Gaming - Page 1103

With the PC port of Batman: Arkham Knight being a huge mess, so much so that Warner Bros. pulled it from Steam, good guy NVIDIA is stepping up to the plate to help fix it out. NVIDIA's Tom Peterson talked about the game during his appearance on MMORPG.com yesterday, saying that some of NVIDIA's best are on the case.

Peterson said: "We're fixing a ton of things that are not necessarily related to us. Some of it may be related to our driver, some not. But at the end of the day the game is the focus and we're going to make it great". Peterson continued: "We have 200 to 300 engineers that are really visual scientists. They're the best out there. Artists, Ph.D.s. ... We've taken the approach that says let's capture what they've got in their minds, convert it to algorithms ... test it and QA it, and then provide it as middleware effectively to game developers".

Why is NVIDIA helping out? It feels like this is just NVIDIA being a helpful member of the PC community, especially when Peterson added: "I look at [Arkham Knight] as an example of where NVIDIA can help a developer get to market with a quality game. Warner Bros. ... made a few mistakes getting the game out. It wasn't fully performance optimized for PC. So now we're deploying our QA resources and our engineers to make that game as good as it possibly can be".

After 15 years of black-market gaming, China has opened up a new door to the bustling video games industry by scrapping its restrictive ban on games systems. The country's Ministry of Culture states that hardware titans like Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo can not only sell but also manufacture video games consoles anywhere in the country.

This new legislature is a huge win for console-makers, as they have free reign to tap the Chinese market. Last year the Chinese government made a similar reversal with the launch of the Xbox One in the region, but console-makers were bound by unfavorable restrictive policies. To sell their consoles in China, console-makers had to agree to specific rules like being told where manufacturing facilities could be placed, gaining approval from regulation officials, and have every individual console inspected before being sold.

Now China has nixed all of these regulations and opened a new frontier of free-trade for video games consoles, completely overturning the decade-and-a-half ban.

Fallout Shelter will launch for Google Android mobile users on August 13, and will be available for free via the Google Play store. In its first two weeks of release for Apple iOS, the game became a top-downloaded game - and helped generate $5.1 million in revenue.

"Whether you're playing on Android or on iOS, Fallout Shelter will feature new game updates, including Mr. Handy as an all premium reward," according to a Bethesda blog post. "Have him collect resources inside your Vault, send him into the wasteland to collect loot, and defend your Vault from creatures and disasters, including all new Deathclaw invasions and Molerat infestations."

Expect Bethesda to support the game "for a long time," according to Bethesda - as the game studio is overwhelmed with support by iOS gamers.

The opening night of All Work All Play in Melbourne, Australia saw a few dozen of us nerds bustle with excitement at our 'full-time hobby' finally getting some mainstream screen time. Although the small turnout was a little disappointing, some familiar faces had woven themselves out of the wood work, these being the types of people you would have seen hunched over a CRT monitor in 2005, wearing baggy cargo shorts and sporting too much gel in their hair.

Although it kicked off with a rough start (technical difficulties), the end result was captivating for us enthusiasts. Following a few champions throughout the entire film, this ESL-led documentary honed in on the former director of pro gaming, Michal 'Carmac' Blicharz and Cloud 9, an underdog League of Legends team.

Following journeys both personal and on-stage, the production quality matched that Valve's 'Free to Play' and poised itself as a film that can educate and capture the imaginations of eSports enthusiasts experienced and new.

In what should come as a total surprise, Mortal Kombat X has topped NPD Group's sales rankings for video games at the retail level in the US for the first half of 2015. Considering the #2 title is Grand Theft Auto V, this is a huge scoop for Warner Bros., especially after the huge issues surrounding Batman: Arkham Knight.

Most of the games on the chart will be games you either own, or have heard of, but it's quite surprising to see Mortal Kombat X top the list. Here's the top 10 sales rankings for video games at retail for the first half of 2015, according to NPD Group:

343 Industries has revealed new info on the importance of teamwork in Halo 5: Guardians' campaign mode, underlining key mechanics and tweaks they've made along the way.

For the most part 343i has kept the standard Halo formula in tact for Halo 5, but this time around the game has a decidedly more strategic co-operative feel. Gone are the days of lone-wolfing it in Master Chief's boots: throughout the missions you'll be accompanied by three other Spartans all with their own attributes, Loadouts, and specialized HUD's.

"Your team is your weapon," reads the developers' new Halo Waypoint update.

While Valve still hasn't confirmed the development of Half-Life 3, rumors have circling Reddit that the script for Half-Life 3 is finished, but it won't be released 'due to fear'.

Well, someone reached out to Valve's Marc Laidlaw, who said: "I can't comment on Valve's internal process, but I can say that it sounds like someone is trolling. Anonymous sources have been posting speculation masquerading as inside knowledge since the Half-Life 1 delay in 1997. If that's any comfort, please rest assured that in my experience at Valve, fear is the last thing that would ever drive a decision about what to work on".

When it came to the question of "If the story is finished, why not release it as a book or a comic", Laidlaw responded with: "There's a misunderstanding that I've always tried to address straight on when this question comes up, which is that a Half-Life story can somehow exist outside of a game. It can't. The story is created through the process of trying to figure out how to best use the features of the engine within the interesting set of constraints it poses".

Some of the developers that worked at CD Projekt RED, the studio behind The Witcher series of games, have moved over to IMGN.PRO. IMGN.PRO is the studio responsible for Kholat and Fool's Theory, with the company joining forces with the ex-CD Projekt RED developers.

IMGN.PRO is working on a new 'demanding, ambitious' title that is powered by Unreal Engine 4, with IMGN.PRO's co-founder, Lukasz Kubiak, teasing: "Evolution is a keyword when thinking both about our business and our new project. Merging our team with the Fool's Theory crew gives us access to the best people in the industry. Since the beginning of Kholat development our goal was to deliver ambitious, high quality games. Nothing has changed in this matter. Despite the fact, that now we want to go even further. With such a talented and experienced team, we intend to create a truly sensational game. The new project we are currently working on will be completely different than Kholat, much bigger and way more powerful".

The former Senior Quest Designer at CD Projekt RED, and Fool's Theory founder, Rokosz, said: "We started working on a game that will be a daring combination of some isometric genres. I don't want to reveal too much details at this point other than we're developing the game on Unreal Engine 4. It was a natural choice for us, taking into consideration how experienced the team is in working with this tool. I can assure you that the game will break some proven schemes and we'll be revealing more information about it very soon".

Some of the most popular stories from the last month or so have been our articles on the Unreal Engine 4 powered showcases of Mario and Sonic, but now it's time for Pokemon.

YouTuber'CryZENx' has released yet another video showing what a possible Pokemon game powered by Epic Games' Unreal Engine 4 could look like, which you can view above. It's quite astonishing what can be achieved with Unreal Engine 4, but I just want to play a Mario, Sonic or Pokemon game in UE4 already.

Five Nights at Freddy's 4 is now available on the Steam marketplace more than two weeks ahead of its projected release date.

Rather than waiting until next month, Scott Cauthon, the game's creator and developer, finished the game early and went ahead and released it right away. Cauthon statement announced the news last night on the official Five Nights at Freddy's Steam community page, leading to resounding fanfare and applause. He said: "Ok, so as many of you already know, I'm bad with release dates. The game is finished. :) Enjoy!"

The game's release date has been pushed up twice now, as the game was originally slated to release on Halloween 2015, then was pushed forward to August 8.

Fallout Shelter has been a major success for Bethesda, generating more than $5 million in just two weeks, but that doesn't mean the game studio will create a large catalog of mobile games.

"We'd been thinking about [making Fallout Shelter] for a while. It was a case of 'We won't do it unless it's a good fit," said Pete Hines, VP of PR and marketing at Bethesda, in a statement to IGN.

"This isn't the start of a formula where every time we make a game we need to do a mobile game... that's not why Fallout Shelter was great. People appreciate the game because it doesn't have our hand in your pocket. It did monetization in a way that people didn't have a problem with."

Activision and Treyarch will launch a global multiplayer beta for Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 next month, in an effort to ensure a smooth game launch later this year.

The multiplayer beta will be available for the PC, Microsoft Xbox One, and Sony PlayStation 4. PS4 gamers will get first crack on August 19, while PC and Xbox One gamers will be able to start playing on August 26. The multiplayer beta will last just four days.

"During the beta, fans will have an opportunity to try the new momentum-based, chained movement system, find the perfect Specialist to fit their play style, get a feel for the new multiplayer maps and more," said Scott Lowe, communications manager at Activision, in a blog post.

The Microsoft Xbox One has greatly suffered while trying to sell its Xbox One and keep up with the Sony PlayStation 4, handily outsold in the United States, Europe and Japan.

It's been a difficult battle that Microsoft is taking seriously, and there have been moments of relief - like after the holidays, when gamers could purchase several Xbox One gaming bundles.

"This progress, as well as the excitement we generated at E3 - with Xbox exclusive gaming content and backwards compatibility - demonstrates the building momentum that exists with the Xbox ecosystem," said Amy Hood, CFO at Microsoft, while speaking during a recent financial call.

As a staunch supporter of Destiny's Titan class (Defenders do it best!), I get excited at the prospect of modeling an incredibly detailed miniature version of my in-game character on my desk...or shelf...or anywhere else.

But where are all the Destiny action figures? Halo has a ton of them, made by McFarlane Toys no less. What about Bungie's newest shooter? Bambaland has answered the call with their gorgeous new Titan action figure that features all the articulation, detail, and eye-catching glory you'd expect from a proper Light-infused space hero.

The only catch is that it's $190. Well the one that comes with the Hawkmoon is $190, maybe the basic retail versions are a little cheaper. At that price range it's clear that the figure is meant to be a handsome bounty sitting atop a collector's shelf of prized valuables. Most of us don't plan to buy it, but it doesn't hurt to window shop. So let's take a closer look, shall we?

The digital download of Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain, scheduled for release later this year, will only require 25.1 GB of free space for Sony PlayStation 4 gamers.

Considering how large some recent games have been, some of you may be happy to hear that Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain will only be about 25 GB. The massive open-world game is smaller than the PlayStation 3's Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots, which is about 26.6 GB.

The game features real-time cutscenes, very little audio files since Snake doesn't talk much, and good compression could attribute to the relatively small file size.

If you're in the market for a new GPU and have had your eye on Metal Gear Solid V, then NVIDIA has you covered.

For a limited time NVIDIA will hand out free copies of Konami's latest tactical espionage adventure to those who purchase a GeForce GTX 980 Ti, 980, 970, or 960 GPU or 980/970M notebook. The copies will be digital, much like NVIDIA's past promotions that include titles like The Witcher 3. Let's hope that this promo goes better than the ill-fated Arkham Knight fiasco.

Interestingly enough, the ex-Konami franchise creator Hideo Kojima released a new promo poster for the game, which can be found below. Kojima's name is markedly absent from the promo. After the heated controversy between Konami and Kojima and subsequent cancellation of the highly anticipated Silent Hills it's fair to say that the publisher has a lot riding on this one. They can't afford a blunder on any platform, especially not on PC.

It looks as if the Xbox One's hot new backwards compatibility feature isn't actually so new after all. In fact Microsoft might have planned to include it before the console was even released, despite Don Mattrick's "backwards compatibility is really backwards" antics.

A very interesting snippet has surfaced as part of an Xbox Wire interview with Xbox's Director of Program Management, Mike Ybarra. "The Xbox Engineering team spent over three years making backwards compatibility a reality," reads the line in question.

Over three years? Wait, that doesn't exactly add up. Since it originally released November of 2013, the Xbox One will only turn two this November, so a round of quick math will reveal that Microsoft had indeed banked on backwards compatibility before the system was released on store shelves. Even with that extra forethought and planning, the Xbox team hasn't had an easy time tackling the feature.

Amid reports that professional eSports players were abusing Adderall during sanctioned tournaments, the Electronic Sports League (ESL), is taking steps crack down on performance-enhancing drugs in the world of pro gaming.

The Daily Dot reports that ESL is working alongside the World Anti-Doping Agency and the National Anti-Doping Agency to institute random drug screens for tournament participants. "We have known for some time that [performance enhancing drugs] would be a challenge at some point and we need to face that," the ESL stated. "As the stakes rise (we issue $500k per season of the Pro League alone) the athletes will push for whatever edge they can, however they can."

Due to the ramifications the ESL is hard-pressed to take action to put out the PR fire as soon as possible. Many key hardware titans have put their might under the banner of pro gaming, and these reports could very well blemish companies like AMD, NVIDIA, and Microsoft.

The Microsoft Xbox One may not be able to steal all momentum from the Sony PlayStation 4, but is giving Microsoft plenty of reasons to celebrate. During Q4, Microsoft sold 1.4 million Xbox 360/Xbox One systems, a massive increase from the 1.1 million sold year-over-year - but Microsoft declined to break down sales for the Xbox 360 and Xbox One.

It looks like the Xbox business is giving Microsoft increased optimism with the looming launch of Windows 10, with Xbox console sales, revenue, and Xbox Live transactions all increasing. In addition, the company's gaming division saw 27 percent year-over-year growth, and plenty of upcoming video games look appealing.

"Xbox platform revenue increased $86 million or 10 percent," according to a Microsoft report. "[That was] driven by higher volumes of consoles sold, offset in part by lower prices of Xbox Ones sold. Xbox Live transactions revenue increased $205 million or 58 percent, reflecting increased users and revenue per user."

When people think of eSports, they likely don't think of physical injuries that could keep gamers out of major tournaments and high-profile events. However, it looks like repetitive motion injuries are taking their toll, with players reporting tendinitis, tennis elbow, trigger finger, and carpal tunnel syndrome as some of the injuries they're facing.

Many professional eSports players spend the majority of their day practicing, both in teams and individually, and hours of continued gaming can pose major health risks. It's not uncommon for professional gamers to spend at least half the day gaming, with another couple hours invested in replay analysis and film study.

"If you don't rest the body doesn't have a chance to heal itself, to go into a homeostatic state and say okay, now I can repair myself," said Dr. Levi Harrison, a hand and arm surgeon, in a statement to Motherboard. "Whether it's non-stop gaming or non-stop MMA training, the body doesn't like that, and there's a price."