Gaming - Page 1102

In just six days, Fallout 4 will take over millions of people's lives and never let them go. To prepare for your impending post-apocalyptic addiction, Bethesda has released the official Fallout 4 Pip Boy app to recreate that authentic Vault-life experience.

The Pip Boy app was just released on the Google Play Store, and is a full-blown companion app that acts as an extremely handy second screen. The app turns your smartphone into a functioning Pip Boy that has everything the mono-green wrist-pad offers and seamlessly interacts with the game.

The app tethers wirelessly to a PC, PS4 or Xbox One running Fallout 4 with the Pip Boy mode enabled. With the app you can inject yourself with power-inducing chems, cure ailments with Rad-away, drop and equip items and gear, and even play the rather fun holotape games like the Donkey Kong-inspired platformer Red Menace or Atomic Command. Using a bigger tablet as a second-screen map is perhaps the most useful feature, and I for one can see myself using it relentlessly when the game ships.

When Activision and Bungie announced that Destiny would embrace microtransactions, gamers instantly saw a red flag slowly raise across one of their favorite games. Microtransactions are, after all, the kinds of things that make freemium mobile games so exploitative and ruin the experience. But the Destiny devs don't appear to be taking full advantage of the scheme (yet?) and promise to use spent cash on bringing free expansions in the future.

In a recent company call, Activision CEO Eric Hirschberg says that Destiny's microtransactions aren't going anywhere. The scheme is here to stay, and we still don't know what kind of animal the publisher will breed. Hirschberg thinks that expansions and microtransactions are harmoniously linked.

"I think expansions and microtransactions are already co-existing. We had a full year of expansions to the game that have been very well received and sold quite well. More recently, you've seen us introduce smaller, in-game purchases that allow people to customize their experience and express themselves; those have been very well received and have sold well also. I think we've already shown that DLC and microtransactions can co-exist and that our community is hungry for more great content."

The Xbox One's hotly anticipated backward compatibility update is almost here, and soon gamers will be able to relive a hundred different Xbox 360 games on the console. But which games will be playable? Apart from a few gimmicky Kinect games and the first Mass Effect, Microsoft has kept us in the dark about the games roster.

The Xbox One will evolve in little over a week's time. Microsoft is rolling out a substantial firmware update on November 12 that completely changes the system over to a console-friendly Windows 10 OS. With the new update comes a host of new features like a sleek, responsive UI, custom button mapping across games, and the big-ticket whammy that is backward compatibility. No one knows which games will be featured just yet, but Xbox boss Phil Spencer assures gamers that the full 100 game roster will be revealed early next week.

Fans have been speculating on the backward compatibility list for months and months. Core staples like Red Dead Redemption and Halo: Reach were among the most requested games, with other titles like Gears of War and Call of Duty titles catching up. With any luck, the library won't be taken up by terrible Kinect games.

November 7 is a special time of the year for Mass Effect fans across the globe as it signifies the heroic Commander Shepard's N7 callsign. To commemorate this day BioWare usually shows off something new or delivers teasers and does something special, and this year is no different.

In a recent update, the devs at BioWare have teased that gamers can expect "surprises" on N7 day, but at the same time they carefully said there won't be "any major announcements" for Mass Effect: Andromeda. Still though we'll likely see some Andromeda content whether it's a tiny glimpse of footage or maybe a few screenshot hints.

"While we won't have any major announcements for Mass Effect: Andromeda this N7 Day, keep an eye out on Saturday for some surprises that we're sure you'll enjoy."

The holidays are just around the corner, and that means huge Black Friday savings. If you're in the market to pick up Sony's PlayStation 4 console you'll be able to grab a console and a free game for just $299.

Some retailers like Sam's Club are actually starting holiday sales as early as next week, offering up great savings across the board. Sam's has a great deal on a PS4 bundle with a free game for just $299, shaving off a clean $50 off the console's recent permanent price drop.

The deal was spotted on the Cheap Ass Gamer forums by an actual Sam's Club employee. The poster also notes that the free game is likely the one included with the PS4 bundles, meaning you probably won't be able to pick a free game off the shelf. Sony offers a number of console bundles including Batman Arkham Knight, The Last of Us: Remastered, Destiny: The Taken King, and the Uncharted: Nathan Drake Collection bundle.

It looks like Activision is ramping up its titanic control over the games industry by setting its sights on the mobile market. Reports indicate that the console gaming juggernaut has bought out the infamous Candy Crush developers King for no less than $5.9 billion.

This merger further solidifies Activision's stance as a leading games publisher, now flexing their long arm over the realm of mobile games. The union could mean some different things for the gaming sector, as we might see a more unified approach to cross-platform integration--think in-app purchases via freemium smartphone mini-games and the like.

"The combined revenues and profits solidify our position as the largest, most profitable standalone company in interactive entertainment," Activision CEO Bobby Kotick said in a press release. "With a combined global network of more than half a billion monthly active users, our potential to reach audiences around the world on the device of their choosing enables us to deliver great games to even bigger audiences than ever before."

Last night I watched Angry Joe's great review on Halo 5: Guardians, where he talked about some of the large issues on the Xbox One exclusive. Angry Joe said that there is no split screen gameplay, which is something that is a huge miss compared to the previous titles in the franchise. Before you watch the video, there's a NSFW warning for language.

Angry Joe called over 'Other Joe' where they were "immediately met with the first sign that this isn't the Halo I would fall back in love with" when he found out there was no split screen goodness on the Xbox One. Joe had to buy an entire second Xbox One and a second copy of Halo 5 just so he could play with Other Joe.

The reason for the removal of split screen in Halo 5? According to Xbox boss Phil Spencer, "the teams make decisions based on the bar that they want to hit for complexity of what they're going to run on a single box". Spencer added: "we see the robustness of what Xbox Live is today and where people are playing across Xbox Live--you at your house, me at our house. We know that's the vast majority of the co-op play. With Halo 5, the team really wanted to focus on making that experience great, both visually on the screen that you're looking at, and all the systems in place".

With the release of Call of Duty: Black Ops 3, we're finding out more details on the PC version of the game. Treyarch has teased that the PC version of Black Ops 3 will include full modding tools, where you can even create your own maps, and run servers for your modded content.

While Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 launches in a few days, on November 6, the modding side of the game will not reach alpha stage until March 2016. But, the developer has released a bunch of information onto its blog, where they said:

Over the years, the Call of Duty® community has proven itself to be among the most passionate in the world - and we count ourselves fortunate to make games for you.

Since it was released on PC, Rocksteady's ambitious conclusion to their Batman saga has been pretty much unplayable and broken in fundamental ways. Now it looks like the devs and publishers at Warner Bros. have finally given up and are fully admitting they won't be able to completely fix the game, offering full refunds as a result.

"We are very sorry that many of our customers continue to be unhappy with the PC version of Batman: Arkham Knight," Warner Bros. official community admin said in a recent update on Steam. "We worked hard to get the game to live up to the standard you deserve but understand that many of you are still experiencing issues."

"Until the end of 2015, we will be offering a full refund on Batman: Arkham Knight PC, regardless of how long you have played the product. You can also return the Season Pass along with the main game (but not separately). For those of you that hold onto the game, we are going to continue to address the issues that we can fix and talk to you about the issues that we cannot fix."

Crystal Dynamics is at it again with their latest Lara Croft journey, spinning gritty adventuring magic right before our eyes. Rise of the Tomb Raider looks like it can go toe-to-toe with Naughty Dog's Uncharted series as it portrays the true soul of classic adventurers mixed with harrowing survival.

The new official launch trailer is just as satisfying as the E3 reveal footage, if not moreso. It's a little over three minutes and sets the tone of the story, which revolves around Lara looking for some ancient treasure of immortality that was originally discovered by her father.

Needless to say that she's not the only one looking for this enchanted elixir: a nefarious group called Trinity is hot on her heels to stir up trouble. The game is pretty much everything that Indiana Jones fans would ever want to have, featuring all the classic staples like pouring through ageless texts and matching symbols, solving enigmatic puzzles, exploring deadly ruins and overcoming traps, and generally surviving the brutal wilderness with nothing but sheer strength and determination.

As a longtime Halo fan, I've always wanted to see the series progress beyond the space-marine shooty-shoot mold that's kept it the same for so long. It's always been about pushing new FPS mechanics to the bar, and at its core Halo is a shooter, but the franchise is so much more...and 343 Industries' Frank O' Connor knows it.

Halo has a thriving, expansive universe of lore, characters and themes that haven't been explored in game form. Sure the Halo games all tell stories and tap this rich vein of possibility, but nothing really comes close to the Halo Legends collection or the books that go beyond the humanity's struggle. Halo is more than Spartans, more than Master Chief...why not explore the Forerunners more, or change up the points of view with different character perspectives?

In a recent interview with TIME, ex-Bungie dev and 343 Industries exec Frank O'Connor talked about what it'd be like to explore the stories that lay beyond Halo's traditional FPS style. "You asked me what I'd be excited about in the future, and certainly in terms of interactivity, I think games or methods of gameplay that aren't simply shooting interest me," O'Connor said, hinting that a new game could bridge gaps in the franchise. "I'd love to go do a xenoarcheological expedition to the original Halo ring. You know, take some scientists down, drive around, catch samples, do some detective work, maybe there's a mystery. And it wouldn't require shooting. It's the universe and environment that can still be exciting, even without action. So that's one of the things I'd love to see us invest more in."

As a long-time Halo fan, I'm quite disappointed in Halo 5, and honestly I could probably fill a book with reasons why I feel the game is pretty bad. One of those main reasons is how awkward the aiming system is, but it's not just me--gamers have proven that Halo 5's targeting is legitimately unbalanced.

A Redditor by the name of Z0oinks has proven that Halo 5's targeting is bugged with a simple video that shows the issue in action.

What's happening is that Halo 5's aiming system is faster for linear X and Y axis aiming than it is for diagonal 45-degree aiming, creating a very clear disadvantage across the board. The awkward aiming becomes obvious when the user moves in a full circle: instead of being smooth like other Halo games, moving the reticle in a circular motion is broken and jagged, meaning users will have to compensate quite a bit.

Although Batman: Arkham Knight has finally made its way back onto Steam, it looks like Warner Bros. hasn't made any actual progress in the last fourth months of tweaking--the game is still very much a mess on PC platforms, so much so that gamers will need a minimum of 12GB of system RAM in order to counteract Arkham Knight's huge performance issues.

As soon as Arkham Knight was re-released on Steam, gamers started to realize that little to no actual improvements had been made. The latest Batman game still doesn't support multi-GPU Crossfire or SLI setups, meaning enhanced graphics performance is off the table. The game still doesn't play very well on Windows 7, leading to hard-drive paging issues during extended periods of play. But the biggest let down is that you won't even be able to play the game if you don't have at least 12GB of RAM.

"For Windows 10 users, we've found that having at least 12GB of system RAM on a PC allows the game to operate without paging and provides a smoother gameplay experience," reads an update from Warner Bros.

In an effort to better serve its player base and use gamers' ideas to pave the future, Sony is always asking its users what kinds of features and functionality they'd like to see added on the PS4. The ability to play physical PlayStation 3 games on the PlayStation 4 is on the top of that list, but that feature probably isn't ever going to see the light of day.

When asked if PS3 games would ever be playable on the PS4 Sony exec Shuhei Yoshida responded with a simple "no". This is a common response from Sony on the subject of backward compatibility, but in the past Yoshida said that the feature would be quite challenging...but not necessarily impossible.

"PS3 is such a unique architecture, and some games made use of SPUs very well," Yoshida said all the way back in June when Microsoft revealed the Xbox One's backward compatibility feature. "It's going to be super challenging to do so. I never say never, but we have no plans."

The eSports market is really lighting up thanks to awesome startups like Unikrn, but big business is getting involved too with the likes of Activision securing the former CEO of ESPN, and the co-founder of MLG to head its eSports venture.

But according to SuperData, the eSports market should be worth $1.9 billion by 2018 - for now, it sits at $748 million. Not too bad for professional gamers, eh? This is being driven by bigger and bigger sponsorship and advertising, which equates for a nice $579 million of that total from this year.

Brand advertising accounts for 77% of the market, which SuperData notes could reach $1 billion by 2016. SuperData's Director of Research and Consumer Insights, Stephanie Llamas, said: "eSports are becoming more mainstream and that has attracted traditional media channels like TBS and ESPN. So far, fans have had to seek out platforms to watch tournaments and players, but now people can stumble upon eSports while flipping through channels. Even old-fashioned brands are taking notice and there is a growing interest in advertising to the coveted millennial male demographic on a medium they know well".

Nintendo today unveiled a new step towards its plans for the future, announcing its first smartphone game, a unified new cross-platform account service, and the replacement loyalty program for Club Nintendo.

The Japanese console-maker will make its debut into the freemium mobile market with Miitomo, a free-to-play smartphone game that sports microtransactions. The Wall Street Journal notes that Miitomo sounds more like a "communications app" built around Nintendo's Mii avatars, which will let users interact with one another via Miiverse-style digital characters. Interestingly enough Miitomo seems to give the Miis their own personalities and lives, animating them in specific ways and letting them interact with other players, but it will all be built around actual player data. Sadly Miitomo has already been delayed until March 2016 so Nintendo can build up awareness on the game, and is the first of five smartphone games Nintendo will launch leading up to March 2017.

The new Nintendo Account hub service spans across all platforms, including console, mobile and PC. Using the new service users will be able to upload saved data and content onto the cloud and share it across different platforms. We've known for a while that Nintendo was going to make a service to unify all platforms, and this will carry over to the new NX console.

Sony's PlayStation 4 has traditionally dominated console sales charts over Microsoft's Xbox One and Nintendo's beleaguered Wii U, and that trend shows no signs of slowing. At Paris Games Week 2015, a Sony exec let slip that the PS4 still reigns supreme in terms of global consumer adoption and has overshot the 25 million sales milestone by a margin.

"I don't think there's a better time to buy into PlayStation - PS4 particularly. Our installed base now is well over 25 million," said Sony exec Michael Denny in an interview with Games Industry Biz. "That gives us a massive community of gamers, supported by a lot of new community features. We've got great games out there, more coming through. We're looking forward to 2016, it's an exciting time."

Interestingly enough, VG Chartz notes the PlayStation 4 has sold 25.45 million units worldwide, but Sony probably has more specifically updated sales data on-hand. In light of the stalwart sales, the Japanese console-maker bumped its fiscal year PS4 projections from 16 million units to 16.5 million units sold.

Hello Games' procedurally-generated space sim No Man's Sky is one of the most anticipated games in recent memory, and now studio founder Sean Murray finally has a release window planned for the game.

According to an announcement made at Sony's showcase at Paris Games Week, No Man's Sky will be available on June 2016 for the PlayStation 4. We still have no word on when the PC version of the game will release, and we might even see another timed-exclusivity deal for No Man's Sky on PS4. Hello Games' founder and boss Sean Murray also announced the news on the PlayStation Blog, and affirms that Sony and the studio will reveal a ton of new information in the coming months.

"Since E3 our release date has now become clear. The game, our ambition and some key developments have fallen into place. It's incredibly hard work, but development is going really well," Murray said, iterating that No Man's Sky is the studio's swan song, their ultimate pipe dream fantasy made into a reality. "This is a game that means everything to our team. I have wanted to play something like No Man's Sky since I was a kid, and many of you have told me you feel the same. For all of us, we get one shot to make this game and we can't mess it up. Our small team knows the world is watching, we've come from the bottom and we don't take it lightly."

Xbox One gamers have been looking forward to the console's new Xbox One Experience update for quite some time. Not only does the update bring much-needed UI changes, it introduces backward compatibility, opening up new doors for a host of yesteryear games. While we've been told in the past to expect the update in November, Microsoft has finally revealed a specific date when the NXOE will roll out.

During last night's Halo 5 livestream celebration, Xbox boss Phil Spencer unveiled that the substantial Xbox One update will hit on November 12, just two days after the anticipated launch of Fallout 4. The update is set to completely optimize the Xbox One in a slew of different ways, including offering backward compatibility across 100 different Xbox 360 games, letting users set their own specific customized button-mapping profiles via controller settings, and a cleaner, much more responsive Xbox One UI.

One of the biggest additions comes with Windows 10 integration, which will come wrapped up within the console's big update. In order to bring the new OS to the Xbox One, Microsoft developed a console-specific kernel called OneCore, which aims to boost productivity and further optimize the Xbox One's cross-platform unification into the Windows 10 ecosystem. OneCore will also plant the seeds for DirectX 12 integration onto the console, which could boost the console's ESRAM performance by 15%.

Bethesda has just confirmed that Fallout 4 will be preloading onto the Xbox One, PS4 and PC very soon. In an official post on the Bethesda Softworks Twitter page, the developer said: "We can confirm that #Fallout 4 will have pre-loading on Xbox One, PS4, and PC so you have a few days to download the game before 11/10".

When exactly can we expect it, if Bethesda says gamers will have "a few days" before launch to get it preloaded? Bethesda boss Pete Hines posted on Twitter, saying: "We will be preloading for Fallout 4 on PC, Xbox One, and PS4. Exact day/time TBA. All should be available a few days before launch day".

As for the size of Fallout 4, we should expect it to weigh in at around 28GB (on the Xbox One at least). It might be a bit bigger on other platforms, however.