boys and girls, because class is in session.

After looking back at the birth of survival horror, the rise in popularity, and a huge wave of sequels, today, we’ll cover the next chapter in the genre’s evolution — one some would even describe as the death of true survival horror video games. (more…)

Posted in Features, PC, PS2, Retro, Top Story | Tagged ,

Here’s 15 minutes of Metal Gear Survive gameplay from Tokyo Game Show 2016

Without Hideo Kojima at the helm, Konami’s Metal Gear Survive didn’t receive the warmest of receptions when it was revealed last month. But the publisher is pressing forward, and they even held a splashy gameplay demonstration for the zombie-centric spinoff during last week’s Tokyo Game Show.

The 15-minute video is now available online, and it focused on a co-op mission dedicated to “co-op stealth, infiltration and defense tactics, and special new equipment and weapons”:

In this world exclusive, Metal Gear Survive takes to the stage for the first time at TGS 2016. Join a squad of four players as they work together on a mission to infiltrate a dilapidated compound and then defend it from the onslaught of relentless creatures. Using co-op stealth, infiltration and defense tactics, and special new equipment and weapons, the squad provides a glimpse of both new and familiar survival gameplay elements that form Metal Gear Survive.

Metal Gear Survive will be released for the PC, PS4, and Xbox One sometime in 2017.

Posted in News, PC, PS4, Xbox One | Tagged ,

New Rez Infinite trailer introduces Area X

Tetsuya Mizuguchi’s weird vision of trippy music and techno visuals helped Rez become a cult favorite for the Dreamcast and PS2 in the early 2000s. And now he’s back with Rez Infinite, a remastered version of the original game for the PS4. But Mizuguchi also plans to add several new features to Infinite, including PlayStation VR support and the mysterious “Area X.”

Earlier today, the developer tried to explain the thought process behind “Area X” to the PlayStation Blog, while also unveiling a new trailer for the game…

Area X is a new level we’ve added just for Rez Infinite.
Area X is an experiment.
Area X is Rez, but it’s also not Rez… it’s something new.

Like classic Rez, Area X is a designed to be a focused, replayable experience, that uses simple shooting mechanics as a means to induce “synesthesia,” an effect where perceiving something with one sense triggers another sense – like you can “see sounds,” or “hear colors” (as pioneered by influential Russian artist and art theorist Wassily Kandinsky).

But other than that basic foundation, the team and I decided to throw away the rest of the formula and start fresh, both in terms of aesthetics and gameplay, building Area X through experimentation and iteration – try something, keep what worked, throw out what didn’t, try again – much in the same way United Game Artists and I created the original Rez so many years ago. Our goal was to create something that evoked the same excitement as Rez, but at the same time, something that felt unique. Something new. Something special all its own.

Rez Infinite will be released exclusively for the PS4 on October 13.

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