The Microsoft Hololens augmented reality headset had an impressive showing at E3, but it was limited to demos behind closed doors. The public wasn't able to see what looking through the headset is like.
A new Warcraft trailer is out, and it gives you a 360-degree view of Azeroth's Stormwind region.
Built for Google's cheap VR headset for mobile phones, Cardboard, the trailer lets you look up, down, and around from the back of a gryphon, a creature used for transport in , and that he might possibly make a trilogy of Warcraft movies.
While we've come to expect digital and physical versions of games to cost the same at launch, it remains somewhat bizarre to see physical versions discounted heavily after launch while digital ones maintain their pricing. This point was raised during a Ubisoft investors call today, prompting CEO Yves Guillemot to shed some light on why this is.
During a post-earnings conference call Q&A session, Ubisoft was asked this digital/physical pricing disparity. For instance, .
If you try to move through the map too fast, you'll die. Go too slow? You'll die. Stray away from your team or stay too close to your buddy? Dead and dead. If you want to survive The Red Solstice, a top-down shooter with an emphasis on tactics, you need to adapt quickly to new situations. Even then, you should probably prepare yourself to die a lot.
The Red Solstice is not very welcoming to newcomers, especially if you try to jump directly into multiplayer (something the game itself advises against). Its core gameplay isn't too hard to grasp--it controls like a real-time strategy game in which you have only a single soldier or small handful of units. Right-clicking moves your soldier(s) to a location, left-clicking orders them to attack, each unit has a variety of skills (each with its own cooldowns), and you have a limited inventory of items. But there is a lot of depth beneath these basics, and if you try to treat The Red Solstice as a pure action game, you will struggle to succeed.
You can slow the action down to a crawl with a tap of the button, giving you some extra seconds to breathe and plan your next move. This slow-mo tactical mode is only available when playing solo, but making good use of it is imperative for single-player success. Sure, you could try running through the map with auto-aim turned on so all your squad members automatically pivot toward and attack incoming threats, but that's a recipe for inaccurate shots and wasted ammo, neither of which you can afford if you want to make it out alive.
One of the key elements of The Red Solstice is that it's class-based, and having a balanced squad of various classes is essential. This goes beyond the obvious "Take a medic with you so you can heal yourself" strategy in that each class has a variety of available skills that can make the difference between success and failure. Using the right support skill at the right time could save lives, and most classes have weaknesses that make it difficult for them to survive alone.
It can also be good to hop online and try to find some experienced players willing to show you the ropes, especially because you aren't likely to learn them all without some help. Even after playing through all 10 missions of the single-player campaign, I felt that the game never communicated some things to me--at least not well. For example, I did not know you could pick up (and then toss) exploding barrels until I saw another player do it online. This bit of knowledge would have made one specific section of a single-player mission, in which I needed to blow up some barricades, a bit less frustrating.
Getting to the center of the storm that is The Red Solstice isn't easy. A less-than-stellar tutorial and initial overload of information combined with a handful of quirks and bugs make it a game you have to stick with for a little while before you can fully appreciate its depth. If you can reach that point, though, and you have some friends to reach it with, this a storm you will successfully weather.
How important is a first impression? In the case of a video game, a poor one can push you into the arms of another. That doesn't mean that the new game isn't good, or even amazing--but you've now turned away from that game, or postponed your time with it. Perhaps you will return, and perhaps you won't; that initial glimpse stays with you and colors your perception.
Class-based, massive online shooter PlanetSide 2 on the PlayStation 4 doesn't make a great first impression, whether you are new to the game, or have transitioned from the
As with most video game wars, your success is never assured, and with loss comes frustration: the frustration of being gunned down by an infiltrator equipped with a bolt-action rifle as you sprint from one doorway to another, the frustration of shooting a teammate as he crosses your path just as you begin firing at the enemy, the frustration of hearing the voiceover explain for the umpteenth time that you shouldn't shoot friendlies. (Thanks, repetitive narrator-man.) Death is rarely an annoyance in and of itself, however. Even if you frequently fall, engagements are too big for you to feel as if you have singlehandedly let down your teammates. If you only rack up a few kill assists in between spawns, there's still a sense of accomplishment. When there's madness in all directions, who can say whether the bullets you landed didn't divert the winds of conflict?
Not every moment you spend in PlanetSide 2 is in the midst of a massive firefight, however. There are uneventful stretches in which you and your squad capture facilities with little resistance, or amble ahead in tanks for many minutes on end, wishing there was something to shoot. Back at your faction's primary base, you might spend some time deciding how to spend the certification points you've earned during your hours and days of battle. This is your primary currency, and as is the case with so many free-to-play games, this currency accumulates slowly after the initial hours. When you feel vulnerable even when surrounded by the stolid armor of a lightning tank, it's only logical that you'd want to reinforce it. And when certs are slow to come, spending real-world money is a temptation.
When in doubt, head towards the sound of gunfire.
I wouldn't call PlanetSide 2 "pay to win;" Too little rests on your individual performance for that moniker to be an apt one. Yet there are some conveniences that are difficult to resist, such as the ability to bypass login queues when you purchase a membership (that is, a paid subscription, which is $14.99 if you pay on a monthly basis). Given that queues are still frequent on some servers, that cost ends up feeling more like blackmail for an experience that should be a base-level expectation (playing as soon as you log in) rather than a premium perk.
Like so many big games with dozens of complex moving parts, your enjoyment of PlanetSide 2 on the PlayStation 4 rests on how forgiving you are of technical hiccups you would properly expect to be vanquished. As you play, the questions mount. "Why did that tank vanish into thin air after I fired my homing missile, and why did my missile then shoot into the sky?" "Why did my vehicle just sink through the geometry and explode?" "Does the view distance need to be this bad, even on a snowy continent?" You may never find answers--but you will temporarily forget you ever asked the questions when you and a squad of jump-pack-equipped light infantry swarm an enemy base, forcing the opposition onto the exterior platform where a friendly aircraft pilot guns them down with a laser cannon. At these moments, the troubles fade away, leaving only the frights and delights of planetary war.
The . The Collector's Edition will likely be officially announced today during the Zombies mode reveal at San Diego Comic-Con. Keep an eye on GameSpot for more news about Black Ops III as it becomes available.
Ubisoft on Thursday reported earnings for the quarter ended June 30, announcing that, among other things,, and Watch Dogs, all of which enjoyed "sustained demand."
Another positive for Ubisoft in the quarter was digital revenue, which totaled €54.1 million and made up a healthy 56 percent of all sales, compared to 23.2 percent during the same quarter last year.
Ubisoft will hold an earnings call to discuss these results and answer analyst questions later today. Check back for more news as it's announced.
, but noted there was a lot of discussion internally about this decision.
PlayStation Worldwide Studios president Shuhei Yoshida added that Sony wondered if it would be "risky" to launch such a major project with a female protagonist. Its developer, however, was able to show people would respond well to the game's central protagonist, as well as the open-world RPG, and the set up of machine versus primitive weapons,
Streaming services like PlayStation Now could be a big boon for publishers, helping them accumulate extra revenue from back catalog games long after release. That's according to Sony's Jack Buser, who told .
After years of development, the Warcraft movie from Godzilla studio Legendary Pictures and Blizzard Entertainment is nearly finished, director Duncan Jones said at Comic-Con. He revealed the details in a new interview, in which he also said he and Blizzard have ideas to expand the one film into a trilogy.
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We're expecting to learn more about the Warcraft movie this week at Comic-Con. Legendary Pictures has a panel scheduled for this Saturday, July 11, where we may finally see the first trailer for the Warcraft movie.
Rob breaks down what's packing in Grand Theft Auto V's newest update, Ill-Gotten Gains Pt 2.
