Most Recent: Xbox 360

Telltale will release Game of Thrones: Episode 5 on July 21

Posted on July 16, 2015 by John Scalzo

Things aren’t looking good for the Forrester family in this trailer for the fifth episode of Telltale’s Game of Thrones adaptation. Hopefully, things will turn out better once Game of Thrones: A Nest of Vipers is released next week:

In this penultimate episode, the actions of every Forrester are vital to the survival of the house. Rodrik’s alliance with House Glenmore, and his defiance of the Whitehills, has drawn the ire of an even greater threat: Ramsay Snow. Far across the Narrow Sea in Essos, with Meereen now a free city, Asher is close to securing the army he desperately needs to return home, and save his family. In King’s Landing, Mira’s activities at Tommen’s coronation have not escaped the attention of Margaery Tyrell, and Cersei has realized that the handmaiden may prove useful in her political games. Finally, beyond the Wall, Gared’s unlikely allies are reluctant to help in the search for the North Grove… but this far into the frozen wilds, Crows and Free Folk have a common enemy; and Winter is coming.

As usual, Game of Thrones: A Nest of Vipers will be available through a number of digital storefronts. Here’s the release schedule, courtesy of Telltale:

  • Tuesday, July 21: PC/Mac, PS3, PS4
  • Wednesday, July 22: Xbox One, Xbox 360
  • Thursday, July 23: iOS, Android

The final episode of the series, Game of Thrones: The Ice Dragon, will likely be released sometime this Fall.

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Xbox Store Today: Rory McIlroy PGA Tour, Prototype 1+2, Guncraft, more

Posted on July 15, 2015 by John Scalzo

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A game or two has been added to the Xbox Games Store every day this week, and these five titles are sure to include something for everyone…

  • Rory McIlroy PGA Tour (Xbox One) marks the first time that a game in the PGA Tour series will be released for current-generation consoles. It also marks the first time in more than a decade that Tiger Woods isn’t on the cover.
  • Activision stealthily added the Prototype Biohazard Bundle (Xbox One) to the Xbox Games Store on Monday. No one knew a current-generation remake of the open-world duet was in development, but here it is.
  • Tachyon Project (Xbox One) is a twin-stick shooter that bears more than a passing resemblance to the Geometry Wars series.
  • The Fall (Xbox One) is an old-fashioned adventure yarn about the AI in a battle suit keeping its unconscious human operator alive.
  • And Guncraft: Blocked and Loaded (Xbox 360) combines the voxel-based “block building” of Minecraft with a modern shooter. I’m surprised it took this long for that combination to appear in a console game.

More information on all of these games can be found after the break. (more…)

Posted in News, Xbox 360, Xbox One | Tagged , ,

Randy Pitchford’s #AskRandy Q&A goes horribly wrong for the developer

Posted on July 15, 2015 by Josh Griffiths

gearbox-logoTwitter is a wonderful place. But sometimes, it can be a truly horrifying place where your worst nightmares come to life. That’s the position Gearbox CEO Randy Pitchford found himself in Monday when he agreed to participate in an #AskRandy Q&A for Develop Brighton.

The intended goal was to get people to ask Pitchford questions about game development, which seems fair enough. The only problem was the timing. On Friday, Pitchford made a statement in regards to Sega’s agreement to a settlement concerning the lawsuit centered around Aliens: Colonial Marines. Sega and Gearbox were being sued by gamers who argued that Sega used false and unrepresentative demos, trailers, and screenshots to sell the game. Gearbox was included in the lawsuit as the developer of the game, though most of the work was reportedly outsourced to TimeGate Studios, and Gearbox was dropped from the suit similar this year.

Pitchford went on the attack in an interview with GamesIndustry.biz, saying, “the legal system failed as it was being manipulated by what appeared to me to be, essentially, mafia-style extortion tactics.” He continued by stating the free market was the only judge for the game: “The market proved it was doing its job perfectly. The market is dispassionate — rewarding what it likes and punishing what it doesn’t. There is an objectivity and fairness in the open market’s harsh, firm justice.”

Of course, the whole lawsuit was about the game being sold on a bed of lying screenshots and trailers, and the infamous E3 2013 demo, but that’s neither here nor there.

Monday also marked the release of the latest episode of Jim Sterling’s Jimquisition show, “Aliens: Colonial Marines – Game Over, Randy,” in which he disagreed with Pitchford’s comments from Friday. This coincided with Develop Brighton’s launch for the hashtag campaign, and with the powder keg primed, angry fans were handed the match.

A sampling of the tweets Pitchford received can be found after the break. (more…)

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Sega releases trailer for fictional “Shia LaBeouf DLC” for Sonic Generations

Posted on July 15, 2015 by Josh Griffiths

As a game critic and commentator, it’s my job to commentate on things like this. But… what is there to say? Sega has posted a video on it’s official forums advertising a “Shia LaBeouf DLC” for Sonic Generations. This is definitely a real thing that is definitely not happening, but it was uploaded to the official Sonic the Hedgehog YouTube Page yesterday, and is being promoted by Sonic’s offical Twitter account.

Sonic’s social media accounts have been extremely interesting, to say the least, over the last few weeks. Allow me to demonstrate:

This could be the start of a recent attempt by Sega to regain the public’s trust after publicly apologizing for recent missteps. I can see an old man at Sega HQ saying, what better way to reconnect with “da kids” than by quoting memes (like Shia LaBeouf’s “You can do it!” message) and posting bizarre jokes to Twitter? Maybe he’s got his feet up on the desk, with a big fat cigar in his mouth, yelling at Peter Parker to get those pictures of Spide-Man while he’s at it.

Posted in News, PC, PS3, Xbox 360 | Tagged

Personal user data exposed after a hack of Epic Games forum

Posted on July 15, 2015 by Josh Griffiths

epicgames-logoEpic Games, the creator of Gears of War and the Unreal Engine, has released a notice detailing a hack of their community forums. The full details of the hack and what Epic is doing to fix the problem can be read right here:

Dear Epic Games Forum Member,

We have just discovered that the Epic Games forums located at https://forums.epicgames.com were compromised by a hacker. We are sorry to report that the incident may have resulted in unauthorized access to your username, email address, password, and the date of birth you provided at registration.

We have taken https://forums.epicgames.com offline. When the site reopens, your password will be reset. If you use the same password on this site which you use on other sites, we recommend immediately changing your password on those sites as well.

The affected forum site covers UDK, Infinity Blade, Gears of War, Bulletstorm, and prior Unreal Tournament games. However, the separate forum sites covering Unreal Engine 4, Fortnite, and the new Unreal Tournament were unaffected.

We apologize for the inconvenience this causes everyone. To further understand what’s happened and prevent it in the future, we’re working with a computer security firm to identify the nature of the compromise. We will report further information on the forums when they reopen.

While the investigation into the security compromise is ongoing, we are reaching out to you directly to let you know of the potential unauthorized access to information you provided at registration. It is possible that any information stored or sent by you using the forums may have been accessed. Since this is a public forum, we do not collect or maintain financial information, but we advise you to be alert for suspicious email such as phishing attempts.

Thank you for being a part of our community, and for your attention to this issue.

Best Regards,
The Epic Games Team

Best of luck to everyone affected by this hack.

Posted in Mobile, News, PC, PS3, Xbox 360 |

Here’s the video game deals for Amazon Prime Day 2015

Posted on July 15, 2015 by John Scalzo

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UPDATE (8:15 PM): We’re in the final stretch of Amazon’s Prime Day 2015 festivities and another PS4 bundle is available to purchase. More deals will surely go live before midnight, but here’s what Prime members can pick up at a steep discount right now…

UPDATE (7:10 PM): Prime Day 2015 is beginning to wind down (and some people aren’t entirely happy about what’s been offered), but Amazon is still posting new deals…

UPDATE (3:55 PM): Are you in the market for a 3DS? If you act fast, you can grab one as part of Amazon’s latest update to the Prime Day 2015 page. There’s a few other new deals of note too…

Previous Prime Day deals, many still available by joining a waitlist, can be found after the break. (more…)

Posted in 3DS, Mobile, News, PC, PS3, PS4, Vita, Wii, Wii U, Xbox 360, Xbox One |

Konami removes Hideo Kojima’s name from the cover of Metal Gear Solid V: Phantom Pain

Posted on July 14, 2015 by John Scalzo

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As the secret war between Konami and Hideo Kojima continues to rage, the publisher has taken another public shot at the developer with the release of the final cover design of Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain. In an attempt to distance Kojima from the title, Konami has officially removed the developer’s name from the game’s packaging. This includes an above-the-title text credit (“A Hideo Kojima Game”) and the Kojima Productions logo. A previous version of the Phantom Pain cover included both. The original cover and the updated version can both be found after the break.

Though Kojima publicly states he is “100% involved” with The Phantom Pain’s development, this redesign of the game’s cover is more proof of the strained relationship between the developer and the publisher. It could even be said that the removal of Kojima’s name is a personal attack on the developer as he’s been given a text credit on the cover of every Metal Gear Solid game since 2001’s Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty.

Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain will be released for the PS3, PS4, Xbox 360, and Xbox One on September 1. Two weeks later, the game will also be released for the PC. While still unconfirmed, Kojima is expected to leave Konami after the completion of The Phantom Pain.

Last year, Kojima announced an intent to resurrect the Silent Hill franchise in collaboration with director Guillermo Del Toro and actor Norman Reedus. That game, Silent Hills, was canceled by Konami back in April. (more…)

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Songs from Paramore, Disturbed, Foster the People, more added to Guitar Hero Live

Posted on July 14, 2015 by John Scalzo

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Activision has announced ten more songs that will be included in this Fall’s Guitar Hero Live, bringing the total number of announced songs to 84. This time around, players can look forward to tracks from Paramore, Disturbed, Foster the People, and more. Here’s the latest tracklist update:

  • Asking Alexandria – “The Final Episode”
  • Cypress Hill (Featuring Tom Morello) – “Rise Up”
  • Disturbed – “Down With the Sickness”
  • Foster the People – “Coming of Age”
  • The Mowgli’s – “San Francisco”
  • OneRepublic – “Counting Stars”
  • Paramore – “Now”
  • TV On the Radio – “Lazerray”
  • The Vines – “Metal Zone”
  • Wolf Alice – “Moaning Lisa Smile”

Guitar Hero Live will be released for the PS3, PS4, Wii U, Xbox 360, Xbox One, and mobile devices on October 20.

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