Gaming - Page 1128

Project Cars is out today, with my version of the game currently downloading from Steam at a nice 10.4MB/sec. The HDD space required by Slightly Made Studios' driving game is just 17GB.

Comparing this to recent games like Titanfall which wanted 48GB of HDD space, or even GTA V which sucked up a huge 65GB, Project Cars is actually light on your HDD. Project Cars is one of the best looking games out right now, so expect a performance analysis from us on the game sometime next week. For now, this is a list of the recent games that have chewed up the most space on our storage:

Electronic Arts is reportedly "very happy" with Battlefield Hardline sales, according to CEO Andrew Wilson while speaking during a recent earnings call. EA didn't disclose how many copies of the game were sold since its March 17 release date, with the title available for the PC, Sony PlayStation 3 and PlayStation 4, Microsoft Xbox 360 and Xbox One.

Even though exact sales figures weren't released, it was announced that 80 percent of Hardline sales were for the PS4 and Xbox One.

"We're very happy with how well the game has sold to date, and more importantly, that we've brought many new fans into the Battlefield universe," Wilson noted.

Electronic Arts expects to sell a minimum of 9-10 million copies of Star Wars: Battlefront during its first fiscal year once it's released on November 17, according to EA CFO Blake Jorgensen. The game will launch for the Sony PlayStation 4, Microsoft Xbox One, and PC - and will ship right out of the gate with 12 multiplayer maps.

Star Wars: Battlefront is a major title launch that will be just in time for the holidays, and there is little room for error. The company says it has learned from its mistakes related to a rocky launch of Battlefield 4, and doesn't believe those issues will be repeated this time around.

"We learned a lot coming out of Battlefield 4," Jorgensen said during a quarterly investor call. "We've launched a lot of large-scale titles on our infrastructure [since BF4], like Dragon Age: Inquisition and Battlefield Hardline... we've been making significant investments into core infrastructure in security and stability."

As seen in a recent press release, Garena has developed a subsidiary called Frostburn Studios and taken over the management and game development of Heroes of Newerth (HoN) from S2 Games.

This move aligns with the fifth anniversary of HoN as this online multiplayer game still sees a large popularity within many eastern countries.

Known as one of the biggest 'MOBA' style games before the birth of League of Legends and Dota2, HoN has seen a small decline in recent years marked around the time of their 2013 'HoN Tour' finals. It has remained quite popular in Asia however with Garena picking up the game and naming the popular community figure Brad Bower as their head.

Parents of school-aged children might very well be aware of the increasingly popular 'Disney Infinity' gaming franchise, which merges collectible figurines with a gaming environment - but the latest version might even interest a few parents! Disney have announced the third iteration of the series will include characters from the 'Star Wars' franchise, along with 'Avengers: Age of Ultron', the upcoming Pixar animation 'Inside Out' and 'Tron Legacy'.

Accompanying the release will be collectible figures, including Obi-Wan Kenobi, Yoda, Darth Maul, Darth Vader, Han Solo and Chewbacca, which will be backwards compatible with previous versions of the series.

Disney Infinity 3.0 will hit stores in the fourth quarter, ahead of the December release of the latest 'Star Wars' film, 'The Force Awakens'.

PC gamers are being prepared for Killing Floor 2 with its minimum and recommended requirements for your PC, where you'll need a dual-core processor from Intel or AMD to play.

On top of that, VGA requirements aren't too bad with Tripwire requiring an NVIDIA GeForce GTS 250 or AMD Radeon HD 4350, 3GB of RAM and a 64-bit version of Windows 7 or higher to play Killing Floor 2. They do recommend an Intel Core 2 Quad Q9550 or AMD Phenom II 450 processor, an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560 or AMD Radeon HD 6950, 4GB of RAM and a 64-bit version of Windows 7 or higher.

As for the PlayStation 4 version of Killing Floor, the team are targeting 1080p 60FPS, with the studio explaining that they already have it running at 1080p 60FPS on the PC on a wide variety of hardware. Alan Wilson, VP of Tripwire Interactive, said: "Its a TARGET. Will we achieve it? Don't know - but we've already got the game running on a pretty broad spectrum of hardware on the PC".

The sequel to Titanfall is coming, thanks to EA's latest earnings call revealing some information on Titanfall 2. EA said that Titanfall 2 wouldn't be coming until at least 2H 2016, or closer to 2017.

Blake Jorgensen, EA's Chief Financial Officer, said in a response to a question about Titanfall 2: "You should assume that's not in fiscal '16; it's more likely in fiscal '17". With EA's fiscal 2017 running from April 1, 2016 to March 31, 2017. Respawn Entertainment, the studio behind Titanfall 2, has said that the sequel to the mech-based first-person shooter would be "multiplatform" teasing that it would arrive on the PS4.

The original Titanfall was released onto the Xbox 360, Xbox One and PC, but never made it to Sony's consoles. Titanfall 2, when it's released, should reach the Xbox One, PS4 and PC.

EA and DICE have been teasing a sequel to Mirror's Edge since mid-2013, but fast forward to now and we finally get a release window of early 2016 for the parkour-style title.

Electronic Arts has said that Mirror's Edge 2 will be out in Q1 2016, with EA saying that Mirror's Edge 2 "reboots the franchise for the next generation". Last year, Senior Producer on Mirror's Edge 2, Sara Jansson, said: "I wanted to let you know that the game is progressing nicely and I think you're going to love it. I know many of you probably wish we would show more of the game, but we're still pretty early in development and our passionate core Mirror's Edge team is working full on to make the best game possible".

Mirror's Edge 2 launches for the Xbox One, PS4 and PC in early-2016.

In a bid to increase sales and show off some features, NVIDIA is offering The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt and Batman: Arkham Knight as a bundle with their GeForce GTX 970 and 980 model cards from participating retailers. If you're looking into the GTX 960 or a notebook containing the GTX 980M or 970M you'll receive a code for The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt only.

The codes for these games can be activated through Steam and are counted as pre-orders, meaning you can download and install the game before the official launch date.

These titles have been chosen due to them allowing NVIDIA's GameWorks technology, enabling new features such as HairWorks in The Witcher 3, PhysX-accellerated cloth effects and destruction plus HBAO+ in both available games.

Mobile gaming is an absolutely huge business, as smartphones and tablets continue to reach new phone owners across the world. Game software revenue is expected to generate $88 billion revenue in 2015, and surpass $110 billion in 2018, according to the Digi-Capital intelligence firm.

The mobile market is expected to draw more interest than console games, but Steam PC titles and free-to-play game titles weren't included in the research.

"Where mobile games will take $3 of every $10 spent by gamers on software in 2015, that figure will go up to $4 out of every $10 by 2018," said Tim Merel, founder and managing director of Digi-Capital, in a report. "Mobile games revenue will grow from $29 billion in 2015 to $45 billion by 2018 at 15 percent annual growth."

Sega won't have a large presence at the E3 gaming conference in Los Angeles next month, choosing not to have a booth.

Earlier in the year, Sega announced it was going to restructure, which includes moving its San Francisco office down to southern California - and any Sega games at the show will be hosted by its industry partners.

"Over the next months, Sega of America will be focusing on the restructure and relocation to southern California, and we have decided to not attend E3 with our own booth this year," a Sega spokesman told Game Informer.

After years of development and heartbreaking delays lately, Project Cars is set for release on May 7. Slightly Mad Studios and Bandai Namco have released the launch trailer for Project Cars, which you can watch below.

At the same time, they have come out with many more details on the game, with Project Cars having the "largest track roster of any racing game with 110+ unique locations". Not only that, but there's dynamic weather, dynamic time of day, "world-class graphics running at 60FPS with up to 45 drivers on-screen" and "next-gen physics running at 600FPS and deep telemetry & tuning features".

With support for over 30 steering wheels, the Oculus Rift and even Project Morpheus for the PS4, Project Cars is one of the most technologically equipped games of the last decade.

John Romero, Doom and Quake game designer at id Software in the 1990s, believes modders should be allowed to receive payment for their efforts. The recent discussion has come back to life following news that Valve included, and then removed Steam paid mods - gamers seem more inclined to be able to donate to modders, but don't want to be forced to pay.

"I've always believed that mod makers should be able to make money from their creations," said Romero, when speaking to GamesIndustry International. Remember, Quake was the stepping stone for the Team Fortress mod, which eventually led to the Team Fortress 2 sequel.

Romero's team came up with an idea that was later abandoned leading up to the original Quake launch: "In 1995, while we were making Quake, we had the idea to start a company called id Net. This company would be the portal that players would connect to and play other mod maker's creations. It was to be a curated site, levels and mods chosen by us at id, and if we put your content on our network we would pay you an amount equal to the traffic that your content drove to the site."

Nintendo has publicly apologized for its continued struggle to keep Amiibos, little plastic figurines based on popular Nintendo characters, in adequate supply for gamers. For gamers trying to find their favorite Amiibo, some will admittedly be easier to find than others in the foreseeable future.

"We may continue to see consumer demand outpace supply levels for certain characters at times, but we will do our best to prevent that from happening," Nintendo said in a press statement. "As our library of amiibo continues to grow, some figures will be easier to find than others. We are constantly looking for the opportunity to reissue amiibo and are already making plans to bring back some currently out-of-stock Amiibo figures. Stay tuned for details."

The gaming company wasn't as proactive as needed when updating gaming fans, and said it will work to resolve those problems. A chaotic labor dispute also led to major delays along west coast shipping ports, which also added to supply problems for Nintendo.

With Batman: Arkham Knight inching closer to release, we're finding out more and more about what the DLC will include post-release. In one of the dedicated "story expansion" releases for the game, Batgirl will become a playable character.

The downloadable chapter will be called "Batgirl: A Matter of Family" and has been described by WB Games as "an all new prequel story expansion in an entirely new location". Batman won't be missing out with the DLC though, with new story missions that will be "featuring legendary super-villains" and "Gotham City Stories" that will provide "key allies" of The Batman "in narrative missions extending their storylines" before and after what takes place in Arkham Knight.

Batgirl and Batman won't be the only playable characters in Arkham Knight, with Robin, Catwoman and Nightwing to be all playable in the game as part of Arkham Knight's "dual play" character-switching feature that will let you switch between Batman and his various allies.

We have been hearing about DirectX 12 all week thanks to Microsoft's Build Developer Conference, with Square Enix showing off one of the most visually impressive tech demos ever. We've heard that the adoption rate of DX12 has been the highest in a decade, and that with Multiadapter mode in DX12, discrete and integrated GPUs can work together for added performance.

Microsoft and Square Enix showed off the Luminous demo running on a Digital Storm PC powered by four NVIDIA GeForce GTX Titan X video cards, and to prove that it was pre-rendered footage, the presenter paused the demo and moved the camera around in the Luminous engine, in real time. The video above is an amazing tease of what's to come from Square Enix, their Luminous engine, and DirectX 12.

Square Enix teased their DX12 powered "Luminous" engine, with the developer adding that it wasn't hard to get Luminous working in Microsoft's next-gen API. Ivan from Square Enix was asked if the developer faced any issues getting DX12 to work under Luminous, to which he replied: "I think it took around three weeks to get the basic rendering working, and comparing this to my previous experience with implementing a new graphics API layer, I would say it was quite straight forward. However I have to mention that this wasn't a direct port and it wasn't using many of the unique of D3D12. Going forward I think we're going to adjust some of our systems in the engine to better match D3D12".

DirectX 12 is shaping up to be a real shift in PC gaming, with Microsoft talking more about its next-gen API at the Build Developer Conference last week.

The Redmond-based OS giant has said that adoption rate of DX12 is the fastest since DX9, with more and more developers jumping onto DX12 early. Microsoft's Principal DirectX Development Lead, Max McMulle, has said: "this [DX12] has been the fastest adoption of the Direct3D API we've seen since Direct3D 9. It's been the fastest adopted API in more than a decade".

We also reported yesterday on DirectX 12's Multiadapter technology, which joins integrated and discrete GPUs for increased performance. McMulle discussed that, where he explained: "This feature exposes direct control of two linked GPUs as well. So you might have known as Crossfire or SLI from AMD and NVIDIA, respectively, but you'll get direct control of both GPUs in DX12 if you so choose".

We heard about a new Battletoads game being in development a while ago now, but since then, nothing. Now the rumors are popping back up, with Rare teasing that they will be showing something off at E3 2015 in June.

Rare's Creative Director Simon Woodroffe took to Twitter to confirm that the developer will be unveiling their new title at E3 2015, saying "E3 will tell the world what Gregg Mayles new project is about". He added that the new game is not a Kinect title, which is nice to hear.

Which game could we see Rare unveil? It could be a new Battletoads or Banjo Kazooie, which could spur some serious sales and enthusiasm for the Xbox One platform at E3 2015. Especially something like Battletoads, which has become a cult classic since it launched. The amount of hours I pumped into that game with my brother... I would almost buy an Xbox One just for that game if Rare do unveil it. What do you want to see more? Banjo Kazooie, Battletoads, or something completely new?

Microsoft plans to stagger the launch of Windows 10 later this year, with PCs receiving the new OS, and then smartphones, and other platforms at a later date.

The Xbox One game console, Internet of Things, HoloLens, and other services will have to wait - and it won't be the same user experience as a PC - but we'll have to wait and see what happens. Some gamers have questioned if users will be able to stream games from a PC to Xbox One, since Microsoft already confirmed gamers will be able to stream from the Xbox One to the PC.

Fable Legends, a free-to-play game that will be available before the end of the year, will support cross-platform streaming.

We've known for a while that DirectX 12 will be providing some serious gains in performance, as well as the ability to join GPUs and their VRAM, but over the last few days we've been learning more about DX12 thanks to Microsoft's Build 2015 conference.

The company showcased their new DirectX 12 "Multiadapter" feature, something that allows unused hardware inside of a PC to be fully utilized. This provides the ability to use integrated GPUs on CPUs - something that would otherwise be completely unused - to be utilized alongside the GPU for additional performance.

This premise isn't anything new, as the likes of AMD, LucidLogix Virtu and other technologies have tried this - but it has never taken off like DX12 will. Microsoft's new DirectX 12 Multiadapter technology creates a specialized coherent link between every GPU available inside of the PC, and lets them work together to provide as much performance as possible.