BioWare’s RPG sequel and Nintendo’s twin titles join Torchlight, MLB 11: The Show, and Major League Baseball 2K11 on the release docket.
The first quarter isn’t even over yet, but it has already seen a host of high-profile games hit the market. This week’s release docket is particularly full, with a variety of high-profile titles for the role-playing gamer, the sports fan, and Pokemon junkies.
The latter title–or titles–are Pokemon Black and White version. Having already sold over 5 million units in record time, the twin games debuted on March 6, in line with Nintendo’s Sunday high-profile releases. The two titles introduce a handful of changes to the established gotta-catch-’em-all formula. Developer Game Freak has expanded the games’ online functionality through features such as Global Link, where players can access special content by uploading their save files to a website. Black and White also introduce more than 150 new Pokemon that players can add to their Pokedexes, as well as changing seasons. The two titles are exclusive to the DS.
RPG lovers get a big-name release this week in the form of Dragon Age II from celebrated developer BioWare and Electronic Arts. The game–which is already available in demo form–will see the player transform Blight-survivor Hawke from “a destitute refugee to the revered champion of the land,” with new combat mechanics for the game’s three archetypal classes. Although Hawke gains fame as the Champion of Kirkwall, the game will peer into his mysterious rise to power over a 10-year period. It will be available for the Mac, PC, PlayStation 3, and Xbox 360 on Tuesday, March 8, which will also see the release of the first two DLC packs for the game, The Exiled Prince and The Black Emporium.
Tuesday will also see baseball fans get a choice of two sports sim titles. 2K Sports will release Major League Baseball 2K11–which boasts Philadelphia Phillies ace Roy Halladay on the cover–for the 360, PS3, PSP, Wii, DS, PC, and PlayStation 2. Meanwhile, Sony will release the latest in its acclaimed line of first-party baseballers, MLB 11: The Show, for the PSP, PS3, and PS2. The latter game will see the introduction of pure analog controls and co-op play to the series.
Xbox Live Arcade will see a notable release this week in the form of Torchlight. The action-RPG from Seattle-based developer Runic Games was originally released for the PC in late 2009. The hack & slasher sees players exploring a mine which leads to a labyrinth of dungeons from ruined civilizations. Players must fight a series of monsters of ever-increasing toughness to discover the source of a magical–but corrupting–mineral called ember.
For further details on the week’s games, visit GameSpot’s New Releases page. The full list of downloadable games on the PlayStation Store, Xbox Live Marketplace, and Wii Shop Channel will be revealed later this week. Release dates are based on retailer listings and are subject to change.
SUNDAY, MARCH 6
Pokemon Black Version–DS–Nintendo
Pokemon White Version–DS–Nintendo
MONDAY, MARCH 7
G.G Series: Horizontal Bar–DS–Genterprise
GO Series: Earth Saver–DS–Gamebridge
Heavy Fire: Black Arms–WII—Teyon
TUESDAY, MARCH 8
Atari’s Greatest Hits Volume 2–DS–Atari
Beastly Frantic Foto–DS–Storm City Games
Dragon Age II: The Black Emporium–MAC, PC, PS3, X360–Electronic Arts
Dragon Age II: The Exiled Prince–MAC, PC, PS3, X360–Electronic Arts
Dragon Age II–MAC, PC, PS3, X360–Electronic Arts
Major League Baseball 2K11–PS3, PC, PS2, PSP, X360, DS, WII–2K Sports
The ,000,000 Pyramid–WII–Ubisoft
MLB 11: The Show–PC, PS2, PSP–SCEA
Petz Bunnyz Bunch–DS–Ubisoft
Ship Simulator Extremes: Ferry Pack–PC–Paradox Interactive
The Sims 3: Barnacle Bay–PC–Electronic Arts
Yoostar 2–PS3, X360–Yoostar Entertainment Group
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 9
Torchlight–X360–Microsoft Game Studios
GDC 2011: Rockstar San Diego’s Western triumphs at Game Developers Conference’s annual ceremony; Mass Effect 2, Limbo, Minecraft, also honored.
Each year, the Game Developers Conference‘s crowning event is the Game Developers Choice Awards, one of the most prestigious ceremonies in gaming. Hosted once again by the comically gifted head of Double Fine Productions, Tim Schafer, the evening wasted no time in getting started, awarding the Best Audio trophy to Red Dead Redemption.
Moving on to Best Game Design, Red Dead Redemption rode off with the trophy, putting another notch in developer Rockstar San Diego’s belt. Minecraft got another trophy for Best Downloadable Game, as well as the Innovation Award, leaving game co-creator Markus Persson virtually speechless.
Best Visual Arts went to Playdead’s Xbox Live game Limbo, which was also the subject of one of the night’s various skits by nerd-comedy troupe Mega64. Best Handheld Game was won by ZeptoLab’s Cut the Rope.
We take our first look at Piranha Bytes’ sequel to Risen and the spiritual successor to the Gothic series.
If there’s a better reason to attend the 2011 Game Developer Conference than the opportunity to take a first look at Gothic developer Piranha Bytes’ role-playing sequel Risen 2: Dark Waters, we don’t want to hear it. This sequel takes the high-fantasy world of Risen, which took place on a besieged island, and will become a full-on, full-fledged, full-featured, full-monty pirate role-playing game, where you play not only as Piranha Bytes’ established “Hero” character, but also as a seafaring adventurer in a fantastic age of sail.
Risen 2 takes place some in-game years after the events in the first game. Specifically, the Hero has vanquished the threat of the powerful titan monster that threatened his island home after first defeating the evil inquisitor and claiming the villain’s magical eyepatch–an artifact that let the Hero identify the titan for what it was–a malevolent creature disguised as a natural disaster. Unfortunately, bigger problems are afoot–other titans are awakening near other islands in the area, and worse yet, hideous sea monsters have emerged from the deep, completely disrupting trade routes and generally causing the few survivors who exist in the world to be very, very grumpy.
And as it turns out, the Hero is the grumpiest of all. In a first for a Piranha Bytes game, the Hero does not suffer from amnesia and does remember his hard-fought battles and narrow escapes perfectly well, thank you very much. However, his cool reception by an unappreciative populace has made him bitter and frustrated, though he still seeks to save the world by finding some means to rescue the other islands from their impending doom.
We make our way through a slimier version of Aperture Science in a two-hour hands-on demo of Portal 2′s single-player campaign.
“Say apple,” Wheatley commands, surveying you with his twitchy blue eye. You go to speak, but end up jumping on the spot instead. “I don’t want to alarm you,” he starts, trying to keep his voice steady, “but you probably have brain damage. Not to worry, though. We’ll probably be okay. I mean, you know, as long as nothing else goes wrong.”
Plenty of things went wrong during our two-hour hands-on demo of Portal 2′s single-player campaign at Valve’s headquarters near Seattle. We made our way through the opening chapters of the game, before skipping ahead to a new section in the latter-part of the campaign.
Portal 2′s beginning is familiar enough: Chell, alone in a room. It’s not the cold, sterile environment we’ve seen before; this new room is a vast improvement–carpeted floors, a wardrobe, a desk, potted plants, and even art. But something just doesn’t feel right.
The new AI caretaker is male, for one. His baritone voice breaks out over the loudspeakers, instructing you to move around and get used to your surroundings. If you’re feeling up to it, he chirps, you can do some basic mental stimulation exercises by staring intently at the framed painting that hangs above your bed.
Or, if that doesn’t do it for you, he can always provide some classical music. You’re just beginning to think about requesting Bach’s Organ Concerto in G when you lose consciousness; you come to in the same room, although you barely recognize it now: vines creep along the walls, the carpet is a mushy brown color, and the desk and wardrobe have fallen into disuse and decay.
And suddenly, there’s Wheatley (brilliantly voiced by Stephen Merchant)–the neurotic caretaker of Aperture’s 10,000 test subjects–telling you that the whole place is collapsing and you have to escape, now.
New release slate highlighted by first M-rated franchise entry and First Strike add-on content for Sony’s console; Beyond Good & Evil HD, Rift, Warhammer 40k: Dawn of War II: Retribution also out.
The splendid shooter Killzone 3 and the foul-mouthed Bulletstorm led all releases last week, but this week’s focus shifts to hand-to-hand fighting, Call of Duty multiplayer, and a revival of Beyond Good & Evil.
Leading the pack this week is EA Sports’ Fight Night Champion for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. Champion is the first Fight Night game to be rated M for Mature. The game is being billed as one that is “gritty” and “dark,” with animations and player damage that “truly conveys the brutality of the sport of boxing.”
EA is promising a refined physics-based animation system and a new “Full Spectrum Punch Control” scheme. The title will focus on a single-player mode intended to re-create the dramatic and emotional aspects of the sport.
PlayStation 3 gamers looking to add to their copy of Call of Duty: Black Ops can pick up the First Strike downloadable content this week via the PlayStation Network. As for the content, the map pack includes four new multiplayer environments ranging in locale from the Berlin Wall in Germany to a North American hockey rink. The add-on also bundles one environment for the game’s zombie mode dubbed Ascension.
While Beyond Good & Evil 2 is still far off, fans of the series can pick up an updated version of the well-received original this week on Xbox Live. Beyond Good & Evil HD will feature 1080p graphics, including enhanced character models and upgraded textures, and Ubisoft has also remastered the game’s musical score.
Also out this week is Trion Worlds’ massively multiplayer online game Rift for PC. As its title might suggest, the game’s premise is that of “rifts” in space time that are playing havoc with the land of Telara and threatening to tear the fabric of the universe. The world will be highly malleable, as these rifts can be triggered by players or the development team, and they can also occur spontaneously. Their arrival will apparently alter the landscape, as well as open up new areas for exploration.
Those who would rather add to an existing game than pick up a new one can grab Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War II: Retribution for the PC. Retribution follows on from the events that transpired in Dawn of War II’s first expansion, Chaos Rising. Set 10 years later, the game sees the Imperium reeling after an apparent betrayal by Gabriel Angelos’ Space Marines. Gamers will be able to assume command of their chosen faction to experience the events of the game as they play out.
Gamers looking for something a little lighter this week can pick up Rango The Video Game. It will be released the Tuesday before the Johnny Depp-voiced animated Western releases in theaters on Friday, March 4. Like its film inspiration, the action adventure game will follow the travails of its titular out-of-his-element lizard. The game will be set in the Wild West town of Dirt, and gamers will find themselves meeting quirky characters, as well as engaging in shoot-outs and other old-timey activities.
For further details on the week’s games, visit GameSpot’s New Releases page. The full list of downloadable games on the PlayStation Store, Xbox Live Marketplace, and Wii Shop Channel will be revealed later this week. Release dates are based on retailer listings and are subject to change.
MONDAY, FEBRUARY 28
Fate of the World–PC–Red Redemption
Martial Empires: The Catastrophe of Babylon–PC–gamigo
TUESDAY, MARCH 1
Chuck E. Cheese’s Sports Games–Wii–UFO Interactive
Fight Night Champion–PS3, X360–EA Sports
Rango: The Video Game–PS3, X360, Wii, DS–Paramount Digital Entertainment
Rift–PC–Trion Worlds
Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War II: Retribution–PC–THQ
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 2
Beyond Good & Evil HD–X360–Ubisoft
Call of Duty: Black Ops: First Strike–PS3–Activision
Perfect World International: Genesis–PC–Perfect World Entertainment
At a recent Microsoft press event, we got a chance to check out the XBLA (as well as PSN and PC) Ghostbusters top-down, twin-stick shooter called Sanctum of Slime. This particular game doesn’t really take place anywhere in the proper Ghostbusters storyline (yes, there’s a proper Ghostbusters storyline) as the characters and locations have been made specifically for this game. Unfortunately, that means no Spengler, Stantz, Venkman, or Zeddemore, but Sanctum of slime does support cooperative play for up to four characters that are not the Ghostbusters from the movie.
Mechanics in Sanctum of slime are pretty straightforward. The left analog stick controls movement while the right analog stick determines aiming and shooting–just as you’d find in most other twin-stick shooters.
The twist is that, in addition to the positron glider, you have two other weapons types at your disposal–each of which produces a different kind of projectile that you can access by pressing a shoulder button. You’ll know when to use a certain weapon type depending on the color of the ghost you’re attacking, so if the ghost happens to be red, then you use the regular glider.
If the ghost is yellow, then you use a different weapon that produces a yellow net-like projectile that covers a pretty big swath of space.
All of the weapons will inflict damage on a ghost no matter the color, but you can kill them (or is it re-kill?) them quicker when using the properly color coded weapon.
There are 12 levels and two separate boss levels in Sanctum of slime. Some of the locations you’ll see include a hotel, sewers, and a graveyard and most of the locations we’ve seen so far have enemies that are unique to that area. Level progression involves clearing out a room and then moving onto the next.
If any team member loses all of their health, you have an opportunity to revive them by standing over the body and pressing the designated button repeatedly. Doing this also means that you leave yourself open to attack, so generally you have to wait for an opening before you risk reviving a fallen comrade.
Robot Entertainment’s first effort falls in fantasy action-strategy genre, due on PC, possibly 360, PS3, this summer.
Ensemble Studios’ closure by Microsoft in 2009 sent shock waves throughout the industry, but it didn’t take long for many of the Age of Empires developers to land on their feet. One studio to form out of that studio’s remnants was Robot Entertainment, which formed under Tony Goodman and other former members of Ensemble’s leadership team.
Today, Robot’s first orders have been inputted, as the studio announced it will release Orcs Must Die as a digital download on consoles and PC this summer. According to a Robot representative, exact platforms have yet to be nailed down, but the studio is aiming to release the title on the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.
As its title may imply, Orcs Must Die sees players defending their castle from a never-ending flood of orcs and other infernal beasts. As seen in the game’s first trailer (below), the high-intensity action title sees players strategically retreating through their keeps while laying and springing traps that range from spiked logs to magical wrecking-ball pendulums.
Robot expects to offer additional details on the title at PAX East, which will take place from March 11-13 in Boston.
