Warp Zoned Presents
Video Game Canon- Meet the World Video Game Hall of Fame’s Class of 2025: Quake, GoldenEye 007, Defender, and Tamagotchi
- The BAFTA Games Awards Polled the Public and Shenmue is “The Most Influential Video Game of All Time”
- 2024 GOTY Scoreboard: Astro Bot, Balatro, Final Fantasy VII Rebirth, More
- The Strong Museum of Play Acquires Prototypes and Development Documents from Volition’s 30-Year History
- Minecraft’s Volume Alpha Soundtrack Has Been Added to the Library of Congress’s National Recording Registry
Warp Zoned Presents
- Video Game Research Library
- It’s beginning to feel like gaming isn’t for everyone – Digital Trends (2025)
- 22 years later, modders are keeping SimCity 4 alive – The Verge (2025)
- The B-movies of Paul W.S. Anderson double as acts of devotion to his muse, Milla Jovovich – The AV Club (2025)
- Breakout, Ripoff, Genre: How Fiction Outgrows Originality – Uncanny Magazine (2025)
- ‘I Could Make “Fart Fart Boobie Fart: The Game” and Maybe It Would Eventually Get Taken Down’ – Devs Reveal Why the Consoles Are Drowning in ‘Eslop’ – IGN (2025)
Most Recent: Top Story
Kickstart This! Defect, Disciples of the Storm, The Nascent: An Anecdote of Aetherholme
During E3 2015, Sony used its press conference to announce that the long-awaited sequel, Shenmue III, would be coming to the PlayStation 4. In the days since, the consolemaker has confirmed they will be helping with development costs, though the game was initially launched on Kickstarter by Ys Net, the studio responsible for the game’s development. The team, led by director and producer Yu Suzuki, could not have asked for a better setting to make the announcement. The game set a new record for reaching the $1 million mark on a crowdfunding platform, managing to hit that figure in 102 minutes, and then passing by its $2 million target in a little over nine hours. It has now gone on to become the second most-funded game ever.
Of course, this stunt has once again raised ethical questions about large corporations testing the waters with crowdfunders. Yu Suzuki was forced to clarify how the Kickstarter funds would be used once it was revealed Sony would be stumping up a sum of cash to complete the game.
Regardless of whether you believe it was morally dubious or not, let us now turn our attentions to a trio of gaming projects that cannot rely on a big E3 announcement to secure funds. We start with ship-building shooter Defect, before revisiting an old classic in Disciples of the Storm, and finishing with the cel-shaded, self-referential side-scrolling platformer The Nascent: An Anecdote of Aetherholme. (more…)
Interview: Looking at Geometry Wars 3 From All the Angles With Creative Director Craig Howard
I thought the Geometry Wars series had gone dark forever after Bizarre Creations closed its doors in 2011. It was a surprising end for the developer that had created Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved, a simple twin-stick shooter that many people consider the first great Xbox 360 game. Retro Evolved was followed by a well-received sequel in 2008, which lead Bizarre’s Craig Howard to admit to the MTV Multiplayer Blog that a third game in the series was already in the works.
Howard moved on after Bizarre’s closure and he’s now the Creative Director at Lucid Games, which teamed up with Activision’s Sierra Games imprint to finally release Geometry Wars 3: Dimensions last year. The game was an instant smash hit was fans of the series, as it expanded the playing field into the third dimension and added a wide variety of new weapons and modes to the franchise’s standard formula. But rather than jump right into Geometry Wars 4, Lucid doubled the size of Dimensions earlier this year with the Evolved expansion. The developer also wanted to take Geometry Wars 3 on the road with portable ports for iOS, Android, and the Vita.
I recently got the chance to talk with Howard about Geometry Wars 3: Dimensions, which will be available for the Vita beginning today, and Lucid’s journey to bring the franchise back. (more…)
Posted in Features, Interviews, Mobile, PC, PS3, PS4, Top Story, Xbox 360, Xbox One
Tagged Geometry Wars 3: Dimensions
The Games of July 2015
You can almost hear the tumbleweeds going by out there! There’s so little coming out in the month of July, which is for the best, as that Steam sale, and this great succession of amazing Wii U games, have really made us all broke. So let’s talk about what we think has potential coming out this July! (more…)
Warpback: What We Played in June 2015
We were all over the map this month here at Warp Zoned! While most of us were on our Wii Us getting our Nintendo on, some of us were also digging into some other games from our backlogs, or revisiting old favorites. Some of us have even discovered we are… gasp… mobile gamers! Read on to find out everything we played in the month of June. (more…)
Splatoon Review: You’re a Squid! You’re a Kid! You’re the Best Shooter in a Long Time!
Even though it doesn’t star Mario or Link or Samus Aran, Splatoon is the quintessential Nintendo game. Starring a race of shapeshifting human/squid creatures known as Inklings, the game’s bright colors and relentlessly cheery attitude place it firmly within Nintendo’s wheelhouse. But Splatoon is also unlike your typical Nintendo game in that it’s a shooter, albeit one that uses squid ink instead of bullets and is more concerned with area control than racking up killstreaks.
It’s also the best shooter I’ve played in a very long time. (more…)
I Wish Sony Had Let The Last Guardian Fade Away
Sony put on an incredible show during this year’s E3 Expo, debuting new IPs from Guerrilla Games and Media Molecule, as well as offering further glimpses at long-awaited titles such as No Man’s Sky from Hello Games and Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End from Naughty Dog. Yet it chose to open its presentation with perhaps the most long-awaited title of all time, The Last Guardian. (more…)
Posted in Opinions, PS4, Top Story
Tagged E3 2015, Final Fantasy VII, Shenmue III, The Last Guardian
Iwata is Listening: 5 Things Nintendo Needs to Hear After Negative E3 Reaction
In a year when big hitters like Microsoft, Sony, and Bethesda gave exciting, extraordinary E3 presentations that included a smooth blend of new tech, surprise reveals, and gorgeous gameplay videos, the reverse is true for Nintendo. The company, who gave up on live E3 presentations two years ago, delivered a lackluster Digital Event that sought to highlight games due out this year or early next year. This effectively ruled out showing any new footage from the still untitled Legend of Zelda Wii U, despite the fact it was revealed at last year’s E3. Not content with backing itself into a corner with this decision, we were told that the company’s new platform, the NX, would also not be touched upon. Yet, given how meager-looking the titles were for the Wii U, it has led to rampant speculation that the company is holding upcoming games back for its next console.
In summary, Xenoblade Chronicles X was shown. Again. Super Mario Maker was shown. Again, and not just from E3 2014, but also from the Nintendo World Championships. Yoshi’s Woolly World was shown. Again.
3DS owners fared far better, with the announcement of new games such as The Legend of Zelda: Tri Force Heroes and Hyrule Warriors Legends, a port of the underrated Wii U game. There was also a new Paper Mario-esque title, Mario & Luigi: Paper Jam, and an odd Samus-lite Metroid game, Metroid Prime: Federation Force.
There were a few surprises for the Wii U, but not the good kind, and certainly not the ones fans wanted or expected, such as Mario Tennis: Ultra Smash or Animal Crossing: Amiibo Festival (which is, essentially, Mario Party with Animal Crossing characters). The initial reaction to the presentation was best summed up by our good friends over at Nintendo Life:
As a Wii U owner and general advocate for Nintendo, I was not as angered as many who chose to vent their anger on social media, but after Sony and Microsoft made pitch-perfect presentations, to say I was disappointed in Nintendo’s efforts would be an understatement. Nintendo President (and part-time puppet) Satoru Iwata seemed equally aware of the reaction from gamers and fans around the world, taking to Twitter to reassure them the company was listening: “Thank you for watching until midnight. We take the various opinions for this year’s Digital Event very seriously. I would like to continue our efforts to be able to meet more and more of your expectations in the future.”
Unlike many armchair CEOs calling for his resignation, I personally think Iwata has steered Nintendo through a stormy chapter in its history, and is obviously aware that more change may be needed. With that in mind, here are five suggestions on how Nintendo can improve for next year. (more…)
Kickstart This! Defragmented, Pixel Starships, Severed World
A short time ago we featured Dimension Drive in our Kickstart This! column. The developer, 2Awesome Studio, thought it had the money in the bag, until one of the donations was deemed fraudulent. However, Kickstarter allowed 2Awesome to relaunch the project straight away, and with two weeks to go the game is already fully funded, so we’re thrilled that everything worked out for the best.
Turning our attentions to some brand new crowdfunding projects, we begin with top-down cyberpunk shooter Defragmented, moving on to starship management strategy game Pixel Starships, before finishing with 2D MMORPG Severed World. (more…)