The acclaimed Metroid Prime Trilogy is now available on Wii U across Europe and North America, and for the first week Nintendo is offering the digital re-release at half price.
The Retro Studios-developed first person adventure games, the first of which GameSpot described as “not just one of the single most atmospheric games ever created, but it’s also quite simply one of the best,” is available for $10 in the US and £9 in the UK. Next week the trilogy will return to its usual listing price of $20 and £18.
This offer marks the third re-release of Wii games on Nintendo’s Wii U platform, following the listings of Super Mario Galaxy 2 and Punch-Out.
While Wii game discs can play on the Wii U, users need to enter the console’s emulator in order to play them. These re-releases remove that barrier, and also offer 1080p output.
More re-releases are in the pipeline, such as the Wii edition of Sin and Punishment. A Wii Remote and Nunchuk is required to play.
Hearthstone‘s next single-player expansion is expected to go live in April, according to a new report with details from a purported insider at Blizzard.
An article by Yahoo Finance contributor, Tae Kim, suggests that the new Hearthstone content update will be “PVE focused”, which suggests it will be a similar proposition to the Naxxramas update that shipped in July.
These single-player expansions pit players against toughened AI, and if Naxxramas is any indication, against heroes who use unique cards and abilities to swing the game to their advantage.
According to the alleged Blizzard employee, the game has now surpassed 75 million players. The user numbers were described as “off the charts.”
Meanwhile, it’s claimed that the Hearthstone team is “also experimenting with a 2 vs 2 version”. It’s not clear whether this means two heroes versus two, or a pair of players sharing command of a single hero.
GameSpot has contacted Blizzard for further clarification and comment.
Comedian and late night talk show host Conan O’Brien was joined by American football players Marshawn Lynch and Rob “Gronk” Gronkowski for a Super Bowl “proxy battle” in upcoming fighting game Mortal Kombat X.
Check out the video above to see O’Brien, Lynch, and Gronkowski duke it out in Mortal Kombat X and react with shock and horror to the games fatalities. Lynch also revealed that he usually likes to play Mario Kart, favouring Toad as a driver.
Chinese e-commerce company Alibaba has invested $10 million in the Android-based Ouya microconsole. According to a report on the Wall Street Journal, Alibaba has partnered with Ouya Inc. to discuss a plan that will incorporate the Ouya’s software into Alibaba’s own “set top-box.”
Alibaba is an electronic commerce company that offers a variety of sales services, with an estimated market value of $231 billion as of September last year. The company’s consumer-to-consumer site Taobao ranks in the top 20 of the most-visited websites in the world.
The original Kickstarter campaign for the Ouya concluded with $8.6 million in crowdfunding. The company went on to secure an additional $15 million through venture capital funding in 2013. The console officially went on sale for $99 in 2013, but it has failed to gather much attention.
Bungie has revealed it is working on a fix for a bug which affects players in its sci-fi shooter Destiny, which sees players lose ammo for heavy weapons. At the moment, players can lose heavy ammo in player-versus-environment activity when they die, return to orbit, or encounter a cutscene.
Developer Bungie is currently working on a fix for this bug which it hopes to roll out “before the end of February.” According to the developer the bug is complex in nature, which is why it is taking so long to resolve.
“In the end, I came up with a surgical change that fixes the main issue and minimizes the chances that a new problem would be introduced. I do not think I can overstate the complexity of these systems – it took me several tries to come up with a fix that did not cause other problems,” sandbox engineer Jon Cable explained.
[UPDATE] It’s Ermac! Developers explained during the live-stream that, similar to past games, Ermac is a defensive-minded character. Some of his moves include hover, teleport, and disappear. A “Spectral” version of Ermac, which can fly around for a small period of time, was also revealed during the live-stream. We’ll have more information about Ermac soon.
The original story is below.
Developer NetherRealm is going to reveal their next Mortal Kombat X character live through the Twitch channel above! Tune in and find out who’s joining the roster live.
Quantic Dream, the Paris-based studio responsible for Beyond: Two Souls and Heavy Rain, has released a HD remaster of its PlayStation 2 and Xbox “interactive narrative” Indigo Prophecy (known as Fahrenheit in Europe).
Shown above is a trailer for the remake, featuring upgraded textures presented in HD resolution. Given the remixed title, Fahrenheit: Indigo Prophecy Remastered, the game is available now on PC, Mac, Linux and iOS. The iPhone and iPad version features new touch-screen controls, while an Android edition is also in development.
The remaster, which has been co-developed by Aspyr Media, will not ship on PlayStation 4 or Xbox One, Quantic Dream explained on the game’s FAQ page.
First released in 2005, Fahrenheit is considered a forerunner of the interactive narrative games that Quantic Dream is known for, though it did not achieve the critical or commercial success of its PS3 titles Heavy Rain and Beyond: Two Souls.
The game’s lead designer, David Cage, has previously expressed some regrets over how the project materialized, particularly with regards to how it relies on typical Hollywood action sequences towards the end.
“It was really after Fahrenheit, I got the feeling we touched on something, but I was too shy with the medium to do anything with it. I was really upset with myself, because I didn’t have enough courage with the project,” he told Develop in 2011.
“I realized I was writing a game where nothing ever happens. There were relationships between characters, and a love story, but it didn’t feel like a video game. I felt I needed something spectacular to end it, I needed to go out with an explosion, with flying characters, I needed the world to be saved.”
GameSpot’s Indigo Prophecy review was nevertheless positive, writing in 2005 that “not everyone is going to love the way in which this game plays, but anybody with a love for good storytelling and the adventure genre will find Indigo Prophecy to be an original and enlightening experience.”
New images of the HD remaster can be found below.
Click on the thumbnails below to view in full screen
Disney Interactive has announced the launch of the Disney Infinity: Toy Box 2.0 app for iPad and iPhone. The app includes all tools and features of Toy Box 2.0 from Disney Infinity (2.0 Edition) and introduces a multiplayer feature for the first time to mobile users.
The Disney Infinity: Toy Box 2.0 app can be used be existing Disney Infinity players or newcomers alike, and will be available to download for free on the Apple store. The app will also feature character trials, which will cycle new characters for users to try every three to five days.
The iOS version of Toy Box 2.0 is powered by the Metal graphics API, which grants it more capability for better visuals over older iOS versions. Speaking to GameSpot in an interview, senior producer mobile Sean Patton said, “Metal has allowed us to take all the assets from console and actually bring them into the Toy Box experience with much improved graphic fidelity… we did a crossplay from PS4 to iPad, and you have to nitpick to find the differences.”
Disney Infinity 2.0 launched in September last year, introducing more than 20 new characters from the Marvel universe and a Toy Box mode. Earlier this month Disney released a statement claiming that Disney Infinity was the best-selling toys-to-life brand in 2014, a title which Skylanders publisher Activision contested.
Update: Xbox Live service has returned and is functioning normally.
The original story follows below.
Users attempting to sign into Xbox Live on the Xbox One may encounter difficulties, as the service is currently running in a limited capacity. Additionally, players trying to access Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare‘s Exo Zombies downloadable content may encounter an error which reads “A downloadable content package was removed or all profiles are signed out.”
To fix this, players need to download and install the free DLC “compatibility pack” by logging into Xbox Live, starting the game, and following the prompts. Players trying to do this via Xbox One may encounter difficulties as the service is currently down.
It is not known what is causing the service outage. In the past, an online hacking group claimed responsibility for attacking the network. GameSpot will continue to monitor this story as it develops. Check back later for updates on the service.
Turtle Rock Studios on Wednesday published a detailed blog post about Evolve‘s recently concluded Xbox One beta, which ran January 15-19. The post reveals key statistics about the beta and goes into depth about what the developer learned and how it plans to adjust the game going forward.
Some key numbers from the Evolve beta:
2.2 million total games played
Hunters won 51.5 percent of matches, compared to 48.5 percent for Monsters
Average game time was 9.9 minutes
The Assault hunter class caused the most damage
Turtle Rock co-founder Chris Ashton also answered a number of questions about the beta. You can find some highlights below, or read the full blog post here.
“We made matchmaking changes from the Big Alpha to the Beta and we were able to get confirmation that those were working well. No more level 20 players versus level 1 players and as a result, the stats were staggeringly balanced. But we still had matchmaking rough edges. In some situations we were trying to match people into full games, or parties into games that didn’t have enough open slots, so that should be sorted for launch.”
On Balance:
“To be honest, when we started making the game, we never really thought about–or worried about–the balance. That’s just part of the job. We’ve had to work through that with every game we’ve ever made. Our primary concern was always the fun factor. Making sure that the game was incredibly fun for both sides. But I am proud of the balance work we’ve done. Just take a look at what happened with Kraken. We were really pleased to see Kraken fall into place this time. During the Big Alpha he was too strong so we made adjustments and the Beta confirmed we were spot on. He had a 52% win ratio.”
General Goals Coming Out Of The Beta:
Make the Wraith easier to track. Even good Hunters have a hard time keeping tabs on Wraith because she can move so far while cloaked.
Make the Decoy less spammy. It doesn’t take any skill to keep punching that ability button and let the AI Decoy go to work. We want to increase the “cost” of using it so that people use it more sparingly/strategically.
Bring Supernova down a notch. It is okay if it’s her primary damage dealer, but it felt a little on the buff side for a while internally and we saw it prove true during the Beta.
Make Abduction a little easier to land. It’s a really fun ability to use and it was underutilized during the beta.
Make Warp Blast a threat. This should be a straight forward damage dealer that also has some nice mobility utility.
Wraith-Specific Changes:
Wraith can no longer warp while cloaked. If she does, the cloak wears off and the Decoy vanishes (just like when you melee attack). This means that when she cloaks, she normally won’t get far and it opens the door for skilled players to do smart things like break line of sight before warping away.
Decoy takes 30% longer to cool down. This immediately makes it 30% less spammy and hopefully results in players saving it for the more opportune moments.
Supernova damage reduced by 10%. Not a huge change, but it will make a measurable difference.
Abduction radius increased by .5 meters (now 3.5). This will make it a little more forgiving.
Warp Blast radius increased by .5 meters (now 8.5). Increasing the radius here has proven a great way to increase the damage output in the past as players are able to hit their targets more often.
![Xbox Live Service Down On Xbox One [UPDATED]](https://playerschoicegames.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/2793080-xboxliveone.jpg)
