I do my best to quickly cover small bits of gaming news twice a week here. Somtimes big news happens between issues and I’m always grateful for my fellow ‘bots getting major stories up for full stories. Two of them happened this week. If you missed it earlier, be sure to read up on Arse-bot and Zombietron’s respective stories about Bungie and EA’s big news.
So, on to the quick hits, wanna produce a music video? Do you love Portal 2? Make your own video to The National’s “Exile Vilify” from the game and upload to YouTube with “PORTAL2NATIONALEXILE” as the tag to enter. The contest is open now and runs through July 15th. The winner will be selected by the community and will receive an autographed guitar and a slew of game merch.
Some minor details about the next potential map pack for Call of Duty: Black Ops have surfaced. Nothing official yet, but the rumor appears to be four more maps and one more zombie stage. the four main maps will likely be called Drive-In, Hangar, Hazard, and Silo. This is probably the long-awaited Retaliation pack.
If you want a map pack with more confirmation, check out the Crysis 2 Decimation DLC. You get five new maps (Apartments, Chasm, Fifth Avenue, Plaza, and Prism) and two new weapons (FY71 Assault Rifle, and M18 Smoke Grenade). The pack will be avilable for $10 on June 28.
Remember how everyone got upset about the Battlefield 3 preorder bonus was going to give someone an unfair advantage? I mentioned Tuesday that DICE announced they’d make it available to everyone via paid DLC soon after release. Now they’ve elucidated, deciding to give it out for free on a post launch date. So, if you’re not preordering, just wait a few weeks anyway. If you’re planning to pick it up the first week, just lay down the five bucks and preorder. It’s much easier than whining.
If you need DLC for not an FPS, how about Mortal Kombat? Starting next week with Skarlet, and following later with Rain, Kenshi, and a mystery the game will be getting additional player characters. A compatibility pack will also be available for those who want to play against the DLC characters, but won’t be downloading it themselves.
Maybe you need additional content for a game not even released yet. If so, the latest Assassin’s Creed: Revelations news is for you. It seems there are at least five different versions of the games coming in various special, limited, exclusive, etc. editions. Does this seem like overkill to anyone else? Here’s the breakdown:
Collector Edition:
- Collector Box
- Artbook
- Animated DVD
- Soundtrack CD
- Bonus single player mission
- Two multiplayer characters
Next upgrade is the Animus Edition
- All of the above
- Encyclopedia
- Armor of Brutus
- Weapon Capacity upgrades
- exclusive customization tool
The less lavish Special Edition:
- Fancy Package
- Soundtrack
- 2 Multiplayer characters
- Turkish Armor
And the GameStop Signature Edition (free preorder upgrade):
- Fancy Package
- Exclusive single player mission
- Weapon Capacity bonuses
- Multiplayer character
- Animated DVD
- Soundtrack CD
Occasionally I come across a gaming announcement and can only respond with, “Why?” Today has one of those. Coming in July to PS3 and 360 is Tour de France: The Official Game. Now I loved Downhill Domination, but that’s nothing like days of road biking. So really, why? Who’s going to buy this?
John Carmack of id Software is already talking about next gen consoles. His expectation is that they’ll be “ten times more powerful” than our current setups and “they’ll be here in a couple years.” This comes on top of Crytek recently announcing work on a Time Splitters 4 for next gen consoles. Meanwhile Sony is still standing by a 10 year life cycle on PS3. What does all this mean? Do they mean next-gen portable, a la Vita? Is Microsoft going to jump ahead of Sony on the next-gen again? Is there more than Sony is telling us?
LA Noire fans should be looking forward to the Nicholson Electroplating Arson Case coming to the masses next week. This was one of the preorder DLCs available at select retailers. In addition, Rockstar has extended their discount period for the Pass that gets you access to all current and future DLC for the game. If you’ve been hesitant, stop it. you know you want it.
Occasionally outright rumor will make it into VGQH. I apologize. But, if correct, the rumor that Mass Effect 3 will have four player co-op missions outside the main campaign, designed with replayability in mind is pretty big. The goal, obviously, would be to draw in new mainstream players with fears about late entry into a complex RPG. I don’t understand it and don’t care – as long as it doesn’t ruin my single player experience. And who wants to play as anyone but Shepard anyway?
While I’m at it I’ll go withone more rumor, an HD collection of Devil May Cry 1-3. The source is fairly unreliable in my eyes, some obscure Spanish e-tailer that used GamesRadar’s fake logo art, but the concept is solid in the modern market with a reboot of the franchise coming from Ninja Theory. The listing was for November 30, 2011. I’m not trusting the details here, but a sound concept means this is a good opportunity to feel out the potential response if the franchise owners decide to make it happen.
And another rare one for VGQH, a deal for gamers, but not related to gaming news. I hate to give free advertisement to Best Buy but I know you all love games and want to play as many as possible for the cheapest price you can swing. Outside of Gamefly, that means BB’s latest deal is big for you. If you’re planning on buying any five of the games in the list, might as well preorder them from Best Buy for a $100 credit. If you were planning on skipping these, the $100 isn’t worth the $300 you’ll spend on the games though. There are at least three on my “for sure” list, all of which have unnecessary colons in the title.
The games:
- Assassin’s Creed: Revelations
- Batman: Arkham City
- Battlefield 3
- Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3
- Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
- FIFA 2012
- Just Dance 3
- Madden 2012
- NCAA Football 2012
- Rage
- Resistance 3
- Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception
I feel like I’m probably missing something vital here but this is one robot that is especially low on vital fluids due to last night’s events. I trust you’ll forgive me if I sign off now and add oil-thick irish coffee to my aching joints. Check back Tuesday. If I haven’t been decommissioned, you’ll find more short shots of gaming information right here on Big Shiny Robot!