News:: The best Resident Evil 7 deals for Tuesday's release

Cheers, Resident Evil fans! Tomorrow's release is looking like it might turn out to a real treat. Early bird word from the critics looks fairly good thus far, and Dtoid's review pegs it at a rare 10/10. If all the review hype has you looking to pick up a copy, there are some decent incentives offered by both retailers and Capcom. Everything below is where you can find the best value for Resident Evil 7.

Best RE7 PC Discounts

• Resident Evil 7 + 10 Free Games (Steam) — $47.99 at GMG  (list price $60)
• Resident Evil 7 Deluxe + 10 Free Games (Steam) — $71.99 at GMG  (list price $90)
• Resident Evil 7 (Steam) — $39.93 at GamesPlanet  (list price $60)
• Resident Evil 7 Deluxe (Steam) — $64.90 at GamesPlanet  (list price $90)

PC gamers have two great options for a Steam key. GMG has a 20% discount slashing the price from $59.99 to $47.99, plus they're tossing in a bonus of 10 free Steam keys. For a cheaper method, head over to GamesPlanet. There the game is only £31.99, which translates to only $39.93 after the favorable currency exchange rate (you can use any major credit card or PayPal).

Both are authorized Capcom retailers, so you'll get your Steam key right away for pre-loading along with the pre-order bonuses. The pre-load has been live for some time now and you might want to hop to it if your bandwidth is limited. The game's install size is around 24GB.

Best Console Discounts

• Resident Evil 7 (Xbox One, PS4) — $47.99 at Best Buy- GCU Required
• Resident Evil 7 (PS4, Xbox One) — $47.99 at Amazon - Prime Required

For the PS4 and Xbox One consoles, discounts are harder to come by. In order to catch one, you'll need either an Amazon Prime or a Best Buy Gamers Club Unlocked membership. If you pre-order or buy a lot of new games, these memberships will pay for themselves with the 20% discounts, but constitute more of an iffy prospect if you only want Resident Evil 7. Nevertheless, the 20% discount after membership does grant you a drop to $47.99 for either platform.

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News:: Breath of the Wild's strategy guide may have been pulled from pre-order due to spoilers

There is a lot of speculation going on with this current story, but it looks like Nintendo may have ceased pre-orders on the strategy guide for Breath of the Wild due to story spoilers. Amazon.com, in both the US and UK, no longer lists the SKU for the guide on its website. A quick glance through Google shows that no other websites even have the guide available, lending more credence to this rumor.

The issue may lie with Amazon.com, but like I said, I can't find the guide from any other website. Usually Barnes & Noble would have a listing for nearly any book, but there doesn't seem to be another site that is selling the guide. Amazon did have listings, but both the UK and US links now lead to 404 errors. This is bizarre stuff.

To make matters worse, I don't really know what anyone would accomplish by pulling the entire product off the internet. So what if people can no longer buy the thing; there are still a multitude of websites that list off the spoilers present in the original Amazon description. In the interest of not ruining it for any Zelda fans here, I'll just say that these spoilers only detail the side quests and the number of mini-dungeons; there aren't any specific story beats.

Amazon pulls The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild spoilerific guide [VG24/7]

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News:: Adam Jensen goes to prison and Arizona in the next Deus Ex add-on

Adam Jensen's about to have a very bad day. He has to go to undercover at a high-security prison for augmented people, and prison seems like a terrible place to go. But, that prison is in Arizona, and a prison in Arizona seems like an especially terrible place to go on account of all the heat and old people and scorpions.

Arizona aug jail is the setting for Deus Ex: Mankind Divided's second major add-on, A Criminal Past. In it, Jensen is tasked with "tracking down and retrieving sensitive information from a fellow undercover agent who has gone dark." It also seems as if this acts as a Mankind Divided prequel of sorts, as it takes place before the events of the main game.

A Criminal Past is set for February 23, one month from today. Square Enix hasn't yet mentioned a price; the first add-on, System Rift, was priced at $12. We can probably expect something similar for this expansion, even if you're not inclined to pay for a double whammy of discomfort.

Go Undercover as Adam Jensen in Deus Ex: Mankind Divided -- A Criminal Past [Deus Ex]

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News:: Audience voting is now open for the 2017 IGF and GDC Awards

The polls have opened for the audience portion of the 2017 Independent Games Festival Awards and the Game Developers Choice Awards. Have an opinion about last year's best games? Vote! (Here for IGF, and here for GDC.) You'll just need a valid email address to submit your selection.

The deadline on voting for the Audience Award is January 31 at 11:59pm Pacific, and the awards ceremonies are scheduled for March 1, starting with the Independent Games Festival at 6:30pm Pacific sharp. You'll be able to watch along from home through Twitch. Here are the finalists:

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News:: Xbox One gets its first taste of Creators Update features

You don't have to wait long to try some of the big Xbox One upgrades that Microsoft has been promising lately. The company is trotting out an Xbox Insider preview update that includes a few of the bigger improvements that will come alongside the Creators Update. Most notably, you'll get a faster and decidedly more intuitive interface. The new home screen is both speedier and will promote the "most valuable content" in your games. You'll have quicker access to the game hub, groups and achievements, too. A refreshed Guide, meanwhile, includes a new home page based on common tasks (such as recent games and pinned apps) and fast access to background music controls.

Source: Xbox Wire

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News:: 'Final Fantasy XV' kicks off a limited-time carnival event

It's not just multiplayer games that can host limited-time events. Square Enix is launching the Moogle Chocobo Carnival, a time-sensitive Final Fantasy XV feature, today (January 23rd) at 8PM Eastern. So long as you have the Holiday Pack add-on (free or paid), you can visit Altissia to participate in carnival games and chocobo races, play new side quests and indulge in themed treats. The gig runs until February 20th, so you'll want to act quickly if you want to give it a look.

Source: Final Fantasy XV (YouTube)

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News:: Capcom is hedging Ultra Street Fighter II: The Final Challengers' success entirely on the Switch

Ultra Street Fighter II: The Final Challengers, announced for the Switch this past week, has a lot of potential. I mean, it's another old school remake of Street Fighter II, with new characters and mechanics. But for now, it's only going to be a Switch joint, so don't get your hopes up.

When asked about the possibility of appearing in other platforms, series producer Yoshinori Ono stated, "If this title sells extremely well we’ll consider it. We put a lot of thought into how this can be fully enjoyed on the Nintendo Switch, so for the time being it’s only going to be on Switch."

I can see a future where the game doesn't sell, and it's forced to rot on a system that Nintendo may not even support for that long. Sounds like classic Capcom and Nintendo shenanigans to me! I'm a sucker though, because newcomer Evil [Violent] Ken has me interested. I'm huge on those Dark Hado characters.

Ultra Street Fighter II [IGN]

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News:: Check out the revised Xbox One home screen and Guide

Microsoft is rolling out an Xbox One update for select Xbox Insider Program members today with, among other things, enhancements to the console's home screen and Guide overlay. Simply put, and as shown in this video, the stuff we tend to look for won't be quite as many button presses away.

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News:: Series producer says Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild has a secret ending

In addition to the possible hundreds of collectibles and hidden secrets strewn about The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, series producer Eiji Aonuma confirms that there is indeed a secret ending.

Speaking to IGN Portugal, Aonuma states, "Yes there is an alternate ending, there is a certain criteria you have to fulfill to see it. Essentially, you do some specific things and you'll see a different ending." Once we see it on paper in a guide or walkthrough video somewhere it'll be so simple, but for now, everyone is on a level playing field.

Big secrets in Zelda games have ranged from hidden dungeons, to "a different title credit scroll" (Link to the Past), so what this ending actually entails, and if it'll be worth it (or involve a Master Quest second playthrough) is anyone's guess.

Legend of Zelda [IGN Portugal]

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News:: Dead or Alive Xtreme 3 is getting a VR patch tomorrow

Have you been waiting for the definitive killer app of the PlayStation VR headset? Well, you won't need to look much further as Dead or Alive Xtreme 3 is getting an update tomorrow to support the device. Along with added VR enhancements will come support for the PS4 Pro, which should make the VR stuff more curvaceous.

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News:: Capcom has no plans for Resident Evil 7, or any Resident Evil, on the Switch

So not a whole lot has changed so far in terms of third party releases on Nintendo systems. The whole industry was scared by the Wii U (and to a lesser extent, the tail-end of the shovelware filled Wii), and a lot of heavy-hitters are holding off on really committing to the Switch.

That includes EA and Ubisoft, who have talked big but have yet to put forth anything but ports, and now, Capcom. Speaking to Express UK, the publisher notes that while the Switch is a "very unique piece of hardware" (this isn't a unique piece of lip service!), "we have no plans at the moment regarding Resident Evil on Switch."

Given the huge partnerships they've had in the past with Resident Evil 4 on the GameCube and the Wii, it's disappointing, to say the least. The Sony deal with PSVR also doesn't help matters, I'm sure. A lot of fans and companies alike have lost faith in Nintendo, but if the Switch sells like hotcakes, Capcom will come knocking.

Resident Evil 7 Nintendo Switch Capcom reveals new console plans [Express.co.uk]

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News:: Mass Effect: Andromeda will have a 10-hour EA Access trial on March 16

Ahead of Mass Effect: Andromeda's March 21, 2017 launch in North America, subscribers to EA and Origin Access will have a head start with the game. A 10-hour trial is set to go up on March 16.

It's unclear what all will be available in this extended demo, but I wouldn't necessarily expect unrestricted access. As with prior trials, you may only be able to progress through to a certain point before EA says you've had enough. Assuming multiplayer is functional, though, that'll be grand.

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News:: Final Fantasy XII: The Zodiac Age is coming along, here's some new footage

We haven't heard much about Final Fantasy XII: The Zodiac Age for a while, but Square Enix is confident enough in it to show it off at the Taipei Game Show. It's not just lip service type footage either, as there's a boss fight, as well as a look at the turbo mechanic (for faster exploration).

As I've been saying since it was revealed, I want to give XII another chance, and I'll wait as long as it takes for Zodiac Age. The story never really grabbed me, and the combat, while good enough, just felt like XI with Gambit-driven AI instead of other players making good decisions (in theory).

At the very least, it's had a much more positive impact on the franchise than say, XIII.

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News:: Dishonored 2 now has a mission select and permadeath option

After going through a beta release on Steam, the second major update for Dishonored 2 is now live on PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One with custom difficulty settings and a mission select option.

With the first option, you can tinker with 20-plus sliders for things like "how quickly Sleep Darts take effect" and "how many active enemies are likely to attack you at once." For the mission select feature, you can take another crack at any mission you've unlocked "after the update is installed, retaining the status of your playthrough at the start of that mission" (e.g., money and runes).

Seemingly as a dare, the update has also added Iron Mode, a permadeath difficulty option that disables manual saves and loads. I'm gonna file this one under "The only winning move is not to play."

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News:: The Great Ace Attorney 2 new trailer reveals 3DS release, still no word on series localization

The latest trailer for The Great Ace Attorney 2 has revealed perhaps unsurprisingly that the visual novel style courtroom and investigation game from Capcom will release on 3DS. Unlike the main series Ace Attorney games, this spin-off series takes place in Meiji era Japan featuring Phoenix Wright's ancestor.

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News:: Mario Kart 8 Deluxe amiibo compatibility details confirmed

We haven't seen or heard many details about Mario Kart 8 Deluxe outside of some basic facts, but given that we're nearly one month away from the launch of the Switch, Nintendo is starting to roll that stuff out. Some of it comes second-hand, inferred by press materials, but I'll take it.

In this case, we have information on what the amiibo details will entail, and it employs a system that's identical to the original game. You have your typical Mii character costume unlocks, but his time you can use a Splatoon amiibo to get a Motocross-type outfit. That's about it!

The game is still set for an April 27 release so anything can change, but this is what we have to go on for now.

[Thanks Adam!]

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News:: Review in Progress: Tales of Berseria

I'll be the first to admit that I'm a newcomer to Bandai Namco's Tales series. In the past, I've only played small snippets of both Tales of Xilla 2 and Tales of Hearts R, and for one reason or another, have yet to sink my teeth into the rest of the franchise.

Of course, that's not to say I have anything against these games. Far from it, it's been a series that I've wanted to dive deeper into for quite some time now, as I enjoyed my very brief moments with the two aforementioned Tales games.

So, when I got my hands on a copy of Tales of Berseria, I wasn't entirely sure what I should have been expecting. I did have an inkling as to how the game would play out from a mechanical standpoint, at the same time, there were still a lot of unknowns.

How would the latest instalment in the Tales series fare with someone who is, for all intents and purposes, a newcomer to these games? Pretty damn well, actually.

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News:: EA claims Nintendo is making a bigger effort for third parties with the Switch

Once again, a big publisher has a lot of nice things to say about a new Nintendo console without actually supporting it. Remember how excited EA was for the Wii U? Well, it still has a grand total of four EA games for it -- and two of those are '13 sports titles.

But don't fret, EA is once again excited for the Switch, as explained by EA executive Patrick Söderlund at the Switch event: "I only spoke about FIFA today, but our company's structure lets us release all sorts of games for every platform, so we'll go wherever the gamers go. I think Nintendo Switch will put Nintendo at the forefront of the game industry once again. Their approach is quite different from anything they've done in the past – they've listened to EA, Activision, and other companies since the beginning of the Switch's development, so we've been involved throughout the whole process. They teamed up with us because they wanted to guarantee the console would be successful. Doing business with Nintendo is very important for us… We'd like to bring more and more games over for everyone."

While it's promising that Nintendo has allegedly attempted to bring third parties into the fray earlier than usual, they kind of had to, so there are no surprises there. But so far we haven't actually seen any real commitment to the Switch from EA, and outside of a Titanfall 2 developer laughing at the prospect of the game "fitting onto a Switch," we barely have any real discussions regarding EA and Nintendo.

EA [Famitsu via Nintendo Everything]

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News:: Review: Resident Evil 7 biohazard

Resident Evil's been a roller coaster of quality for twenty years now. The first handful of games terrified players by making them exceedingly vulnerable in a world where a biological weapon turned living beings into various nasties that wanted nothing more than to kill you in horrendous ways. Stagnancy raised its head eventually, and Capcom knew that it needed to inject the series' ol' corpse with some much-needed life, and we received Resident Evil 4. Depending on your perspective, that game was either a great reboot that transmuted the series into something more akin to an action horror shooter, or the death knell of the fear that Resident Evil was once associated with.

Though 5 and 6 had a few redeeming qualities, stagnancy was flooding in once again. These games were Resident Evil 4 but bigger, less focused on horror, and you could play them with a friend. The spirit of creativity that Capcom had shown in the past was fading. With the surprise announcement and subsequent demo release for Resident Evil 7, Capcom has been coy about what we should expect. Slower, fearful encounters would make a return, as would a more intimate setting, but it would be seen from a new first-person perspective, and PlayStation VR would be a major component.

I was hesitant to see if Capcom could make Resident Evil a series worth anticipating again. At best, I expected an enjoyable horror shooter with small references to past, fondly-remembered games, and at worst, a slog through a cliché-ridden hillbilly cannibal story. Instead, we have the best Resident Evil game in ten years.

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News:: 'Tekken 7' delayed to June 2

After saying that it would arrive in early 2017, developer Bandai Namco now says Tekken 7 is coming to the Playstation 4, Xbox One and PC on June 2nd. "We were trying our best to get the game out ... as early as possible," director Katsuhiro Harada told GameSpot. Saying he didn't want players to "bash the product" over lack of content, "we made some hard decisions and that was the result."

Source: Sony

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News:: Tekken 7 is out in June with a collector's edition

Having been in this industry a long time, I'm used to blocking off basically all of June as "the E3 month." Everything to be around that time frame is "before E3" (BE3!) or "after E3," and in this case, I'll have a few good weeks with Tekken 7 before the big event actually starts.

Yep, after months of waiting around in an attempt to figure out when Tekken 7 would actually hit home consoles, Bandai Namco has announced this morning that it will arrive on June 2 on PC, Xbox One, and PS4. I am legally obligated to inform you that the Switch was not mentioned, even though the Wii U got Tekken Tag 2.

So, details! It'll have a collector's edition (which you can view below), as well as a season pass with "new characters, stages, a new mode, costumes, and a bonus '35-piece' costume pack." The pre-order bonus is Eliza the vampire from Tekken Revolution (that free-to-play thing you probably forgot about). If you're pre-ordering on Xbox One, you'll get a free copy of Tekken 6, which is backward compatible with the system. On PS4 you'll get legacy costumes for King, Xiaoyu and Jin, as well as a Jukebox mode.

It all checks out like a typical Bandai Namco release -- DLC and pre-order bonuses coming out the ears. Now, we wait to see if the console version is any good. I'll be mainlining Akuma once it hits.

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News:: The final Dark Souls III DLC is called 'The Ringed City'

Dark Souls III didn't have the strongest showing for its first DLC, but it had its moments. The Ringed City on the other hand, the second and final add-on (possibly ever, for Souls), looks like it isn't messing around.

With no mention of PVP, Ringed City seems to be heavily infused into the lore, and will once again bring new bosses, areas, and items into the fray. As always, I'd recommend not watching the video if you want to go in fresh -- and speaking of fresh, some of the enemies are looking amazing.

Hopefully it's not as truncated as the first DLC! The Ringed City will drop on March 28 on PC, PS4, and Xbox One. It's being sold piecemeal, and is part of the $24.99 Season Pass.

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News:: Review: Kingdom Hearts HD 2.8 Final Chapter Prologue

Kingdom Hearts has had a rough but eventful history.

It debuted in 2002 and took the world by storm with its genius marriage of Final Fantasy and Disney -- a combination no one knew they even wanted. To fuel the fire there was a portable sequel to hold people over until the sequel three years later, a very respectable wait by today's standards, but then the series sort of went off the rails. Spinoffs upon spinoffs, mobile titles (for feature phones in Japan!), and 10 years later -- there's still no sign of Kingdom Hearts III.

Well, there's a new Kingdom Hearts game...compilation...thing right around the corner, and it's still not Kingdom Hearts III.

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News:: Corsair's new K95 gaming keyboard is surprisingly classy

When I first encountered the Corsair Rapidfire K70, it was love at first sight: The feel of the brand-new Cherry MX Speed keys and their short 1.2mm actuation point was par excellence, and the RGB lighting gave me faint Candy Land vibes with its bright colors. However, while it was good for typing and many games, configuration fanatics were left out of the fun by the lack of dedicated macro keys. This month, Corsair finally added MX Speed keys to its flagship K95 model, but that's not the only upgrade gamers and typists will discover. The $200 K95 RGB Platinum features some redesigned buttons, a reversible wrist rest and a snazzy lighting bar. It's more of a refinement than a revamp, but it's one that makes the new K95 a flashy, yet somehow tasteful, addition to any desk. Yes, even with the colors.

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