A Steam page for Resident Evil 7's Season Pass has revealed what you're getting if you pay extra for the feature. The pass apparently comes with two volumes of "banned footage" composed of three episodes each, as well as an additional story content. Volume 1's episodes are entitled Nightmare, Bedroom and Ethan Must Die, while Volume 2's are 21, Daughters and Jack's 55th Birthday.
Source: Steam
If you managed to get access to the Titanfall: Frontline beta, congratulations: You're playing a mobile game marked for death. "We've learned an incredible amount in the beta test of Titanfall: Frontline, but in the end felt the experience wasn't ready to deliver the intense action-packed gameplay synonymous with Titanfall," a post on the game's website says.
Via: GamesIndustry.biz
Source: Titanfall Frontline
Sometimes, you get things right on the first try.
That's the philosophy which has guided the Dragon Quest series for thirty years, and it's hard to argue. The franchise has consistently been a top seller in Japan, and Dragon Quest games are known for their length and quality. They're also known to be quite traditional, and combat is still handled from a turn-based, first-person perspective, just as it was on the NES. Despite all its success in its home country, the series has never made the transition to mass popularity in the West, though not for lack of trying.
Dragon Quest games tend to come late in a system's life, and publisher Square Enix has always waited to see what the dominant console will be before committing the resources to put out a Dragon Quest title for that system. Dragon Quest VIII first came out at the tail end of the PlayStation 2's life cycle, and it was a brilliant send-off, a lush, vibrant game with well-written characters and a story that has touches of genuine pathos. It's a huge, meaty role-playing game, and just completing the main quest is said to take somewhere around 80 hours. There were several changes made in the transition to the 3DS, though, so how does DQVIII hold up on the newer hardware?
I'm a simple man. All I need in my games are cute characters, things to jump over, and dudes to punch in the face. But little did I know that I needed something like this. Thanks to Metal64, Bubsy is now a playable character in Streets of Rage 2. Replacing the now lame in comparison Max Thunder, the hacked Bubsy comes complete with his own title's animation and physics.
Accolade's Bubsy was criminally underrated as he was seen as yet another mascot character attempting to compete with famous characters like Cool Spot and Chester Cheetah. Up until his unfortunate transition to 3D, I was along for every (non-Jaguar) step of the way. Some may find him annoying (so annoying his cartoon never got passed the pilot stage), but I'll always have a soft spot fur his furry tales.
RIP Bubsy, we miss you every day.
Someone hacked Bubsy into Streets of Rage 2 [Romhacking.net via Tiny Cartridge]
Boy, what a doozy! If there was an award for most complicated game system, Nintendo's Switch would win in a landslide. The simple name really betrays the true complexity of the system given its seemly uncountable number of ways to play games. The newest console truly is a combination of Wii, Wii U, and 3DS yet still adds enough new features to make it stand on its own.
The Nintendo Switch has three advertised modes of play but since "handheld mode" and "tabletop mode" are technically the same thing I'll refer to them together as "portable mode." For controls, you can use both Joy-Con (doesn't make a difference if you hold them freely or attach them to either the screen or Grip), a single Joy-Con held horizontally, or of course the Pro Controller (sold separately). The Joy-Con are a natural evolution of the Wii Remote & Nunchuk, no longer requiring a sensor bar but now featuring "HD rumble" along with the amiibo NFC reader and an IR sensor in the right Joy-Con for added gimmick.
Rain World, a game about not getting eaten, is still coming along. I've got the gifs to prove it!
But first, writing on the PlayStation Blog, artist and programmer Joar Jakobsson put into words why this title continues to captivate us (and why, otherworldly visuals aside, it's such a looker in motion). "With Rain World," he said, "we are doing quite a lot of things differently from the standards of video games. As much as a game, we've built a kind of living ecosystem simulation where creatures exist independently of the player and autonomously search throughout the world for food and shelter."
Citing examples of that design in practice, Jakobsson noted that "slithering neon lizards you encounter have brutally dangerous claws and teeth, but are also individuals that can learn to recognize you. The mighty vultures swooping down from above are fierce hunters of both lizards and slugcats, but they're not mindless machines — if you wrong one it may decide to track you specifically and you’ll never again be able to pass under open sky without an anxious eye upwards. The scruffy scavengers rooting through the garbage heaps are distrusting and dangerous, but save one from the jaws of a vulture and you might make a friend, or eventually even gain the trust of the entire pack."
Simply put, "the world and its inhabitants give you no special treatment," and rather than growing more powerful, "you'll gain knowledge about how other creatures work such as their hunting habits and tastes in prey." Wonderful concept. I don't mind waiting for a game like this to take its time.
It's easy to forget a few of the projects announced during the Nintendo Switch livestream recently, because there was a lot. All of them might not be coming at launch, or possibly even 2017, but they exist!
And while some third parties didn't have the biggest showing (Ubisoft announced three ports after the presentation), a few did, like Square Enix when they unveiled Project Octopath Traveler to the world (as well as a I am Setsuna port). And producer Tomoya Asano, who contributed to Bravely Default and his team have just dropped a new Facebook page to celebrate.
Currently it just has an intro from Asano and some screenshots, with no specific details (including a date), mind, but it's something. Asano mentions a "long road ahead" though, so strap in.
Project Octopath Traveler [Facebook]
I spent half of last Friday tearing my way through games at Nintendo's big Switch launch event. More than any particular title, the highlight was the hardware itself: a $300 console-handheld hybrid that's harder to describe than the latest Xbox or PlayStation. The Switch console is actually a tablet: It's the piece that does all the processing and acts as screen when it's away from your housebound dock and TV. But if the tablet is the brains of Nintendo's strange new 2-in-1, the heart is split between the two included Joy-Con controllers.
Back in October 2015, Respawn Entertainment and Nexon signed a multi-game deal to adapt the Titanfall franchise to a mobile format. The first of those titles was Titanfall: Frontline, a turn-based card game based on the existing lore of the Titanfall universe. But, it's getting scrapped before it ever took off.
Respawn recently posted a memo on the game's site stating that Frontline "wasn't ready to deliver the intense action-packed gameplay synonymous with Titanfall." The developer continued "While it's never easy to cancel a game, we're excited to take some of the concepts we saw resonate with players and build off of them in future Titanfall mobile games."
This decision was made toward the tail-end of a closed beta. Respawn notes that the beta will end on January 20, at which point the servers will go offline. For those who are interested in how Frontline looked, a video's embedded at the bottom of this post that shows some gameplay from the beta.
Frontline will never get off the ground, but all indications point to Respawn and Nexon trying again. There's no mention of specifically how many titles the multi-year deal included, but Particle City, a mobile-focused team within Respawn, was created for this venture. As long as Electronic Arts keeps its faith in Titanfall, it seems like Respawn and Nexon will keep gunning for the mobile side-action.
Nioh, my most anticipated game of 2017 currently ("currently," because who knows, maybe From Software will announce another Souls game or we'll get a Devil May Cry 5 at E3!), has gone gold. That means that it's done and dusted, and ready to ship -- it's just awaiting its February 7 release date.
But before then the game's director, Yosuke Hayashi, will be hosting a livestream on January 20, 2017, at 10:00PM JST on YouTube to share a few more zero hour details. As most of you know, I'm highly invested in seeing how the finished game plays out, and whether or not it'll springboard Team Ninja back into the public's good graces.
So far the two betas have played out magnificently, winning folks over the first time around, and even moreso on the second hit with its various improvements. But can it sustain itself for a full length game? Find out next month with us and everyone else!
Nioh [Twitter via Siliconera]
Neo Geo games on Nintendo Switch seemed like something that would happen sooner than later, but it's nice to hear confirmation all the same. So far, Hamster Corp. has announced five titles for worldwide digital release on the system: The King of Fighters '98 (due out in March, presumably right on schedule for early Switch adopters), Waku Waku 7, Shock Troopers, World Heroes Perfect, and Metal Slug 3.
You probably recognize most of those names, but if you need an introduction or even just a refresher, all of those links point to extended playthroughs. Watch 'em over lunch and remember the good times.
I've played most of these before, in some cases many times over given how often they're ported and how liable I am to re-buy anything Metal Slug. Not Waku Waku 7, though -- that one's new to me. Looks rad! Assuming this goes well, I wonder what other Arcade Archives selections might appear on Switch.
“NEOGEO”の名作をNintendo Switchで遊べる！『ザ・キング・オブ・ファイターズ'98』など5タイトルが配信決定 [Famitsu via Engadget]
If you boot up Super Mario Run, you'll be greeted by the first bonus coin event "Load of Coins," which grants you 1.5 times the amount of currency for winning a Toad Rally match. The promotion will run until January 27.
For those of you who don't really play, coins can be used to buy cosmetic options for your kingdom, and serve as one of the three main currencies in Mario Run. The others are tickets (that you have to spend to play Toad Run, the time trial mode of sorts with ghost opponents), and Toads, which are arguably the most important bit of the game.
By playing others in Toad Run you can acquire more Toads, which in turn unlock the ability to buy new cosmetics. It's a grindy circle, but it's something that should last people a few more weeks while they aim to unlock everything. Remember though, these events seem to be the only thing we're going to get, as new content is not planned at the moment.
[Thanks Tony!]
The Heroes of the Storm team sure does love its Warcraft characters and the assassin role. Thankfully, so do I! (To a certain extent, anyway.) The latest combatant, Valeera Sanguinar, checks both boxes.
After a round of teasing over the past week, the Blood Elf rogue will join the game's Public Test Realm tomorrow, January 17. This video previews her stabby ways and some upcoming character skins.
Given the popularity Hearthstone, I can see why they'd want to incorporate someone like Valeera. Maybe give us something a bit more out there next time, though. A combo-breaker would be nice.
Lately, there's been a lot of buzz around footage PtoPOnline posted of a scrapped, Mega Bloks-themed Halo action game. Why did it get the axe when its mix of shooting and construction looks like a blast to play? You're not about to get that exact title, but you might see something like it in the future. In a news update acknowledging the leaked game (known internally as Project Haggar), current Halo developer 343 Industries has said that there may be a game "along these lines" as a result of all the "positive support and feedback" from fans watching the Mega Bloks clip.
Source: Halo Waypoint, PtoPOnline (YouTube)
One of the things I loved about the Wii U is how much Nintendo backpedaled on motion. Sure some games had it as an option to aim with the GamePad's gyroscope, but compare say, Donkey Kong: Tropical Freeze's smooth button-based rolling as opposed to the Wii's forced waggle rolling. It was a great change of pace, and the Switch will keep those good times coming with more optional control schemes.
According to a segment on the recent Treehouse Live stream, Arms, Nintendo's new fighting game IP, will not require motion controls -- even though that's all they showed during the initial presentation. While some games are indeed better with motion, again, I love that there's an option to play with what you're comfortable with -- think Splatoon or even recent Mario Karts.
Treehouse Live [YouTube]
After taking time away from Access games for health reasons and to become a Buddhist priest, Hidetaka "Swery" Suehiro ultimately left Access Games in October 2016. Now he's back to making games after starting his own development studio called White Owls. Swery, also known as Swery 65, is most known for his work designing cult hits Deadly Premonition and D4: Dark Dreams Don't Die, the latter of which was an unfinished episodic title.
While we may never get to see D4 finished, Swery promises to deliver what we all love about his work: "bizarre" and "dreamlike" content. On the White Owls website once you wade through pictures of owls and stuffed monkeys you can find the company message "Do you need more weird content? White Owls is prepared to give you the unique content that you’re looking for, which you won’t be able to find anywhere else."
I remember walking by the Nioh video reel at TGS in 2015 and thinking "why isn't this playable?" It was one of the most attractive games at the show, but at the time it had just been introduced by Team Ninja, and we knew very little about it. Fast forward to 2017, and we're on the eve of its release, with two betas under its belt -- a highly unusual move for an action RPG.
Speaking to the game's director Fumihiko Yasuda, that's sort of what the entire project is going for, and I dig it.
Nvidia unveiled a new Shield TV box at CES, but the list of upgrades was pretty slim. It has a funky new controller, with a mesh of triangles peppering the grips, but otherwise it's the same hardware with some extra software bells and whistles. If you have the older model, good news -- today, you're getting all those non-hardware additions too. They include a new foundation -- Android 7.0 Nougat -- and a bunch of new apps including Amazon Video, Twitter, the NFL, Comedy Central and Vimeo.
Source: NVIDIA
So, 1-2 Switch. You know, that milking mini-game that looks like it should be a pack-in? Well, it's $50. And when you plunk down $300 on your new Switch console, you won't get anything else with it.
Speaking to GameSpot, Nintendo of America head honcho Reggie Fils-Aime says it was to get the cost down on the base package. Not only is 1-2 Switch a "wider pallet of experiences," but decisions were made based on the pricepoint they wanted for the console: "From a US price point, we wanted to be at $299. Certainly, lower is always better, but at a $349 or $399 price point, we just didn't feel that was the right place to be. So we start there. And then it's all about, what's going to be included? Obviously the inclusion of the two Joy-Con, critically important; all the right cables, the dock, critically important. We also have to do this from a financial perspective as well. Once we got to that bundle, it really needed to be at $299 without a piece of software."
So there you have it. What Nintendo is basically saying is instead of spending $350 and maybe getting a pack-in you don't want, you can buy something else like Zelda instead. While that's reasonable enough if they're saying between the lines that they're making a profit on each console sold, it doesn't instill all that much confidence in 1-2 Switch.
Why Switch Doesn't Include Any Bundled Games [GameSpot]
If you're dead-set on owning a Nintendo Switch, you should probably start thinking about your charging setup. In addition to the main unit, you'll need to keep the detachable "Joy-Con" controllers topped up, which could prove tricky if you're playing the console exclusively at home. That's because the Joy-Con Grip bundled with the Switch (shown above) doesn't have any charging capabilities of its own. As Eurogamer reports, it's basically just a plastic shell designed to keep the two Joy-Cons in place.
Source: Eurogamer
The Xbox Games with Gold promotion is doing some shuffling around today, as Outlast and The Cave are leaving the service, and Killer Instinct Season 2 and Rayman Origins are entering it. World of Van Helsing: Deathtrap is the only game that's available the entire month. While Outlast seems to have had its switch flipped back to $20, The Cave is lingering for a bit as of a few minutes ago, so try to grab it for free while you can.
In other news, you'll want to pick up both Killer Instinct and Rayman Origins if you can because both of them are fantastic. Microsoft previously put Season 1 up for free too, so at this point you might even had a near complete edition if you just buy the base version of Season 3.
Games with Gold [Xbox.com]
Welcome to Monday morning. Over the weekend, we toured Dyson's UK HQ (featuring mannequins, jet engines and more), how China wants increased security for its app stores and our prediction that the best unused Nintendo Switch feature of 2017 will be its 'high definition' vibration tech.
