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
- With Grand Theft Auto 6 poised to take over the world, I reached out to Jack Thompson and it did not go well – PC Gamer (2026)
- Vib-Ribbon: An oral history – Design Room (2026)
- How a Second-Grade Teacher Revived a Beloved Video Game – The New York Times (2026)
- Spore: An oral history – Design Room (2026)
- Diablo IV PC Cooled With Real Human Blood Is Still Going Strong Two Years Later, Says Guy Who Won It – Aftermath (2026)
Most Recent: PC
Shantae: Half-Genie Hero update will add Hard Core Mode, PS TV support, more on March 6
XSEED Games has announced that Shante: Half-Genie Hero will be receiving its first update on March 6, 2017. Update 1.01 focuses mostly on fixing bugs and adding PlayStation TV support for the PlayStation Vita version of the game.
But Update 1.01 also offers a host of other changes, most notably among them being Hard Core Mode. Hard Core Mode offers harder hitting enemies, faster scroll speeds, faster enemy patterns, rebalanced magic items, remixed enemy locations, additional enemy locations, new boss stats and patterns, and limited use of healing items.
Matt Bozon, the Creative Director at WayForward and Creator of the Shantae series, wants everyone to play nice with Half-Genie Hero’s first big update:
“Thank you for your ongoing support, and for waiting patiently while we continue production of Shantae: Half-Genie Hero. And also thanks to everyone on Twitch, YouTube, and other social media for helping us make the game even better with this update. We hope you’ll enjoy Hard Core Mode while you wait for the bigger DLC packs to arrive. Remember, no throwing controllers, and please keep your hair-whipping in the game where it belongs!”
WayForward has been collecting a list of Half-Genie Hero’s “known issues” on their official forums, so hopefully that means the developer has found solutions for some of the peskier bugs, such as audio corruption and save file issues.
Shantae: Half-Genie Hero is rated T For Teen and is currently available on the PlayStation 4, PlayStation Vita, PC, Wii U, and Xbox One.
Overwatch is “Game of the Year” at the 2017 GDC Awards
Overwatch continues to rack up year-end awards for Blizzard Entertainment, and it picked up two more statuettes last night during the Game Developers Choice Awards. After more than a month of deliberations, the GDC committee choose to bestow “Game of the Year” status on the team-based shooter, as well as “Best Design” for its colorful world.
Two other games collected multiple awards at last night’s GDC Awards. Playdead’s platformer, Inside, earned “Best Audio” and “Best Visual Art.” And later in the night, Campo Santo’s Firewatch was selected as “Best Debut” and its story was honored with “Best Narrative.”
“This year’s amazing slate of winners is a testament to the diversity of experiences in games,” said Meggan Scavio, General Manager of the Game Developers Conference.
Scavio added: “Pokemon Go [“Best Mobile/Handheld Game”] took gaming outdoors using AR, while Job Simulator [“Best VR/AR Game”] showed how lo-fi aesthetics could meet cutting edge tech for a winning VR experience. Overwatch once again proved Blizzard’s uncanny ability to make a perfectly balanced multiplayer game, and Inside delved deep into our dark psyches to unearth our scariest nightmares. These nominees speak to the strength of games as a medium, but also show the various textures and possible creative outlets that interactive entertainment can provide. Congrats to all of the winners and nominees for following their visions and thanks to all developers who strive to make amazing games for us day in and day out.”
The full list of winners from the 2017 Game Developers Choice Awards can be found after the break. (more…)
Posted in Mobile, News, PC, PS4, Xbox One
Tagged Battlefield 1, Firewatch, GDC 2017, Inside, No Man's Sky, Overwatch, Pokemon Go, Uncharted 4: A Thief's End
Quadrilateral Cowboy won the Seumas McNally Grand Prize at the 2017 IGF Awards
Quadrilateral Cowboy, Blendo’s hacking-based heist game, took home the “Seumas McNally Grand Prize” last night during the 2017 Independent Games Festival Awards. Its 1980s-inspired world also helped Quadrilateral Cowboy capture the “Excellence in Design” category.
The other big winner last night was Heart Machine’s Hyper Light Drifter, which was also the recipient of two statuettes. The action RPG’s glitchy 16-bit graphics were rewarded with a win in the “Excellence In Visual Art” category, and its mass appeal ensured an “Audience Award” victory.
The Independent Games Festival Awards are awarded annually in conjunction with the Game Developers Conference, and you can view a replay of the entire ceremony through the GDC’s Twitch channel.
But if you’re in a hurry, a list of all the winners can be found after the break. (more…)
Orisa, a robotic Tank, will be the next character added to Overwatch
Every good hero needs a name… which is why “OR-15” wasn’t a worthy moniker for the latest creation from robotics prodigy Efi Oladele. Instead, she rechristened her new companion as “Orisa,” and the robotic Tank will be the next playable character added to Overwatch.
Orisa is now available for testing in the game’s Public Test Region, and will be added to the full game at a later date. But in the meantime, you can learn more about the character at PlayOverwatch.com:
Orisa serves as the central anchor of her team, and defends her teammates from the frontline with a protective barrier. She can attack from long range, fortify her own defenses, launch graviton charges to slow and move enemies, and deploy a Supercharger to boost the damage output of multiple allies at once.
Overwatch’s Game Director, Jeff Kaplan, further delved into what makes Orisa tick in a new Developer Update video, which can be found after the break. (more…)
The biggest Beta in Ubisoft’s history belongs to Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon: Wildlands
Click to Enlarge
Ubisoft compiled several other staggering statistical records in the infographic embedded to your right. Beta participants played more than two billion minutes of Wildlands, and over 60% of players teamed up with their friends to test out four-player co-op for the first time in the Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon franchise.
Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon: Wildlands takes place in a future narco-state version of Bolivia, overrun by the Santa Blanca drug cartel. Players must eliminate the drug cartel using deadly force and a combination of playstyles, including four-player co-op or solo play… both of which were playable during the Beta phase. However, Beta participants only scratched the surface of the game, as the Closed and Open Beta allowed players to only explore two of the 21 provinces in the game (Itacua and Montuyoc).
Participants of the Closed Beta, Open Beta, and Technical Test will all be treated to the Unidad Conspiracy Pack. The Unidad Conspiracy Pack will feature three exclusive missions, which will be located in the Media Luna region. Players will also receive one of the Unidad Strongholds. The Unidad Conspiracy Pack will be available for download post launch.
Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon: Wildlands goes on sale on March 7, 2017 for the PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One.
Posted in News, PC, PS4, Xbox One
Tagged Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon: Wildlands
Microsoft brought a bunch of upcoming ID@Xbox games to GDC 2017
The 2017 Game Developers Conference is in full swing, and Microsoft is promoting their upcoming ID@Xbox lineup in a special area known as the Xbox Lobby Bar. While taking a break from the hustle and bustle of the convention, attendees will be able to play more than 20 games that’ll soon be available for the Xbox One and Windows 10.
The ID@Xbox display at GDC 2017 includes newly-announced titles from Cellar Door Games (Full Metal Furies), Lazy Bears Games (Graveyard Keeper), and Wizard Fu (Songbringer), as well as highly-anticipated games like Cities: Skylines, Tacoma, The Church in Darkness, and Mages of Mystralia.
You can learn more about Microsoft’s presence at GDC 2017 at the Xbox Wire, and you can find the complete list of games playable at the Xbox Lobby Bar after the break. (more…)
Video Game History Foundation wants to create a digital record of the industry’s past
Frank Cifaldi is a developer who has worked on Mega Man Legacy Collection and IDARB, but he is also the founder of the Video Game History Foundation, a new non-profit that seeks to preserve and digitize the history of video games.
The Video Game History Foundation launched their first “Digital Collection” yesterday, focusing on The NES Launch in 1985. Cifaldi is also seeking donations to expand the scope of the Foundation, as detailed on their “What We’re Doing” page:
The heart of the Foundation is its digital library, an online repository of artifacts related to the history of video games and video game culture. The ultimate goal is to create a searchable, organized, always-online archive of verified, high-quality material that is accessible to researchers and historians as a public education resource.
All donations to the Video Game History Foundation are tax deductible, and I can’t wait to see what collections they come up with next.
Ubisoft is developing another game based on James Cameron’s Avatar
Avatar is nearly ten years old, and practically absent from the current pop culture landscape, but director James Cameron continues to insist that he’ll release the first of four sequels to his Oscar-nominated sci-fi spectacle in 2018. Today, Ubisoft announced it’ll be accompanied by a brand new Avatar game, which is in development at Massive Entertainment.
Massive Entertainment is best known for their work on Tom Clancy’s The Division, and they plan to work closely with Cameron’s Lighstorm Entertainment to bring recreate Pandora for players:
The new game will return PC and console players to the Avatar universe, using Massive’s Snowdrop engine – also used in The Division and the upcoming South Park: The Fractured But Whole – to bring Pandora’s unique terrain and inhabitants to life. It was after seeing a Snowdrop-run game prototype, in fact, that Avatar creator James Cameron and Lightstorm agreed to the partnership.
“With the power of Massive’s Snowdrop engine, and the team’s passion and obsessive focus on detail, we know they’re the right group to bring the beauty and danger of Pandora to life,” Cameron told the UbiBlog.
Representatives from Massive Entertainment are in attendance at this year’s Game Developers Conference, and hope to hire a number of new developers to help them work on this Avatar project. You can find a list of open positions at their official website.
Massive’s Avatar game is currently without a title or a release date, however, we do know it’s in the works for “PC and consoles.”