Each Clash of Ninja installment brings either drastic or subtle changes. For instance, the Japan-onlyClash of Ninja 3 introduced transformation modes, and Clash of Ninja 2 Revolution brought in-hand seals performed with the Wii Remote to increase health or chakra. In Naruto Shippuden: Clash of Ninja Revolution 3, the franchise’s fifth installment, players are treated to a new tag mechanic that instantly switches teammates in combat, and, to the delight of the community, online matchmaking play. CONR3 sets out to be one of the best in the franchise, but several shortcomings frustrate the overall experience.
The combat remains largely untouched from its predecessors. The fundamentals center around players jockeying for position on a 3D plane, with sidestepping crucial for avoiding linear attacks and tricky teleport set-ups. Combos can be as simple as mashing a single button, while harder combos involve delicate timing and careful character placement. Canceling, a mechanic that interrupts a move at the cost of your chakra meter, can lead to some fantastic, long combos. However, long combos are kept balanced by the substitution jutsu mechanic (teleporting as an instant escape out of a combo), and the game’s accelerated gravity system on airborne characters gradually pulls them towards the ground.
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Among others, we’ve been able to battle zombies as a high-school football coach and a Vietnam vet in Left 4 Dead. Could the Midnight Riders be next?
Fans will recognize the The Midnight Riders as a fake southern rock band featured throughout Left 4 Dead 2’s “Dark Carnival” campaign. Posters promoting the group list an official website, which leads to what appears to be a teaser site registered by Valve.
There’s already speculation that the southern rockers will be Left 4 Dead’s next group of survivors, possibly starring in a DLC pack. If that turns out to be the case, expect more information early next year.
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Rules of War
Stepping back from the front lines to examine how war has defined how we make games.
By John Constantine
The rule is that war is a given in video games. The second game ever made had the word right in its name. MIT’s Model Railroad Club made Spacewar! to indulge their predilection for Sci-Fi pulp first and foremost, but that game nonetheless fired the medium’s first weapons, and saw the first players trying to gun each other down in combat. Those guns have never left games, and they have arguably done more to define the art of making games than anything else. Video games have been more defined by humanity’s compulsion towards armed conflict than any other cultural force. War and the instruments of war are the model for game rules and what a game program does when we interact with it. In turn, video games have, like any artistic medium, redefined the way we perceive war throughout the west.
You can understand why. The central pleasure of all gaming is manipulating a digital body, some shape outside of your own in the physical world. Making something on a screen move is the first hook in games, and changing the environment is the second. A gun, any projectile you separate from your in-game body, enhances your influence in the game world, intensifying your connection and response to it. War as game has been naturally proliferated by basic design impulses, as it was in the board games that preceded video games. By placing you in opposition to a threatening force, you are given a goal and control over the means to destroy or hamper that force guaranteeing your survival and dominance. Even beyond the nuts and bolts of play, war has provided the ideal aesthetic and emotional subject matter to engage a player. War entails dispassionate strategy but also complete emotional engagement, action as well as drama.
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Sony’s latest attempt to broaden the feature set of the PlayStation Portable has come to fruition with the release of the v6.20 firmware update. The primary feature you’ll find after downloading and installing the firmware will be the option to download the digital comics reader. The digital comics service launches on the PlayStation Network in December and will allow you to download and read comics on your PSP either page-by-page or frame-by-frame. Sony is promising a free sample will soon be available so that you can get a taste of what it’s like to read comics on a PSP screen, and whether or not that’s something your eyes will be able to tolerate.
Back in August, Sony claimed that there would be over 1,000 comics available in December from Marvel including Spider-Man, the Fantastic Four, and X-Men. You can see that the preview image above, first shown in August, also has Iron Man and Civil War, but there’s no indication as to whether those will be available next month or not.
In addition to the comics reader, the new firmware will grant the ability to transfer your video and picture playlists from a computer to your PSP via the Media Go software, provided you’ve downloaded the latest version (v1.3, available here). Other new Media Go features include the ability to download PSP firmware updates, new encoding options when transferring media to a device, Windows 7 taskbar support, and you’ll now be able to transfer digital copies of DVDs and Blu-rays to your PSP.
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The free service of the PlayStation Network had some thinking it would force Microsoft to follow suit and drop their Gold charges; but it now looks like the situation may turn out the other way around. Eurogamer reports that a presentation from Sony mentioned a “new revenue stream from subscription” for the PlayStation Network. In a statement, Kaz Hirai said the company is “studying the possibility of introducing a subscription model, offering premium content and services, in addition to the current free services.” Right now any of these plans seem to be in the brainstorming phase, but we could see the new model coming. No doubt the ailing economy would affect this decision.
That said, there’s no reason for PlayStation 3 fans to panic just yet. Hirai’s wording was careful, but seemed to indicate that the current services, like free online play, would stay free. Even if Sony introduced some new features and charged for them, free online play would mean most users could get by just fine without. This would still make it a far cry from Microsoft’s model, in which the popular feature of online play requires a Gold membership. We’ll let you know if Sony outlines more specific plans.
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Square Enix has just announced the release date for Supreme Commander 2. The sequel to Gas Powered Games’ ambitious real-time strategy game will be out at the beginning of March on the PC, and two weeks after that on the Xbox 360.
As with Order of War, Square Enix is publishing Supreme Commander 2 in an effort to broaden its appeal. Square Enix CEO John Yamamoto called their relationship with Gas Powered Games a “strategic partnership.”
“Supreme Commander 2 is a shining example of our strategic partnership with Gas Powered Games,” said North American Square Enix CEO John Yamamoto.
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We’re still more than a month still to go before Dark Void hits retail, Capcom has just announced that there’s going to be a movie as well. And not only that, Brad Pitt might be cast in the starring role.
Pitt’s production company Plan B Entertainment has picked up the film rights for the game, which stars a pilot who is battling an alien race with his high-powered jet pack. It takes place in “The Void,” an alternate world that can found through the Bermuda Triangle.
“As a game, Dark Void was developed with a wide-screen mentality – a world full of adventure presented in cinematic scope and scale,” said Capcom senior vice president of licensing Germaine Gioia.
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The release of Dragon Age: Origins downloadable content is continuing at a rapid pace. Electronic Arts and BioWare have just announced Return to Ostagar, the third set of DLC to arrive since the game’s release earlier this month.
As the name implies, the DLC pack takes players back to Ostagar, the “site of the Grey Wardens’ darkest hour.” There it seems that it will be possible to “discover King Cailan’s top-secret political agenda.” Naturally, there will be plenty of epic loot to make the trip worthwhile.
At the moment, there are two sets of DLC available for Dragon Age. Stone Prisoner grants access to the Golem Shale, while Warden’s Keep opens up a new area to explore. While Stone Prisoner was available for free in some versions, BioWare and EA have been criticized by some for not including all of the DLC in the original game.
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Zelda series producer Eiji Aonuma reveals even more about the change of the “Zelda structure” than he did yesterday when he was interviewed by ONM
“We’re making efforts regarding the total flow of the Zelda game. So far, the basic flow of the Zelda games is you’re exploring a field, you go to a dungeon, you conquer it and return to the field. We’re looking at altering that traditional flow. That’s all I can share, and I can’t say more until E3 next year.”
– Eiji Aonuma
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