Leading the pack of XBLA releases is Fruit Ninja Kinect, which releases this Wednesday on Xbox Live. A motion-control-enabled version of the popular title for mobile platforms, Halfbrick’s latest version of Fruit Ninja challenges players to slice up airborne produce while avoiding bombs.
Yes, you heard me right. You can now now enjoy the thrilling excitement of playing a $1 iPhone game on your
$200 console. It’s no Angry Birds, but it’s definitely a step in the right direction.
In Port Royale 3, players will embark upon an epic adventure through the Caribbean during the 17th century.
Kalypso Media announced Port Royale 3 for the PC and next generation consoles. PR3 lets players step into the role of a 17th century sea captain trying to make a name for themselves in the Caribbean.
There are two ways for the player to attain fame and fortune. Action fans will opt to become an adventurer. They’ll conduct raids, conquer cities, collect bounties and plunder anything that isn’t nailed down.
Alternately, players can find success through commerce. They’ll set up trade routes, construct production facilities, and develop settlements. The game’s economic system is said to be both deep and realistic.
The campaign asks you to pick one path or the other. In free-play mode, though, you can find a balance between the two approaches. Judging by the name, free-play mode will probably just let you build up your empire to your heart’s content.
Port Royale 3 also includes multiplayer modes. You and another player will be able to go head-to-head. No other details were provided but presumably you compete to amass the most wealth or power. Or maybe you just try to wipe each other out.
PR3 is being developed by Kalypso Media subsidiary Gaming Minds. Gaming Minds is composed of former employees of Ascaron Entertainment, the developer of the first two games in the series. Ascaron went bankrupt in 2009.
Kalypso expects PR3 to be released in the second quarter of 2012.
The morning brings a trio of horror-news about Diablo III. I’m outright bewildered about what Blizzard have done, and shuddering about the likely reaction in comments. I won’t muck around here, and instead shall just wade straight into the things that are probably going to end up being PC gaming’s biggest controversy of 2011.
1) The game requires a constant internet connection. It cannot be played offline.
2) Mods are “expressly prohibited.”
3) Items in the auction house are bought and sold for real-life money.
Upgrade to Kinect-driven pet game adds a new adventure, pandas, grizzlies, and more; set for release as add-on or in bundled retail release this fall.
Last year’s Kinectimals allowed players to enjoy all the cuteness of baby tigers, leopards, and other big cats with none of the danger to life and limb. Microsoft is expanding on that idea, as today it announced an expansion that would serve the same need for those who love the idea of playing with bear cubs but hate the idea of being savagely mauled.
Set for release this fall, Kinectimals Now with Bears will be available as a $50 stand-alone retail game or a $15 downloadable add-on for the original game. As the name suggests, the expansion’s big attraction are the ursine additions, including a black bear, grizzly bear, polar bear, panda bear, and more. The game will also feature a new guide and a new plot in which the player and a cub explore Bear Island in the footsteps of a famous explorer in search of buried treasure.
A combination of pet simulator and minigame collection, the original Kinectimals let players adopt and care for a variety of different big cat cubs like tigers, leopards, and so forth. Using the Kinect camera, players could play with the pets, teach them tricks, and perform a number of more unlikely activities like racing them around obstacle courses on remote control cars.
Something else to add to The Infinite Download List Of Infinite Downloads is Aether, a major mod for good ol’ Minecraft that’s so fat with features and changes that you could almost call it a total conversion. It’s also an extension of Minecraft’s ill-defined, open-to-interpretation fictional universe. If The Nether is Minecraft’s hell, then Aether is its heaven – an even more abstract cube-world of floating sky-islands, angry birds (no, not those ones), loot-holding dungeons and flying whales.
They had me at ‘flying whales.’ Oh, and there’s a ton of new block types (including trampoline-like bouncy clouds) plus an expanded, more RPG-like accessory system and even difficulty tiers for the new dungeon runs.
This one will require full exploration for a longer, later post, but meantime find out more and get it installed here.
Bit of a bastard to install, requiring a few other mini-mods first, so if you’re struggling or not in place where you can download lots of random zip files, here’s The Yogcast’s exporation of The Aether:
Volition and THQ are already readying a third game in the open-world crime series, which will take the franchise in a “new direction.”
Having defeated the rival gangs of Stilwater at the end of Saints Row 2 and overthrown the influence of the Ultor Corporation, the Saints have found themselves with free reign over the city. They target a bank, attempting to airlift the vault out of it, but the alarm alerts the Stilwater PD and the Saints are incarcerated. In prison, they learn that the bank they tried to rob was owned by a huge international crime organization called the Syndicate, led by Phillipe Loren.
After bribing the police, the Syndicate capture the Saints’ leader, Johnny Gat, and Shaundi to try and negotiate a business plan with them, aboard Loren’s private jet. While in-flight, Loren tells them they will be allowed to live if they turn over two-thirds of their territory in Stilwater. The leader of the Saints rejects this offer, and a gunfight breaks out, with the Saint’s leader thrown from the jet.
With the Syndicate in full control of Stilwater, the Saints relocate themselves to the city of Steelport. Pierce is instructed to remain in Stilwater to make sure everything runs smoothly. Steelport is a city that was created as factories flourished with little city planning, and since has suffered from economic failure, contrasting the glamour of Stilwater. The Syndicate has already begun to take control of some parts of Steelport, focusing on vices like merchandise and gambling.
To extend their reach, the Syndicate had divided their control of the city through three gangs. The Morning Star, lead by Loren directly, are typically European men with impeccable taste, selling guns. The Mexican wrestler Killbane controls the Luchadores who deal with gambling. The Deckers, led by hacktivist Matt Miller, are computer geniuses, and handle the money laundering. The Saints see the opportunity to take control of Steelport from these groups. A government trained Special Tactical Anti-Gang (STAG) units will attempt to halt any violent activity whether it be the Saints or the Syndicate.
Sometimes, a game comes along that’s the absolute last bloody thing you need right now. There are many things I need right now: time, a haircut, lunch, the extension of about 48 deadlines, someone to do my shopping for me, a cat that can empty its own litter tray, a keyboard that doesn’t give me an RSI, a teleporter, and even more time.
There is but one thing I don’t need right now: a horribly compulsive action-RPG MMO that tickles just about every lizard-part of my brain. I want I want I want I want. I want to level up, I want a better bow, I want to get to the bigger monsters, I want to show that cocking Mad God Oryx just who’s boss. (The boss is me. Or at least it will be. One day. Soon. Yes, Oryx. Soon.)
2K Games pushes Digital Extremes’ sci-fi FPS to next year on all platforms; game will be playable at Comic-Con 2011 this week.
It looks as if The Darkness II will stay cloaked in shadow for longer than expected. 2K Games confirmed for GameSpot today that it has pushed The Darkness II beyond its previously announced October 4 release date. The publisher now expects to release the Digital Extremes-developed title for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC on February 7 in North America and February 10 internationally.
The Darkness II will pick up several years after the events of the well-regarded original, with players once again taking the role of Jackie Estacado, now the don of the Franchetti clan. While he has controlled the chaotic powers inside him since the events of the first game, a reasonless attempt on his life kick-starts a full-on mob war in New York, a perfect situation for the Darkness to reemerge.
While the original Darkness game was made by Starbreeze Studios (The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape From Butcher Bay), development for the second installment has been entrusted to Digital Extremes. The Canadian studio is perhaps best known for 2008′s third-person action game Dark Sector, but it has more recently been working on the PC port of THQ’s Homefront, as well as the multiplayer mode of 2K Marin’s BioShock 2.
Along with news of the delay, 2K Games confirmed The Darkness II’s presence at Comic-Con 2011, which descends on San Diego July 21-24. The publisher will be hosting a panel for the game on July 21 at 12:00 p.m., and it will feature voice actor and Faith No More singer Mike Patton. Talent from franchise creator Top Cow Productions, as well as Digital Extremes, will also be on hand.
Metro: Last Light is an upcoming action-oriented video game with a combination of survival horror and first-person shooter elements.
The game is set in 2034 in the same setting as Metro 2033, the Moscow Metro. The game picks up after the “bad” ending from Metro 2033, in which Artyom delivers a devastating attack on the mysterious supernatural race known as the Dark Ones. The station-cities of the Metro struggle for power using weapons found in D6. The player follows Artyom, the main protagonist from Metro 2033, as the supposed “key to survival – the last light in our darkest hour…”
