Old school gamers clearly love Mega Man. Mighty No. 9, Keiji Inafune and Comcept’s spiritual successor to the Blue Bomber, has reached its Kickstarter goal ($900,000) and then some. With the latest stretch goal reached, $2.2 million, there are versions coming to PS3 and Xbox 360 in 2015. The next landmark stretch goal will resolve your question about why it will be coming to current gen consoles in 2015 instead of the next-gen many of us will be playing by then. It’s still a ways out at $3.3 million, but that goal will get extra levels, modes, and PS4/XB1 versions. The Kickstarter ends October 31, 2013. So get over there if you want to get them the extra million dollar push to next-gen.
EA has finally announced their new CEO. Andrew Wilson, former head of EA Sports, is set to take over the role recently vacated by John Riccitiello. Posting on the company’s website. Wilson says
Let me start by saying I am deeply honored and humbled to become EA’s CEO. I have a profound respect and passion for this organization, as well as for our global community of fans, and I’m incredibly motivated to serve our people, our gamers and our shareholders at such an exciting time in our industry.
From my start at EA in Australia back in 2000, through stops in Asia, Europe and now North America, I’ve worked with people in this company who have consistently amazed and inspired me. It’s my passion for our people and the great products we all impact that gives me such excitement for our future. I hope you all feel the same level of energy and optimism that I do as we embark on this journey together.
I envision EA as the World’s Greatest Games Company. This is not about what we are aiming for or what we will become. Rather, it is about an unfaltering commitment to what we will be every day. This is an attitude that must drive our culture as one team.
I also believe EA’s strategy is sound. Our focus on our talent, our brands and our platform together with our investment in next-generation consoles, mobile and PC free-to-play, as part of our ongoing transition to digital, is right. But we have plenty of work ahead to ensure our collective success.
In the short term, our mission is crystal clear: We are 100 percent focused on delivering our FY14 business plan. We have made strong progress in the first half of the fiscal year, establishing financial discipline and continuing to create a slate of fantastic games for current and next-generation consoles, mobile and PC. But now we’ve got to finish the job – execute in Q3 and Q4 and deliver on the promises we made to our fans and our shareholders.
Looking ahead, my focus will be on three things:
1. Continued transformation for our digital future;
2. Delivering amazing games and services across platforms; and
3. Instilling a culture of execution that will drive profitable growth.
In the days and weeks ahead, I will provide a greater level of operational detail behind the plan that will make these goals a reality.
I could not be more proud to lead you as CEO of EA. Thank you in advance for your support.
Fede Alvarez (Evil Dead remake) and Universal Pictures seem to be moving forward on a film adaptation of the Dante’s Inferno video game from Visceral (but not the book).Eric Newman and Marc Abraham (Robocop remake) are rumored to be producing. If this turns into something worth following we’ll have more details when they become available.
SEGA Dream Corporation has inked a deal, to be finalized by November 1st, taking ownership of Index. Who the hell is Index? They’re the parent company of Atlus, who you should know as the publisher of Catherine, Persona, Dragon’s Crown, etc. The $88 million deal will net SEGA a whole slew of IPs, most of which are sort of niche titles. Then again, SEGA’s a bit of a niche company anymore.
The whole world’s talking about a tiny game release from this past Tuesday in Grand Theft Auto V. At this point, you’ve seen the reviews and you’re either playing it or not. The biggest news now is the amount of money this thing’s generating. I actually had to visit two GameStops as I hadn’t pre-ordered and the first one had oversold their inventory on pre-orders alone. At nearly 1.6 million units in the first two days in the UK it has become the fastest selling title in the region – beating Call of Duty: Black Ops by approximately 200,000. Unfortunately, there are some technical issues plaguing the title. Installing the “play” disc to your XBox 360 is not recommended as it will cause texture and pop-in issues. There also seems to be a problem with Sony’s digital versions getting hung up during the install phase. This seems isolated to the EU at present. If this happens to you, Sony suggests deleting the install files and starting the download from scratch. (Come talk about GTA V with us in Sithbot’s Day One Impressions.
At Gamescom, Sony announced a program to allow gamers to upgrade certain cross-generation games from PS3 to PS4. Now they’ve detailed how that program will work. Long story short, you’ll need to redeem a voucher code from your retail PS3 copy on PSN, spend $9.99 for the upgrade, and download the PS4 game. Sweet, now you can go sell your PS3 copy. Nope! You will need to keep the PS3 copy in your PS4 to play the game. Confirmed titles for the program so far include Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag, Battlefield 4, Call of Duty: Ghosts, and Watch Dogs. NBA 2K14 is also on the list, but not in North America. ??? The offers will only be available for a limited time after the PS4 version releases. Detailed, official instructions are available here.
As you’re looking forward to your XBox One in November, start thinking about the space in your entertainment center. Albert Penello, XBox Senior Product Manager, reiterated at TGS that the system will not support a vertical orientation. This is not a cooling issue, as some have claimed, but due to the design of the slot loading drive. Penello stated, “We don’t support vertical orientation; do it at your own risk.” Which I read to mean it’s probably possible to stand the thing on its end, but it’s not very smart.
Penello also made some really weird comments at TGS. He was trying to pimp the HDMI pass through port on the XBox One, but did it in a strange way. I’m guessing the idea behind the port is to support TVs with limited HDMI inputs. So you can connect your cable box to your XB1, then to your TV without needing extra TV slots. Or, as Penello pointed out, you can run your PS4 through it. According to Penello, “Any application can be snapped to a game… this could the live TV feed, so if you wanted to be playing Ryse and Killzone at the same time, you could snap that.” That’s useful. I guess.
We also have some sad news to end this week in video gaming. Hiroshi Yamauchi, long-time CEO of Nintendo, has passed away. Read Zombietron’s In Memoriam for more information about this legendary figure, a man that changed a playing card company into a worldwide icon for computer entertainment.
So as not to end on a sad note, I’d like to remind you to spend some of your weekend time with the ‘bots as they run a 24 hour gaming marathon to raise money for Rescue Rovers Adoptions. We all love video games, and you all should love dogs. This charitable event is made just for you, so help some puppies and watch some robots goes berserk sometime after hour nineteen. Here are the details.