Gaming - Page 1125

With The Order: 1886 doing quite well as an exclusive to the PlayStation 4, developer Ready At Dawn, has some money to spend. The Irvine, California-based studio has just announced it has hired Blizzard's Chief Operating Officer, Paul Sams, as well as the expansion of its operations found in Austin, Texas.

Ready At Dawn has also said that it's in the process of finding a partner that will inject funds into the studio so that it can continue to create projects "of the transmedia IPs that we create" adds the developer. The company wrote on its official website of the news, with Ready At Dawn's co-founder and CEO Ru Weerasuriya saying: "It is never easy finding someone to take over the reins of a company after this many years, but I cannot think of anyone better suited to guide the team as we look to the future. He is one of the most accomplished, respected and experienced leaders in our industry".

Sams enjoyed a very successful run over at Blizzard, where he "played a key role in guiding the company from less than 50 employees to over 4,000 and to grow company value well in excess of $5 billion", writes Ready At Dawn. Sams was responsible for many of Blizzard's biggest games and services, such as World of Warcraft, Diablo, Warcraft, StarCraft, Battle.net, Hearthstone, Heroes of the Storm and Overwatch. Sams himself added: "Ready at Dawn is one of the best pure game developers in the industry. After 12 years, they remain an independent developer true to their craft of creating gameplay in unique and immersive worlds filled with engaging characters and experiences".

Bethesda unveiled Fallout 4 last week, with some beautiful graphics and a world that will beat the size of Skyrim considerably. But it's the news that it 'will never work' on the Xbox 360 or PlayStation 3 that should have gamers happy.

Bethesda says that Fallout 4 "looks amazing" visually, and this is thanks to the studio coding the game for the current generation Xbox One and PS4 consoles, as well as PC. This obviously means they had to leave behind the previous generation Xbox 360 and PS3, but this is for a good reason - to allow the game to look as good as it does.

Project Cars has been one of the most talked about games of the year, with Slightly Mad Studios announcing that they have sold over one million copies since it was released a month ago.

The studio, together with publisher Bandai Namco, released a statement with SMS head Ian Bell saying: "Throughout the development of Project CARS the community were instrumental in guiding the game - giving us feedback daily on each build iteration, telling us what needed improving, highlighting what they'd like to see included, and ultimately approving it as the racing game of their dreams. Even with this amount of early indication that the bold, ambitious vision we had was on track to be something that would truly stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the existing leading titles in the genre, it wasn't until the first review scores came in that we truly realised how much Project CARS had resonated with both media, racing professionals, and gamers alike around the world".

He continued: "To now stand here having reached over a million players in such a short time really justifies the work both the team and the community have done over the years and solidifies Project CARS' future as the multi-platform racing experience of choice for fans around the world. And we'll be talking more about that future very, very soon".

Microsoft plans to launch a new Xbox One bundle featuring a console unit with 1TB of storage and the shiny new controller with a 3.5mm audio jack.

There was a brief listing on Amazon for the console bundle, which includes The Master Chief Collection for $400, but it has been removed. The Amazon listing noted that the "item will be released on June 15, 2015," which means a public announcement is expected during E3.

Although 1TB of storage may seem like overkill for game consoles, it could become a necessity with the rise of downloadable content. Destiny weighs in at 25GB, while Batman: Arkham Knight will be 45GB - so you may want that larger storage space.

Set as a Kickstarter Staff Pick, this first person shooter project boasts the ability to make you "a pirate in space with friends online," allowing you to sail the seven.. err galaxies - alone or with companions.

Set for release on Steam (depending on Greenlight) with Microsoft Windows and Xbox One support, this game is focused on finding and boarding enemy player ships, seeing a large team split up into 4-5 player sub-teams in order to combat and take over an enemy ship from within - full-on pirate style!

This is claimed to be 100% skill based with no pay to win and opens up the doors to competitive PvP, custom matches versus AI or offline modes.

Microsoft and the Xbox team expect Windows 10 to become a solid overall operating system, but have special plans in regards to gaming. The company is removing middleware added to games for Windows Live, and expects to provide a better streamlined experience for gamers. However, there are plenty of other features that should excite gamers moving forward:

The idea that Xbox will be integrated into Windows 10 is another clear indicator that Microsoft wants to push Windows 10 forward - and hopefully generate extra interest in the Xbox One. Windows 10 is the "best version of Windows ever for both gamers and developers alike," and that will become clearer during the company's E3 event later this month.

"We weren't fully committed as a company, and I've said that before," said Phil Spencer, head Xbox executive, while speaking to PC Gamer. "We made commitments to developers and consumers that I don't feel we lived up to... the key difference now is that the Xbox team is driving the Windows and console gaming efforts as one connected ecosystem."

Fallout 4 will take place in post-apocalyptic Boston, with all of us starting out trying to escape Vault 111. Bethesda Softworks teased Fallout by launching a website with a countdown clock on Tuesday, and hasn't disappointed. Here is Fallout 4's first new trailer:

Fallout 4 will be available for the PC, Sony PlayStation 4 and Microsoft Xbox One. Interested gamers can pre-order the game, and some rumors predict the game available in time for Christmas this year.

Bethesda promised additional details during its showcase at E3 later this month.

Valve has introduced a refund policy for Steam purchases, with gamers allowed to "request a refund for nearly any purchase on Steam - for any reason." The offer is good for Steam purchases within 14 days and the game must have been played for less than two hours - all requests can be filed through the Steam support system.

The refunds apply to downloadable content, in-game purchases (for Valve-developed games), pre-purchased titles, bundles, and Steam Wallet purchases. Anyone banned by the Valve Anti-Cheat system are ineligible for refunds, and no refunds will be made on purchases outside of Steam, or on purchased movies or gifts.

Prior to this sudden change, Valve would only issue refunds under extreme circumstances, so this could be a welcome change for PC gamers.

The open-world first person survival horror game Dying Light has reached 4.5 million gamers, according to Techland.

Techland has released several Dying Light DLC packages for gamers, and it's possible an expansion could be developed one day. Even if the 4.5 million figure isn't actual game copies sold, it's still a major success for the studio.

"Sales [we] count later - we need time to calculate the sales and returns and so on," said Pawel Marchewka, CEO of Techland, in a statement to Eurogamer. "Unique users means all the unique users we calculated on the server playing the game for significant number of time. Sales might be slightly less because that includes also secondary sales."

We covered Ed Zarick's awesome laptop Xbox and PlayStation console mash-ups not too long ago and now he's back for more.

Titles the PLAYBOX 4 One Mk. II, this PlayStation 4 and Xbox One combo unit contains an upgraded 24" Vizio LED LCD screen.

His previous edition was such a success that event Wayne Brady from Lets Make a Deal called him up to place an order, which drew Zarick from Edsjunk.net to produce this advanced edition.

XCOM 2 will be a PC exclusive video game developed by Firaxis Games, and is being designed to be a full sequel to XCOM: Enemy Unknown. Here is a first glimpse of the game:

In the new game title, the XCOM will be the invading force responsible for securing resources and avoiding being eliminated by aliens. Over the next month, interested gamers will receive information about new soldier classes, what types of new enemies you'll be able to fight against, a mobile aircraft carrier, the gameplay environment, and other details.

2K Games is promising procedurally-generated levels that will provide a unique gaming experience to each of you individually. It should make for a rather interesting gaming experience, if it's done well.

Just how big is The Witcher 3? Huge. The RPG is so large that it has over 450,000 lines which required 950 speaking roles. Side, a voice production company, was hired to handle all of the voice roles in CD Projekt Red's ambitious RPG, where it took over two and a half years to record the dialogue alone.

Senior writer on The Witcher 3, Borys Pugacz-Muraszkiewicz, talked about the game's vocal directors, where he said: "masters of the human psyche and heart, with a keen ear for language in its many regional and social variations". So if you had any doubts in how massive in scale The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is, with two and a half years behind the game in voice recording alone, it makes it one of the biggest games of all time.

Sorry gaming fans, Microsoft Xbox chief Phil Spencer says the company isn't trying to purchase the Silent Hill game franchise from Konami.

Konami is focused on making changes internally, and will make mobile game development a priority moving forward - but that doesn't mean Microsoft can purchase Silent Hills.

"Konami will continue to embrace the challenge of creating entertainment content via different platforms," said Hideki Hayakawa, president of Konami, in a statement published by GameSpot. " Not only mobile platforms, but for home consoles, arcade units, and cards, to meet the changing needs of the times."

Carbine Studios has confirmed it will make its WildStar massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) a free-to-play game title.

When the game launched last June, it required a monthly subscription - Carbine Studios originally facing criticism to charge players - and it looks like things will change this fall. Developers watched how other similar games tried to make a transition from subscription to free-to-play and believe they will have time to work with players during the transition.

"WildStar is now a much better game than it was when it launched nearly a year ago," said Mike Donatelli, product director at Carbine Studios, in a statement to GameSpot. "We're at the point where it's time to really focus on growing the game, and we as a team feel that the best way to do that is to make it so that everyone who wants to play can do so with as few hurdles as possible. This means removing the two biggest barriers of entry to the game - the cost of the box and the required subscription."

Windows 10 isn't far away, and with it are the big benefits promised by DirectX 12. Slightly Mad Studios is promising even more with Project Cars running on DX12, where we should expect a huge 30-40% performance improvement with the next-gen API.

SMS boss Ian Bell has talked about the benefits of DirectX 12, where he said that the DX12 version of Project Cars will be 30-40% better, while the DX12 version of Project Cars on the Xbox One will see a smaller 7% boost. The DX12 patch for Project Cars is expected to drop at the end of the year, a few months after Windows 10 arrives.

Bell said that slower quad-core processors in PCs will see a ~40% boost thanks to DX12, as the API will handle multi-threading much better than DX11 does.

Take-Two Interactive CEO Strauss Zelnick believes the full potential of the Sony PlayStation 4 and Microsoft Xbox One haven't been fully realized yet. Take-Two has plenty of next-generation console games in the pipeline, including NBA 2K16, Borderlands 3, WWE 2K16, Battleborn, and others.

"We have yet to see entirely what the technology can allow," Zelnick said while speaking during the 43rd Annual Technology, Media & Telecom Conference. "We've had a couple releases for new-gen, but I don't think we remotely have seen what can be done, and that's super exciting. And that speaks to many of our titles; hopefully all of our titles, ultimately."

Meanwhile, PlayStation President Andrew House also expressed excitement that E3 2015 will feature new PS4 titles that really show what the console is capable of.

Strauss Zelnick, CEO of Take-Two Interactive, believes game studios must show their customers a bit of respect so they don't feel like they are being "robbed."

Speaking during the Annual Technology, Media & Telecom Conference, he spoke bluntly about the current state of the evolving gaming market: "You never want the consumer to feel as though you've picked their pocket," Zelnick recently said. "You want a consumer to feel like you gave them a great experience. You want them to be happy that they spent money on the experience."

Zelnick also discussed the controversial free-to-play ecosystem, which typically makes a game available for free - but the games are monetized based on microtransactions:

A prototype of a new Microsoft Xbox One controller hit the Internet a few days ago, and Austrian retailer Libro has unveiled what the device is expected to look like. The new unit will feature a 3.5mm headphone jack, with no other upgrades expected.

There are rumors the controller will be unveiled on June 8, which is before the E3 gaming conference in Los Angeles.

GameSpot received the following email from Microsoft earlier in the week: "We're gearing up for an exciting E3 where we'll showcase more games and experiences. We have nothing further to share at this time."

Now that Project Cars is out, gamers across the world have been pushing their systems and consoles to the limits playing one of the best looking games ever made. But it could soon get better.

According to Slightly Mad Studios boss, Ian Bell, the team has been working on the Xbox One version of the game to optimize its performance, as it has been suffering from stuttering problems. Bell added that Project Cars "loves" DirectX 12, and that the DX12-powered version of Project Cars will run "extremely well" on the Xbox One.

Bell said: "With DX12 the Xbox will perform extremely well for us. With the upcoming imminent patches it's already much better. We'll need to do some work of course but the way our engine is structured lends itself to the main benefits of DX12. We never said we'd run 30 cars at night in the rain at 60. We said the game runs at 60FPS, which it does. So Gran Turismo, but it drops to 20's under heavy action in the wet at night".

Despite being in production for years, the upcoming tie-in game to 'Mad Max: Fury Road' missed the theatrical release window for the film and is not slated to hit PS4, Xbox One and PC in September to co-incide with the Blu-ray release. But with the film getting rave reviews, Avalanche Studios are keen to keep the game in the consciousness of gamers and have now released an explosive new storyline trailer.

Officially announced at E3 2013, the 'Mad Max' game was originally intended to hit Windows, PS3, PS4, Xbox 360 and Xbox One platforms but now, the previous generation console versions have been abandoned.

'Mad Max' will be available in September.