Category: Xbox

Gearbox Working on Halo 4 for Next Xbox?!

Gearbox Logo

One of the industry’s best upcoming FPS studios, Gearbox Software has been long rumoured to be working on a secret project that is “bigger” than anything they’ve ever tried. Since this is the team that made the entire Brothers in Arms series, the Halo PC port and many awesome expansions of Half-Life, this is something.

Rumour has it that they’re working on nothing but a Halo 4. Apparently the fight isn’t quite finished. Supposedly, the game is in development for a next-generation Xbox console. It should be noted that while we don’t have any announcements of a new console generation, we haven’t even heard talks about anything like that.

The rumour comes from the Official XBox Magazine, and there doesn’t seem to be any hard verification. Still, it doesn’t seem unbelievable or contradictory. Gearbox only has one product on their plate, Borderlands and Bungie announced that they’re done with the Halo franchise.

In any case, Microsoft milking out the Halo franchise definitely isn’t news, what will all that promotion during Halo 3‘s launch. What is news is the weird, outlandish rumour. So is Microsoft working on a next-gen Xbox? How powerful is it? Is Gearbox actually working on a sequel to Halo 3? Will it come anytime before 2015? Questions galore.

We have no doubt that Microsoft has an answer to them all. ‘Microsoft does not respond to rumors’ or some such.

WALMART Looks Into the Gaming Future

Walmart? Who shops at Walmart for state of the art gaming stuff?

Well, pretty soon it may be me and YOU, as Walmart corporate has allowed its key buyers to blog information they obtain from consumer electronics shows.

Now you can preview the newest games, gadgets and gotta have techno toys at their new blog.

BUT before you click away, here are some of the up-and-coming trends in the market as put forth by Tifanie Van Laar the Walmart game buyer.

Expect Packaging to Matter – We spoke with quite a few folks about their publishing. It is time for our industry to mature and take more responsibility. Look at movies and music and some of the efforts they have undertaken. No need for heavy plastic packages that really are way overbuilt. We challenged quite a few suppliers on this front. We can, and must do better.

Expect More Street Dated Releases – Here too, we have much to learn from our brethren in music and movies. You know that Tuesday is the day for big releases in movies and music. Even smaller releases are out on Tuesday. With some of the marketing and development costs makers are talking about, there is no need to just ship date these titles. A street date serves as a call to action for the consumer. Hey, if I were spending $10 MILLION on just marketing a title, I would want a street date. Only one retailer does not want street dates, the other retailers want them. Seems that less than 30% of the industry is trying to have it their way. It just does not make sense to the industry or the consumer.
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The Games of 2008: Part II

In Part I, we covered the games whose release dates we knew for sure. Now it’s time to head into the more obscure territory, by covering the games whose quarters we know, but not their release dates.

Quarter I

Mario Kart Wii (Wii)
Genre: Driving/Racing

Mario Kart Wii is, well, the Wii version of the ultra-famed Mario Kart series that you must know if you call yourself a gamer. A new system of balancing things out between newbies and experts will be featured, along with an online racing mode. Also of note is the Wii Wheel that will be packaged with the game – yet another Wii accessory to make you look silly in front of your TV. As for the rest – It’s Mario Kart! Hop in and have fun!

S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Clear Sky (PC)
Genre: First-Person Shooter

Clear Sky is the prequel to the surprise hit of this year, S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl. Clear Sky will explain a lot of things that happened before SoC, as its protagonist is one of the reasons why the radioactive world of Chernobyl is the way it is. An armour/weapon upgrade system and improved AI has been promised, as well as a very atmospheric environment. A must-buy if you’ve played and liked Shadow of Chernobyl.

Worms: A Space Oddity (Wii)
Genre: Turn-Based Strategy (Action elements)

The Wii’s serving of the legendary Worms series takes us back to its 2D roots as our beloved Worms continue their eternal war in a brand new setting – space! A brand new interface, multiplayer and six different planets to play on are up for grabs. If you’ve never played the fantastically addictive Worms series of games before, this seems to be as good a place to start as any, especially with its unique Wii controls.

Sins of a Solar Empire (PC)
Genre: Real-Time Strategy

Perhaps winning the award for the most unique title of 2008, Sins of a Solar Empire is a sci-fi RTS that will feature seamless, real-time integration of epic strategy and close-up strategy. This means that you can check out your massive ships in space and zoom in to see your individual units, vehicles etc., all in real time! You also get to conquer planets, moons and the like, while the game’s impressive new engine is touted to be able to render lots and lots of space bodies. This might be a surprise hit in the RTS field, folks!

Frontlines: Fuel of War (PC, XBOX 360, PS3)
Genre: First-Person Shooter

Frontlines takes us to a near-future where an all-too-predictable war for natural resources (specifically fuel) has begun, causing chaos across the world. You must fight for your nation to find and defend fuel in this title! The game’s specialty will be its large-scale conflicts, which should make war more realistic than a dozen soldiers on each side fighting it out. A lot of depth in gameplay can be seen here, which makes this one first-person shooter you want to look into.

To view the large Quarter II and the other two quarters, hit the jump, babeh!

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Bioware’s top-secret MMORPG based on KotOR?

Cropped version of Knights of the Old Republic cover

Good followers of gaming news will have known by now that Bioware’s Austin Studios have been working on an MMORPG project for quite a while. They still haven’t announced what the hell it really is, then again, they didn’t tell us the meaning of life when we asked them. But Primotech is reporting a rumour that this mysterious game is in fact based on Knights of the Old Republic franchise, owned by LucasArts.

KotOR, entirely developed by Bioware and published by LucasArts, quickly became an RPG masterpiece and yet another notch in Bioware’s worthy hat. It’s a really great game – you should go play it right now. It was followed by a very rushed sequel, developed by Obsidian. While Obsidian didn’t do a bad job on it, LA gave them an unreasonably small development time, which made for a hurried game. It could have been an epic game had it been given its time. Even then, it’s a decent game worth playing.

This is Bioware’s first MMORPG project, but it isn’t a first for LucasArts (that is, if the rumour is right). LA had earlier come out with Star Wars: Galaxies, whose popularity graph resembles Microsoft’s sales graph – in reverse. With a world so dense and rich to tap, there is no doubt that LA will persistently try open-world games in Star Wars, and another MMORPG, based on one of their best property’s – KotOR is rather predictable.

Now, I’m a KotOR fan and my response is mixed. First off, KotOR is LucasArt’s first singleplayer RPG in the Star Wars universe, which makes it an important game. It did not ship with a multiplayer, and hence was completely built on singleplayer (which ended up in one of the most richly-made singleplayer game I’ve ever played.

Taking KotOR straight into massive multiplayer is a bold, albeit predictable step. After all, the stories of both KotOR games were epic enough – it’ll be sort of silly to have a string of epic events within a span of fifty years. A MMORPG’s story will be considerably toned down and open. How that will fare for KotOR-style gameplay, I find it difficult to guess. But even then, I’m a little disappointed, because if the rumour is right, there is a good chance that a singleplayer KotOR III will not come not. (

But fear not, spacers. We will bring you more news and toilet paper as they become available.

Bungie officially splits from Microsoft, Halo still owned by Redmond

Bungie Freedom

Well, what do you know? Turns out one rumour ended up being real. Bungie has split from big daddy Microsoft and is on its way to become an independent republic company. Of course, Microsoft won’t let one of its slaves off that easy.

It still maintains an equity interest in Bungie and “at the same time continuing its long-standing publishing agreement between Microsoft Game Studios and Bungie for the Microsoft-owned “Halo” intellectual property as well as other future properties developed by Bungie”, whatever the hell that means.

Harold Ryan, speaking from Bungie’s fortress said that their relationship with Microsoft went pretty well and that they will concentrate their next titles on Microsoft® platforms. To cut a long story short, Bungie’s next games will be for the Xbox 360 (and whatever other consoles Microsoft spits out). This means that Bungie is still hugging Microsoft and will probably not let go for quite a while.

Shane Kim, corporate VP at Microsoft Game Studios, said that Microsoft appreciates the work their little slave has done for them and that they will further the Halo franchise with more collaborations, one notable name being Peter Jackson. Of course, no movie specifics were announced. As you can guess, Microsoft talked more about the franchise Bungie created for them rather than Bungie itself.

We hope Bungie evolves to make more kickass games, and we sure as hell hope they move on to something new and original and stop making more armoured-guy-kills-aliens games, please. Thanks.