Warp Zoned Presents
Video Game Canon- Angry Birds, Dragon Quest, FIFA Soccer, and Silent Hill are the World Video Game Hall of Fame’s Class of 2026
- 2025 GOTY Scoreboard: In Progress
- BAFTA Games Awards: All the Winners from 2003 to Today
- Clair Obscur Completes the Sweep by Winning “Best Game” at 2025-2026 BAFTA Games Awards
- Boss Fight Books to Get a New Look for Richard Moss’s “Age of Empires”
Warp Zoned Presents
- Video Game Research Library
- How a Second-Grade Teacher Revived a Beloved Video Game – The New York Times (2026)
- 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)
- Creator of Hit Game Shovel Knight Is at a ‘Make or Break’ Moment – Bloomberg (2025)
Most Recent: Articles
Star Wars: Battlefront is crowned Best of Gamescom at Gamescom 2015
Heeding the words of Yoda (“Do… or do not. There is no try.”), Electronic Arts and DICE pulled out all the stops to win to five awards for Star Wars: Battlefront at Gamescom 2015, including the coveted “Best of Gamescom” title. The game also took home “Best Console Game – PS4,” “Best PC Games,” “Best Online Multiplayer Game,” and the “Most Wanted Consumer Award.” Strangely, Germany’s Digital Gaming Culture Foundation (Stiftung Digitale Spielekultur) didn’t even nominate it in the “Best Console Game – Xbox One” category.
Other multi-award winners at the 2015 Gamescom Awards include Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain (“Best Console Game – Xbox One” and “Best Action Game”), FM6 (“Best Racing Game” and “Best Simulation Game”), and Super Mario Maker (“Best Console Game – Wii U” and “Best Social / Casual / Online Game”).
Not to be forgotten, the HTC Vive virtual reality headset, produced in conjunction with Valve, won for “Best Hardware / Peripheral.”
The full list of this year’s winners can be found after the break. (more…)
New Final Fantasy XV trailer is all about fathers and sons… and a 2016 release date is teased
Square Enix released a new trailer for Final Fantasy XV at the 2015 Gamescom expo that is all about fathers and sons. Specifically, about the “strong bond” that exists between King Regis and his son, the Crown Prince Noctis. It is Noctis who ventures out into the world with his comrades after the Niflheim army attacks his homeland of Lucis. Can he save the world? Probably, as this trailer tells us, he is the chosen one after all.
I gotta say, I really enjoy the traffic jam with its bizarre mix of coupes from the 1930s sitting alongside modern supercars, all being directed by knights in full plate armor carrying machine guns.
If you were hoping that Square Enix would announce a release date for Final Fantasy XV, you’re unfortunately out of luck. But GameSpot did have a sitdown with Director Hajime Tabata during the show, who said that the game won’t be released this year, but “It’s going to be before [2017].” So if it’s not out this year and 2017 is too late, that means we’ll probably be playing Final Fantasy XV sometime in 2016.
However, Tabata also said an official release date announcement would likely take place during this year’s PAX Prime expo.
Posted in News, PS4, Xbox One
Tagged Final Fantasy XV, Gamescom 2015, PAX Prime 2015
Bandai Namco has released a gameplay trailer for Dark Souls III
The Dark Souls franchise will make its PS4 and Xbox One debut early next year (or rather, the first original entry in the series will) and now we’ve gotten our first look at it as Bandai Namco released the first gameplay trailer for Dark Souls III during this week’s Gamescom expo.
If you prefer your action games to be gothic and gruesome, Dark Souls III is the game for you:
Dark Souls III continues to push the boundaries with the latest, ambitious chapter in the critically-acclaimed and genre-defining series. As fires fade and only embers remain, journey once more into a world filled with more daunting and colossal enemies and environments. Players will be immersed into a world of epic atmosphere and darkness through faster gameplay and amplified combat intensity. New to the series are the Battle Arts attacks as each weapon will be equipped with its own unique Battle Art to deliver powerful attacks that will break through enemy defenses.
Dark Souls III will be released for the PC, PS4, and Xbox One in early 2016.
Posted in News, PC, PS4, Xbox One
Tagged Dark Souls III, Gamescom 2015
Spectra Review: Chiptunes, Racing, and 80s Arcade Style Aren’t a Bad Combination
It’s a rare game that credits the composer as a co-developer, but that’s what you get with Spectra, an overhead racing game that’s set to a chiptune soundtrack created by Niamh “Chipzel” Houston (best known for her work on Super Hexagon). British developer Gateway Interactive took her bleeps and bloops and laid them over a procedurally-generated raceway that expands out into space using arcade-style wireframe graphics. The music and visuals complement each other nicely, but Spectra’s “keep it simple” style goes a bit too far. (more…)
Daily Scoop: August 7, 2015 – Anime games on sale
Yay, it’s Friday! You know what that means: I’ll think about playing games and talk about playing games and maybe, if I’m lucky, I’ll find some time to actually play some games. Here’s hoping I get all my homework done in time to do just that!
There are some good deals happening digitally around the Internet today. The Humble Store is having an Anime Weekend sale. Dragon Ball Xenoverse is $24.99, Hatoful Boyfriend is $2.49, Skullgirls is $3.74, and Guilty Gear X2 Reload is $4.99.
At Steam, the big weekend deal is on the Naruto Shippuden franchise. You can get 75% off all Naruto games right now. The Daily Deal is on the adorable Dyscourse, which is on sale for just $7.49. You can also opt for the special edition, which includes the DLC, for $12.49.
There are so many great shirts today! Hit the jump to spend some money. (more…)
Posted in Daily Scoop
Xbox Store Today: Beatbuddy, Submerged, The Swindle
Three new Xbox One games are available to download from the Xbox Games Store today…
- Beatbuddy: Tale of the Guardians is a side-scroller where players take control of the titular Beatbuddy as they swim through the world and interact with it through music and sound.
- Submerged also has an underwater theme as it asks players to explore a “mysterious flooded city” in order to save their dying sibling. Heavy stuff.
- But The Swindle is not so heavy as the “steampunk cybercrime caper” is all about breaking into building, hacking systems, and stealing cash. Getaway airships are just the start of the wackiness.
More information on all of these games is available after the break. (more…)
Posted in News, Xbox One
Tagged Beatbuddy: Tale of the Guardians
Blizzard reveals World of Warcraft: Legion expansion at Gamescom 2015
Announced yesterday at Gamescom, the next expansion to World of Warcraft will be known as Legion. With Legion, players of Blizzard’s massively popular MMO will gain access to a new Hero Class (Demon Hunter), a new continent (The Broken Isles), and an increased Level Cap (110). The expansion will also include powerful “Artifact Weapons” to use against the demonic Burning Legion, a new “Order Hall” to recruit a regiment of NPCs, and a new PvP Honor System.
Will players need all these features to take on the Burning Legion? Probably, because they sound like bad dudes…
In this dire new chapter of the Warcraft saga, the demonic Burning Legion has returned, seeking to call forth their fallen leader—the dark titan Sargeras, Ravager of Worlds. As destruction rains across Azeroth, its heroes must seek salvation among the ruins of the Broken Isles, doomed center of ancient night elf civilization and birthplace of myths dating back to the world’s creation. In the face of hopeless odds, they must learn to master mighty Artifacts—legendary weapons that hold the potential to bring down the corrupted armies of the Legion—and strike an infernal pact with the dread Demon Hunters of the Illidari… accursed followers of the infamous Illidan the Betrayer.
We don’t yet know when World of Warcraft: Legion will be available, but a more complete rundown of the game’s features (including a very informative trailer) can be found after the break. (more…)
Posted in News, PC
Tagged Gamescom 2015, World of Warcraft
Nintendo Download: Etrian Odyssey 2 Untold, Golden Sun: The Lost Age, Picross E6, more
Nintendo has big plans for the Virtual Console this month as Golden Sun: The Lost Age and Onimusha Tactics are now available to download through the Wii U eShop. The strategy RPGs, both originally released for the Game Boy Advance, are the first two games released as part of Nintendo’s “Classic Games For Hardcore Gamers” promotion.
Also available this week is Etrian Odyssey 2 Untold: The Fafnir Knight, a remake of the second Etrian Odyssey game. The 3DS RPG from Atlus includes a completely original Story Mode and the original Etrian Odyssey 2 game with “updated graphics and a full roster of classes.”
Finally this week, Picross E6 will delight fans of the “Picture Crossword” series with 300 new puzzles.
More information on all of these games (and a few others) can be found after the break. (more…)
Posted in 3DS, News, Wii U
Tagged Etrian Odyssey 2 Untold: The Fafnir Knight