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
The Legend of Zelda: Tri Force Heroes brings a triple threat
During their E3 Digital Event, Nintendo announced the newest entry in the Zelda franchise: The Legend of Zelda: Tri Force Heroes. The game, which comes to the 3DS this Fall, retains the same birds-eye view seen in classic titles and, more recently, The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds. Cooperative gameplay is a focus here, as each player controls one of three differently-colored Links. You’ll need to rely on teamwork, as all three Links share the same health. The Links can also hop on each others’ shoulders to create a Totem pole in order to reach inaccessible areas and solve puzzles.
Outfits will also play a role in the game. You’ll need to equip Link with different costumes in order to utilize their abilities. The Lucky Loungewear, for example, increases your odds of not taking damage after getting hit. Additionally, the Big Bomb Outfit allows you to carry and toss large bombs as if they were their smaller counterparts.
Tri Force Heroes is set to hit the 3DS this fall.
Posted in 3DS, News
Tagged E3 2015, The Legend of Zelda: Tri Force Heroes
Beatbuddy will swim onto the Xbox One and Wii U this Summer
Beatbuddy: Tale of the Guardians continues to find new oceans to explore. The rhythm side-scroller will be released for the Xbox One, alongside the previously announced Wii U version, this Summer.
If you’d rather not wait that long, developer Threaks has also informed us that Beatbuddy is available now for the Android-powered Nvidia Shield microconsole. Priced at $5.99, its available through the Google Play Store.
Beatbuddy for everybody!
Xbox Store Today: Quantum Rush Champions, Tour De France 2015
Two new Xbox One games were added to the Xbox Games Store today, and both involve hardcore racing action, although one goes much faster than the other.
If you’ve ever hopped on your bike and cruised down the street pretending to be Lance Armstrong (you know, before the whole drug scandal), then you might be interested to know that Tour De France 2015 is now available for the Xbox One from Cyanide Studio and Focus Home Interactive. Players will race through the French countryside in all 21 stages of the Tour as they compete for the yellow jersey and a three-second mention on SportsCenter.
This week’s other new racing game is Quantum Rush: Champions, from German developer GameArt Studio. Rocketing around the track at 1,000 MPH (sure beats a bicyclist’s top speed of 50 MPH), this futuristic racer will include “extensive” customization options and a wide variety of weaponry.
More information about both games can be found after the break. (more…)
Street Fighter V: Here comes a new challenger! And another!
The 2015 E3 Expo might be over, but we’re still digging through everything we saw. For example, during Sony’s E3 Press Conference, Capcom announced the addition of two more fighters to the Street Fighter V lineup. Cammie, who first appeared in Super Street Fighter II, and Birdie, who we haven’t seen since Street Fighter Alpha, will be mixing it up with the already-announced Ryu, Chun-Li, Charlie, and M. Bison.
Additionally, the PlayStation 4-exclusive online beta program will roll out from July 23rd to July 28th. The only way to get access to this online beta is to pre-order the game through select retailers or through the PlayStation Network. But there will be more beta programs taking place throughout the year, so stay tuned!
Street Fighter V will hit the PS4 and PC in Spring 2016.
Posted in News, PC, PS4
Tagged E3 2015, Street Fighter V
US release of Star Ocean: Integrity and Faithlessness announced by Square Enix
Square Enix has officially confirmed that Star Ocean: Integrity and Faithlessness will be released in North America in 2016. Originally announced back in April, the fifth game in the Star Ocean will launch exclusively for the PS4 in North America, though it’ll also be available for the PS3 in its native Japan.
Star Ocean: Integrity and Faithlessness is actually an interquel that takes place between Star Ocean: The Second Story and Star Ocean: Till the End of Time…
Star Ocean: Integrity and Faithlessness takes place centuries after humans have left Earth for the stars. On a planet in the distant Faykreed star system, the swordsman Fidel Camuze and his childhood friend Miki Sauvester set out to protect their village from being swallowed in the tides of civil unrest.
The first English language trailer, featuring a history of the franchise and ninety seconds of footage from Star Ocean: Integrity and Faithlessness, has been embedded above.
Posted in News, PS4
Tagged E3 2015, Star Ocean: Integrity and Faithlessness
PS4/PS3 will get CoD Black Ops III DLC first as Activision reveals multiplayer trailers
This year’s E3 Expo was the epicenter of a cataclysmic event that has shaken the very core of the video game industry… downloadable content for Call of Duty: Black Ops III will not appear first on Xbox platforms. Instead, Sony and its PlayStation platforms will be the temporarily exclusive home to all Black Ops III DLC. Come this November, Xbox gamers will be the ones who have to wait an extra month to get their quarterly fix of new content in a Call of Duty game.
But that wasn’t the only major announcement Activision had up their sleeve. They also revealed the first trailer for the game’s competitive multiplayer mode, which will now feature nine unique “Specialists”:
Choose to play as one of nine new Specialists, each with their own look, personality, abilities, and level progression system. Finally, equip up to five attachments and an optic while customizing nearly every aspect of your loadout with the new Gunsmith, then tap the power of the Weapon Paintshop to give your weapon a signature look.
However, if you prefer your multiplayer games to be cooperative ones, there’s more to see. Activision and Sony teamed up to release a nearly six-minute look at Black Ops III’s Cooperative Campaign. Not only that, but Treyarch’s Mark Lamia dropped by Sony’s Live Coverage studio to talk even more about the game.
Call of Duty: Black Ops III will be released for the PC, PS3, PS4, Xbox 360, and Xbox One on November 6. And if you pre-order the game on the PC, PS4, or Xbox One, Activision will grant you access to Black Ops III’s multiplayer beta, which will begin in August. (more…)
Mega Man creator Keiji Inafune teams up with Armature to bring ReCore to Xbox One
Keiji Inafune really loves robots. After leading the Mega Man franchise for more than 20 years, Inafune left Capcom to pursue his own games. That path eventually lead to Mighty No. 9, a side-scrolling spiritual successor to Mega Man that will be released this September.
During Microsoft’s E3 Press Conference, the legendary developer announced ReCore, a shooter that takes place in the aftermath of an apocalyptic event. Players will “forge friendships with an eclectic cast of robots” as they “lead them on an epic adventure across a mysterious, ever-changing world.”
For this project, Inafune will partner with Armature, a studio that was formed by several former members of Retro Studios. Earning their stripes on Metroid Prime, these developers definitely have plenty of experience with futuristic shooters. And with Inafune, for that matter. Armature previously worked with Capcom in 2010 in an attempt to transform Mega Man X into a first person shooter. That game, Maverick Hunter, was canceled less than six months after development began.
Looking at both games side-by-side, the “energy core” mechanic from ReCore seems to have originated with Maverick Hunter. Who knows what other pieces of the canceled game were repurposed by Armature for ReCore? We’ll find out together when ReCore is released exclusively for the Xbox One in Spring 2016.
Nintendo Download: Nindies@Home reminder, Fire Emblem Sacred Stones, Fat City, more
Before we delve into today’s additions to the Nintendo eShop, the consolemaker wants to remind everyone that only four days remain in their Nindies @ Home demo offer. The program, which expires on Monday, June 22 at 12:00 PM (Eastern Time), gives gamers at home the chance to download nine demos that Nintendo brought to the 2015 E3 Expo as part of their “Nindies” initiative. There’s some pretty great games in the list including Extreme Exorcism, Rive, Freedome Planet, Typoman, Runbow, Lovely Planet, Soul Axiom, Mutant Mudds Super Challenge, and Forma.8. I highly recommend exploring the “Nindies” if you own a Wii U.
Now then, onto this week’s new releases, which also includes the Wii U Virtual Console release of Earthbound Beginnings, which was originally released for the NES back in 1989 and only in Japan. But if you’re looking for something new to the Wii U eShop today, there are a few options…
- Nintendo’s Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones was the second game in the strategy RPG series to be released outside of Japan when it originally launched for the Game Boy Advance in 2005.
- Heavy Iron’s Fat City looks to combine the “let’s pull off a heist” plot of Ocean’s 11 with the overhead viewpoint of Pac-Man.
- Super Icon’s Life of Pixel is a side-scroller that promises to take players through a history lesson of early gaming styles.
- Jose Varela’s Solitaire Dungeon Escape is a solitaire/puzzle game with magic card.
More details on these games, as well as a pair of new releases for the 3DS, can be found after the break. (more…)