Xbox 720 release date, specs, rumours

The Xbox 360 is in its eigth year now and, in the West at least, sits comfortable at the top of the console gaming pack.
A follow up console is innevitable - and the name most have settled on is the Xbox 720 - no matter how spuriously that came about.
Although some of the Xbox 720 rumours doing the rounds are a little more speculative than others, as the eagerly awaited next-generation console edges ever closer to reality, a flurry of reports suggest it will emerge later this year.

Xbox 720 Release Date

Right now, there’s no concrete information about the release of Microsoft’s next-generation console but Sony’s PS4 reveal event in New York has set the rumour mill churning.

Industry analysts won’t make any solid predictions but the received wisdom is that Microsoft isn’t about to sit on its hands and let Sony steal the march on the next-gen.

One of the reasons the Xbox 360 outsold the PS3 in the West is because it was out almost a full year before the PS3 hit the market. Microsoft understands that getting to market first can be the silver bullet in establishing dominance.

Now that the Sony PS4 is off the blocks – with a scheduled release date of Holiday 2013 (that’s December in the UK) – the pressure is on Microsoft to step up.

Still, the only information that’s emerged thus far comes in the form a countdown clock that was posted on the blog of the director of programming for Xbox Live, Larry Hryb AKA Major Nelson.

The clock is counting down to E3 2013, where, if past history is anything to go by, Microsoft will likely unveil its next-gen machine.

Xbox 720 Price

If the PS4 comes to market in the UK this year, Microsoft are likely to make every effort to get their next-gen console onto retailers’ shelves at around the same time.
With the Xbox 360, Microsoft released several variants with differing onboard storage options, which in turn, dictated the retail price point.
At the cheapest end, the entry price in the UK was £209.99. Taking this as a ballpark figure makes sense in light of a 2010-dated document that surface last year, stating the planned RRP of the new Xbox console would be around £200.
If that ends up being the case, this would make the Xbox 720 the cheapest next-gen console on the market.

Xbox 720 Specs

In January of this year, VGLeaks, published what it claims were technical specifications of the next-gen Xbox console, originally leaked under the codename Project Durango.

According to the information published on the site - and this is by no means official - the next Xbox will be powered by an 8-core CPU running at 1.6GHz, alongside 8GB of DDR RAM.

The machine also boasts a custom 800-MHz graphics processor, which "can effectively issue 1.2 trillion floating-point operations per second".
The console also contains 8GB of RAM and a Blu-ray disc drive, which can read 50GB discs, 32 MB of fast embedded SRAM, as far as its connectivity goes, it has Gigabit Ethernet, Wi-Fi and Wi-Fi Direct networking.
The full 'leaked' specs are as follows:

CPU:

- x64 Architecture

- 8 CPU cores running at 1.6 gigahertz (GHz)

- each CPU thread has its own 32 KB L1 instruction cache and 32 KB L1 data cache

- each module of four CPU cores has a 2 MB L2 cache resulting in a total of 4 MB of L2 cache

- each core has one fully independent hardware thread with no shared execution resources

- each hardware thread can issue two instructions per clock

GPU:

- custom D3D11.1 class 800-MHz graphics processor

- 12 shader cores providing a total of 768 threads

- each thread can perform one scalar multiplication and addition operation (MADD) per clock cycle

- at peak performance, the GPU can effectively issue 1.2 trillion floating-point operations per second

High-fidelity Natural User Interface (NUI) sensor is always present

Storage and Memory:

- 8 gigabyte (GB) of RAM DDR3 (68 GB/s)

- 32 MB of fast embedded SRAM (ESRAM) (102 GB/s)

- from the GPU’s perspective the bandwidths of system memory and ESRAM are parallel providing combined peak bandwidth of 170 GB/sec.

- Hard drive is always present

- 50 GB 6x Blu-ray Disc drive

Networking:

- Gigabit Ethernet

- Wi-Fi and Wi-Fi Direct

Hardware Accelerators:

- Move engines

- Image, video, and audio codecs

- Kinect multichannel echo cancellation (MEC) hardware

- Cryptography engines for encryption and decryption, and hashing

Microsoft has yet to confirm any of these specifications at the time of this writing.by nick cowen

Borderlands 2 has now shipped more than 6 million copies since launch in September, parent publisher Take-Two Interactive announced today. During a postearnings financial call today, Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick revealed the new sales milestone, up from 5 million at the end of October

Zelnick added that the Borderlands franchise is one of Take-Two's most important long-term properties, suggesting the company may be planning a series release for future platforms.

Borderlands 2 was a key contributor to Take-Two's bottom line this quarter, helping the company post a profit of $78.8 million for the three-month period ended December 31, up 148 percent over last year. In addition, the game's digital expansions helped Take-Two digital revenue rise 244 percent year-over-year.by eddie makuch

Splinter Cell video game cuts controversial sequence

torture scene in which the player plunges a knife into an enemy’s body and twists it back and forth to extract information -- “move and hold to interrogate,” the game advises -- has been eliminated from the still unreleased game, following widespread complaints from gamers and fellow designers.

“I left the Blacklist demo sick and infuriated,” wrote Tom Bissell on Grantland in July, after the controversial scene was shown off at the E3 video game conference in Los Angeles. “I spent a couple days feeling ashamed of being a gamer, of playing or liking military games, of being interested in any of this disgusting bulls**t at all.” (Bissell co-wrote “Gears of War: Judgment," a shooter from Epic Games set for release in March.)
 

A video trailer released for E3 showed the entire sequence. Following the screams of the man being tortured and the extraction of information, the player is left with a moral choice, according to Maxime Beland, the creative director for “Splinter Cell: Blacklist,” who narrates the video: Press the left button to knock him out or the right to kill him.
“Whether or not the enemy is spared or killed is a moral choice we leave in the player’s hands,” Beland said.

The moral choice comes after the torture sequence.
At a press event in Paris last week, producer Andrew Wilson said the scene had been stripped from the game.
"Definitely we are not going to see when the game's coming out that there are torture scenes in it. That scene is not there anymore. I've not really heard anyone say they loved it," Wilson said according to Eurogamer.neT
"We've scaled a lot of that back, and as we've gone through the process of development there are always things that you feel are not working as well,” he said. “Every game does this, and cuts certain things."
“Splinter Cell: Blacklist” will be released for Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC August 20, according to GameSpot.fox news


 

Aliens Colonial Marines Community Event

Aliens: Colonial Marines hits store shelves in a couple weeks, but why wait that long to play it when you can join IGN at a special community preview event and get hands on time early?
IGN and Gearbox are throwing a party at 4PM on February 2nd for IGN and Aliens fans in the Bay Area, and we want you to join us. Party hats are optional. We'll have the single-player game to delve into, multi-player matches to compete in for prizes, star Gearbox developers to chat with, pizza to devour, and tons of cool stuff to win.

Had other plans? Cancel them and come hang with us instead!
Here's how you can join the fun:

• Visit this link to RSVP - space is limited so get in quick!
• Lay out your best jeans and t-shirt
• On February 2 at 4PM (PST) join us at Dogpatch Studios in San Francisco
• ashley jenkins

 

Rumored Xbox 720 specs

looks like the next-generation Xbox is going to be a monster. It seems that website VGleaks has gotten ahold of leaked specifications for the Xbox 720, which it says will include an 8-core 1.6GHz processor, 8GB of RAM, an 800MHz graphics processor, a 50GB 6x Blu-ray Disc drive, and Gigabit Ethernet connectivity. The leaked specifications are in line with previous rumors that also gave the next-generation Xbox an 8-core processor and 8GB of RAM, so there’s nothing overly surprising about VGleaks‘ report. The Xbox 720 will likely be announced at the E3 gaming convention this June and will be Possibly in the fall.

Favorite Games of 2012 Halo 4

 

the idea of proclaiming a single one as the best of 2012 strikes us as a little limiting. This year, and write about the experiences that brought us the most enjoyment this year-- and that's the point of playing video games, isn't it?

I guess it should come as no surprise that Halo 4 is one of my favorite games of 2012. The first entry in a new trilogy -- and helmed by Microsoft's internal developer 343 Industries -- does an admirable job of resurrecting everything I love about the series. Halo 4 consistently lives up to what I expect of a Halo game: polished gunplay, a unique visual style, and engaging offline and online features that makes the repetitive act of shooting feel satisfying hours, weeks, even months later.

 Halo 4 isn't the standout of the series. It tinkers with ideas which came before and assembles a strong overall package to fit modern shooter standards. To frame it as some second coming for the series seems a bit naive. Outside of some story beats involving a dormant forerunner threat and the fate of Cortana, nothing that happens in Halo 4 hasn't happened in some form before. But I say what's wrong with more Halo? What's wrong with more missions that tweak existing ideas and enemy counts to feel bigger and better over time? What's wrong with introducing new hardware and vehicles that continue to expand the satisfying combat? Halo 4 takes a slightly conservative approach to updating one of the most beloved shooters in video games, but the results still feel on par or better than anything else out there.

Shooters come and go every year -- with impressive efforts by Gearbox and Ubisoft in Borderlands 2 and Far Cry 3,but few deliver the satisfying gunplay that keeps me coming back to Halo 4 months later. jose otero

Oculus team building immersive gaming goggles

Strap on the headset and adjust the goggle to your eyes. Look down and you'll see the floor of a space station. Look up and pipes weave above your head. Turn left or right and the tight walls of a dark corridor flank your sides. An alien bursts through a door. Look at the monster, pull the trigger and mow it down.
Palmer Luckey cobbled the headset together from spare smartphone parts. His partner Brendan Iribe is rallying the videogame industry to build the games. The result is a relatively affordable, next-generation headset that eventually will allow players to disappear into virtual worlds.

Virtual reality experiences have been the stuff of dreams for decades, with movies such as "The Lawnmower Man," "The Matrix" and the holodeck on "Star Trek: The Next Generation" popularizing the idea. So far, though, systems to take people to other worlds are expensive and built only for niche uses, such as military training.
Luckey and Iribe, the founders of Irvine's Oculus VR, have raised $2.4 million through online crowd funding to build a system that offers a virtual-reality experience to at-home gamers.
"It's the future," Luckey said. "It's the matrix."

The task facing anyone working on a virtual-reality experience is two-fold – create a device inexpensive enough so people will buy it and improve upon the current state of gaming.
"If there's not something additive or functionally better, it's not going to catch on," said Jesse Divinich, vice president in charge of analysis at video-game research firm EEDAR. "It has to do a better job than the market standard that existed before."

Luckey and Iribe are trying to tackle both problems and look to succeed where others have failed. Luckey is using low-cost smartphone components to make a headset – called the Rift – that costs hundreds of dollars rather than thousands.

"A lot of things we're doing weren't invented by us," Luckey said. "They were invented by other people. And we happen to have the luck to be in the right decade to make it happen."
Luckey is the 20-year-old co-founder of Oculus. A passionate gamer from Long Beach, he's also obsessed with virtual reality. His workspace is covered in disassembled gadget guts, and he's like a walking encyclopedia of all things VR. He perused government auctions, hospital liquidations and university sales to add to his collection of headsets, which is now more than 40. He also worked for about a year under Mark Bolas, a leading researcher in head-mounted displays at USC.by ian hamilton

New ‘Medal of Honor’ In Hot Water

Navy SEALs who worked on the video game “Medal of Honor: Warfighter” is the latest in a series of misfires for the interactive medium’s popular military shooter genre, which continues to face scrutiny as high-definition graphics become more lifelike and gamemakers attempt to create the most authentic experiences possible.

“These games are now trying to portray things and tell stories around current events,” said Casey Lynch, editor-in-chief of the gaming site IGN.com. “When you’re dealing with current topics, there’s a higher level of sensitivity. I think most people would agree there’s not the same level of sensitivity when compared to old World War II or Vietnam War games.”

Navy officials said last week that seven members of the secretive Navy SEAL Team 6, including one involved in the mission to take down Osama bin Laden, were reprimanded for disclosing classified information to the creators of “Warfighter,” a modern-day, first-person shooter from developer Danger Close Games and publisher Electronic Arts Inc
.
“We worked really closely with more than two dozen operators on the mission objectives, operations, maneuvers and various elements in the game that helped shape our single-player campaign, things like the weaponry, the gear, the way these operatives perform door breeches,” said Luke Thai, producer at Danger Close Games, ahead of the game’s Oct. 23 debut.

Thai noted that both the gamemakers and military personnel who consulted on “Warfighter” were cognizant about not detailing too much about current conflicts — or making them boring in virtual form. One of the game’s missions tasks players with explosively battling a band of Somali pirates. Thai said the real-world inspiration for that level was far less fiery.

“In terms of the various conflicts that are still going on throughout the world, we touch upon those, but we don’t replicate them exactly,” he said. “They serve as dotted-line inspiration for things that go on in the game. For instance, our overarching single-player campaign story revolves around a global hunt to shut down a fictional terror network.”

Still, to ramp up the game’s realism, “Warfighter” creators mimicked real-world weaponry and centered the plot on the ripped-from-the-headlines threat of an industrial explosive known as PETN, or pentaerythritol tetranitrate, the same material used in 2001 by convicted shoe bomber Richard Reid when he tried to destroy a trans-Atlantic flight.

The tactic doesn’t seem to have helped fuel “Warfighter” sales. The NPD Group, which tracks sales of new physical products, said last week that “Warfighter” ranked eighth in overall game sales in October, behind such titles as “NBA 2K13” and “Resident Evil 6.” EA noted in an earnings call last month that “Warfighter” had a “weaker than expected performance.”

(EA spokesman Peter Nguyen said last Friday the company has no plans to recall or alter “Medal of Honor: Warfighter” in light of the SEALs’ punishment.)A/P

'NBA 2K13' delivers again

A video game that has been so excellent for the past several years, but 2K Sports has found ways to make “NBA 2K13” even better – with some help from the league’s most famous owner.
Along with fluid gameplay, enhanced graphics and a smoother control scheme, this year’s edition of the best-selling basketball franchise welcomes rapper – and minority owner of the Brooklyn Nets – Jay-Z as executive producer.

From the start, Jay-Z makes his presence known. The introduction is like the opening of one of his electrifying concerts, with his “Public Service Announcement” serving as the soundtrack to a medley of highlights, from Russell Westbrook’s thunderous one-handed dunk to Josh Smith’s soaring alley-oop slam. Jay-Z selected 24 songs for the game’s soundtrack, and they feature some of music’s top acts, including himself, Kanye West, Coldplay, U2, Nas and Roy Ayers.

But Mr. Beyonce’s star power isn’t the only thing elevating this franchise’s game. One of the new elements in “NBA 2K13” is signature skills, which assigns star players a variety of traits that make them special commodities. For example, LeBron James has five different traits, including Chasedown Artist, which allows the reigning NBA Finals MVP to chase opponents down to negate shots on fast breaks.

Another improvement is the integration of the “MyPlayer” and “MyCareer” modes. In “MyPlayer,” you are able to build a player from scratch and purchase everything from game-day accessories to casual clothing with virtual currency. From there, you can take your created player and insert him into “MyCareer,” where your player is chosen as the No. 1 overall pick in the NBA draft.
On the court, the gameplay is stellar. The new dribbling and shooting control scheme gives gamers more offensive freedom, with an array of moves to drive past defenders or create enough space from an opponent for an efficient jump shot.

Defense has gotten some improvement also. Now you have the ability to lock down an offensive player, using the trigger button to disrupt the ball handler’s rhythm by crowding him.

The commentary, from Kevin Harlan, Steve Kerr, Clark Kellogg and sideline reporter Doris Burke, is once again solid. The player models are still on point, and the artificial intelligence on offense and defense makes playing against the computer seem realistic. The 1992 Dream Team and this year’s U.S.A. Olympic team are also available. A/P

GTA San Andreas Lawsuit Fails

Jjudge denies supposed Cypress Hill backup singer's claims that Rockstar used his likeness as model for CJ character.

Rockstar Games parent company Take-Two Interactive has won a lawsuit over Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, writes The Hollywood Reporter. An appellate court judge on Wednesday denied supposed Cypress Hill backup singer Michael "Shagg" Washington's claims that Rockstar used his life story and physical appearance as a basis for protagonist Carl "CJ" Johnson. Cypress Hill denies any association with Washington.

Washington sued Take-Two in 2010 for $250 million, alleging that during the course of the game's development, he met with Rockstar to discuss details regarding his former life as a gang member. He even provided the company with a photo of himself and his name appears in the GTA: San Andreas credits.
However, a judge did not find this to be enough, and a California appeals court has concurred. Washington's principal problem was that he could not prove it was his likeness that appeared in San Andreas. The judge said, "Plaintiff is relying entirely on CJ's physical appearance in the game, but that appearance is so generic that it necessarily includes hundreds of other black males."
Additionally, the judge ruled that even if Rockstar did base CJ on Washington, it would have been protected as transformative fair use. This is an argument based on the fact that the First Amendment allows existing materials, including images, to be used so long as they are amended enough for a new purpose.
"Washington has presented no evidence demonstrating that the plot or characters of GTA: San Andreas have any relevance to his life or his purported fame," a statement from the decision reads.by eddie makuch

HALO 4 REVIEWS

Players jumped in by the millions to finish the fight in Halo 3, back in 2007. And yet, like many a franchise before it, the one-time trilogy of Halo games finds itself with a new fourth sibling, years later.

Minecraft Review - Xbox 360

360 version of Minecraft gives players a map at the start of each game, for free. Getting something for nothing in Minecraft is almost sacrilege, but it’s much appreciated here. Maps are craftable in the PC version, but not until you’ve found some redstone deep in the earth and crafted iron to built a compass, which means you have to figure out how mining and smelting works before you’ve ever figured out where you are.
Sitting next to loved ones and playing a game is an often overlooked source of fun in the age of online multiplayer, and in an open-world game like Minecraft, it’s like bringing your friend to a massive playground, except with more zombies.
Even with a four-player split screen going and other players in your server, navigating through Minecraft’s complicated menus is quickly mastered, if your television is big and HD enough. The menu system is about as serviceable as you could realistically expect from a 360, which is not to say it’s good or anything. Consoles just aren’t suited to complicated menus–a mouse and keyboard is the much preferable input solution.


So that’s all the good, but here comes the bad: Overall, console-Minecraft is based on an early version of the game. The PC version of Minecraft has evolved through updates to contain a whole lot more stuff than the 360 version, as well as noticeably improved lighting and graphics. A partial list of content that’s missing: Modding. The hunger mechanic that drives the PC version. The ability to raise animals from babies. Jungle cats. The jungle biomeme. Ruins in mines. NPC characters and villages. The enchanting system. The alchemy system. The End World, Ender Men, and the Ender Dragon final boss. And more. While some of these “later” additions aren’t all that great, and none are necessary for having a good time, on the whole, the PC Minecraft experience provides greater diversity and much deeper gaming, especially for more seasoned players. While 4J has said it’s interested in frequently updating Minecraft-360, those updates are not available at the time of this review. Let’s hope they’ll come soon.


The list of Minecraft features missing from the 360 is long, but the most egregious omission is the sheer scope of the PC version of Minecraft. While computer Minecraft’s procedurally generated geography is limited only by the amount of memory your PC has, the 360 version takes place on a 1024 by 1024 block level. That’s pretty big in terms of many games, but tiny in terms of Minecraft. It’s dispiriting to get to the edge of the map with so little effort, especially when the boundary has been so shoddily defined. A wall of lava or an un-climbable peak would have been preferable to Minecraft’s lazy invisible barrier. The absence of endless open spaces means that you can essentially never get really lost, and it also limits the amount of sheer raw materials in the world, potentially scuttling hugely ambitious building plans.

Speaking of resources, the PC version of Minecraft contains a creative mode where you have access to everything the game has to offer. It’s perfect if you prefer building with an infinite Lego set and don’t feel like being ravaged by skeletons. The 360 game offers only the survival mode. Big points off for that. And big points off for not allowing gamers to change difficulty in the middle of games, too.
On the whole, any Minecraft is better than no Minecraft, and the 360 version is a full, satisfying game, when not judged against the PC version.stephen a johnson

Atari 2600 35 Years Later

it launched in the U.S. in October 1977 -- and 35 years is a long, long time.And while Atari supported the 2600 into the '90s, for most consumers the system's life effectively crashed to an anticlimactic end in 1983 when Warner (who owned Atari at the time) reported that its games division had overextended itself and lost billions of dollars. The U.S. video game industry reeled from those losses and didn't recover until Nintendo performed triage a few years later with the NES -- the system that a large percentage of 1UP readers regard as their entry into the medium.

The simple fact is that 35 years is a long time in video game terms, and while the average age of gamers continues to rise, today's "core" gamer tends to have gotten into gaming well after the 2600's heyday. Many contemporary game fanatics, weaned on post-PlayStation 3D visuals, can barely stomach the comparatively primitive visuals of NES and Genesis games; for them, Atari 2600's minimalist blocks and bleeps are so far removed from their expectations for video games that they may as well be cave paintings.

And yet, regressive as the 2600 may appear to the modern eye, video games would exist as they do today without the influence of that console. The 2600 didn't really do anything first, but it did it better, and it created an industry in the process. The 2600 helped transform games from a novel amusement into a creative medium: A financial juggernaut. And while the system had its failings, both technical and corporate, it taught its successors both what to do and what not to do. And for millions of kids -- now grown adults who perhaps no longer respond to Internet solicitations for their memories of video games -- it opened a world of imagination, entertainment, and even addiction.

Maybe most gamers don't see Atari 2600 as the baseline of video games the way they did back in the NES and even PlayStation days, but the system's impact has in no way diminished over time. The 2600 remains as important today as it was in the days when it ruled the living room and school kids replaced "a partridge in a pear tree" with "a cartridge for Atari" when they sang "The 12 Days of Christmas."by 1up

Microsoft compares Next Halo to Call of Duty

Gamers have long drawn comparisons between chart-topping shooter franchises Halo and Call of Duty, but now Microsoft has commented on the similarities. Speaking to GameSpot, Halo franchise development director Frank O'Connor said such comparisons are "reasonable," Halo 4's new loadout system. Ultimately, though, he said Halo is different than Call of Duty because it does not favor the player with the "bigger gun."
"Halo 4's loadout system frequently, and sort of appropriately, gets compared to other FPS games, including Call of Duty and others. And definitely, in terms of how much effect the progression system has on your player, that's a reasonable sort of comparison," O'Connor said.
"I think the real difference is that Halo is built on a notion of really balanced gameplay. I love Black Ops, for example, and in Black Ops I'm always trying to get to a weapon; my eyes are always on that prize. And it will be a very, very powerful weapon," O'Connor added. "Halo is really more about survival encounters, rather than getting the drop on someone or winning through having a bigger gun. And also using the things you've learned on the battlefield. So while you are able to unlock weapons and abilities that do modify your baseline traits [in Halo 4], they're, bluntly, not as powerful and not as game changing. They're about subtly and their about style ultimately."
Players will be able to decide for themselves this November. Halo 4 arrives on November 6.by eddie makuch 

No Far Cry 3 on Nintendo's Wii U

Following the publication of this story, a Ubisoft representative confirmed to GameSpot that Far Cry 3 will not be available for the Wii U because the system was not considered at the onset of development.
"We will not be releasing Far Cry 3 on Wii U," reads a line from the statement. "The game has been in development for more than two years and at the time Wii U had not been considered."

Far Cry 3 is the latest AAA title to skip the Wii U. An Ubisoft representative has told CVG that Ubisoft's December-dated first-person shooter is not planned for Nintendo's first high-definition console

Ubisoft did not provide the site a rationale as to why Far Cry 3 is bypassing the Wii U, and the company had not responded to GameSpot's request for comment at press time.
Ubisoft is one of Nintendo's most prolific partners for the Wii U at launch. The French publisher is bringing a host of games to the console, including Assassin's Creed III, ZombiU, Just Dance 4, Rayman Legends, Marvel Avengers: Battle for Earth, and Rabbids Land.
Other big-name games skipping the Wii U include Resident Evil 6 and Dead Space 3. Additionally, just last week, Fallout and Elder Scrolls publisher Bethesda said it presently has no plans for the Wii U.
The Wii U is due out on November 18 in North America beginning at $299.

Microsoft Xbox 360 Top Selling Console

Fears of video games sales slumping due to the lack of new consoles, Microsoft’s (MSFT) seven-year-old Xbox 360 continues to be the No.1 selling console in the U.S. for the 20th consecutive month, according to NPD Group. The data reveals 193,000 Xbox 360 systems were sold in August giving Microsoft’s console a lofty 48% share of the U.S. console gaming market. In addition to holding the top spot for hardware, five out of the top-10 selling games in the U.S. last month were Xbox 360 titles: Call of Duty: Black Ops, Darksiders II, NCAA Football 13, Sleeping Dogs, and Transformers: Fall of Cybertron. NPD gathers that retail spending on the Xbox 360 topped out at $196 million and expects this holiday’s strong lineup of titles including Halo 4, Forza Horizon, Dance Central 3, Fable: The Journey, Kinect Sesame Street TV, Kinect Nat Geo TV and enhancement features such as SmartGlass to keep the Xbox 360 as the frontrunner for the current console generation.

Castlevania 3DS delayed

Konami today confirmed a delay for Castlevania: Lords of Shadow - Mirror of Fate. Previously expected to launch this fall, the 3DS debut for the whip-cracking action series has been pushed back to an early 2013 release.

In announcing the delay, producer Dave Cox explained, "It's been two years since the enormous success of Castlevania: Lords of Shadow, and with this next installment, we want to take the necessary time needed to give fans a handheld title unlike any other."

Stepping back from Dracula's story, Mirror of Fate redirects its focus on the Belmont clan, 25 years after Lords of Shadow's conclusion. Players take on the roles of Trevor and Simon Belmont, as well as Dracula's own son, Alucard. The game will also lead into next year's other Castlevania game, Lords of Shadow 2 for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC. All three games have Mercury Steam as developer.by brendan sinclair

DayZ a Shining Example of PC Gaming at Its Finest

DayZ is now officially on the path to becoming a standalone game. The popular ARMA II mod recently surpassed 1 million players, a milestone which coincides with today's announcement that ARMA developer Bohemia Interactive, along with DayZ designer Dean Hall, will be creating a version of DayZ that functions independently of the games currently required to play it. It's quite the success story -- the mod has only been available for about four months -- and is a testament to what's possible on computers.

A quick glance at of DayZ might give the impression that it is nothing more than a dreary-looking zombie mod. Look a bit deeper and you'll find out there is a very good reason that, even with as many zombie games as there are out there, people are compelled to purchase a three-year-old military game best known to many as the source of footage mistook for an IRA film in a British documentary last year. More than a zombie mod, DayZ is an open-world survival mod that happens to be set in a world inhabited by zombies. You don't have a set of missions to complete or a certain finish line to cross; after awaking on a beach with next to nothing to your name, you're set into a huge world with only the goal of surviving. That entails more than just avoiding long drops from the top of a building or aggressive zombies; you also have to worry about your temperature, getting sick, and eating and drinking regularly. To take care of hunger you'll need to track down food somewhere in the world, illnesses require antibiotics, and having your temperature drop means finding the tools necessary to start a fire. These resources can be difficult to track down, and guns can be even harder to come by, which is a brave but sensible decision for a game that looks like a first-person shooter This in and of itself can be challenging enough, and you'll likely die helplessly more than a few times as you learn the ins and outs of the game. But you also have to account for the fact that you're playing on a server with dozens of other players who also have needs. Much like in a real zombie apocalypse, others may decide to be friendly and share resources with you, or they might see you as a threat and take you down the second the second you walk into their crosshairs. What makes this all the more significant is the game's use of permadeath -- die, whether by the hand of another player's hand or otherwise, and you'll lose all of your progress, forcing you to start over again from scratch on the beach.

In a way, it is almost like the EVE Online of zombie games. Unlike most games, where you're expected to complete particular goals, you're essentially left to your own devices to make your own fun and craft your own stories with other players. With no story in the game itself, this may not sound like the makings of a truly memorable narrative. In reality, this ensures no two playthroughs are alike, and the tension that stems from interacting with other players leads to an experience unlike anything else I've experienced in gaming -- all this from a mod that is still considered to be in alpha (and rightfully so, as it's not yet an especially smooth experience).

The mod will continue to be developed alongside the standalone version of the game which Hall, DayZ's creator, calls "the fairy-tale outcome for a mod that many would have said impossible four months ago." And he's right, as many of the details about DayZ don't necessarily sound like they would add up to a mod that a million people have now played. Yet here we are, with the game doing well enough to justify the development of a standalone game and ARMA II: Combined Operations (a bundle of ARMA II and the Operation Arrowhead expansion, which is also necessary to play DayZ) having been one of the best-selling games throughout this year's Steam Summer Sale.Development of the standalone DayZ will employ the Minecraft model, which is to say, it will feature "fast iterations with the community alpha available for a heavily discounted price." Minecraft began being sold not long after its development started at a discounted price, with those who bought in early receiving all future updates for free while being able to play the game and provide feedback before its official launch. Going this path with DayZ is a wise decision, and not simply because Minecraft proved to be such a remarkable success. With players already having experienced the mod and feeling like a part of the development process, it wouldn't make sense to suddenly adopt a traditional development model that shuts them out until the game is mostly complete. Why wait to release a somewhat final version of the game (it's hard to call anything "final" these days with the way games evolve post-release) when you can involve ardent fans in the development process (and get money upfront)? Doing so will only lead to a better finished product and more invested players who are in turn more likely to champion the game and encourage friends to check it out. The notion of PC gaming's death has been disproved and shot down so many times it seems silly to even continue to acknowledge it. Still, as someone who adores PC games, it's nice to have yet another piece of evidence for why anyone who suggests PC gaming is in decline is flat-out wrong; the NPD Group's inability to reflect DayZ's popularity in its sales charts doesn't change the fact that the mod has driven hundreds of thousands of sales of ARMA. Better yet, DayZ is also an example of something that is currently only possible on computers. Hopefully console manufacturers will one day open things up to the point where mods like this can also thrive on their platforms -- bringing an experience like this to more people can only lead to good things. Until that time, computer games will continue to be a bastion for innovative titles, particularly those which feature elements which deviate from the accepted standard of what makes for a commercially successful game.by chris pereira

Amazon Leaks Wii U Box Designs?

don't read too much into them, but just in case they're the real deal, what do you think of the splash? And the colour scheme?
The yellow is a bit weird, but the "swoosh" design is something we've seen from Nintendo plenty of times before, from the spine of DS games to the top of GameCube covers.
We're asking Nintendo for clarification, and will update if we hear back.

Wii U.luke plunkett 

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Next-generation Xbox developer leak may reveal Xbox 720 specs

 A supposed Xbox 720 “Durango” developer kit was posted on an obscure developer forum and offered to the public for the price of $10,000. The device resembles a traditional PC tower running a regular debug launcher, leading many to be skeptical about the authenticity of the prototype, which was said to feature an Intel processor, NVIDIA graphics, and “more than 8GB of memory.” EuroGamer’s Digital Foundry reached out to the source of the leak and multiple developers, however, and determined that the system is in fact “genuine.”

The man behind the leak, known only as DaE, revealed that Microsoft’s next-generation gaming and home entertainment system will feature an eight-core CPU, confirming previous rumors that have suggested the future system would contain six to eight cores. The next-generation console is also rumored to include support for Blu-ray, true 1080p and native 3D output, and is expected to be six times more powerful than the current Xbox.by dan graziano