New Games |
- Playstation All-Stars hack for Super Smash Bros. Brawl
- Join our 48-hour Extra Life marathon on Dtoid.TV!
- There's always room for Final Fantasy cover music!
- The Weekend Modder's Guide: Mount & Blade
- Review: Dragon Ball Z for Kinect
- Pokédex entries must have been written by children
- Disgaea D2, a true Disgaea sequel, is on the way
- Review: The Last Express (iOS)
- Mew-Genics is the newest official Team Meat game
- GameStop to make one lucky Hitman fan jump out of a plane
- Review: PDP Afterglow Universal Wireless Headset
- PlayStation Store revamp delayed in America, UK, Canada
- The Daily Hotness: Forward Unto Dawn
| Playstation All-Stars hack for Super Smash Bros. Brawl Posted: 20 Oct 2012 03:00 PM PDT I can't remember when, but apparently I challenged the Super Smash Bros. Brawl hack community to recreate the upcoming PS3/PS Vita title Playstation Battle Royale All-Stars using the game that inspired it. I doubt my challenge had anything to do with this, but if it did, then... you're welcome? According to the hackers, this project was created "To celebrate the 'Playstation Battle Royale All-Stars' game, the copy of Super Smash Bros...". As far as celebrations go, this one is pretty thorough. Other than Colonel Radec from Killzone, it looks like the gang is all here, including Parappa, Kratos, Nathan Drake, Sackboy, and even Big Daddy. On top of all that, we've got new big name celebrities from other titles that have appeared on Playstation consoles, like Commander Shepard, John Marston, Isaac Clark, Lara Croft, Niko Bellic, Tomba (!) and more. Sadly, Tomba looks a bit jank, but everyone else looks relatively legit, if not slightly uncomfortable in their new standard definition tights and skins. So not only is this fan-made copy of a copy of Smash Bros. Brawl free, but it actually includes more new characters than the copy that it's copying. There is something ironic in all that, but I'm having trouble pinpointing exactly what. All I know for sure is, I'm a lot less motivated to buy Playstation All-Stars Battle Royale now. Thanks Jared! |
| Join our 48-hour Extra Life marathon on Dtoid.TV! Posted: 20 Oct 2012 01:15 PM PDT [Update: We're live right now! Join the fun!] Beginning tomorrow at 1 PM Eastern, Destructoid is hosting a weekend-long Extra Life charity event on our Twitch.TV channel! Join King Foom and our other awesome Dtoid.TV streamers as they play games to raise money for sick kids! We've got a celebrity-filled lineup in store for your viewing pleasure, including appearances and giveaways from:
Additionally, our community webcast site Streamtoid will be holding a 24-hour marathon of its own! Tune in to both channels all weekend long to be a part of the action, and please help us in our effort to raise $10,000 for sick kids by donating to our Extra Life page! 100% of the proceeds go to charity! Thanks so much, and have fun! Update: Foom may be done, but that doesn't mean the fun is over! We've got all kinds of crazy shenanigans planned! Tonight we have our all-star cast of streamers over at Dtoid.tv and another 16 hours of insanity from the Commune in San Francisco over on Streamtoid.com! Check them out! |
| There's always room for Final Fantasy cover music! Posted: 20 Oct 2012 10:00 AM PDT In the span of a couple of months, three very different Final Fantasy cover bands released their first full albums. Is that too much? Well, if you had read the headline of this article, you would already know the answer to that question! Boston-based Square-Enix tribute band The World Is Square kicked off the festivities on September 3 with No Phoenix Down Can Save You Now. This album is all about acoustic renditions of FF themes from the SNES and PS1 eras. If you want that soothing, folksy sound, you can download the 13-track release for $7. On October 10, rock opera group Those Who Fight dropped the EP The Fall of Bahamut. It is four tracks (with a secret fifth track) of powerful vocals and deft guitar work. If that's your jam, it'll only set you back $5 for either the digital or physical copy. Finally, Knight of the Round out of Indiana shreds up and down the block with Gaia's Bane, released on October 11. This is some serious, head-bangin' thrash metal shizz to get you out of your chair and punching small animals. Want it? The 10-track pack can be yours for $8. Be sure to listen to the samples below before you make any life-changing decisions.
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| The Weekend Modder's Guide: Mount & Blade Posted: 20 Oct 2012 09:00 AM PDT Mount & Blade is one of my favorite games on PC. It's an open-ended world that allows just about anything. If you want to be a traveling merchant, a mercenary for hire, a thieving bandit king, or the champion general of an entire kingdom, it's probably possible. On top of its freestyle gameplay, it's also very friendly to mods. Better yet, it's easy to have multiple mods installed with Mount & Blade. I've rounded up a few of the most interesting ones here for you to try out. Feel free to install them all, but just expect to stay up until 3:00am tonight. Time: About half an hour for each mod Note: Some of these mods are for Warband, while others are only for Mount & Blade (M&B). I've marked each of them after the title. How to install a Mount & Blade mod:
Star Wars Conquest (M&B) I started off as a Twi'lek working for Jabba the Hutt. On Tatooine I got a mission from Jabba to hunt down and kill some guy. After visiting the cantina for a hand of Pazak and recruiting some wookies to fight for me, I took off in my ship for other worlds. The game map has been changed to a map of space, and you fly around and visit planets. As soon as I left the Tatooine, I was boarded by pirates and after a brief battle, I was captured. So ended the career of Bubba Foo. Star Wars Conquest is surprisingly well put together. It's limited by the Mount & Blade engine in what it can do, but it's a heck of a lot of fun. I highly recommend that you check this one out.
High School of the Dead (M&B)
Wastelander The Rift (M&B)
Brytenwalda (Warband) This is my preferred mod to use when playing Mount & Blade. I love the accurate setting and it's easier to get into than the made up stuff from the base game.
C-RPG (Warband) You have to set up an account in order to play, but don't worry -- it's all free and they don't spam your email with crap. It's merely so you can keep track of your characters and they can keep away the cheaters. This is the type of mod that relies on other people using it to make it worthwhile. Thankfully, most of the current multiplayer matches out there use this.
While there are tons of other mods out there for Mount & Blade, I feel like these ones are the most interesting and worth your time. I may come back and revisit the series in the future and bring another round of mods to you. Feel free to share any mods that you use in the comments! |
| Review: Dragon Ball Z for Kinect Posted: 20 Oct 2012 08:00 AM PDT It seemed like a good idea at the time: Take the popular Dragon Ball Z fighting games and put them in first person perspective with Kinect controls, allowing players to punch, kick, and Kamehameha their way through the series' popular battles, allowing players to be immersed in the Dragon Ball world like never before. Wait... Kinect? No, I was wrong. That doesn't seem like a good idea at all.
Dragon Ball Z for Kinect (Xbox 360) By now, I'm sure we realize that some games can work for Kinect and some just simply do not. Sadly, that second category is the more prevalent one, and yes, Dragon Ball Z for Kinect falls squarely into it. From the outset, it looks like a solid attempt was given to ensure that the Kinect motions would be simple to execute to give the game some simple play control. And while that does hold true initially, once you venture into the realm of the more complex motions (i.e. your special attacks), you'll find frustration once again rearing its ugly head. First off, if you're going to play this game (or any game on Kinect), you should prepare yourself to look like an idiot. Jumping in place has your character leap into the air for ranged attacks. When charging your Ki, you have to squat a bit, sort of like you're taking a hunching dump in your living room. Charging a Ki blast has you holding your hand almost to your shoulder while you build up a charge before thrusting your hand forward to throw it. Even simple moves have their faults, as punches look normal but kicking at your TV feels silly. Besides looking goofy while playing, you'll also get tired very quickly. This is due to the fact that, while the game may be built to be a Kinect title, some of the gameplay remains decidedly QTE-inspired. As you land a series of successive hits, a small meter builds. Fill it and you'll be treated to a cutscene series of attacks in which you occasionally punch rapidly to fill more meters. If an enemy attacks with a power move, you'll have a series of options that appear on screen, one of which you must choose quickly to avoid being struck. This is where the real problem is, as some of these motions are more than the Kinect can see and thus don't register well. In fact, the Kinect works about 60% of the time. When throwing simple punches or occasionally holding both arms in front of you to block, it responds surprisingly well. Even the occasional special attack is executed with surprising ease -- I've thrown a fair number of Kamehamehas in the comfort of my living room, with no environmental damage to my walls or apartment complex (just to the landscape in the game, of course). However, not all attacks are performed the same way, and various times you'll struggle to have the Kinect register your movements as you flap your arms around like some wounded man-bird.
That's not to say that the game is difficult. Far from it, actually, as the enemy characters move so slowly and telegraph their actions so much you can avoid contact from practically every attack -- if the Kinect registers your lean out of the way, that is. Even so, you'll end up doing the same thing just about every match: land a flurry of punches to initiate the cutscene combo, punch more to sustain it, cutscene of your enemy's attack, QTE to avoid, lather, rinse, repeat. For what are supposedly the mightiest fighters in the universe, these guys are all pushovers. You'll find yourself fighting through the majority of the series' biggest battles, but don't look for a cohesive story here. Before each fight you're given a very small cutscene that pertains to what is about to occur but may not have any connection to the previous battle. I won that last fight, so why is Goku's shirt suddenly torn and why is he incapacitated? If you know the show, no issues here (and goodness knows we've seen the story in enough games as it is), but it does feel a little disjointed. Thankfully, the graphics do little to offend, as the crisp cel-shading does the title justice, if not seeming only slightly flat due to the first-person perspective. Since the story itself is so truncated, you'll find you're actually able to beat the game in about three to five hours. There is no multiplayer this time around, merely a Score Attack mode in which you attempt to best your story mode score for more achievements. There's also an exclusive animated episode included on the disc, but as far as meat, there's not much left on the bone.
DBZ for Kinect is just what you'd expect: a half-realized game for a half-realized piece of hardware. While some of the motion work as intended, too often they do not, but at least there's no real repercussion or headache for that, as even if an enemy lands a hit, it does little to slow you. Unless you're the hardest of hardcore or a kid who wants to wear the included cardboard "Goku Hair" BK crown while you scream and squat in your living room, this game's not worth your time. But at least it's not on rails. |
| Pokédex entries must have been written by children Posted: 20 Oct 2012 07:00 AM PDT If you've ever played a Pokémon game, you'd realize that some of the critters possess rather unbelievable abilities beyond comprehension. I'm not talking about just the legendary Pokémon but also the run-of-the-mill creatures that are analogous to real-world animals. Of course, we don't actually see many of these abilities in practice. All this information comes straight from the Pokédex, which claims that Metagross is smarter than a supercomputer, Pidgeot flies at Mach 2 speeds, Magikarp -- friggin' Magikarp -- can leap over a mountain, and so on. We take these Pokédex entries at face value without ever asking for the supporting research. This photo album on Imgur makes a strong case that the Pokédex was written by kids. How else could you explain such outlandish statements if not that they were the exaggerated accounts of excitable children? [via xaaronh's Twitter] |
| Disgaea D2, a true Disgaea sequel, is on the way Posted: 20 Oct 2012 06:30 AM PDT Look, I have nothing against Disgaea 2's Adelle, Disgaea 3's Mao, and Disgaea 4's Valvatorez (I love them all actually), but there's just something about Laharl that made the original game so special. Nippon Ichi Software Announces Disgaea D2 [Anime News Network] |
| Review: The Last Express (iOS) Posted: 20 Oct 2012 06:00 AM PDT When The Last Express was first released in 1997, it was considered an incredibly engaging mystery set on the Orient Express as it traveled from Paris to Constantinople on the eve of World War I. In many ways the game was far ahead of its time, but what really pushed it ahead of its peers (and even some current-day titles) was the way it progressed through real time as you tried to solve a murder mystery among a diverse set of characters with varying nationalities and motives. However, The Last Express was also a commercial flop when it actually released and was soon forgotten by the gaming culture at large despite its brilliance. Last month, an iOS port was released, and I finally had a chance to play through this endearing game for myself and truly understand why it was such a critical darling. I just wish the finicky touch controls didn't keep impeding my immersion and enjoyment.
The Last Express (iOS) In The Last Express, you take on the role of Robert Cath, an American adventurer who is dashingly handsome, fluent in various languages, and burdened with a questionable criminal past. In many ways, Cath fits into the Indiana Jones archetype -- even to the point that in one very Indiana Jones-ish combat scenario I could've sworn I heard the Wilhelm scream as an enemy died. Cath boards the Orient Express as an unknown, sneaking onto the train via motorcycle and quickly discovering that the friend he was expecting to rendezvous with has instead met his own mysterious demise. The game quickly sets you off onto a sort of choose-your-own-adventure, where you find yourself wandering the various corridors of the train and becoming either a passive or active participant of the events taking place around you. Even when playing casually on an iOS device, The Last Express will easily draw you into its immersive and self-contained universe. Characters pass by in narrow hallways, giving you a look and their pardon as they pass. People mill about in their rooms or in the restaurant car. And at various times you can eavesdrop on their conversations or actively become part of them. Of course, you don't actually have options as to what you will say -- Cath as a character is pretty self-assured and needs no help from our fourth-wall prodding -- though your choice to engage in conversations or ignore key characters will have a direct effect on your playthrough. The graphics are incredibly simplistic and the animations aren't even full-frame at times. Somehow, this simplicity is actually to the game's benefit. As you move about the train and watch characters interact, movements and gestures seem incredibly lifelike because of their familiarity -- it sort of feels like watching a simplified Renoir come to life. I know this sounds a bit pretentious, but I was honestly surprised by how such basic palettes and colors could tell such a deep and at times even emotional narrative. Normally, games that contain a murder mystery plot with overarching political intrigue really bore the shit out of me, but where The Last Express succeeds is in truly putting you in the moment. Every minute that passes is another minute towards your last destination, after all, and that final stopping place may change with your decisions from moment to moment. I can honestly say I have never felt the immediacy of my surroundings and actions in the same way as I did while playing through The Last Express. In one playthrough you may develop a love interest, help to defuse conflicts both petty and political, and develop alliances and enemies with various key players onboard. Granted, even though there are multiple ways to end the game, it seems that there is only one true sequence of events that leads to the "good" ending. Honestly, though, I'd be hard pressed to call any of the endings "happy." I've spent a lot of time gushing about the game itself -- I admittedly missed this gem the first time around, so it was exciting to play it in whatever format was available. However, the particular platform it's been released on has some incredibly frustrating issues, and I can't brand the game with a glowing review without considering the worthiness of it as a port.
Touch sensitivity is a tricky beast for games ported to iOS, though successfully ported point-and-click adventure games have certainly come to mobile devices before. In complete honesty, I simply can't consider The Last Express among them. This may change with an update down the line, but as of now the game has an incredibly finicky touch control system. I played The Last Express on a 3rd generation iPad and found myself practically fighting with the controls at nearly every juncture. Icons on the screeen represent directions for your character to turn, though they could have been wingdings for all of the worth they had in actually getting my character to move properly. If I pressed on the button signifying "right," half the time the game would do the exact opposite. Pressing the button to move forward one frame would often send my character into a sprint, bypassing everything until the next traincar. These controls were especially frustratung during combat sequences, which play as proto-QTEs where you have to press the right direction with proper timing to survive dangerous fights. I nearly gave up in frustration during one of the late game battles because of this system. It took not only proper timing but bashing on the on-screen directional arrows and hoping they registered with the intended move. People often generally complain about touchscreen control and how awful it is for most mobile games. I argue stongly against this contention, as I have played so many awesome games with incredibly responsive controls that run the gamut from simple puzzle games (Ichi) to more complex adventure games like Swords & Sworcery that have the same familiar point-and-click interface. The Last Express falls on its face with the port's touch implementation, and this is really a shame. While I certainly accepted a certain amount of archaic control scheme frustration, I was surprised at how little work it seemed was actually put into making sure the game worked -- at least on an iPad. This was especially surprising given I was playing through on a device with ample screen space.
Fortunately, The Last Express does have a good checkpoint system that even allows you to rewind time and play from an earlier train stop if you failed or missed something along the way. I suppose this and the newly implemented hint system are the major saving graces of this frustrating port. In every other way, it remains faithful to the original -- at least as far as I could surmise. I'm torn on this game, as I would normally give a game of this scope and brilliance a perfect 10, but my constant fight with the controls really did mar my enjoyment. Perhaps it's because the game is supposed to be playable on both iPad and iPhone, though from others' responses I've noticed it really only works on a smaller device. At the end of the day, I'd highly recommend picking up this relatively inexpensive version of The Last Express regardless, even if that means biting the bulllet with the control scheme and dealing with those frustrations. It's a piece of videogame history and a shining example of what can be done to create an experience so much more immersive than the Heavy Rains of today. I just can't rate the port as highly as I'd rate the core experience itself. |
| Mew-Genics is the newest official Team Meat game Posted: 20 Oct 2012 05:00 AM PDT Edmund McMillen of Team Meat has just announced that he and Tommy Refenes are hard at work on their follow-up to Super Meat Boy. It's about cats. Mew-Genics was conceived during a game jam session, but the duo felt it had potential as a full-blown project. Aside from the teaser image above and the news that levels will be randomly generated, there are no other details right meow. Not even a target platform. Development is speeding along, so more info ought to trickle down soon. [via NeoGAF] |
| GameStop to make one lucky Hitman fan jump out of a plane Posted: 20 Oct 2012 04:30 AM PDT GameStop does some pretty insane things to get folks to place pre-orders, but this one just might take the cake. The killer of mom and pop game shops now wants to let you to know what it feels like to be a hitman. Along with Square Enix, the retailer is footing the bill for an elaborate European vacation that includes skydiving in Zurich, racing in Nuremberg, and acquiring a custom Italian suit in Rome. For a chance to win you'll need to become a PowerUp Rewards member (if you're not one already) and put money down for a copy of Hitman: Absolution before December 4th. While there can only be one lucky winner, I have heard good things about the stand-alone Hitman: Sniper Challenge pre-order bonus. |
| Review: PDP Afterglow Universal Wireless Headset Posted: 20 Oct 2012 04:00 AM PDT With all of the gaming headset options on the market this year, you've got to do something to stand out. PDP's Afterglow Universal Wireless Headset certainly does, as its headband and earcups are illuminated, and glow brightly. Looks are one thing, but price and audio performance matter most to gamers shopping for headsets. Thankfully, this headset stands out on these fronts as well.
Product: PDP Afterglow Universal Wireless Headset By my tastes, PDP's Afterglow headset is a bit too flashy. They're literally flashy as the earcups and headband are made of transparent plastic, and are lit with colored LED lighting. Even the extendable boom mic has a LED light built into it, with its color indicating mute status and more. The outer hard, transparent headband stands away from the inner suspension headband by quite a bit, making it look like a big halo around your head. For my tastes, it stands out too far. But, if you're fine with (or even enjoy) your head looking big and glowing as you play games, you'll dig their showy design. The Afterglow fits pretty comfortably on my head, though the tension of the inner, soft suspension band could stand to be a bit more relaxed. The earcups are sufficiently soft, and the whole kit is pretty light. I had no problem wearing these for three hours or more in testing. The Afterglow headset works out to be a 'universal' solution by way of its USB transmitter. When plugged into a PC or MAC, it works as an audio device, instantly transmitting wireless audio to the headset. A cable that runs from the bottom of the transmitter has a standard 1/8" jack can be plugged into several other devices to send audio wirelessly. For most consoles you'll see the included RCA stereo piggyback cables, which grab the audio from your console before it's passed along to whatever device it's plugged into.
For those using a Nintendo Wii or an older system, like a PlayStation 2, the RCA stereo piggyback cables work nicely, plugging right into the A/V cable of the system. It's also quite easy to connect the RCA cables (or the 1/8" jack) to your television's audio output, which lets everything coming into your television come through the transmitter and into the headset. Things are a bit more complicated if you're using a TV that does not have audio outputs, or are working in an HDMI-only situation with the Xbox 360 or PS3. You can try to simultaneously use both the A/V and HDMI cables on your console, though you might have to do some audio routing trickery to get it working. If you have an older Xbox 360, you can get the Xbox 360 Audio Adapter, which features stereo RCA outputs. This works perfectly fine alongside an HDMI video connection. Finally, for portable devices, you can directly connect the included 1/8" jack cable to the device and a port on the headset, essentially making them powered headphones. As soon as the transmitter receives power (via USB), pairing is automatic and instant.
The Afterglow sounds great. I put this set through its paces with several games on both PS3 and Xbox 360 and came away surprised at how good they sound. The 50mm drivers put forth a clear, full range sound. There's a really great low-end response that never sounds pushed or distorted. It's a bit odd to have a more sophisticated sound coming out of a headset that glows. A quick couple of test recordings on phone and PC showed that the boom mic does a proper job of picking up the vocal range, and that the noise canceling feature is doing its job. The right earcup end features a large logo'd power button that doubles as a mute button. On the left side you'll find a volume dial and a game/voice mix dial. Below that is a cable jack to connect the headset to an Xbox 360 controller for voice chat. The headset is charged via the included mini-USB cable, and PDP claims 10 hours of use on a single charge.
A sound mode button lets you flip through three settings: one for pure audio, another for a more immersive sound, and a bass boost mode. I found that I liked the natural setting the best, though there's nothing wrong with the other two. The only issue I had with the headset was a couple of instances of having the volume drop out after changing the volume dial's setting. By turning it completely down and up the issue was resolved both times. Unless you like looking like you're wearing a lost prop from Tron, you may not dig its design, but the key thing to get from this review is that PDP's Afterglow headset sounds pretty good, and does so at a reasonable price for a wireless set (MSRP $89.99). |
| PlayStation Store revamp delayed in America, UK, Canada Posted: 20 Oct 2012 01:30 AM PDT Following launch day issues in certain European territories, Sony has decided to postpone the roll-out of its new-look PlayStation Store, claiming the marketplace must be "exceptional" before gamers get to use it. That must game PSN users in Turkey, where it's already out, feel real special. The US, UK, Canada, Mexico and Brazil are all waiting for the update, while the aforementioned Turkey, as well as other Euro regions, have the less-than-exceptional version already. It's believed Sony will be using these regions to test the service, and make improvements as issues occur. So the good news is that the PAL region got something first. The bad news is that it's because the PAL region's a guinea pig. Oh well, swings n' roundabouts. |
| The Daily Hotness: Forward Unto Dawn Posted: 19 Oct 2012 04:59 PM PDT
Although I'm not nearly as into Halo as a videogame series now as I was ten years ago, Forward Unto Dawn reminds me that the franchise has really rich fiction associated with it. The folks at Machinima have done a great job with it so far. Otherwise, Jim talked to Ninja Theory on the upcoming DmC: Devil May Cry, Dale ranted about K-pop a bit, and so much more happened on this fine Friday. Destructoid Originals: Community: Reviews: News: Offbeat: Media: |
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