Here we have three videos with various aspects of gameplay for the highly anticipated Bioshock 2. None are terribly spoilery, and there's almost zero plot info, but if you want to remain completely in the dark about the upcoming game you can probably get by without watching these. In the one above, we've got a peek at the the brand new deathmatch multiplayer mode. It looks pretty much how you'd expect a Bioshock deathmatch mode to look like - lots of shooting, lots of plasmids - but that little vanishing act from the Houdini splicer's bag of tricks looks like it could add a nice little twist to the match.
After the break, a pair of short videos from the single player campaign show the classic conflict between hitting the X or Y buttons, otherwise known as Harvesting or Saving a Little Sister. Lastly, there's a look at the new hacking mechanism. It's a bit more elegant and believable than playing a game of Pipe Mania every time you wanted to get a cheaper price on some ammo or chips, but I imagine a few of you may be disappointed by the change.
I'll admit it. I am one of the many addicted to character creation. I am also one of those who will lament over the avatar creation screen as much as skill trees or weaponry. He or she simply has to beautiful! Soul Calibur 4, Fallout 3, City of Heroes. There were times I would boot each game with the sole agenda of playing dress up with my "dollhouse" of creations. Here is my Dragon Age: Origin's Mage Class: Bronx mixed up in some of my own impromptu "fan fiction". I think it's a bit comical that he looks like a Disney prince compared to Fereldan's butter faced denizens. I found this game's creator to be much easier to manage than the others mentioned. What are some of your favorite character creators and games linked to those favorite creations?
If you're quick, IGN's Fileplanet has a limited number of Battlefield: Bad Company 2 beta test keys for the PS3. Just register for a Fileplanet account, or sign in if you already have one, hit a few more buttons and within seconds you'll have a code to download your own multiplayer test of the upcoming shooter. It's limited to folks with American PSN accounts (but not necessarily Americans, if you catch my drift).
I thought the single player of the first Battlefield: Bad Company had some charm, but never really tried out the multiplayer, which now appears to the the main selling point for the sequel. I know some folks disillusioned by the Modern Warfare 2 marketing machine are pinning their hopes on this game, so now's your chance to see what they're bringing to the table.
The public beta is exclusive to the PS3, although the game is also set to release for Xbox 360 and PC. While I'm sure they're testing things out on those systems too, you're just not invited. Sorry! Don't fret, though: a multiplayer demo is due for all systems early next year. How that will differ from this beta content remains to be seen, however. Preordering the PS3 version of the game at Best Buy or Gamestop will also net you a copy of the beta, but if you'd rather try before making that sort of commitment, just head to the link below. The game is due out March 2, 2010. After the break, check out a video EA made just for the release of the beta. It's not terribly action packed, but if you love freeze frames of war stuff and a lot of browns and tans, you'll be in heaven.
Battlefield: Bad Company 2 on PS3 Beta [Fileplanet]
This past week I gathered a group of gays and we huddled into the illustrious Chelsea Cinemas on 23rd st. to see 2012. While it is always a pleasure to see John Cusack reprise his role as everyman Tom Hanks, the real treat was my first glimpse of the upcoming movie Avatar. This trailer was made to appeal to gamers. The first few seconds I could have sworn I was witnessing a live action crossover of Final Fantasy XII and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2.
James Cameron's latest epic follows the exploits of a young marine (Sam Worthington) who has been paralyzed from the waist down as he enters the Avatar program enabling him to walk once again. This experimental program places Worthington in the seat of "Driver:" one who controls living, breathing bodies using cutting edge technology to link his mind with the avatar. The ensuing trailer shows Worthington as he interacts with the amazing fantasy world of Pandora from the safety of his base, building relationships and fighting battles not unlike what most of us do from the safety of our couches. Another trailer showed the beefy daddy Bruce Willis in Surrogates. As Lt. Harvey Greer he investigates a world where no one leaves their home but instead send their biological robotic clones out to live life for them. This recent stream of bleak, pre-apocalyptic views seem to tie some form of gaming or technology to a collective psyche of undoing. Are these snapshots of inspired schematics for future online gaming? Will the current boon of motion technology and casual gaming be the mother and father of ubiquitous and salaciously addictive lifestyle practices?
More thoughts after the break.
Yay
- Wool - 80 MS points. Wool is a game that puts you in the paws of a sheep dog herding sheep, with gameplay similar to the Xbox Live Arcade game Flock (or more accurately, the PS1 game Sheep). Personally, I actually prefer this indie take on the gameplay over Capcom's (far more expensive) offering. The sheep AI is just the right balance between cooperative and unruly to make the game challenging without becoming too frustrating. There is also a nice multiplayer mode that has up to 4 players trying to horde the herded sheep all to themselves that gets very competitive very quickly.
- Neo Terra - 80 MS points. Neo Terra is a real-time space strategy game that moves at a very quick pace akin to the popular iPhone game Galcon. The game presents a galaxy of planets to conquer that will produce more ships that you can send and conquer more planets. The game creates an addicting tug of war dynamic between you and your opponent where both sides will be taking and retaking planets from each other. There are two main game types, with the first an all out domination match where the last player standing is the victor, as well as a king of the hill type mode where a player wins by controlling a flagged planet for a set amount of time. The multiplayer extends to up to 4 players, with the option to also have 4 AI players in the mix as well, making for a truly hectic strategy experience.
- Inside Lacrosse's CL2010 - 400 MS points. Perhaps it's the just because of the sheer phallic imagery involved in the sport, but I've always been fascinated by lacrosse. As such, I've always wished there was a lacrosse videogame, and Inside Lacrosse's CL2010 does a damn good job of that. I don't claim to know the intricacies of the sport, but I do know that while playing the game I had a lot of fun. Even if it's just the little touches, like seeing the trajectory of a pass before you throw it, or using the right analog stick to aim a shot while you maneuver around the field, this is one of the few sports games that I've truly enjoyed and feel comfortable recommending to anyone regardless of how familiar they are with the sport.
- Aesop's Garden - 240 MS points. Aesop's Garden looks, sounds, and plays like a long-lost NES game. Someone nefarious has been planting weeds in your garden, and you need to collect the weeds to make your garden beautiful again. It's a puzzle game at heart, with the real challenge to maneuver mazes and push blocks so you can reach the weeds. There is also a complete level editor for the game to create your own puzzle gardens, though the created levels cannot be shared online.
- Aardvark - 240 MS points. On the surface, Aardvark seems like just another Breakout clone with a funny name. In large part that assessment is true and, despite the sheer number of Breakout clones already on the Xbox Live indie game channel, Aardvark is one of the top out there. But what really sets Aardvark apart is the level editor, letting you build your own block breaking levels. There's no level sharing online, but it's still fun to play your own creations.
Dear Diary,
This week, Narnia had a celebration! Well, not an actual celebration, but there was an occasion marked, even if it was only quietly. On the flip side, it was also another sad week of loss. I'm beginning to wonder if I smell or something. There has to be some reason why nobody sticks around anymore! I mean, I've got townies who seem to be relatively permanent, like the regular cast of a TV show. But then I get these new castmembers who somehow turn into special guest stars and disappear. Did they get a better offer? Who am I talking about this time? Well, you'll see after the break. And obviously it's not Pippy, because I'm still able to string sentences together!
EA announced today that the first downloadable content for Need For Speed SHIFT will be available worldwide on December 1 for the Xbox 360 and then later for the PlayStation 3 on December 3 in Europe and December 10 in North America. The Team Racing Pack offers up an all-new gameplay mode called Team Racing where two teams of up to six racers battle against each other online, and teamwork will be required to make it to the finish line first. In addition, you'll also get five new legendary race cars: The 1967 Chevrolet Corvette Stingray 427, the 1967 Shelby GT-500, the 1969 Dodge Charger R/T, the 1971 Dodge Challenger R/T and the 1998 Toyota Supra Mark IV. Oh yeah, and best of all? Like I said in the headline, the Team Racing Pack is totally free. Gratis. Enjoy!
While it's still on track to publish No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle for the Wii, Ubisoft has confirmed that it will not be publishing No More Heroes HD, AKA No More Heroes: Hero's Paradise in the US, even though Japan will get the PS3 and Xbox 360 versions of the updated original game in February.
Said an Ubisoft spokesperson:
"Ubisoft will not be publishing either of these versions."
No reasons were given, nor any indication of whether or not another publisher will pick up the stateside slack. But a gamer can hope!
This looks great! It's a little sparse on the gameplay footage, but it's getting me pumped. I've always been a fan of the 8 bit
aesthetic and always thought it would look cool in 3D. It's nice to see Atlus running with this idea, I just hope the gameplay is as clever as the look and feel. There's a lot of wrong ways to do 'retro' games. The game will be released in America on May 11, 2010 for the PS3.
As with many of the writers here at the GayGamer.net castle, I've had a huge chunk of my time swallowed by playing Dragon Age: Origins. As we already have a review and sex scenes with Zevran, I wanted to write about another piece of the game across which I ran (and one more piece after that--but that includes finishing the game, which I should manage this weekend).
In Denerim, the metropolis, in medieval terms, of Fereldan, there exists a brothel you can visit called The Pearl. If you speak to the madame there, she gives you the option of choosing your preferences, whether that be male, female, a surprise, or both.
Choosing both gives you what you see in the screenshot I captured up top. So, while many of us are going YAY! about the inclusion of Zevran and Leliana, below the fold you'll read about an issue that's made me frown.
There's been some talk in the past week about a pretty staggering number: one million XBox 360 units banned from XBox Live on account of being modified - presumably, of course, to circumvent those pesky new game prices with the magic of Bittorrent. Not that it ever sounded very wise to tamper with a closed, proprietary game console before logging onto a closed, proprietary online service and assume nothing could possibly go awry.
Well, despite many, many, many, many, many sites reporting that a million accounts had been banned, it sounds like there was a bit too much cross-referencing and not enough fact-checking. XBox Live General Manager Marc Whitten hinted yesterday that the actual number of XBoxes banned last month is much smaller, noting that the popular 'one million banned' statistic essentially came from one site.
Even if it ended up being a false lead, it's easy to see why the appeal of this particular number was pretty tempting for most. Piracy is one of those problems that hovers like a specter, always present and hurting the bottom line of companies who give their all for their projects, but also basically impossible to actually measure. Regardless of who is or isn't a saint when it comes to respecting generations-old IP laws in our digital age, it's both astounding and plausible that a million XBoxes could have been modified to play pirtaed games on XBox Live. PROTIP: That's more XBoxes than the population of Alaska!
Regardless of whethery they number into the millions or have their own senators, the mass of folks who recently found themselves banned from XBox Live may yet get their comeuppance, in form of a class-action suit. Hit the jump to read more!
The National Institute on Media and the Family will be shutting down at the end of 2009. NIMF, known for its annual Video Game Report Card, will be closing because of a lack of funding. Fairview Health Services, which supported NIMF annually with $750,000, could no longer meet its commitment thanks to economic woes.
President and founder Dr. David Walsh vowed to soldier on despite the organization's closing:
The current challenging economic environment accelerated those discussions making this the right time to begin transitioning the programs to other organizations who share our mission and values. I look forward to transitioning the Institute's programs to worthy organizations that I am confident will continue to educate parents and caregivers on our rapidly changing digital culture.
And in a blog post:
We've accomplished a lot of amazing things in the last thirteen years. And in that same amount of time there has been unprecedented technological innovation and an ever-increasing number of screens in young people's lives, making the Institute's mission just as relevant today as when we started. So while this chapter of the Institute's work is coming to a close, I am excited to transition the Institute's programs to organizations that will continue to foster the same important conversations and bring relevant solutions to parents.
NIMF's most recent Report Card gave high marks to the industry for education and enforcement of video game ratings - save an "incomplete" for Parental Involvement.
NIMF to Close at Year End [GamePolitics]
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