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Saturday, May 8, 2021
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Nintendo Super Smash Bros. Will Be Released This Summer

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super-smash-bros Details of the the long anticipated and waited for new installment from Nintendo, Super Smash Bros. were revealed by the series creator Masahiro Sakurai in a video that not only provided the avid gamers with specs and features, but also with release dates, and we are using the plural because Nintendo Super Smash Bros. is coming in a 3DS version this summer, while a Wii U version is planned to be released sometimes in the colder season, fall or winter, depending on what source you choose to consult. The main point however, is that both games will bless the gaming community in 2014 and, if you are a fan of Nintendo, we are sure the details will please you a lot.

Both Nintendo Super Smash Bros. versions will come with a 60 frames per second running feature, different from the previous versions, while the less good news is that some in-game features will still run at 30 frames per second, and the examples include Pokemon and Assist Trophies.

Are you going to playing Nintendo Super Smash Bros. For Fun or For Glory?

Don’t raise your eyebrow, as the question is legit: For Fun and For Glory are the two modes of play you can choose from, no matter the game version you’re opting for. For Fun mode features randomly picked stages with all power – ups and items being available, while your loses won’t be recorded to your profile. The For Glory mode features a Final Destination stage where variations are available, but lacks the platforms, the elevated areas or the items. In this clear, fair battle, both your wins and your loses will be added to your profile.

The Nintendo Super Smash Bros. will also feature some of the oldies but goldies characters, a bunch of new and improved ones and a a lot of other specs and features to please the gaming community. You will have a new Pokemon, a new version of Yoshi and many other surprises. One of the most important aspects of the new games is that

both the Wii U and Nintendo 3DS versions of Super Smash Bros. will offer online multiplayer game play with other players on the same platform. Players with broadband Internet access can battle it out with anyone else who is online and also has the game.

Summer is not far from us and while you’re getting ready to enter the battlefield, put your skills to the test with 3DS model in the wait for the Wii U version.

 

Oculus Rift developers gain $75 million in funding ahead of release

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oculus-rift The Oculus Rift has been in development before the Kickstarter project landed last year, but it is still not available to the public and the only place to really check the virtual reality headset out is at various trade shows and gaming events where it is likely to be available to try.

In many ways the Oculus Rift shares the same story as Google Glass, two companies trying to reinvent how we consume media – on the Oculus Rift side, you have games and on the Google Glass side, you have social networking and other features a smartphone may use.

This is not the first time the Oculus Rift developers have asked for funding, recently grabbing $100 million on top of the funding from Kickstarter. They have now grabbed $75 million, apparently to fund the launch of the Oculus Rift and to market it out to gamers.

Users of the Oculus Rift say it is an immersive experience, better than anything on VR headset previously. The development team have put a lot into making the SDK and hardware feel right and work incredibly well and soon it may be in the hands of game developers to make great games.

Oculus Rift is running on open source software and it should be easy for developers to get into the swing of things – perhaps it will take a little bit of time before any developers brings out a truly immersive game that feels better on the Oculus Rift than any other platform, simply due to the immersion.

We still have no clear date on when the Oculus Rift will be available to buy, without any restrictions and “beta” words being thrown about – like Google Glass it shares a unique goal of becoming as great as possible before being unleashed on the public, for better or worse.

Microsoft sells two million Xbox One consoles in 18 days

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After the remarkable one million orders both Microsoft and Sony chimed in one day after the consoles release, it is a little disappointing to see it has taken an extra seventeen days for the Xbox One to double on its sales, although there is all the pre-orders to be taken into account and the lack of consoles actually available without huge delay.

This is the first real statistic on console sales since day one from Microsoft, when Sony revealed it had sold 2.1 million consoles Microsoft proceeded to answer that stat with how many zombies have been killed in their Dead Rising 3 exclusive game, a pretty useless statistic.

Microsoft is hitting around 111,000 sales per day, a record breaking amount according to their PR department. The demand is actually exceeding their expectations in all 13 markets the Xbox One is available in, according to Yusuf Mehdi.

PS4 seems to be off to an early lead but the markets have got to be taken into consideration, Sony had a bad start with the console only being available in the US and Canada, while the Xbox One came to all thirteen markets in one push.

Sales are not a huge deal in the early world when it comes to console launches, many gamers will not want to pick up the new consoles due to high-price and not a lot of games that really take advantage of the new consoles horsepower.

We have seen sparks of genius on the next generation, Tom Clancy: The Division, No Mans Sky, Destiny and Titanfall all have very impressive mechanics, physics, power and graphics showing what the next generation can run and is capable of running without flaws.

Off the bat, most of the games on the Xbox One and PS4 seem average at best, Killzone and Knack on the PS4 have both had less than favourable reviews and Dead Rising 3 has been reviewed without anyone getting overly excited about the power of the game.

Microsoft sells one million Xbox One units in twenty-four hours

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xbox-oneMicrosoft has almost cloned the announcement Sony made a week ago, revealing one million Xbox One sales in the first twenty-four hours. This is a pretty incredible announcement, especially considering the Xbox One coming a week later than the PS4.

This is a lot more impressive considering the Xbox One is only currently available in 13 markets and has missed out on Japan and other very video-game focused areas of the world that Sony has been able to tap, though both consoles are not available in Japan until 2014.

In addition to the late launch and small regional launch, the Xbox One also costs $100 extra as it comes with Kinect. We are not sure how much Microsoft rounded up the Xbox One unit sales, but on the same side Sony could have rounded up PS4 sales.

Microsoft has always had a stronger foot in the US market against Sony, who normally do better in Asia. This generation, both console manufacturers have left Asia out and Microsoft has put the Xbox One out into the European market earlier.

This may have been vital for early sales in Europe, especially with the move to have the Xbox One and a free copy of FIFA 14 shipped out to all Europeans. Microsoft has been criticised for being anti-consumer in the long run up to the launch of the two consoles, but it looks like the end results pitch both console manufacturers level in sales.

Both consoles are suffering from a lack of games at the launch, the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One are both suffering from a lack of solid exclusives and the ones available have had meagre reviews – leading many to wonder if buying a console in 2013 is worth the money.

This may have made a few consumers sour about the next generation, but with both getting one million sales in 24 hours and a few more million before Christmas, we can see plenty of developers wanting to get their biggest titles out on the consoles.

Call of Duty: Ghosts hits $1 billion in day one sales

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call-of-duty-ghostsRockstar Games exceeded all expectations when they launched Grand Theft Auto V and had already made $800 million in revenue from the game after three days, Activision has now trumped this number, announcing $1 billion in sales on the first day.

Call of Duty: Ghosts is the newest in the CoD franchise, one of the biggest gaming series in the world. Activision and Infinity Ward have talked in detail about new features added to the video game, but early reviews and first impressions hit the game for weak graphics and no ambition.

That has not stopped millions of fans grabbing the game on day one. Activision have pushed the game out to as many platforms as possible, although the dominate one will probably be Xbox 360, the hub for all Call of Duty games this past decade.

Other platforms Call of Duty: Ghosts will be on include the PS3, Wii U, PC and will be coming to the Xbox One and PlayStation 4. Activision has added some new multiplayer game modes but already people are stopping similarities and reworks of all games, pointing at Infinity Ward not trying their hardest for the next generation platform.

With the end of the seventh console era about to come to the a close, more and more games are hitting peak audiences. The Xbox 360 and PS3 each share around 80 million users and Microsoft reported around half of those 80 million are Xbox Live Gold Members.

This means game developers have a unique opportunity to reach an unparalleled size audience. The next generation consoles may take a few years to become the first party platform for many game titles, with the developers instead finding more success and revenue on the older generation.

Activision will be a big part of the next generation, their game in collaboration with Bungie is set to shake the console world. Destiny is a huge open world futuristic RPG and there are plenty of other open world games taking advantage of the new consoles power, including Tom Clancy: The Division, Elder Scrolls Online and Dead Rising 3.

Grand Theft Auto V surpasses 30 million sales in a month

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grand-theft-auto-vTake Two Interactive announced its best quarter in the history of the company, thanks to Rockstar Games’ hugely successful Grand Theft Auto V, the fifth expansion to the GTA series and the biggest one yet, already surpassing its predecessor by around five million sales.

It has not been a great year for the gaming industry in terms of sales, with the industry getting hit hard, forcing some companies like THQ to fold and others like EA to drop a large work force and some studios to make up for poor revenues.

Grand Theft Auto V seems to be the game everyone was waiting for on the consoles, the perfect end to the long seventh-generation. The video game has been almost universally applauded as some of Rockstar’s finest work, connecting a huge fruitful world with an immersive and humorous story.

Any doubts on Rockstars ability to smash the hype have been flushed away with Grand Theft Auto V. The studio may be capable of taking on even grander games in the future and returning to old franchises like Bully and L.A. Noire, two other critically acclaimed games from the studio.

We are not sure what the split is between Xbox 360 and PS3 on the sales side, but reports a few weeks ago showed PlayStation 3 sales were up after the Grand Theft Auto V bundle had been advertised almost everywhere, pushing sales past the dominant Xbox 360.

Either way, this is definitely one of the biggest selling games on both platforms, the current leaders on the two platforms being Grand Turismo 5 on the PS3 and Call of Duty: Black Ops on the Xbox 360, both hitting just over 10 million sales.

On all consoles, Grand Theft Auto V is only beaten by games bundled with consoles and just a few million behind is GTA V, the forth expansion. This shows Rockstar’s dominance when it comes to gamers and we wonder how many more will grab the game when it comes out for PC.

Xbox One dashboard revealed in new promotional video

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xbox-oneMicrosoft may be suffering from the lack of good publicity on the Xbox One, but this new promotional video looks to show the depth of content available on the Xbox One and the ability to push between one app and another without the long delays.

The new promotional video shows a user shifting through movies, TV, gaming and chat through voice commands on the Kinect. The user goes from a movie on Pacific Rim to the Activity Feed, then joins a game of Titanfall and is able to record some gameplay and share online.

Ability to switch and snap between different apps allows the user to move from Titanfall to TV and then answer a Skype video call to chat. This is all done through the voice command service and it seems to work incredibly well, although this is a promo video and we must not expect this to run as smoothly.

This will be appealing to some but others who resent the Kinect functionality will not find this impressive, even if the technology behind it runs smoothly and can be useful in some situations, the promotion does show a lot of features a little too quick, making it look like the user has ADHD.

The Xbox One is Microsoft’s push into one design aesthetic, promoting the Windows 8 metro design. The Start platform may not be the most widely adopted yet, but some users are starting to sink into it with Windows 8.1 changes.

We can see the functionality on the Xbox One being able to rival what Sony has put forward with the PS4, even if the console battle is being won by Sony at the moment. Indie games, DRM and other drama has overshadowed the actual consoles and it is going to be nice to see the reviews of both systems, to see which one can come out on top.

Sony teases 24 exclusive titles for the PS4 launch

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ps4The PS4 is drawing ever closer and despite some problems with shipping delays on Amazon and other retailers the company is still ready for the biggest launch in the past decade, dwarfing the previous console generation.

Even though the PS4 has crushed the Xbox One on current pre-orders, Sony still feels like they still need to brag about exclusives on the platform, the one place they may be trumped by Microsoft who have picked up a collection of video game studios.

There will be 24 exclusive titles on the PS4, some are from big household studios like KillZone: Shadow Fall, Driveclub, The Order 1886, Infamous: Second Son and Knack. There are some others in the mix and the launch lineup looks pretty decent.

Comparing it to the Xbox One, it does seem a little lacklustre, with Microsoft grabbing Crimson Dragon, Dead Rising 3, Fable Legends, Forza Motorsport 5, Killer Instinct, Ryze: Son of Rome, Quantum Break and Sunset Overdrive.

The exclusives may be one reason to buy a console, but the biggest games will be coming out on both machines and we have a huge list of titles for the late-2013 to early 2014 launch, including DayZ, Final Fantasy XV: A Realm Reborn, Battlefield 4, The Crew, The Elder Scrolls Online, Thief, Watch Dogs, Destiny and a whole load of other top games.

This is the season for games and we are sure a lot of studios are putting their finest hours into creating content for the new consoles. Ubisoft have been particularly frantic about the new console launches, developing around half a dozen games around the launch period, including four of the top games.

Sony and Microsoft will be launching their next generation consoles on November. The early days may be won by Sony, but we can see the Xbox One appealing to a lot of fans, especially if the company manages to grab more exclusives.

Valve’s three announcements: Steam OS, Machine and Controller

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steam-controllerValve has made three important announcements regarding the Steam ecosystem and they all seem to configure around the idea of making a PC console, similar to the Xi3 Piston released a few months ago.

This move has been rumored for a while now, with the Steam ecosystem becoming a large flowing mess of indies and AAA studios building games to run on really powerful PC hardware.

Some believed Valve’s third announcement would be three new games for Steam, these would be Half Life 3, Portal 3 and Left 4 Dead 3. This is a little fantasy many have had for a while and it may still be possible when Valve implements all the hardware and software to create the perfect Steam Box.

Essentially Valve will build everything, Steam OS is a Linux-based gaming operating system, similar to Android but for games, not mobile. Valve will work on Linux and develop a gaming user interface familiar and simple for users, we could see this bootloaded as a second OS.

They will then built a Steam Machine (or Box) with different component options, like a normal computer range the price will start at around $499 for the cheap model all the way up to the thousands for a premium build. Valve has said they will cut the price with video game optimisation.

The controller is the third announcement and allows users to play Steam games without using the keyboard and mouse. Keyboard and mouse are seen as the elite gaming controller simply because of the accuracy, precision and amount of buttons, but most casual console gamers prefer the gamepad.

The Steam controller is a new peripheral that tries to mimic the mouse for older games, with two buttons for the mouse clickers and two rounded haptic sensors for movement, instead of the traditional analogue sticks.

This is a big move by Valve to enter the living room, as the next generation consoles are preparing to launch. The question is will Valve have any exciting exclusives for Steam, ones that run much better on the Steam Machine – we will have to wait and see.

Rockstar Games earns $800 million in Grand Theft Auto 5 day one sales

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grand-theft-auto-vRockstar Games has been well known for their big expansive open world games, with Red Dead Redemption, Grand Theft Auto, Max Payne, Bully and L.A. Noire all hitting critical acclaim for their vast openness and creative world.

The biggest series is definitely still Grand Theft Auto, with San Andreas hitting huge amounts of sales and still selling on XBLA today and Grand Theft Auto IV making huge amounts of money in the first few weeks.

Grand Theft Auto 5 has already overshadowed both games in terms of early sales and any game in recent memory, with Rockstar Games earning $800 million on opening day for the fifth in the GTA series.

Considering the game took Rockstar Games $250 million to make, the biggest budget for any type of media (films, games, music) it is the biggest bet that has already paid off, with almost four times the original investment paid.

Take Two Interactive, the studio owner, has said this is the biggest game ever sold under the company branch and it is looking to become the most successful game of all time, eclipsing the likes of Minecraft in revenue already.

There are major factors that have come into play to make Grand Theft Auto 5 so successful, the huge fan-base, releasing it on Xbox and PS3 to around 150 million potential buyers and keeping silent about releases for next generation consoles.

It has currently sold about fifteen million copies worldwide and the way it is going we wouldn’t be surprised to see another twenty million from Grand Theft Auto 5, even more if they release solid DLC like they did with GTA IV.

As for the game itself, reviewers have been calling Grand Theft Auto 5 a masterpiece, Rockstar Games finest work and a commitment to showing older consoles can still pump out incredibly good, powerful and large games with breaking the console.