Wednesday, October 30, 2013

Exploring the deep themes in Beyond: Two Souls

When I went to play Beyond: Two Souls for the first time, I didn’t know much about it. I tried to stay away from the trailers so I could be surprised. All I knew was that it was made by Quantic Dream, the people behind one of my favorite games, Heavy Rain, and that it was about a girl named Jodie Holmes who has a link with an entity. Little did I know the story was going to affect me emotionally as much as it did.

The reviews for Beyond are mixed, with people on one end of the spectrum saying that it’s one of the best games ever made and those on the other end saying that it’s a complete mess. I’m one of those people on the positive side. I wasn’t so sure about it at first as the anachronistic storytelling threw me off, but I really came to love it.

Titanfall will remain exclusive to Xbox, PC

Zampella was also asked if Respawn Entertainment will make a PlayStation 4 game some day. He replied, "Of course we will, just not the first Titanfall."

The original story is below.
PlayStation and Nintendo fans hoping to play Respawn Entertainment's first-person shooter Titanfall on their consoles appear to be out of luck. The game will remain exclusive to Xbox One, Xbox 360, and PC "for the life of the title," Electronic Arts CFO Blake Jorgensen said today during an earnings call.

Titanfall is the first product from Respawn Entertainment, the studio founded by numerous former Call of Duty developers, including Infinity Ward cofounder Vince Zampella. "For the life of the title" suggests that a potential Titanfall sequel could be released on a non-Microsoft or PC platform, though this has not been announced.

Microsoft featured Titanfall prominently in its recently launched Xbox One advertising campaign, rolling out on TV, the Web, and on billboards this month in the lead-up to the Xbox One launch on November 22.

Grand Theft Auto 5: nearly 29 million copies shipped

"Oh, you think you're proud of selling one million copies? Your friend, Grand Theft Auto 5 sold almost 30 million copies! You're such a failure!"

That's probably what an overzealous mom would sound like, if she had mothered a video game. And video games were people. But thankfully, we're safe from this horrifying alternate reality.

"During the fiscal second quarter, we delivered record Non-GAAP results driven by the unprecedented success of Rockstar Games' Grand Theft Auto 5," Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick said in a recent earnings call. "The title received stellar reviews, shattered entertainment industry records, and has already sold-in nearly 29 million units to date. The extraordinary success of Grand Theft Auto 5 illustrates the positive momentum in our business and consumers' enduring appetite for the highest-quality interactive entertainment.

The Simpsons: Tapped Out revenue passes $100 million

The Simpsons: Tapped Out has now generated over $100 million in life-to-date digital net revenue, publisher Electronic Arts announced today. The game was released in August 2012 and has been in the top 20 iPhone grossing games in the United States for all but 12 days since launch, EA said.

The news came as part of EA's latest earnings report for the quarter ended September 30. Overall, EA posted a profit of $105 million on $1.04 billion in revenue.

"EA's strong second quarter was driven by great title launches, continued digital growth, and financial discipline," new CEO Andrew Wilson said in a statement.
"While we have made good progress in the first half of the year, we remain focused on executing our FY14 plan and delivering a full slate of amazing games and services to players on current and next-generation consoles, mobile, and PC," he added.

Also in the report, it was confirmed that EA had to pay around $40 million in college football settlement expenses related to the settlement between EA and a group of former athletes.

Tearaway story trailer reveals folk influences

Tearaway is about more than the artistic wonders of papercraft. There's a story involved, too, one based on strong folk influences. To offer some of what the story entails, Sony and Media Molecule have a released a new trailer for their upcoming Vita-exclusive papercraft platformer.

"The actual story is all about this character, the Messenger, with an envelope-shaped head," lead creator Rex Crowle says in the trailer. "Their whole reason for existence is that they have something, they have a message, trapped inside them, which they're trying to deliver. And the person that they're trying to deliver this message to is you, the player, the person that's holding their hold world in their hands."

Pokemon Dev Opposed to the Idea of DLC

Pokemon X & Y may have signaled the maturing of Game Freak’s successful series, but that doesn’t mean the team is interested in implementing other kinds of contemporary features. This includes DLC, according to art director Ken Sugimore in a recent interview (translated by Siliconera).

“When it comes to business, the one thing I’ve always said ‘no!’ to is ‘the act of buying Pokémon with money’. That is something that has been said since the days [creator Satoshi] Tajiri was completely involved in everything.

“The reason being, is because it’s one of things that could ‘ruin the worldview’ of Pokémon. I believe the reason we don’t simply commercialize [Pokémon], is that it’s a way of protecting the brand, and for this purpose, we have the specialty company called The Pokémon Company. Therefore, suppose we sell a Pokémon for 100 yen, then we must prepare something that is worthy of that 100 yen, along with a reasonable consent for doing so.”

Titanfall to remain exclusive to Microsoft

Those hoping to get a taste of towering mechs on their PlayStation 4 will be very disappointed to hear that Titanfall will most likely not find its way to a Sony platform. EA has stated that the game will remain exclusive to Xbox One, Xbox 360, and PC for the entirety of its life cycle.

"In the case of Titanfall, it's a brand new IP and it's exclusive only for the life of the title on Xbox One and Xbox 360 and PC," said EA CFO Blake Jorgensen during today's EA financial call (via Joystiq).

This statement contradicts an earlier statement from Respawn, who had previously expressed that a PS4 version was "definitely not out of the question." Respawn's Vince Zampella has weighed in on Twitter, adding that the studio will not release Titanfall on PS4, but will develop future games for the platform.
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