ArenaNet has released the launch trailer for Guild Wars 2‘s first expansion, Heart of Thorns, which launches in just under a month on October 23. Check out the video below, which appears to use in-game assets instead of a more Blizzard-style CG approach. Whatever the case, people are loving it.
As previously announced, Heart of Thorns adds a new Maguuma Jungle zone, an expanded progression system, more abilities (such as hang-gliding), a new Revenant profession, guild halls, and a new PvP Stronghold mode, among other things.
The base Guild Wars 2 game recently became free, but Heart of Thorns is a paid expansion available by itself or through various bundles. Pre-purchasing any version of Heart of Thorns grants you guaranteed access to all beta weekend events leading up to release.
Originally slated to launch in 2015 before being pushed to 2016, Mega Man and Dead Rising designer Keiji Inafune’s platformer Mighty No. 9 now has an official release date. Publisher Deep Silver and developer Comcept announced on Friday that the game will launch in the Americas on February 9, 2016 and in the rest of the world on February 12.
That release date applies to the physical and digital versions of the game for Xbox One, PlayStation 4, and Wii U. The game will be available digitally only for Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC. Digital versions of the game for PlayStation Vita and Nintendo 3DS are also in the works, but are without release dates.
A demo for Mighty No. 9 was supposed to be available for backers on September 15, but it has been delayed. Comcept has apologized for the delay, but has not announced a new release date for it. The developer has, however, confirmed that the demo’s time limit has been dropped.
In a new interview today, Destiny: The Taken King creative director Luke Smith talked about some the challenges that the shooter faced in its first year. Specifically, he acknowledged that Destiny’s original leveling system was flawed right from the time the game launched in September 2014.
Smith tells Kotaku as part of a wide-ranging interview that Bungie started working on the new leveling system that would be introduced in The Taken King as early as September/October of 2014.
“The original Light system, when that went out the door, we were not thrilled with it,” Smith said. “We knew when that went out the door that we were going to need to revisit it. So that work basically began in earnest probably September or October [of 2014]. We had already started to work on a new proposal, the proposal that would become the Light 2.0 that’s in the game now. We were working on that as early as last fall.”
Smith and his team devised the new leveling proposal that would eventually be delivered in this month’s Taken King expansion. But it couldn’t be implemented in the game until now due to some compatibility issues with previous expansions The Dark Below (December 2014) and House of Wolves (May 2015).
“We had to look at DLC 1 [The Dark Below] and DLC 2 [House of Wolves] and say, ‘OK, well, how can we set those two DLCs up to allowing for this [leveling] pivot?’ So in DLC 2, that’s why you see the introduction of the Etheric Light mechanic, because we were trying to get players to converge quickly at a single, common level because we knew where we were going to take them next.”
Kotaku’s full interview with Smith, available by audio only here, is a great listen, featuring interesting and frank insight into Destiny’s development and where the game is headed next.
FIFA 16 launched this week, and players didn’t need very long to rack up some amazing goals. EA Sports has now published the first “Best Goals of the Week” video, highlighting some stunning strikes.
Watch the video below to see these in action. My favorite is probably the Navas score at :45. You can submit your own goal for next week’s highlight reel here.
“FIFA needed a year like this. Without serious competition from Konami’s PES in the past few years (until now), and with Ultimate Team keeping players playing and paying all year round, there’s been no pressing motivation to ring the changes,” we wrote in our review. “Annual titles will always evolve gradually, but recent progress has felt glacial. FIFA 16 can be stubborn and stifling, but it feels gloriously new, and having to learn fresh strategies and nuances in a game series like this is an almost-forgotten pleasure.”
For more on the critical reception to FIFA 16, check out this review roundup.
The NFL on Friday announced a partnership with EA Sports to develop a new video series that will air every week on digital platforms. The show is called EA Sports Madden NFL Live, and it will air on a weekly basis through NFL.com and Twitch (yes, the NFL has its own Twitch account) every Friday at 12 PM EDT.
Reruns can be seen on the NFL Network on Fridays at 4 PM EDT. You’ll also be able to watch clips from the show on NFL.com, the NFL mobile app, and Twitch.
EA Sports Madden NFL Live is produced by the NFL’s internal NFL Media team. The show aims to be the “premier destination” for everything you’d want to know about EA’s Madden series. Hosts will talk about new in-game content for Madden Ultimate Team and give you pointers on how to play better.
The show will also include a SportsCenter Top 10-like segment of the best plays of the week and provide the latest details on in-game player ratings. There’s also some synergy going on here, as the show will air recaps and highlights from real-world NFL games “through the lens of Madden NFL 16.”
The EA Sports Madden NFL Live hosts are writer Adam Rank and former Pro Bowl running back Maurice Jones-Drew. Popular Twitch sports game streamer Scott “Coltrane” Cole also appears on the show, while a different guest–a current or former NFL player or celebrity–will join the regular hosts every week.
Comedian/late night TV host Conan O’Brien has posted his latest “Clueless Gamer” video segment, and this one’s a doozy. Watch as O’Brien, Tony Hawk, and rapper Lil Wayne play Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 5, which launches next week for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One–but that’s not all.
There’s a good amount of gameplay here. But as you’d expect, it’s also stuffed with “that’s what she said” jokes and a segment where O’Brien quizzes Hawk and Wayne (a playable character) about “skateboard trick or sex position?” Oh, and O’Brien gets a (temporary) tattoo at the end of the video, so there’s that.
Wolverine star Hugh Jackman has spoken about preparing for his final big screen appearance as the iconic member of the X-Men. The third standalone Wolverine film is currently scheduled for a 2017 release, but in an interview with Collider, Jackman revealed that the film was still being written.
“I’ll be really honest with you, the actual script in its full form we’re up to about page 60. Obviously there’s a treatment, so it’s not fully done yet, we’re not fully there,” he said. “I’m sounding a little cagey because this is the last time I’m playing him, and I have just made the commitment to myself, really, and told everyone that until that script is perfect, until it is that perfect way to sign out, I’m not gonna start shooting.”
Jackman also stated that Patrick Stewart’s Professor X character would play a part in the new movie, something Stewart himself confirmed in August.
“Patrick does figure in it, that’s for sure,” Jackman said. “I think it’s a really important relationship but I want to see signs of that quasi-father/son sort of relationship that has not been seen before, and sides of particularly Professor X that have not been seen before. So we have some really, really cool ideas.
“I really have known for quite a long time how I want to finish this sort of odyssey that I’ve been on, this amazing journey. And I won’t let it fall anywhere in between. I won’t fall short of it.”
According to Jackman, the plan is to start shooting next year, although the production location was currently “one of the things that is up in the air.”
The third Wolverine will be directed by James Mangold, who previously helmed 2013’s The Wolverine, which went on to make more than $400 million worldwide. At San Diego Comic-Con in July, Jackman hinted strongly that the film would draw from the Old Man Logan line of comic books, a futuristic storyline which sees Wolverine as the world’s last remaining mutant.
The film is one of four upcoming films that form part of Fox’s X-Men universe, with Deadpool due in February 2016, X-Men: Apocalypse following in July, and the currently directorlessGambit scheduled for next October.
2K’s upcoming pro basketball sim NBA 2K16 isn’t slated to launch until September 29, but you can play it starting today, provided you’re willing to preorder. Everyone who preorders the game can start playing right now, September 25, as part of 2K’s previously announced “Early Tip-Off Weekend” promotion.
This promo is good only on physical copies of the game reserved at brick and mortar retailers like GameStop. That retailer opened 3,000 stores across the United States last night to support the release.
In addition to early access, other Early Tip-Off Weekend bonuses include the following:
10,000 Virtual Currency (VC);
MyTEAM VIP Package:
New-Gen & PC – 3 MyTEAM Emerald Packs each with a guaranteed Emerald player;
Prior-Gen – MyTEAM Gold Booster Pack with Guaranteed Gold Player and 4 additional Gold items.
Online retail behemoth Amazon is currently offering 12-month Amazon Prime subscriptions for just $67, a nice markdown from its normal $100 price. Current subscribers looking to re-up their subscription at the lower rate are out of luck, as this deal–good today, September 25, only–is offered exclusively to new users.
The offer expires tonight at 11:59 PM EDT. You can get started at the Amazon Prime sign-up page. After the first year, your Prime membership will jump back up to $100, though you can cancel anytime.
Amazon is cutting the price to celebrate the success that Amazon’s new show Transparent enjoyed at the Emmys this weekend. Transparent received 11 Emmy nominations this year and won 5. Actor Jeffrey Tambor took home the Emmy for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series for his portrayal of Maura Pfefferman. The $67 subscription price comes from this year being the 67th Emmy Awards.
Amazon Prime comes with a number of perks, including free two-day shipping, access to streaming music and video content, as well as free unlimited photo storage and Kindle ebook borrowing. Subscribers can also save around $10 on new video games from time to time.
Is this deal sweet enough to get you to sign up? Let us know in the comments below.
The American Registry for Internet Numbers has issued its last IPv4 number for North America. That means that anyone looking to get a number will now be entered onto a waiting list.
The transition from IPv4 to the newer IPv6 has already begun, but it still could cause headaches for some service providers going forward. In 2011, when several large companies got together to test IPv6 capabilities for 24 hours, only 0.25% of the web was compatible with IPv6, according to Wired.
IPv4 addresses are how most internet traffic is routed today. You’ve probably seen 198.168.1.1 or some variation listed as the IP address of your router. The 32-bit number limits the possible addresses to just over 4.2 billion, which probably seemed like a number that could never possibly be exhausted when the protocol went into use in the early 1980s.
Every internet-connected device has an IP number attached to it. The newer protocol, IPv6, uses 128-bit numbers, meaning there are a possible 340 undecillion addresses. Undecillion, despite not appearing as a valid option in spell-checkers, is a real, ridiculously huge, number: a one followed by 36 zeros.
However, with the end of unassigned IPv4 addresses comes changes in ARIN’s transfer policies, meaning “there is no longer a restriction on how often organizations may request transfers to specified recipients.”
