New Games

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• I don't think that's Lon Lon Milk...
• Preview: Need For Speed: The Run 3DS
• Monkey Island collection coming to Europe this fall
• Neckbeard creates 3D printer in Minecraft
• Weekend Destructainment: Super train
• XSeed keen on Earth Seeker and Rodea, less keen on 3DS
• Tips and tricks for maximizing efficiency in Tiny Tower
• Preview: The Sims Medieval: Pirates and Nobles
• Weekend Mobile roundup: QuBIT, Two Worlds II CD and more
• Hands-on: Use gravity to pummel space pirates in Rochard
• Preview: Madden NFL 12
• Introducing That's So MMO!, a weekly MMO news column
• Preview: The Secret World
• Kids and weird ladies are all up on Rhythm Heaven Wii
• Is Mega Man Legends 3 going to get canceled?
• The Daily Hotness: BioShock Infinite

I don't think that's Lon Lon Milk... Posted: 09 Jul 2011 02:00 PM PDT This sign was found in front of the Atlantic Crossing pub in Seattle this week. I don't know what kind of scrape Link has gotten himself into for which a cup of coffee or possibly booze would lead to his salvation. Check the full image below to discover the sinister mastermind behind this ostentatious display. Taken at Atlantic Crossing, 7/4/11, U District, Seattle WA [So Seattle]

Preview: Need For Speed: The Run 3DS Posted: 09 Jul 2011 01:00 PM PDT When Need For Speed: The Run was premiered at EA’s E3 Press Conference back in June, it made quite an impression on the press and series fans. The one feature to stick out was the inclusion of the on foot sequences, which was seen as a bit tad irreverent from fans. But don’t worry, the 3DS version of the game focuses exclusively on the driving experience. Need For Speed: The Run (3DS) Developer: Firebrand Games Publisher: Electronic Arts To be released: November 15, 2011 For the most part, it follows the same plot as the console releases of the game. You play as Jack, a street racer forced into a high-stakes cross-country race from San Francisco to New York. Along the way you’ll race through locations like Las Vegas and Chicago, while evading police and facing off against rivals who will use any means necessary to take you out. Spread over 5 acts, the game’s narrative is played out in animated cutscenes drawn by artists from Marvel and DC Comics, which are all fully voiced. Being the first Need For Speed game that uses real locations, players will race across locations that will undoubtedly feel familiar to them. Featuring tracks that are loosely based off of actual city streets and highways, the game features over 20 different races from a variety of cities across the country. Visually, the game looks quite sharp overall. The game keeps a solid frame rate throughout, and the locations you’ll race through look stunning on the 3DS. However, what impressed me the most was the real time GPS map interface on the bottom screen. With full animation and all in real time, it’ll keep track of you and your rival drivers throughout the events. After playing through two different races types, I really noticed how tight the controls are. With limited use of the touch screen, the driving controls are primarily on the shoulder and face buttons. L and R controls brake and acceleration respectively, and the face buttons control drift and boosting. The analog pad is surprisingly tight for making turns and controlling your vehicle. Which was a relief considering the amount of obstacles, such as evading drivers and performing takedowns against your rivals. Even when going at high speeds, the controls feel just as smooth. Occasionally during races and events, the game will attempt to switch things up by throwing unique challenges your way. Some rival drivers during races will resort to dirty tricks, such as pulling out firearms, to throw you off your driving game. When this happens, the game will switch over to a short sequence where you have to swerve and weave using the analog pad to get out of the line of fire. Succeed and you’ll get a boost to your boost gauge, but fail, you’ll crash out and fall behind the other racers when you respawn. Another sequence that changes things up is when you come across extremely tight turns. Prior to making the turn, the bottom half of the screen will display a prompt for you to trace the logo for a U-turn. While clever, this particular sequence came off as a bit odd. Even knowing about it before hand, I still felt like I was caught off guard, and it felt awkward having to move away from the face buttons to the touch pad. It’s made worse by the very small window of opportunity you have to initiate trace. While I appreciate the attempts to switch things up, I felt that it took me out of the experience of being in a high-speed race. I couldn’t tell if there was a specific way to initiate these events during my playthrough, but what bothered me most is the jarring switch over. You’re in a race going over 100mph, then out of nowhere you switch over to the quasi-QTE sequence. Again, I appreciate the attempts to changes things up, but I feel that the execution could be better. Overall, I really liked what I got my hands on. The game is loaded with content that’ll keep you playing even after the finishing the main story or just sticking with the standard race types. Not to mention with the inclusion of the Autolog system, you’ll be able to complete new challenges, compete on the leaderboards, increase in driver ranking, unlock new cars, and race against friends in local multiplayer. To be released on Novemeber 15, Need For Speed: The Run looks to be another solid entry on the handheld side of the series. Plus, if you’re still put off by the on foot sections in the HD releases of the game, you’ll still at least have a version of the game that focuses purely on the driving.

Monkey Island collection coming to Europe this fall Posted: 09 Jul 2011 12:00 PM PDT The Monkey Island Special Edition Collection, which could possibly be the longest and most complicated name conceived for a videogame bundle, is coming to Europe as a retail release on September 9th, 2011. The Monkey Island Special Edition Collection (say that five times fast) will include The Secret of Monkey Island Special Edition (say that five times fast) and Monkey Island 2 Special Edition: LeChuck's Revenge (don't even bother to say that one out loud). The special editions of both games include new recorded dialog, hand-drawn graphics, enhanced controls, and a hint system for when you don't know that combining the chicken with the pulley is the proper solution. Monkey Island 2 features an optional audio commentary from Ron Gilbert, Tim Schafer, and Dave Grossman, the bizarre minds that made the original games. If getting two fantastic games isn't enough for you, LucasArts is adding some bonus content to sweeten the deal. You'll receive concept art and a soundtrack from both special editions. LucasArts was working with Industrial Light & Magic on an animated Monkey Island movie, which was never released, and you'll get to see some concept art and storyboards from that too. LucasArts hasn't specified the pricing of this combo deal yet, and there is no word on a North American release. The Monkey Island Special Edition Collection will be available on PC, Xbox 360, and PlayStation 3.

Neckbeard creates 3D printer in Minecraft Posted: 09 Jul 2011 11:30 AM PDT more videos like this Minecraft is probably the single most successful indie game ever made. It has sold almost 3 million copies, and it isn't even out yet. It's success is well-earned, though. Mojang created a remarkably simple tool set and let players run wild. We've already seen a fully functional computer, loads of pixel art and even the planet earth. Now we have yet another example of obscenely imaginative people with perhaps a tad too much time on their hands. Shrogg2 has created a 3D printer using red stone and pistons. It's really interesting to watch, and I must admit I'm thoroughly impressed with his knowledge of electrical engineering. As Minecraft gets closer and closer to its full release, I'm excited to see what else people will come up with. I'm half expecting people to cure cancer, solve the energy crisis and invent faster-than-light travel with their own animal-based space program.

Weekend Destructainment: Super train Posted: 09 Jul 2011 11:00 AM PDT more videos like this You Minecraft people are insane. Seriously, I would have lost interest as soon as I cleared the floor for the ground work. Still, an amazing site to see. Solid Snake does Hamlet, Final Fantasy gets all stop motion-y, Falco saves Princess Peach, more cosplay from Anime Expo 2011 and The Legend of Zelda gets dubstepped. Solid Snake does Hamlet. more videos like this Badass Final Fantasy stop motion fight between Cloud and Sephiroth. more videos like this Falco saves Princess Peach. Spotted on GoNintendo. more videos like this Some more cosplay from Anime Expo 2011. more videos like this The Legend of Zelda theme dubstep remix. Spotted on GoNintendo. more videos like this

XSeed keen on Earth Seeker and Rodea, less keen on 3DS Posted: 09 Jul 2011 09:30 AM PDT XSeed are the guys that brought JU-ON, Little King's Story, Rune Factory Frontier, and Fragile Dreams to the Wii. They're also the U.S. publisher for Retro Game Challenge, Flower Sun, and Rain and the upcoming Solatorobo on the DS. In short, they have the love of videogames and marketing savy needed to take the weird Japanese titles that other U.S. developers don't have the guts to publish, and make them profitable in the West. If it weren't for the fact that Pandora's Tower, The Last Story, and Xenoblade are Nintendo products, I'm sure they'd be working to snatch that gravy up and bring it to the Western Wii audience posthaste. Instead, XSeed will be keeping a close eye on two other Wii titles; the post apocalyptic RPG Earth Seeker, and Yuji Naka's next big project, Rodea: The Sky Soldier. I'm really looking forward to playing those two, and as long as they don't totally bomb in Japan, it sounds like XSeed is feeling pretty optimistic about the publishing the both of them. The same can't be said for games on the 3DS. According to Ken Berry, director of publishing at XSeed "We are looking at some 3DS titles, but for now I don’t think we’re ready to jump into that market just yet unless the perfect opportunity comes by. We’re still sort of sitting back and watching how the market plays out on the 3DS." Mr Berry sounds a lot more optimistic about the PS Vita- "If we could be there at the launch of Vita, that would be absolutely great for us. It just seems like a natural transition from all of the PSP work we’ve been doing recently to be able to move on to Sony’s next handheld platform." This isn't the first time I've heard a publisher voice caution towards the 3DS. Failing to hit Nintendo's projected 4 million in sales within the launch window changed a lot of people's thinking on the console. It's worrisome to hear that even XSeed, the masters of publishing risky and potentially unprofitable games on Nintendo consoles, is feeling gun shy towards Nintendo's latest handheld. I really hope the 3DS has an exceptional year, lest they loose too many publishers to the imposing PS Vita and the budding smart phone market. Xseed Interview Part 2 – Exceeding The Future [Siliconera]

Tips and tricks for maximizing efficiency in Tiny Tower Posted: 09 Jul 2011 08:30 AM PDT Tiny Tower may not be everyone's cup of tea, but that hasn't stopped me from obsessing over it and playing it way too much in the past week. In that time, I've encountered a couple of tricks to make my tower run like a well-oiled machine. Because a lot of people are playing it, and because my friends' towers sometimes look like they could use a little tweaking, here's a handy Tiny Tower guide to save you some time and maximize your efficiency so you never have to buy any Tower Bux. 1. Managing your Tower Bux You get Tower Bux for building a new floor, finding a Bitizen when prompted, and sometimes for moving a Bitizen in the elevator to the right floor. Especially early on, it can take a while to stock up on Tower Bux. The first thing you should save up for is buying all the elevators. By doing so you'll transport Bitizens and VIPs around in less time, and by the time you can afford the third and final elevator, you'll have a tower high enough to want to speed things up as much as possible. The third elevator is not really that much faster than the second one, but as you reach tower level 25-30 you'll regret not having it. The downside is that because it's still pretty fast, it can be annoying to move the elevator down one floor -- it tends to overshoot. If you need to do that, just move it down two floors and tap it once or twice to move it up slightly and land on the right floor. Once you have all the elevators, how you spend your Tower Bux is down to how you play the game. I tend to spend them on speeding up construction of new floors, but if you have 6-8 hours to wait and are about to go to bed, you're better off saving those Bux by waiting until you wake up again. Other than speeding up construction, keep 5-10 Bux in stock at any time to move floors around (See section 2.) and to speed up stocking goods or sell them instantly when needed (See section 5.). Alternatively, you can use them to instantly sell a type of good (See section 3.) that takes 2+ hours to stock before you go to bed. When you wake up, it will be ready to generate you more money. After you get the third elevator and get around 60 Tower Bux, trade them in for $100,000. You'll have money and spare Bux to use for whatever requires it at any time. There is no reason to ever trade in anything less thatn 50 Bux, since over time it will be less efficient. Even if you trade in 20 Bux and instantly buy and complete a new floor, you won't recoup the $50k you miss out on by doing so. Unless you play the game really casually and never play it more than 3 minutes at a time. 2. Managing your Tower layout As you start out, you'll likely end up constructing new floors and not having many issues with how they are organized. It will become a mix of different floors all stacked on top of each other, which leads to a lot of scrolling up and down in a few days. When your tower becomes rather high, it's time to organize everything properly. Moving all residential floors to the bottom makes it easier to manage your Bitizens' jobs. If they are not at their job, you'll also know where to find them easily. Moving the different types of shopping floors together will also save you some time. Try to put shops of the same type on top each other, with the fastest-stocking shops at the bottom. This will make it easier to know where to look when only a few goods sell out, as you won't get any indication that one good is out of stock and the goods that stock fast also stock less of it -- and sell out faster. Once you've done this, it's time to dress up your Bitizens. It might be fun to give them all funny hats, beards, and glasses, but that comes at a cost of efficiency. How will you quickly find them if they all look the same or completely different, unless you memorize every single one of them? A good idea is to dress them up according to the color of their shop they work at. It only costs $1 to change their appearance randomly, so money is no issue by the time you'll want to organize everything. The way I did this was to give every employee of the same type of shop glasses, beards, hats, or different color shirts. Keep in mind that women can't have beards or moustaches (boo!), but you can always dress up the female Bitizens with the color of that shop type. So I have a couple of floors with Bitizens that all have hats, Bitizens that all glasses, and Bitizens with color-coded shirts so I know where they'll be. Once you've done this, it will never take more than 10 seconds to find any Bitizen for quick Tower Bux. If they are not in the couple of floors of the right color or dress attachment, they will be in the couple of residential floors at the bottom of the tower. At worst you'll only have to tap on a bunch of floors in a row if they are halfway outside the screen, instead of going up and down your entire tower if you can't find them. 3. Managing your Bitizens The colored numbers indicate your Bitizen's skill level in that type of shop. This only means that they will give you that percentage off stocking a good. Having three level 9 Bitizens in one store gives you 27% off, etc. Dream jobs are more valuable than that, regardless of the skill level. Giving a Bitizen their dream job not only gives you an instant 3 Tower Bux (you keep it if you evict or move them afterwards), but it also stocks twice the amount of goods for the same cost. Every additional dream job Bitizen gives you the x2 multiplier for an extra good, up to three. If you are impatient or need to go to sleep, don't be afraid to spend a Tower Bux here and there to stock a shop and be able to move jobs around. Moving a normal level 9 Bitizen out of a store to replace it with a dream job Bitizen will always pay off in the end. The more goods you stock, the more they will sell and the less often you have to micromanage re-stocking those goods. Moving them before bed time means you'll wake up with more stocked goods and don't have to re-stock them as much afterwards. When you have Bitizens with no skill levels above 7 and no dream-job you can place them in, you can always evict them. You'll never know what kind of floor you'll end up with unless it's a residential floor, so it's not worth saving them up in most cases. However, if you already have two or three Bitizens with the same dream job for a store you don't have yet, it can be worth to keep them employed elsewhere and wait. When you have three Bitizens in their dream job and get a new one with the same dream job, just evict whoever has the lowest skill level and replace them. Yes, you'll be a dick for doing so but it's ok to be the evil landlord in this game. If you have just built a new floor and the only unemployed Bitizen you have left only has skill level 0 for that job, don't keep him in storage just because he's not a good fit. He can still stock goods and make you money -- you can live without the maximum 9% off the price. But always look if there's another Bitizen who has a high skill level for two shops and no place for his dream job, and move that it to the newly constructed floor. Then put the first unemployed Bitizen in the open spot that was created. This may take some time to manage, but you'll end up with the best workforce in the end. Finally, Bitizens will only move into a residential floor is there is an open spot. Early on, it can pay off to evict anyone who is not level 9, preferably spread across multiple residential floors so the chance of a new Bitizen moving in is increased. Later on, you'll need to play it for long stretches at a time to get them to move in all. Just use Tower Bux to fill up a new floor as needed, and keep one or two open spaces in case someone does want to move in. You'll probably earn 10 Bux in the time you'd wait for that random move-in. Evict whoever is useless. 4. What floor should I build next? You will always need to have enough residential floors so you can have 3 Bitizens at work everywhere. The best good in a shop gives you $3 per sold unit and net you the most profit, so always fill up the shop workforce. There's five types of shops that each have three slots for Bitizens, and residential floors can house five Bitizens. You'll want an equal amount of floors for each shop type to equalize demand for goods. This demand will always go back to 100 if you keep building new shop types and residential floors, so don't worry about demand too much. Ideally, you will have 3 times as many residential floors as you have shop floors of one type. Since there are a 5 shop types that can each contain 3/5th the amount of Bitizens of a residential floor, you will only need 3 times as many residential floors as you have of any shop floor -- provided you built them in equal distribution. If math is hard for you, just go to the Stats screen and look at the floor distribution. Then multiply the amount of floors for any shop by 3 to reach the amount of residential floors you need. If you have a distribution of 2/2/2/2/2 or 4/4/4/4/4 for shops, that means you'd need 6 or 12 residential floors.  Easy no? Always build a new residential floor first if you have an equal distribution of shop floors, or you won't have anyone to work in the next shop floor! New Bitizens might move in while you save for the next shop, and those in turn might yield you more profits or goods storage if you're lucky. 5. Damn those VIPs, I always waste them! This is a common problem. The first thing you should learn is to not select them in the Lobby unless you know you can use them. Construction VIPs wear a yellow helmet, and VIPs that take 3 hours off stocking goods wear a brown postal outfit. Chances are you'll have a floor under construction 90% of the time, or a good that takes 1h+ to stock. If you want to maximize these VIPs, save them if you can build a floor in the next ten minutes, or potentially use a Tower Bux to sell out a good that's nearly sold out and takes less than 3 hours to stock. Provided you keep an eye on your tower that would cost you 1 Tower Bux, in exchange for a new fully stocked good and not having to keep an eye on that good for a long time. The hard part is when you have to distinguish between extra-customer VIPs (they wear glasses) and VIPs that instantly buy up one type of good. Between the latter two, always take a look at your shop floors that take the longest to stock. They will have the highest amount of goods to sell (depending on how much has been sold already) and make the best targets in general. Just check a couple of shops, see if there is one that has a lot of all three kinds of goods stocks, and dump the VIP in there. For advanced tactics, look at which shop is fully stocked while everything else is being stocks. Dumping the VIP there might sell out one of the goods, allowing you to re-stock it again. 6. Look, I really don't have time to play this all day That's ok, not many people do. Notifications can help you if you're at work or studying, but they can distract just as much. You also don't want to hear "TING" when you are just falling asleep. Keep in mind you'll only get one notification after you close the game, so if you tap Close it can be to forget about the game afterwards. There are a couple of shops, especially the food shops, that have a very low stocking time. You could technically destroy them so you only have other shops to manage if you are short on time during the day, but one of the reasons to keep playing Tiny Tower is to get as high a tower as possible. In the end, it comes down to your own play-style and how much time you have. If you can play all day, just stock some 40+ minute goods before making dinner. And just because a good takes 5 minutes to stock doesn't mean you should obsess over it. They will sell out quick and the income is not worth the hassle. If you're a management buff, go all out and tailor everything for efficiency. If you just want to make a tower that looks fun, you can do that too. Try to find a middle road between "fun looking" and efficiency if you can, since looks don't get you paid in this game. Last but not least, someone over on the Touch Arcade forums has created a spreadsheet with all data you could possibly need!

Preview: The Sims Medieval: Pirates and Nobles Posted: 09 Jul 2011 08:00 AM PDT How much “YAR!” can you handle?  The Sims Medieval came out back in March and as we might have seen with other Sims games, we have a new expansion ready to roll out in Pirates and Nobles. As the title implies, it adds pirates and nobles to the mix of your kingdom where you are still the ruler and are able to influence the daily activities of all of your citizens. The storyline to this expansion also builds on the current questing- and story-based gameplay that was newer to the Sims franchise with this title. In this expansion, there is a story of forbidden love between these two groups and your job is to either help it along or destroy any hope of them making amends for the sake of the two star-crossed lovers who are NOT Romeo and Juliet. The Sims Medieval: Pirates and Nobles (PC) Developer: The Sims Studio Publisher: Electronic Arts To be released: August 2011 In addition to the new quests, items and characters, there is a new treasure hunting system in the game that will give your pirates the choice to search the land for buried treasure using maps that you find and earn. There is quite an abundance of new items and you will have plenty of hours to spend trying to unearth all of them. Something that has also been added to the expansion is the addition of little flying birds. The pirates will have the option to use parrots to help them out on their quests, whereas the nobles will have falcons to help them find treasure and solve puzzles. Of course, you will also be able to have cages for them to live in and at the moment there is no confirmation that they will be able to say, “Polly want a cracker.” Hopefully, it will not be confirmed since there is no way to translate anything into Simlish. If you played the original game, one standout aspect of it was something unique called the Pit Monster. This was a monster that you could send people to who did you wrong as punishment and they would be tossed into this deep, dark pit where a giant tentacle monster would do unspeakable things to them in the blackness of the hole. Pirates and Nobles has added a new toy for you to torture play with called the interrogation chair. In it, you will be able to extract information from your enemies/friends and will be able to complete your quests and get information, such as treasure locations. Various methods of interrogation include something as simple as tickling the informant with a feather, or you can use a chinchilla to work the prisoner over until you get the required info, if you are feeling particularly just plain weird. When EA first showed the game during GDC, it was great to see a version of the Sims that guys can play. With all the quests, challenges, item crafting, and leveling, it's great to see them take a great idea and build on what makes the core game interesting and playable to a larger demographic: men with addictive personalities. The Sims Medieval will come out this August for around $29.99.

Weekend Mobile roundup: QuBIT, Two Worlds II CD and more Posted: 09 Jul 2011 07:30 AM PDT more videos like this Gameloft is having some weird Android giveaway thing where they announce a game that will be free for two hours every day. By the time you read this you'll only have Sunday's giveaway left, but you can keep an eye on their UK Twitter account tomorrow. Kairosoft's Pocket Academy came out recently, but I haven't had the chance to get into it yet. If you were a fan of Game Dev Story and Hot Springs Story, you probably know what's up. Those two are currently only $0.99 so here's your chance to pick them up on the cheap. If you are unfamiliar with the Kairosoft games, Brad Nicholson loved Pocket Academy over on Touch Arcade and any disappointments can be hurled in his direction. Other than QuBIT being a lot of fun, Two Worlds II Castle Defense being terrible, and a couple of freebies on iOS, there's not a whole lot to talk about this weekend. But let's take a look anyway! Weekend highlights:  Ionocraft Racing (iPhone, $1.99; iPad, $3.99) more videos like this Here we have an actual steampunk racing game. Ionocraft Racing's main strength is that it lets you unlock and purchase, components for your steampunk hover racing vehicle, and that how you design it affects how it controls. Putting powerful main engines at back of your steam-craft makes it feel like you are controlling a rocket at times, while attaching them at the front makes it feel like a pod-racer. To offset the raw power, you can add things like side-thrusters and spoiler-wings anywhere on your vehicle. The idea is pretty fun, if more suited to a console or PC experience than a mobile one. Every level is brown, because in steampunk games and movies there's apparently no such thing as paint (why is that anyway?). There are 13 levels that take between 20 to 80 seconds per level once you have a good engine. And once you do have a good engine, it becomes a grind to buy the remaining quality components to go for the world high score. I lost all level progress at some point, while keeping my craft, and it took me 15 minutes to race through all the levels from the start again. Since you'll need to replay a lot of races for money, and since you need money to get the gold medals, I just stopped playing it shortly after that. This grind becomes tiresome as the levels themselves are not very interesting to play. You race forward, steer, occasionally let go of the throttle, and sometimes jump or take a high route. And the only really steampunk thing about the game is that you see puffs of steam come out of your vehicle. It's not a bad game, but there's nothing about it that makes it worth recommending either. QuBIT (iPhone & iPad, $0.99 -- universal app) more videos like this Whereas Ionocraft Racing focuses on craft customization with boring racing mechanics, QuBIT just focuses on creating an interesting racing game that is fun to play. Moving left and right by tilting the device and going forward automatically, the goal in QuBIT is to last as long as possible. You are surrounded by tiny colored cubes. By racing over colored crystals, you make these colored cubes go dark and fill up a wave meter to finish a wave. You progress to the next wave after going through a short bonus section for extra points. Every wave you get an additional colored cube to "fill" and any time you race over crystals of the color that you had already "filled" it costs you energy. When you run out of energy, it's game over. The continuous levels also include rails and nodes that boost you forward and give you energy. As you progress through the waves you'll go from casually tilting the device around to fill the initial two cubes, to manically moving around trying to grab the right crystals while avoiding the others. It comes hard quickly, but it's ridiculously fun to play QuBIT. You can switch to touch controls for moving if you want, but it doesn't work quite as well. Part of the fun of the tilt controls is that you end up tilting your device around like a madman and really get into it. As a $0.99 universal app, it's highly recommended to go try it out. You do need a current-gen device that supports iOS 4.3 though, and your device will also get pretty hot pretty fast because of all the graphical power displayed on screen. The biggest downside is that you are going to look like an idiot if you play this in public areas; but you will do so while wearing a gamer-face and a smile. 100 Rogues (iPhone & iPad, free -- universal app) more videos like this This is a pretty cool little rogue-like game for iOS. 100 Rogues sees you exploring dungeons, collecting loot, killing monsters, and pretty much doing what you'd expect from this type of game. It's all top-down 2D with dungeons made out of typical grid structures, and everything moves as you either move yourself or decide to wait a "turn." Despite the core being turn-based, it plays like a real-time game for the most part. Since it's free for the moment, and more of a "hardcore" kind of game than most of the typical popular mobile stuff out there, give it a shot if you are in the market for an old-school dungeon crawler. The music is pretty awesome too! Cute Cloud (iPhone, free) more videos like this Cute Cloud is, simply put, Katamari or Feeding Frenzy with a cloud. You eat smaller clouds while evading larger clouds for as long as possible and that's all there is to it. This game has tilt controls, which may take some getting used to. Don't expect to play this while lying in bed or anything, but on a couch, chair, or standing upright it works well enough. Since it's free right now, you can't really go wrong other than having it fill up your apps list in iTunes, but it's the kind of game you'll occassionally play while in transit when you have five minutes to kill.  Catan (Android $4.28) Catan for Android, need I say more? It includes hot-seat multiplayer and graphics options to switch to the German and English boardgame styles. Apparently you need to purchase the Seafarers expansion (3 euro/$5-ish) to play the campaign though, so you might want to save this for multiplayer sessions. It probably has some skirmish stuff, but if you need players around you to get the most out of it then you might as well play the boardgame, right? Still looks a bit expensive to me. Two Worlds II Castle Defense (iPhone, $4.99, lite; iPad, $4.99, lite) more videos like this I usually force my way through at least half of a game's content before giving a verdict on a mobile game, but Two Worlds II Castle Defense is something else. As a castle defense game, you place units (soldiers, archers, mages, etc) at pre-set locations to keep incoming waves at bay. Each unit can be upgraded in health and attack power, and you can heal it for gold as well as use some other abilities. The idea is to put the world of Two Worlds II into a mobile game environment. However, this game is just terrible. The tutorial is one screen filled with tons of info that the player is expected to just remember, with no option to recall it in-game. If you close the app to check email or Twitter or whatnot, you need to start the entire level all over again. What!? Worst of all, the units move from their placement spot, but the placement spots are laid out in such a way that you can easily end up with one unit that always walks to the front of an incoming wave, while the rest just sits back and laughs at you for even trying to play the game. You can teleport units, but nothing in the game encourages you to keep playing it. Despite trying to force my way through the game, I just ended up sighing and facepalming at my screen, and any time a notification pop-up appeared it felt like divine intervention to quit and never go back. At a $5 price, this is just an insult to mobile gamers whether you liked Two Worlds II or not. It's one of the worst mobile game I've played since buying an iPod Touch. Don't even bother with it if it goes free, because ther's plenty of better and cheaper defense games out there. Although you can play the lite versions or a PC demo in case you are a glutton for punishment. Weekly news roundup: A guide to Tiny Tower! EA is bringing cross-platform Scrabble play to Facebook, Android and iOS Cave released Deathsmiles on iOS A free SOCOM HQ app was released on Android  Freerunners HD was finally released on Android as well So was King of Fighters-i on iOS And while you're at it, Yuji Naka's Unreal demo is on iOS too A Pokémon app is coming to iOS and Android That guy who trademarked EDGE released an actual game that looks like crap Final Fantasy Tacticsdelayed for iOS until the end of July Gameloft unveiled its mobile lineup for the remainder of 2011 Word Fighter for iOS and Android is among this year's PAX 10 Darkness 2 dev has something to say about the iPad encroaching on consoles Carmack feels differently and explains, half the commenters didn't read what he actually said There are Techno Kitten Adventure shirts! The single-fan-made Marathon port was released free for iPad, paid for HD version Mobile games reviews: Chaos Rings Omega (iOS) James Pond in the Deathly Shallows (iOS) Sonic and SEGA All-Stars Racing (iOS) That's it for this weekend. If you know of a ridiculous or cool new Android or iOS game, hit me up on Twitter or send us an email. Or post it in the comments!

Hands-on: Use gravity to pummel space pirates in Rochard Posted: 09 Jul 2011 07:00 AM PDT Upon first playing Rochard, some immediate impressions come to mind. The art style of the game is very reminiscent of Team Fortress 2, using a similar bold and simple color pallet and cartoonish characters that seem to carry themselves with the same kind of heft as the characters from the famed team-based shooter. The mechanics call to mind Half-Life 2 with a device that works quite similarly to the gravity gun. Even the general format of the game is a hearkening back to other "2.5D" games released on the PlayStation Network and Xbox Live Arcade, most notably Shadow Complex. Yet what makes Rochard stand out is exactly how it incorporates these elements with a fine level of polish, while simultaneously adding some new twists to well-tread formulas. Rochard (PlayStation Network) Developer: Recoil Games Publisher: Sony Online Entertainment Release: Summer 2011 The story begins with your hefty hero, astro-miner John Rochard (voiced by John St. John) narrating as he explains how the trouble he's in all began. I won't go too much into story detail as I certainly wouldn't want to ruin it but I will say that it involves your plucky blue collar gravity-manipulating hero involving himself in something about alien artifacts, space pirates, and plot twists rife with betrayal and sabotage. The first half of the beginning chapter of the game serves as a tutorial of sorts, guiding the player's hand through the game mechanics that are gradually introduced. Even at these early parts of the game, Rochard's vibrant character shines through. Much of the first chapter of the game involves banter between John and his fellow miner Skyler as she carries the plot along or goads the player into figuring out puzzle sequences. The primary item of use that the character gets is the G-Lifter, a sort of gravity gun that first allows you to manipulate objects such as crates and movable platforms in order to solve relatively simple puzzles to progress. While you're holding onto an object with your G-lifter, the object is encased in a protective gravity bubble that serves as a shield and even deflects bullets back at enemies when held at the correct angle. It's a pretty neat defensive strategy, but the most fun comes from simply lobbing large objects at your enemies a la Half-Life 2, and Rochard never lacks the endless supply of large crates, explosive canisters, and other items to lob at enemies in various strategic ways. Throughout the game, Rochard comes across upgrade stations that add a new twist to what his G-lifter can do. One of the first new tricks you discover and one of the primary new mechanics of the game is the complete manipulation of the gravity around you, so that you can jump and float at will in order to reach areas that may be otherwise too high or too far out. Once this mechanic is introduced, it can be tricky to remind yourself to implement it at the right time. Or perhaps it was just that I had issues as I had to make repeated attempts to jump from insane heights without low gravity switched on. I was told that upgrades you'll find may relate to more active abilities such as new powers for your G-Lifter, or to passive abilities such as upgrading your health and regenerative powers. Throughout my session with the game, I was treated to more active upgrades and each one added more ways to solve puzzles and gave interesting new twists to combat. One of my favorite examples of these upgrades actually came in the second chapter, which takes place in a refreshing change of atmosphere, a sort of space casino with all of the neon and noise expected of such an environment. At a point near the end of my session with the game, I was finally able to grab turrets with my G-lifter and throw them at enemies or even use them to help solve puzzles. I really appreciated this new upgrade as throughout the earlier parts of the game a turret often meant I could either run like hell or expect a pretty quick death. Being granted with this new ability gave me a feeling of power sort of akin to the gravity gun in the final hours of Half-Life 2. Though by the time I got the upgrade, I had so many other abilities that I began to forget that I could even use this new one. I found myself using other strategies to destroy the turrets before remembering I could simply grab them and throw them off into electrical fields. Beyond the upgrades to your G-Lifter, Rochard also shines when it comes to puzzle-solving. It has that unique "one-more-time" ability that causes you to attempt a scenario despite your frustration simply because you know the goal is attainable and just within your grasp. And if you're feeling especially clever, most puzzles have an added wrinkle that end in successfully finding a Trophy collectible that presumably adds up to new Trophies. Overall, I came away impressed with the game mechanics and the light and sometimes humorous dialogue of Rochard. A part near the middle of the second chapter actually had me laugh aloud, as a sort of Native American character gave some cheeky dialogue about losing an important game item due to gambling. It was especially funny as the character was already portraying a stereotypical "Indian" by going into a metaphysical tirade about how the item was within us all. Or something. Until he admitted of course, he simply lost it. Unofficially, the price of Rochard won't hurt your wallet at all (so not around the $15.00 price range) and will provide the average player with eight to ten hours of gameplay. It may take some gamers much longer as the puzzles ramp up and really take knowledge of physics and combat strategy. I was told that Rochard will feature a total of five chapters, and from the chapter and a half or so that I got to play I could tell the game would be a relatively lengthy and diverse experience, with multiple ways to solve puzzle and combat scenarios. Though Rochard was slated to release July 19, the date has gone to a more ambiguous "Summer 2011." I know that I'll be booting up my lonely PlayStation 3 to log into the PlayStation Network for this game though, as the end of my playthrough just left me wanting to know what new puzzles and storyline elements would be revealed next.

Preview: Madden NFL 12 Posted: 09 Jul 2011 06:00 AM PDT more videos like this The yearly appearance of the Madden franchise seems to be a constant in the videogame industry, acting as a reminder to football fans everywhere that the new season is right around the corner. Except, potentially, this year, when the fate of a full NFL season still hangs tenuously in the balance. After six months of hearing about CBAs, lockouts, and the inability of business professionals to find an agreeable model with which to split billions of dollars, getting my hands on Madden 12 at EA’s Summer Showcase was like receiving a warm, comforting hug. Madden NFL 12 (PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 [previewed]) Developer: EA Tiburon Publisher: EA Sports To be released: August 30, 2011 The first thing that struck me while playing Madden 12 was the attention paid to presentation. In the past, the franchise has proudly paraded small advancements meant to help the player truly feel like they’re in the game, but those attempts pale in comparison to the revamped presentation. All of the teams’ unique intros have been faithfully recreated, aided by consultation with the NFL’s official camera crew. These dynamic camera angles -- often times unique to each individual stadium -- are surprisingly apt at upping the intensity of an aspect of the game that is usually hastily skipped over by players. They also serve to help emphasize one of EA’s main goals with Madden 12, which is bringing “gameday football” into the living room. A few other camera tricks help emphasize this point. Kickoffs, for example, are displayed in a panoramic side-view, as you would see on television, before the camera warps around to the traditional gameplay view; the camera angle for field goals also has been pulled out some. They’re small, seemingly inconsequential touches, but they actually helped me appreciate the size and scope of the stadium, even if the crowd is still largely composed of simply modeled, “cardboard” fans. While these subtle alterations to the presentation help to serve EA’s goal of bringing true to life football into the living room, they are ultimately secondary to the gameplay. Thankfully, the core gameplay is where I found some of the biggest advancements that the series has seen, which translates into a more faithful recreation of the game fans know and love. When I finally began playing a game, pitting my St. Louis Rams against a computer-controlled Baltimore Ravens team (on “Pro” difficulty), I was a bit surprised by how much more visceral the game felt relative to previous iterations. The reason for this change, I would soon realize, is the completely revamped animation system. In past Madden games, animations would often begin before players made contact, which would lead to awkward, sometimes frustrating moments where players seemed to inexplicably “warp” into each other, ignoring the distances between them as if they were compelled by some sort of “suction” or magnetism. In my hands-on time with Madden 12, I found that irritating abnormality is no more, as animations don’t kick in until players have made contact. Aside from making the game feel more realistic, I also felt a lot more satisfaction in player movement and interaction. Every hit seemed to carry an appropriate sense of weight, despite not being powered by a physics engine (something EA’s Anthony Dimento mentioned that the team would be looking into in the future), and tackling is infinitely more rewarding because of it, even when you don’t use the hit stick. Whether due to the implantation of the new animation system or simple AI tweaking, there are other noticeable improvements over last year’s title. The secondary seems to play much better when in zone defense, replacing the ineffectual zone defense of Madden 11, and route running seems to have been cleaned up a bit. I also felt like my players were much more competent blockers, while, at the same time, screen plays seemed to be a much less cheap offensive tactic. I also spot-checked the game’s All-Madden difficulty setting by playing two quarters against the Pittsburgh Steelers and, while I was down 10-3 at halftime, All-Madden seems much more reasonable and less frustrating than in previous iterations. A game and half is nowhere near enough time to render judgment on balancing, particularly when there are hundreds of plays I left untouched, but my hands-on time left me fairly optimistic. The two other new features the core game rolls out are custom playbooks and Dynamic Player Performance. Okay, the option to create and use custom playbooks isn’t a new feature -- they were in the game last generation -- but their return is definitely a welcomed (re)addition, and something that fans have been clamoring for since the feature was removed. The Dynamic Player Performance system is meant to lend itself to true-to-life accuracy. There is a set list of tendencies that players can have, which are tied to the player’s stats. These tendencies can alter a player’s performance mid-game. For example, putting a lot of pressure on Bears QB Jay Cutler could negatively affect his accuracy, while putting an equal amount of pressure on Tom Brady might go unnoticed by the clutch, stoic pocket passer. While I only got a brief taste of this system, it has the potential to add some authenticity to player performance independent of statistics and add an extra little wrinkle of strategy to the game. In an attempt to weave the new system into the core gameplay more subtly, the announcers’ commentary on the game is supposed to clue the player into these changes in real-time. While interesting in theory, it was much easier to simply access the start menu, where the effects of the system are prominently displayed. As a long time Madden player, I basically subconsciously tune out the announcers, as you tend to hear the same commentary ad nauseam after playing for any considerable amount of time. On a related note, I was pleasantly surprised to hear much more new commentary overall, much of which was player-specific and involved a bit of banter between Gus Johnson and Cris Collinsworth. It’s bound to get old eventually, but it seemed like there was more new content added this time around, so it should last a bit longer than usual. Perhaps disappointing to some, the online franchise mode has been largely unchanged from last year’s game, though I was assured the rest of the modes have seen “substantial upgrades,” including the previously ignored offline franchise mode. A bit of good news for future Madden games: Dimento mentioned that the team is bridging the gap between the online and offline franchise modes, which means that new feature implementation will no longer have to be done two separate times. This hopefully means that the two modes will see simultaneously advancement in the future, as opposed to one always seemingly being left out in the cold. One addition to online connectivity is online communities, which are going to be formally announced and detailed July 15. Dimento could only describe them as “a way for gamers to really get together and play Madden the way they want to play it, with the people they want to play with, adding that social aspect that’s been so huge. This is our answer to that, and how we’re going to capture that audience.” Perhaps it’s just a symptom of my regular yearning for football by this time of year, but I walked away excited for Madden 12. Whether or not the tweaks to the game distinguish it enough from past iterations in the long run, when the veneer and novelty of newness wears off, remains to be seen, but Madden 12 is aiming to be a fresh experience in the franchise, an aim that’s helped along by how much better and more responsive the game feels when playing.

Introducing That's So MMO!, a weekly MMO news column Posted: 09 Jul 2011 05:30 AM PDT [Editor's Note: Hey, everyone! I would like to introduce David Moore. He has run the site gamebunny.com for the past ten years and co-runs torwars.com, a site focused on all things Star Wars: The Old Republic. Basically, he is an MMO MASTER! He will be contributing a new weekly series, That's So MMO!, rounding up the week in MMO news. If you are a fan of MMOs, you are in for a treat! Let's give David a warm, wet Destructoid welcome! -- Chad] Welcome to the inaugural edition of Destructoid’s That's So MMO! I’ll be your MMO master of ceremonies for this weekly wrap-up (July 03 - 09) of what’s hot and happening in the world of online games. Let’s get right down to it!   “Battle of the planets” - SOE has been busy shuffling its deck. After killing off one eight-year-old game, Star Wars Galaxies, they’re pumping new life into another eight-year-old game with the confirmation of a long-rumored sequel to PlanetSide. PlanetSide 2 doesn’t yet sport a release date, but Sony is promising that “technology” has now caught up with their original “vision.” Those looking for a space age Call of Duty, with customizable players and weapons, may want to enlist.   “Let the blood flow freely” - Funcom’s barbaric MMO Age of Conan has gone free-to-play. If you have any desire to quaff mead with brazen wenches, ride exotic beasts and behead your sworn enemies, now would be a good time. Check into AoC’s “Unchained” offering and commence with the slurping and slaying.   “Raid Aid” – You may have heard about World of Warcraft’s new “Starter Edition”, which allows prospective players to fire up a character and reach level 20 without time constraints. What’s new and fabulous for the subscribed faithful? Patch 4.2 introduced a Dungeon Journal containing locations, loot tables and boss abilities for all instances in the game. Your need to Alt-Tab out of WoW for tips & tricks has just decreased.   “Origin Story” – EA’s recently announced Origin digital download service will be the only way to obtain a digital client for Star Wars: The Old Republic when it launches later this year. No Steam for you! If you are worried about lack of content in SWTOR, simmer down. EA Games President Frank Gibeau has stated that each character class in SWTOR offers 200 hours of fresh gameplay. Let’s see: 8 classes x 200 hours = like … a bazillion hours! Not bad.   “Trails and tribulations” – With the new "Waves of Madness" Update 1.3 certain shards (servers) in Rift have been re-designated as “Trial” servers. These Trial shards will be destinations for the waves of incoming newbies sampling the game with trial accounts and promotional offers. What does this mean for paying players with characters already living on these shards? Eviction notices!   “Macro not micro?” The just introduced “Incarna” patch for EVE Online brought with it the Noble Exchange (NeX), or “Item Shop.” Many players are up in arms at the high prices and possible future introduction of non-vanity items, such as ships and powerful guns, which could unbalance gameplay, favoring those with thick wallets. Player protests are ongoing. Stay tuned.   “Opening the gates of Hell” – T3 Entertainment has remade Hellgate: London and are inviting interested adventurers to jump into the fire with the debut of the Hellgate Global Open Beta. Is this formerly derided and failed game now worthy of your time? Hey, it’s free-to-play. You’ve got nothing to lose by burning your shoes with a download.   That’s going to do it for this time around worldly ones. I’ll see you next week with the latest and greatest in Massively Multiplayer. Keep it logged-in.

Preview: The Secret World Posted: 09 Jul 2011 05:00 AM PDT As more and more MMO’s are popping up in today’s market, it’s difficult to stand out in the crowd. However, the veteran MMO developer Funcom (creators of Anarchy Online and Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventure) is looking to create an online game unlike any other. Shown off at EA’s Summer Game’s Showcase, The Secret World is a new MMO that aims to take a new approach to the genre. more videos like this The Secret World (PC) Developer: Funcom Publisher: Electronic Arts To be released: 2012 Now take a moment and try to imagine what our world would be like if myths, legends, and all things supernatural actually existed. A world where vampires, werewolves, ghouls, and demons stalked the streets of major cities around the world. And that the only ones keeping the balance between the human world, and the world of the supernatural, are three secret societies called The Illuminati, The Dragons, and The Templars; that have long been controlling the course of mankind from behind the curtain. During the hands-off demo, many of the key features for The Secret World were put on display. Referring to them as the four pillars of gameplay and narrative players will make throughout their experiences -- the modern settings, secret societies, free form progression, and the narrative decisions -- Funcom seeks to emphasis the importance of player actions and decisions by giving them as many choices as possible. One of the more surprising aspects of the game is that there are no character classes to choose from. While you still acquire experience points and level up, you also get skill points which you spend on various talent pools to shape your character in any way you see fit. As a part of the free-form character progression system, the over 500 different abilities to choose from give your characters a degree of flexibility and give a sense that you have complete control over your character’s evolution. The demo begins on Solomon Island, a location that has been under attack by undead creatures known as the Draug. The hero character, who has sided with the Templar faction, meets up with a contact from the mysterious group Orochi Organization. The NPC tasks the player character with seeking out the source of the Draug invasion and forcing them back off the island. When taking new quests or otherwise watching cutscenes during instanced locations, you’ll be treated to a scene with the non-playable characters that feature full voice and motion capture animation. As one of the main pillars for The Secret World, having fully voiced and dynamic characters will be able to bring more into the experience. While it did look a bit rough at times during these scenes, it is impressive to know that all encounters with NPC’s feature such detail in speech and animation.  After accepting the quest to clear out the Draug invasion, the player is transported to the instanced dungeon via a super high-tech helicopter. Upon arriving, the hero character meets up with the rest of his party members (all controlled by Funcom developers.) Before commencing with the instance, the developers gave a rundown of the party member’s roles: The tank player who utilizes heavy weapons and damage mitigating magic, the healer who uses the mysterious blood magic, a ranged character utilizing rifles and grenades for AoE and crowd control, and finally an elemental magic user specializing in fire spells. As for the hero character, she’s a close ranged fighter specialized for high damage output and DPS. As the party makes their way through the dungeon, wading through bodies of water almost knee deep, they fight various forms of Draug that use different tactics and spell to combat the party. Male Draug creatures summon zombies as backup while still being able to hold it’s own in combat. The overall look and feeling of combat in The Secret World looks to be what most gamers would expect from an MMO. Funcom has taken a step back from the more action oriented combat in Age of Conan, but that isn’t to say that players won’t be kept on their toes during fights. During a battle with a female Draug creature, the enemy uses various lighting spells to electrify the waters around the player, causing additional damage. With the inclusion of environmental hazards and spells that focus on key areas in the field, players will also have to factor movement and placements of their party during battles. After clearing out the mobs of Draugs, the party comes to a cliff overlooking a field with a makeshift fort made out of shipping containers and a massive ghost ship, known as the Polaris, that has since run aground and is the source of the invasion. From here, the party receives orders from their quest giver and are given time to prepare. Also in this area is a feature known as the “Anima Well.” These wells allow players to respecialize and alter their character's abilities to adapt to the challenges they encounter. The hero character switches her abilities from close ranges attacks to elemental spells and long range attacks to prepare for the next battle. The party then enters the shipping container fort and encounters The Verangian, the first boss of the dungeon. Using similar tactics and spells as the weaker Draug, The Verangian takes advantage of his large size and strength and attacks the group. With the party still standing in bodies of water, the boss uses the surrounding water to summon zombies and takes advantage of lighting spells to cause additonal environmental damage. Eventually, the monster falls back towards the shipping containers while the party remains in pursuit. With lighting spells in effect, the party leaps onto the nearby containers to stay above water as to avoid electrocution. After using the containers for high ground and with their long-range spells, the party defeats The Verangian. Afterwards, the developers show off an interesting way to acquire loot. Near the defeated boss is a cache of high-tech treasure chests that require security numbers to unlock. Luckily, the shipping container that houses the chests has a code on the side of it which can be used to unlock the chests. Funcom briefly mentioned their intent to expand upon this feature by creating real world websites that contain secret codes which show the locations of secret chests within the game world, and also the passwords to unlock them. For the sake of time, Funcom skips ahead to the later half of the dungeon to encounter another boss known as the primordial dweller. A large mammoth-like creature that uses lighting spells, the dweller is seemingly the source of the invasion on Solomon Island. Using similar tactics from the previous boss, this boss is quickly defeated. The party members are then extracted from the dungeon by the same helicopter from earlier, and another cutscene is shown where a large monster swoops by the helicopter and forces the vehicle down. As the demonstration comes to a close, Funcom expressed their interest in creating an MMO that is unlike anything that anyone has ever seen. While they've succeeded in creating a setting that is incredibly engaging and interesting, the combat itself looks like it's fallen back into the sort of typical MMO combat. Which is disappointing after Funcom's previous effort with Age of Conan's heavily action oriented combat. With that said, everything about the game looks on point. Great setting, a strong narrative, and so far several good ideas. As for the game model, Funcom stated that they are exploring all possible options as either a F2P game or with a subscription model.

Kids and weird ladies are all up on Rhythm Heaven Wii Posted: 09 Jul 2011 04:00 AM PDT more videos like this Rhythm Heaven Wii is about to be released in Japan, and marketing for the title is starting to pick up. We've already gotten a look at some of the game's 50+ levels, multi-player mode, and a endless games, but these TV spots show us a few more levels in greater detail. The "taking pictures of sweaty luchadors" level seems to be a big hit with the kids, and it looks like that vaguely androgynous middle aged woman really loves making those seals wiggle. I know a lot of you might scoff at paying full price for a game that you can likely complete in 4 or 5 hours, but to me, it's more than worth it if both the replay value and memorability are there. Just like with movies and songs, a game's "length" isn't a real way to measure value. I'd much rather own Fist Full of Dollars over Paint Your Wagon, or Jive Talkin over MacCarthur's Park. There is nothing wrong with short and sweet, as long as you're getting a quality product. I still replay (and think about) Rhythm Heaven and Rhythm Tengoku on a regular basis, not because they're long games, but because I love the gameplay and music so much. From the sounds of it, I'll feel the same with Rhythm Heaven Wii. "Pica Pica Pica Desu Ka!' indeed. Rhythm Heaven Wii - 2 Japanese commercials [GoNintendo]

Is Mega Man Legends 3 going to get canceled? Posted: 09 Jul 2011 02:40 AM PDT That's the question a lot fans are asking. If you look at the history of the game's development thus far, it's easy to see why. First the game was announced by Mega Man series co-creator Keiji Inafune, and that this was a project that he's been trying to get made for a while. Shortly after that, he left Capcom (which probably had something to with the cancellation of Capcom's other current Mega Man project, Mega Man Universe), putting the future of the Mega Man series on much shakier ground. After that, a prototype version of Mega Man Legends 3 was announced, set to launch alongside the 3DS eShop launch in June. Going by these videos, this prototype version of the game looked pretty much finished well before June, which makes it all the more worrisome that it still hasn't launched. Also worth noting is that Capcom claimed that Mega Man Legends 3 wouldn't be finished unless the Mega Man Legends 3 Prototype sold well. With the Prototype nowhere in sight, it's easy to think that the future of the full game is even more in question Now the Mega Man Legends 3 tab has been removed from Capcom Japan's homepage, which is what happened shortly before Mega Man Universe was canceled. With Inafune gone, and the 3DS selling less than expected, is Capcom getting ready to ditch one of the 3DS's most promising titles? Because Everyone Else Is Doing It... [Protodude's Rockman Corner]

The Daily Hotness: BioShock Infinite Posted: 08 Jul 2011 04:59 PM PDT more videos like this The Internet was finally treated to the E3 presentation of BioShock Infinite. The game looks amazing, needless to say. The new episode of Podtoid is out, we got a first real look at PlanetSide 2, Suda 51 and Kojima team up for Sdatcher, I'm amazed that Nick Chester still enjoys doing the Rock Band DLC of the week story on a regular basis and more happened on 7/8/11. Destructoid Original: New Destructoid Episode: Battlefield Reefer Madness Leak! The Question: Are you getting a PlayStation Vita? Podtoid 157: Muddy Buddies Friday Night Fights: Miracle Day Edition Videogames that make you feel godly Live show: Saturday Morning Hangover joins the EDF This weekend on JTV: July 9-10th Live show: Mash Tactics plays community picks Community: Community blogs of 7/8 Forum thread of the day: Super Street Fighter IV Contests: Sell and buy used games (gasp) & get entered to win a 3DS Contest: Win a Dtoid themed Xbox 360 Calibur11 Vault case Reviews: Review: Proun Previews: First details: PlanetSide 2 I don't know how to feel about Burnout Crash! Events: 2011 PAX 10 indie selection includes Fez, Jamestown, more News: Activision bringing new Bond game to San Diego Comic-Con Catherine gets art book so you can do a dirty masturbate Rumor: Last Story, Xenoblade already localized for NA DICE details the four classes in Battlefield 3 Mass Effect 3 Deluxe Edition is 'only on Origin' Xenoblade Chronicles to release early in Europe Japan gets a giant Resident Evil 15th Anniversary Box Carmack: Mobile and cloud technologies are the future 'Suda 51's Sdatcher' announced by Kojima without typos Mad Catz officially signs on to make Xbox 360 games Iwata: 3DS suffered due to health scares, lack of games Rock Band DLC: Erasure, Frankie Goes to Hollywood, P.O.D. Project Mimicry lets you play a real-life sandbox game Skyrim will be 'less confusing' but not 'more accessible' GOG.com starts its Hidden Gems promotion with Sanitarium Gears of War 3 leaked due to Microsoft's incompetence? GameStop lists PC specs for Battlefield 3 Resident Evil HD downloads to get full Achievements Sony is working to fix PlayStation Plus tech issues Free App of the Day: Eternity Warriors Gameloft is giving away Android games this weekend Pachter: PSN Pass ill-timed, won't make money Automatic game demos might be next for 3DS and Wii U Neil Burger to write and direct Uncharted film EVE Online coming to Japan The Sims Medieval expansion promises nobles and pirates Green Man Gaming is giving away three games today Limbo gets release dates for PSN and Steam Age of Zombies free on Amazon app store Men of War: Condemned Heroes saves you from the gulag Offbeat: I'm sorry about this: Pokemen at Anime Expo Headless Kamikaze stars in Serious Sam recruitment video If you're a girl, go buy a Techno Kitten Adventure shirt Media: Jump to explode: See Burnout Crash! in action Holy crap! Go watch the entire BioShock Infinite E3 demo King of Fighters-i now available on the App Store Sonic Generations City Escape trailer offers modern music The cities in Deus Ex: Human Revolution New PS Vita trailer shows trendy dicks having a chat Two Worlds II: Pirates of the Flying Fortress screenshots Dragon's Dogma screens show off the pawns Bid on these Street Fighter skate decks for a good cause

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