Most Recent: Xbox One

XBL Store Today: Transformers: Rise of the Dark Spark, Grid: Autosport, more

Posted on June 25, 2014 by John Scalzo

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Microsoft has added nine games to the Xbox Live Games Store today and it looks like there’s (mostly) something for everyone.

As with yesterday’s PlayStation Store update, the big addition to the XBL Store today is Activision’s Transformers: Rise of the Dark Spark. The title merges the Transformers movieverse with High Moon’s popular War For/Fall of Cybertron games, though Edge of Reality is the developer on this installment. Rise of the Dark Spark is available to download for the Xbox 360 and Xbox One.

On the complete opposite end of the spectrum from gigantic robots bashing each other is Ubisoft’s Valiant Hearts: The Great War. This puzzle platformer, which is also available for the Xbox 360 and Xbox One, is set during World War I and features a unique hand-drawn art style.

Other new releases available this week include…

  • Grid: Autosport (Xbox 360), the latest installment in Codemasters’ popular racing series.
  • R.B.I. Baseball 14 (Xbox One), a next-gen version of MLB Advanced Media’s retro baseball sim.
  • Zombie Driver: Ultimate Edition (Xbox One), a next-gen version of EXOR’s overhead driving game.

More information on all of these games (as well as a few others) can be found after the break.

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

Game Critics Awards has announced their Best of E3 2014 nominees

Posted on June 24, 2014 by Nicole Kline

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The Best of E3 2014 nominees are in, and Evolve is currently leading the pack with six nominations (Best of Show, Best Original Game, Best Console Game, Best PC Game, Best Action Game, and Best Online Multiplayer). The rest of the Best in Show games all have multiple nominations as well – Alien: Isolation, Batman: Arkham Knight, Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor, No Man’s Sky, and Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six: Siege. After all the attention it’s gotten, I’m surprised Sunset Overdrive isn’t on that list, but it’s on a few others.

Check out the full list of nominees after the jump.

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

Watch Dogs Review: A Bit Ruff

Posted on June 24, 2014 by Dan Hobbs

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Watch Dogs was unveiled in 2012 at Ubisoft’s E3 Press Conference to the adoration of the entire industry. Over the past year, the Internet hype machine went into full effect, fueled by Ubisoft themselves and the fervor of online commenting communities. After that initial reveal, conjecture naturally sprung up around the web. Would the game look that good? Would the open world really be that open? With Ubisoft sending out trailer after trailer, Watch Dogs was labelled as a coming-of-age party for the next generation in terms of graphics and gameplay.

But the hype train is a bad one to catch, and it has not helped Watch Dogs, making it feel far less than it should be after the initial reveal. After experiencing much of the game’s content, what you end up with is a title that is actually still quite fun to play, but oddly uncompelling. (more…)

Posted in PC, PS3, PS4, Reviews, Top Story, Xbox 360, Xbox One | Tagged

Take that Ubisoft! Sunset Overdrive will include playable female characters

Posted on June 24, 2014 by Nicole Kline

Insomniac’s Associate Community Manager, Brandon Winfrey, tells us a tale of magic and wonder in the latest “Sunset TV” developer diary for Sunset Overdrive . By “magic,” I mean he talks about the utterly amazing traps you can set up to kill enemies (the Pyro Geyser? Hell yes!). And by “wonder,” I mean you can play as a woman in Sunset Overdrive… or a person of another nationality, or a dude in a skirt, or whatever the heck you want to play as (limited only by the character creator and your imagination).

In the video, one of the female characters sports a hooded white robe. Surely this is a friendly poke at the backlash Ubisoft received during this year’s E3 Expo over the lack of female characters in Assassin’s Creed: Unity. Watch the video… it’s great.

Sunset Overdrive will be out on October 28 for the Xbox One.

Posted in News, Xbox One | Tagged

Metro Redux will be available on August 26

Posted on June 24, 2014 by John Scalzo

Deep Silver and 4A Games previously confirmed that Metro Redux, a next-generation makeover of Metro 2033 and Metro: Last Light, would be released this Summer. Now we know that the compilation will be available on August 26.

In addition to the Metro Redux compilation, enhanced remakes of Metro 2033 and Last Light will be available to download separately for the PC, PS4, and Xbox One.

Posted in News, PC, PS4, Xbox One | Tagged

Stop (In the Name of Love) for Richard Sherman’s Madden NFL 15 cover

Posted on June 23, 2014 by John Scalzo

maddnenfl15-boxBox art reveals are usually pretty boring. Take a nice piece of concept art… emblazon the logo along the top… slap an ESRB rating in the bottom left corner… and you’re done. They only become newsworthy when a publisher does something stupendously weird (such as the word salad on Batman: Arkham City‘s “Game of the Year” cover) or ridiculously neat (such as the minimalist Resistance 3 cover).

The official Madden NFL 15 cover falls in the former category.

I don’t know if cover athlete Richard Sherman is auditioning to become a traffic cop or if he really loves “Stop In the Name of Love,” but it’s definitely an odd choice for the Madden box. It’s possible he’s doing something football-related like reaching out for a high five or stiff-arming a wide receiver, but the whole thing just looks off somehow. A part of me thinks that whichever EA Sports employee it was that made the final cover choice has to be a fan of the Denver Broncos.

Madden NFL 15 will be available for the PS3, PS4, Xbox 360, and Xbox One on August 26.

Posted in News, PS3, PS4, Xbox 360, Xbox One | Tagged

R.B.I. Baseball 14 coming to PS4, Xbox One next week

Posted on June 22, 2014 by Nicole Kline

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Next week, R.B.I. Baseball 14 will be coming to PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. MLB Advanced Media brought the game to mobile platforms back in the Spring, as well as the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. The company will be updating these versions of the game this Summer, bringing them a multiplayer mode and alumni packs.

And let’s not forget, there will also be updated rosters! The next-gen and mobile editions of the game will now feature rising stars such as “Jose Abreu (White Sox), Emilio Bonifacio (Cubs), Brandon Hicks (Giants), Mark Reynolds (Brewers), Jonathan Schoop (Orioles) and Masahiro Tanaka (Yankees),” among others.

R.B.I. Baseball will be out on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One on June 24 (so two days from now).

Posted in News, PS4, Xbox One | Tagged

European gamers prefer watching the World Cup to playing TitanFall

Posted on June 22, 2014 by Andrew Rainnie

Respawn Entertainment has effectively proved what everyone on this side of the Atlantic knows to be true: when football [Ed. Note: soccer] is on, everyone’s eyes are focused on the beautiful game, and not playing with others. The company has released a graph showing the number of players on TitanFall‘s European servers during two recent World Cup games. The more interesting observation is that there was only a slight drop during the Colombia vs Ivory Coast match, which started at 5:00 PM GMT, yet over one third of players dropped off to watch Uruguay smash England 2-1 at 8:00 PM GMT. In the latter game, players can also be seen returning to TitanFall for a brief game during the 15-minute halftime break. Clearly the mid-match commentary was not riveting enough.

Publisher EA will be happy either way, seeing as they also produce the FIFA series of games.

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