Category Archives: News

IDL NEWS – Backwards Compatibility, Call of Duty, and Definitive Islands

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Oh that mid-week lull . . . probably makes news much more dull?

So, as I pointed out yesterday, the summer months are not very interesting when it comes to video game news and releases. September is where the fun is at, but until then, aside from my hibernation holidays, it’s easiest to just keep the head down, and plug away at those games that sit atop the uncompleted list. Sigh. There’s just so many 😥

Call of Duty Black Ops 3 Multiplayer Beta

The multiplayer beta for COD BLOPS III kicks off on the Playstation 4 first, as announced earlier in this year’s at E3. Starting Aug 19 and ends Aug 23. It will then migrate to the PC and Xbox One on Aug 26 till Aug 30. Available for all those who pre-ordered the game.

call-of-duty-black-ops-3

Xbox Backwards Compatibility

Speaking of Call of Duty and Black Ops, Black Ops II is currently the most requested Xbox 360 game to come to the Xbox One via backwards compatibility. Red Dead Redemption now sits in 2nd place. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, Halo: Reach, Call of Duty: Black Ops, Gears of War 3, Fallout 3, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, and Mass Effect 3 round off the top ten.

Black Ops II remains on my shelf unopened. If it’s the first game to be made available, it will be the first game I play. Deal? Deal.

Definitive Dead Island?

According to recent info, and following a growing trend, it appears that Dead Island might be the next game to get the remake/re-release treatment over to the current-gen hardware by way of a Definitive Edition. Blegh.

Speaking of islands, tomorrow will be my last day posting live news for the next little while. I’ll be rounding off the week with an article tomorrow, on my current playlist of things getting played. No review, or Achievements either, as I actually haven’t played anything this week. Sad face.

BUT! I’ve been working hard, and I’ve prepared some stuff for next week, to at least keep the posts flowing, while I’m away. Hopefully you’ll like it.

And then shortly after, I’ll return. Hopefully nothing exciting happens while I’m away. I’d hate to miss it.

-iRogan

IDL NEWS – New Games and Deals, and The Top Games to Round of the Year

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I don’t get paid on Tuesday, lest I’d be ruined come Wednesday.

New games today, and Xbox Spotlight deals. There’s also a nice list at the bottom, of the notable games still to be excited for this year. What a great year we’ve had already!

I should’ve titled this “What I Will Be Playing”.

New Games – July 21:

Zombie Army Trilogy (Xbox One, PS4) – Sniper Elite was a pretty fun game, and the first two Zombie Army games were originally released as DLC for 2013’s Sniper Elite V2. I might pick this up and play in co-op with Illestrader.

These aren't the dead you're looking for.

These aren’t the dead you’re looking for.

F1 2015 (Xbox One, PS4) – Another F1 game by Codemasters. I found these titles to be too much simulation for me, and not fun. Pass on the right. Into a wall.

Journey (PS4) – The lovely award winning PS3 indie title has finally made it;s way to the PS4.

They said I could become anything, so I became a shooting star.

They said I could become anything, so I became a shooting star.

Game of Thrones: Episode Five – A Nest of Vipers (PC, Xbox 360, PS3, PS4, Xbox One) – I have the full TellTale Games game pack, which includes all the games, and subsequent episodes. I’ll wait for Episode 6 to be released before starting the story.

Hatoful Boyfriend (PS4, PS Vita) – You are a human, who lives in a cave, and falls in love with birds? Or human birds? I dunno?

Deals With Gold Spotlight Sale

Xbox One
Forza Horizon 2 and Forza Motorsport 5 Bundle 35%
Forza Motorsport 5 Car Pass Add-on 50%
The Elder Scrolls Online: Tamriel Unlimited Editions 33%
Wolfenstein: The Old Blood 25%
DARK SOULS II: Scholar of the First Sin 40%
Dragon Ball Xenoverse 25%

Forza Horizons 2 was a great game and Forza Motorsport 5 was fun, if not limited. I’m not always a fan of simulation racers. And I have the physical copy of Wolfenstein: The Old Blood on its way. So expect opinions on that soon. The New Order was fantastic. I should do a replay and iReview of that one.

Xbox 360 (lots of sales this week. I’ve included the notables – all great)
Max Payne 3 75%
L.A. Noire 75%
Red Dead Redemption 75%
Midnight Club: LA 75%
Bully Scholarship Ed. 75%
Forza Horizon 50%
Enslaved 75%

Top Games Still To Be Released This Year

Rare Replay – Aug 4: Announced this year at E3, the Rare Replay is a 30 game collection of all the classics, coming to the Xbox One. There are also 10,000 achievements points available.

Dishonored: Definitive Edition – Aug 25: Enhanced visuals and including all the DLC. Great if you haven’t played it, but I’d have to see the videos to see if the visual upgrade is enough to justify a 2nd copy. Maybe I’ll just replay the 360 version for free when its backwards compatible.

Gears of War Ultimate Edition – Aug 25: A remastered version of the original game that kicked off the franchise. A game night staple.

Mad Max – Sept 1: Open-world post-apocalyptic survival game based in the universe that is Mad Max.

Metal Gear Solid V – Sept 1: I’ve talked about this game a lot already, and I really don’t think I can say anymore. Just that I can’t wait.

Destiny: The Taken King – Sept 15: The next chapter in the Destiny Saga. Comes as a stand-alone as well which includes the previous full release and 2 expansions. New maps and modes, new missions and strikes, subclasses, gear, items and a Raid.

Rainbow Six: Siege – Oct 13: Intense first-person shooter in the Tom Clancy Rainbow Six world. Infiltration and hostage extract modes look incredible and tense. Back to the one-life gameplay style. Online only competitive games scare me away, as I’ve learned with Evolve. But from a co-op Terrorist Hunt mode perspective, I’ll pick it up.

Assassins’s Creed Syndicate – Oct 23: The next game in the Assassin’s series.

Halo 5: Guardians – Oct 27: Sold. Obviously. Another game night staple is the Halo franchise. Now that ODST is out for the MCC, and the game is finally stable, I’ll do a review.

Need For Speed – Nov 3: How many times has the Need for Speed franchise been rebooted now? The E3 impressions looked incredible, and it’s going back to the nocturnal open world, focusing on the street life and car customization.

Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 – Nov 6: Another annual title that I’m usually a few years behind on. Just finished Ghosts for crying out loud. Didn’t try Black Ops 2 either. And still haven’t gotten to Advanced Soldier. Woops

Rise of the Tomb Raider – Nov 10: Loved the first reboot, and I’m super excited for the sequel.

Star Wars Battlefront – Nov 17: First impressions at E3 show promise. The online-only direction might be a deal breaker, but the co-op missions show promise. Obviously more info has to be seen, but I’ll get first impressions through EA Access.

Just Cause 3 – Dec 1: I’m holding out on this one for now. No co-op is a huge bummer, and I quickly grew bored of Just Cause 2.

Hitman – December 8: New entry in the franchise, simply titled Hitman. Very interested as the last one was a huge improvement for the franchise in my opinion, and now with the online presence and unique one-time contracts . . . definitively appealing.

I’ll be back tomorrow with some more news, and What i’M Playing.

-iRogan

IDL NEWS – Hideo Kojima :'(, Duke Nukem, and Xbox Streaming

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Hooray for Mondays, hooray for inconsistency.

Today in the news we’ll talk about Hideo Kojima’s downward spiral of sadness, Dead Island 2 woes, Duke Nukem, and Xbox Streaming.

Tomorrow we’ll talk about the new games of the week and Tuesday’s deals, and then the remainder of the week is dedicated to What i’m Playing, an iReview, and achievement stuffs. Next week I’ll be starting a 2 week offline break, but I will have a Xbox 360 daily feature planned to be posted while I’m away, and a short story that takes place in Titanfall.

Newandexcitingthings. Yay!

So, onward and upwards!

Kojima, Kojima, Kojima! Konami, Too. 😥

So, the web of intrigue that is Konami vs Kojima continues to unravel. Godzilla and the Kaiju couldn’t make this more interesting.

The latest news in the deteriorating relationship has the publisher, Konami, removing Hideo Kojima’s name, creator of Metal Gear Solid, from the Phantom Pain’s box art. The Kojima Productions logo has also been removed.

MGS_Boxes-720x405

The story also got a unique twist when an internet light was shone on a specific mission in The Ground Zeroes, that might have alluded to Kojima knowing he was on his way out, earlier last year.

A mission in Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes set players the task of deleting the logos of Metal Gear games directed by Hideo Kojima.

As spotted by GamesRadar, the Déjà Vu mission requires you to use a UV light to erase the logos of all games crafted under Kojima. If you’re successful, the following message appears:

301999d095b9cfdb34cbcc459ac6e39dde306fb3.png__1917x983_q85_crop_upscale-720x369

There’s also a personal voice message, seemingly from Kojima, thanking the player for “all [their] support”.

Kojima is the man!

Yager Gone from Dead Island 2 – Mutual Parting

Spec Ops: The Line developer Yager has officially been removed from Dead Island 2 project. This troubled game has seen problems with delays, and now developers parting ways. Publisher, Deep Silver, stated that they will be sharing more information at a later date, but reports show that this was a mutual parting, a difference in opinions towards the game’s progress.

dead-island-2-logo_0

Dead Island 1 developer Techland released their other open-world zombie game Dying Light earlier this year, making me wonder, is a Dead Island sequel even necessary at this point?

Gearbox’s Duke Nukem Plan

Randy Pitchford, of Gearbox, has stated that concept development has been started for Duke Nukem, but it might not be Gearbox working on it as they’re busy. They’re are looking into bringing in the correct developer and working alongside them.

“I did not acquire the franchise merely so we could all experience Duke Nukem Forever. That was the toll to pay to give Duke a chance. That said, I liked that game,” he said.

Xbox One Game Streaming

Microsoft is moving the Xbox One game streaming feature out of the Preview Phase into full release. With an Xbox One and and a Windows 10 machine, we will now be able to stream our console through to the machine using the Xbox App. I’ll post more info and hands-on when Windows 10 is released later this month. I’m excited for this feature, and all it really requires is a wired Xbox One/360 controller, Xbox One, and a PC.

So there’s the important stuff out of the way.

New Games and Deals tomorrow, and we’ll discuss So Many Me, and this week’s Xbox sales. Then more on Titanfall, Arkham Knight, maybe an iReview and then Achievement stuff to wrap up the week.

As I mentioned at the start, I’ll be offline for two weeks starting Friday, but I hope to be posting a daily article about the top 5 Xbox 360 games, and a new short story, with the Titanfall setting. I’ll just be missing the news. Sad face.

-iRogan

IDL NEWS – Nintendo In Mourning, Kojima Productions Shuttering?

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Back on form. Back to the news. Another Monday creeps around again.

Today we had some sad news reported, so we’ll touch on that first.

Nintendo President Satoru Iwata Has Passed Away
At the age of 55, the President and CEO of Nintendo has passed away, due to a bile duct growth that he had been battling for the last couple years. He passed away July 11th, 2015.

Iwata began his long tenure with Nintendo as a programmer in the 1980s, and can be credited to the success of Kirby.

Batman: Arkham Knight PC Woes and DLC
Warner Bros. Interactive have apologized to fans for the notorious PC problems and suspension of sales. They’ve issued full refunds to all those they’ve disappointed. They’ve also announced that the upcoming Batgirl DLC will be delayed on PC until further notice. The DLC will not be available until the main game is fixed.

Kojima Productions Has Disbanded
More sad news. The Japanese voice actor for Solid Snake, Akio Otsuka has confirmed the closure of Kojima Productions.

“Kojima Productions was forced to disband, but it appears that the work that the team has been putting their utmost effort into is nearly complete,”

“I’m not exaggerating when I say that I expect it will become their greatest masterpiece. I couldn’t help it. I just wanted to say ‘Kept you waiting, huh?’ (Laughs.) But even if this is the end, Metal Gear Solid is immortal!”

Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain is set to release on September 1st, 2015.

MGS5_TPP

I’m very much excited to play this, potentially last, game. And the closure of the studio has pretty much confirmed my next tattoo.

Over the next coming week I hope to play Metal Gear Solid: Ground Zeroes some more to get reacquainted.

Very sad news about Iwata as well, today.

I’ve been playing, and wrapping up The Crew, as evidence by the review from earlier today. I also tried Massive Chalice and will be posting more about that on Wednesday. Titanfall has been a blast to step into again, and I’ve been plugging away at Batman: Arkham Knight. Further impressions on what I’ve been playing later this week.

Tomorrow is the new games and deals day.

-iRogan

IDL NEWS – Destiny, PAX, and New Games

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I posted earlier today (and updated), the Xbox Ultimate Summer Game Sale, but there’s also more Xbox Deals With Gold to discuss, Destiny rewarding their most dedicated fans, and some PAX news. 

No new games were released, but they made up for it I guess by unloading a ton of sales.

Bungie Rewarding Dedicated  Fans
Bungie has announced a special reward for first-year Destiny players who complete a certain set of challenges, called The Moments of Triumph, before September 9th. Some of the hardcore fans out there will have already completed some of these, as the data is being pulled retroactively, but here’s the list for those who want to strive for the exclusive emblem:

TriumphEmblem

The Moments of Triumph are:

  • Apprentice of Light — Reach level 20
  • Light of the Garden — Finish the Black Garden mission
  • Light in the Soul  — Finish The Dark Below story
  • Light of the Reef — Finish the House of Wolves story
  • Bane of Skolas — Defeat Prison of Elders on hard
  • Bane of Atheon — Finish the Vault of Glass raid on hard
  • Bane of Crota — Finish the Crota’s End raid on hard
  • Public Servant — Complete 50 public events
  • Crucible Gladiator — Win 100 Crucible matches
  • Chest Hunter — Find all 20 golden chests

PAX Prime 2015 – Kim Swift
Prime’s Keynote speaker will be none other than Kim Swift, one of the creators of a little game called Portal.

Kim Swift is currently a Senior Game Designer at Amazon Game Studio and her resume shows she previously worked on another little game called Left 4 Dead, among others. She’ll be telling stories and sharing insights about her career.

PAX Prime runs from August 28-31. I’ll be at the event itself, and adding a section up top, as we near the event. So stick around for further coverage of the event.

E3 Game Critics Awards
The Game Critics Awards results for E3 have been revealed, and I’ve chosen a few of the notable ones, shown below:

  • Best of Show – Fallout 4 (Bethesda Game Studios/Bethesda)
  • Best Original Game – Horizon Zero Dawn (Guerrilla Games/SCE)
  • Best Console Game – Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End (Naughty Dog/SCE)
  • Best PC Game – Fallout 4 (Bethesda Game Studios/Bethesda)
  • Best Action/Adventure Game – Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End (Naughty Dog/SCE)
  • Best Independent Game – No Man’s Sky (Hello Games/SCE)

Deals With Gold

Xbox One
Lords of the Fallen – 60%
Destiny Expansion Pass – 25%
Destiny DLC I – The Dark Below – 25%
Destiny DLC II – House of Wolves – 25%

Xbox 360
Monaco – 60%
Kane & Lynch: Dead Men – 75%
Kane & Lynch 2 – 80%
Destiny Expansion Pass – 25%
Destiny DLC I – The Dark Below – 25%
Destiny DLC II – House of Wolves – 25%

Hopefully some more news tomorrow, but it’s definitely slowing down on the overall news front, and new releases as we hit the summer lulls. It’s all just sales while we wait for September, and then the holiday season.

This would probably be the time for me to start expanding the different features of the site, like articles, shorts, and E3 opinions. Or maybe play some games.

-iRogan