Uplay services in general affected.
Every time an Xbox Live service alert is posted, a little ritual takes place at OXM Towers. Step (1) A large, bronzed, half-naked man strikes a gong with one of our Saints-Row-branded dildo bats. Then, Jonty leads a solemn procession to Microsoft's Soho offices, where an offering is made of merchandise and hamsters. Subsequently: fires are seen on the heights of Mount Doom, and all the cupboard doors within 50 miles flap open and closed mysteriously. Then I sit down and write a news story about it. Here's the need-to-know.
And Battlefield 4 isn't "done", insists GM Karl Magnus Troedsson.
Battlefield Hardline isn't some quick-fix diversionary action, designed to buy time for DICE while it develops the inevitable Battlefield 5 - according to the latter's general manager Karl Magnus Troedsson, his studio and Dead Space developer Visceral have been working on the concept for years.
Ed Boon trolls fans, says it's done "out of love".
A poster of a spine with the words 'Who's Next?' and a familiar-looking dragon logo at the bottom has appeared, and Mortal Kombat creator (sorry, kreator) Ed Boon has been teasing people for the last few days with cryptic (gah, kryptic) clues (I'll stop now) through his Twitter account.
Watch Dogs 2 only a matter of time.
Within 24 hours of going on sale, Ubisoft's latest open-world title Watch Dogs has sold more copies than any other Ubisoft game, ever. Yes, that includes any of the Assassin's Creed games.
Handsome Jack invites you to gaze upon his works.
Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel already had space, zero gravity combat, its own version of Captain America's shield, lasers and freeze rays. Now it has poetry, too. The latest trailer riffs gleefully on Percy Shelley's Ozymandias, a grim commentary on the folly of ambition. As VG247 points out, you might recall it from the trailer for Breaking Bad's season finale.
Free-to-play or other non-premium revenue schemes aren't necessarily the way to go.
Once upon a time, downloadable indie games were felt to be categorically inferior to big budget boxed releases. And today? I'm not so sure. Nor is Capybara's co-founder Nathan Vella, one of the men behind the recent Super Time Force and the upcoming Below - he thinks that players are more comfortable now with higher pricepoints for smaller-scale indie titles, and that to make content available for free is potentially to do your own work a disservice.
One building is larger than any location in Hitman Absolution.
IO Interactive's first Hitman game for Xbox One won't be at E3 this year, but the developer assures us that it's steaming along nicely. To illustrate that, here's a concept artwork of a building in the game that's "larger than any location in Hitman Absolution".
Leaked trailer sheds light on modes, maps, weapons, single player and more.
Action stations! Somebody's leaked a gameplay trailer for Battlefield Hardline - titled "Omaha" at the time of the video's creation - which was announced by EA earlier this morning following a leak yesterday. Watch it, quick. It probably won't be around for long.
Deathsmiles and DoDonPachi creator has plenty on the boil.
Former Cave producer Makoto Asada has announced no less than three new games for Xbox One, following the announcement of no less than three new games for Xbox One. Three plus three equals six, arithmetic fans. Crikey, where have they all been hiding? Are these the first tumbling pebbles that herald a landslide of Japanese-made Xbox One exclusives?
"Xbox: don't use Kinect anymore".
We all know Microsoft's got form with switching their dashboard UIs - pour one out for the blades, yo. The folk of NeoGAF are already preparing for Xbox One's next major shift in home screen architecture, following the announcement of a Kinect-less console bundle this month.
EA confirms game for fall 2014 release following leak.
Battlefield Hardline is, indeed, a Real Game rather than some deranged fantasy we all concocted during a mescaline-assisted screening of Ocean's 11. It's being created by Visceral Games, developer of the Dead Space series, and is the first instalment of "a brand new series in the Battlefield franchise, set against the backdrop of a genre we all love - the war on crime and the battle between cops and criminals."
Pay real money as a shortcut to catch up with your friends.
DICE will sell in-game content in Battlefield 4 for players who don't have the time to level up to join their mates (and, indeed, anyone who feels like spending real money). The game's three Battlepacks can still be earned through, y'know, actually playing the game you've already bought.
EA DICE FPS franchise to become a heist 'em up, according to report.
This year's police-themed Battlefield game appears to be Battlefield: Hardline, according to details prised from a recent Battlelog update. Code-named Battlefield Havana, the game is reportedly down for release on both Xbox 360 and Xbox One, and offers at least four new multiplayer classes.
KAPOW! A new game hits your console.
It's an-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-nother Lego Batman game! After introducing an original story for the first entry, then fully-voiced dialogue and an open world for the second, Beyond Gotham takes the caped, cuboid crusader and his DC buddies (or not - we've seen Joker and Lex Luthor getting involved already) to space in a valiant attempt to stop Superman villain Brainiac from shrinking entire worlds with the power of the Lantern Corps' rings.
Say hello to Master Creep.
Halo is so epic, so awash with epicality, that it even looks epic when glimpsed through the lens of Minecraft's universe and aesthetic. Mojang, Microsoft and 4J Studios have released a trailer for the forthcoming Minecraft Xbox 360 Halo Mash-Up Pack - the latest batch of themed textures, character skins, props, menu skins, music and pre-made worlds, out on Xbox Live in the not too distant future.
The good, the bad, the invariably ugly and the truly horrific.
This week's Deal of the Week is a testament to mankind's conviction that if there is life on other planets, it probably wants to use your ribcage as an eggbox. It's also a testament to the untold woe that has been inflicted on H.R. Giger's greatest monstrosity over the years, though there are a few bright spots - Rebellion's Aliens vs Predator isn't half bad.
"You have to betray fans enough to give them something new and surprising.".
Like rapidly condensing gravy fumes, mystery continues to swirl around the first Gears of War game for Xbox One. Will it prolong the franchise's love affair with chest-high walls, or will it concoct new ways to ruinate the Locust? Come to that, will the Locust return? Is there a spin-off TV show in the works? And is Marcus Fenix still the guy on the cover? Here's Rod Fergusson, top dog at new developer Black Tusk Studios, with a few thoughts on the project's general direction.
Welcome to Los Santos, est 1980.
No, there's nothing concrete to report yet about GTA 5 on Xbox One, but a "new version" of the game has been confirmed for that early '80s powerhouse, the Commodore 64. Check out a creatively arranged "demo" below, care of Youtuber MajamiHiroz.
But it looks very, very pretty.
In Dragon Age: Inquisition, some battles are won not with swords, but with tongues. Allow me to elaborate on that, before your imagination gets the better of you - in the luxurious corridors of the Winter Palace, charm, the gift of the gab and friends in the right places count for rather more than the size and spikiness of your battle axe.
City, punctuation norms nuked from orbit.
I know, I know - the title "Chaos;Child" is the linguistic equivalent of Cthulhu, an abomination unto man and beast, but right now the game is exclusive to Xbox One, so all is forgiven, I guess? For you late-comers - and I'm going to assume that includes most of you - Chaos;Child takes place in an earthquake-hit Tokyo, and is a direct sequel to Chaos;Head. You know, Chaos;Head! That other game you've never heard of.
