It was a bit of a slow weekend for me, I burned through The Force Unleashed II and made a few more crawling steps on my second New Vegas‘ playthrough. It seems the video game news circuit also decided to relax. Still, there’s a few interesting bits here that might get you through to Friday’s update which will hopefully be more exciting.
The new world of video games has created a positive trend. Small, independent game developers have so many tools and outlets that the quality has really gone up. That boost in quality has captured the attention of major publishers who also have an outlet for smaller, high quality games with XBLA, PSN, and WiiShop. That’s what led to the relationship between Brad Borne and EA. This spring, Borne’s hit Flash game, Fancy Pants Adventures will be making its way to XBLA and PSN thanks to EA. If you missed out on this game’s Flash craze suffice to say it’s a very dynamic side scrolling platformer with an appealing art style. The console version will feature two-player co-op and plenty of special secrets. No official date or pricing has been announced.
In one of the strangest stories out of the weekend, Bungie, creators of Halo, can’t decide if it’s serious, funny, or unemployed. David Aldridge, lead network engineer, mentioned in a GDC panel that the developer is working on a “massively multiplayer action game” that will not be “WoW in space.” Supposedly it’s set for a 10 year publishing deal with Activision and planned for multiple consoles. The project is called “Tiger” internally and the game is known as Destiny. The studio then stated on their website that David was joking, but he apparently has a bizarre sense of humor that no one understands. The post on their site, of course, didn’t say what they were actually doing. My inclination is that Mr. Aldridge let a little too much cat out of the bag and the studio’s simply backpedaling. They’re surely working on something and Activision won’t settle for anything less than a title that can be exploited for a decade or more.
Venturing deeper into the world of rumor and unconfirmed reports takes me back to Rockstar Games. I mentioned last week the developer had picked up several domain names that have a distinctly GTA feel to them. On top of that, a minor league professional wrestler, Robert Esparza, recently tweeted that he’d had his body scanned for a game called Rush, coming from Rockstar. The tweet has since been deleted. This could match up with an industry casting call from February for Rush. The casting call was looking for “a weed evangelist”; “a Welsh monk/cult leader/yoga teacher…very into exploring your personal tension through gripping massage”; “an old unshaven female spiritualist”; an “annoying, wise-cracking, highly successful FBI agent”; a “neurotic soccer mom”; an illiterate “English hardman actor, 35, who acts tough but wants to do the serious work”; and someone named Nervous Jerry. These sound like GTA characters. So is Rush actually an internal codename for GTA V? That’s the theory of twitter detective Superannuation, who found all of this evidence. I don’t know this person from Adam, but he seems to know his schtick. Maybe I’m blinded by my love of the series, but I hope he’s right.
If you’ve been waiting for SOCOM 4, scheduled for April 19th, you’ll want to know the beta schedule which has just been announced. The private beta will begin next week on the 15th. Playstation Plus members will get access on March 22nd. If you bought Killzone 3, you’ll get to redeem your beta code on March 29th. Finally, the open beta will begin on April 5th. The beta will include Suppression, Last Defense, Uplink, and the new mode, Bomb Squad. Two maps will be available and all modes will have standard or classic variants. The beta will end on April 13th.
Things are looking up in the world for Lara Croft. The Tomb Raider Trilogy is coming to PS3 on March 22nd. Crystal Dynamics is hard at work on the series’ reboot, expected next year. And GK Films recently acquired the rights to the film franchise. It will be co-produced by Tim Headington and Graham King (for whom GK Films is named). Headington and King recently produced The Tourist with Angelina Jolie, but that doesn’t necessarily mean she’s coming back to the role. It appears they also want to reboot the series and tell an origin story for Lara. [Side note: Graham King seems to be a busy fellow. According to his imdb page he’s working on the Dark Shadows and Hugo Cabret films, and has recently completed The Rum Diary, which I’ve been hearing about for over ten years and I think is just a lie.]
Deus Ex: Human Revolution, has finally gotten a release date from SquareEnix, August 23, 2011. Yeah, it’s still quite a ways away, but at least you can circle that date on your calendar now.
And that’s it for now, minor news about some possibly major titles. Come back Friday for the updates from the rest of the week.