Despite the demo for Mortal Kombat already being available, apparently all the secrets are not yet out. The not so major news drop in the last few days is that Kabal will be a playable character. He was never one of my favorites but he definitely has his fans.
Last week had plenty of news about game delays due to the recent catastrophe in Japan. On Friday I predicted the delayed regions for Motorstorm: Apocalypse would likely get the game around the same time as the US planned date of April, assuming the destruction was on its way to some degree of repair. If things weren’t starting to come under control by then, the US would be delayed as well. Sony isn’t going to wait that long to find out. And that’s fine with me. The game has now been pulled from its planned release in North America and currently has no dates scheduled at all. If/when Sony determines there is a good time for this game to release, I’ll pass it on.
Going in a completely different direction, Red Faction: Battlegrounds now has a release date. The game will be available on PSN April 5th for $9.99. The news was broken by an email from Sony to its subscribers so nothing about XBLA was mentioned, but presumably it will hit at the same time. XBox users, however, won’t have the option to get the game for free by being a PlayStation Plus subscriber.
I mentioned recently that Bethesda had announced they were working on Prey 2. It seems they’ve actually been working on it for some time and have a lot of the key concepts down. Revealed in a story in Game Reactor magazine, the game will have no multiplayer and Human Head has stated explicitly they are borrowing from some recent top tier games. The main character, Killian Samuels, is said to have free-running movement borrowed from Mirror’s Edge, while the cover mechanic is inspired by Killzone 2. They also mentioned the playable areas are wide open, a la Assasin’s Creed 2, and it will have the “freedom of Mass Effect.” All of this sounds very different from the first Prey and that’s probably a good thing.
An upcoming shooter that will have multiplayer, is the long-awaited Duke Nukem Forever. Like most things Duke, the multiplayer modes are classic stereotypes of the genre with a self-serving twist. Dukematch and Team Dukematch (featuring blue and red shirted Dukes) are known in other games as deathmatch. Also featured will be Capture the Babe (flag) and Hail to the King (of the Hill). Naturally, picking up a flag isn’t good enough for Nukem, so he’ll be beating and kidnapping women instead. All of the great weapons you would expect will be making their appearance in the 8 player matches along with some classic maps and new ones. The jetpack, though not in the main game, will be available in multiplayer. It will also have a typical XP ranking system to make your Duke better than everyone else’s. And you can get bonus XP by using pipe bombs for suicide runs, just what gaming has always needed.
In a move that surprises no one, EA Sports has announced they’ll no longer be including instruction manuals with their games. Ubisoft made the same decision some time ago. The ad-men are saying it’s an effort to go “green” but it’s clearly their economic green, not the environmental one these companies are thinking about. Frankly I support them for environmental reasons and would be even more supportive if it meant they passed their savings on to the consumer, even if it’s as little as 50 cents a title. The games will have a digital version of the manual available via an in-game menu. Considering the number of online guides available you should have no trouble learning to play the game. If you’ve been buying used you probably haven’t gotten the manual very often anyway. I use GameFly and they don’t send manuals but you can usually get a .pdf of it from their site if needed.
I can’t say I really know much about Gun Loco, the XBox 360 game from Square Enix. But I’m sure the cartoon shooter had its share of would-be purchasers that will be disappointed to know the game has been canceled. No reasons for the cancellation have been officially announced. Whether or not the game is up for grabs to another developer or publisher is also not known.
Another Square Enix title, Dungeon Siege III, is not only still moving forward, it’s expanding. Conciding with the game’s May 31, 2011 release (PC, PS3, 360), Square Enix will be teaming up with Dark Horse for a free web comic. The comic “will deliver three exciting vigenttes by writer Jeremy Barlow (Star Wars: Rebellion) and artists Iban Coello (Iron Man: Iron Protocols) and Sergio Abad (Transformers: Prime). The 10th Legion has fallen, but heroism is not dead in the kingdom of ehb, even as civil war tears the country apart….” You’ll be able to read the comics at dungeonsiege.com or at Dark Horse’s site. In addition, the game will be packaged with new print comic if you’re buying from Wal-Mart.
Puzzle gamers have likely heard about or played Zoe Mode’s Chime already. It’s been available on PC and 360 for some time and was generally considered overpriced for the level of content it provided. But that extra cost was considered worth it by many since it went to charity. Now, Chime Super Deluxe will be making its way to the PSN on March 29th. It will be cheaper ($9.99) and include more content, but the charity element of the purchase is out. The game is classic styled block puzzler, a la Tetris or Lumines, with a heavy element of music.
Saving the best for last in this edition, I give you the preorder bonuses for Batman: Akrham City. Actually, this may be only some of them, with more being announced before it releases on October 18th. If you order at GameStop you’ll be getting the “Joker’s Carnival” challenge map. Best Buy is offering the “Combo Pack,” but it’s not clear what will be in that combo. I’m thinking the world’s greatest detective probably has no need for pretzels stuffed with pizza. But of the two, the mystery combo pack sounds better to me. The challenge maps had very little appeal to me in the first game.