Category: News Page 16 of 19

Tuesday 12-5-17: Cuphead, UFC Stream, Mega Man 11, FNaF 6, Darkest Dungeon DLC, A Hat Early in Time.

On December 5, 2017

It’s Tuesday! That means I accidentally forgot to post on Monday again. once again, I’m sorry. the new FNaF game caught me by surprise, but more on that later. here’s the news from the last 3 days:

Cuphead Updates
Twitch Streamer broadcast a UFC fight
Mega Man 11?!
A new Five Nights at Freddy’s game??
Darkest Dungeon DLC
A Hat in Time released early

The Cupdate
Studio MDHR has recently released a new major update for their hit game, Cuphead. This update will include a number of changes to the game. This will include improvements to the game engine, as well as some gameplay modifications for fairness sake. This will cause some big uprooting to the Speedrunning scene. You can read the full list of changes at the Changelog posted on the developer’s website.

UFC Live Broadcast
Saturday night was the UFC 218 fight. To view this event, you had to purchase it via Pay Per View. One clever Twitch streamer decided to broadcast the fight on the video game oriented streaming service, Twitch. How did he not get stricken down for copyright claims? He held a controller and pretended to be playing the recently released, EA UFC 3. This allowed him to go under the radar from admins, by the time news of his exploits went nationwide, the fight was over, and his archived footage deleted. When asked if he is worried about repercussions, he stated that he doesn’t think Twitch will do anything. So far he’s right, no action has been taken by Twitch, UFC, or EA regarding the event. The streamer is called Lester_Gaming and can be found here.

Mega Man 11
That’s no joke, Mega Man 11 has been announced. Capcom recently released a trailer premiering the next in the line of Mega Man games for next year. The last game having released 7 years ago, was a retro homage to the classic series of NES games. Now they are taking is in a modern direction with updated graphics, sound, and design, while keeping the style true to the originals. More details will be released next year, for now, you can see the trailer for yourself here.

Freddy Fazbear’s Pizzeria Simulator
The next in the line of Five Nights at Freddy’s titles have been released. Creator of the series, Scott Cawthorn, had teased this previously, stating that he wouldn’t go an entire year without releasing something new. The game initially appears to be an 8-bit arcade game, where the player throws pizzas at kids. It doesn’t take long to discover what this really is. I played about 30 minutes of the game, which you can watch here. It’s an interesting combination of classic FNaF and a new creative spin, and I’m all for it. Best of all, its free! You can download the game at no cost on Steam.

Darkest Dungeon: Color of Madness
The dark and gritty RPG will be receiving another DLC pack after the vampiric success of their previous one, The Crimson Court. The Color of Madness is an HP Lovecraft style campaign where the player deals with a comet having fallen to earth. Full of cosmic horrors, the DLC will include a new wave-based mode, a new enemy faction, and a collection of new monsters, items, and powerful trinkets. You can see the announcement post for yourself here.

A Hat Earlier in Time
The Console release of the cute platformer was scheduled for December 6, tomorrow. In a surprise turn of events, the game has released tonight for the NA Playstation 4 Market. You can get the game now on American Playstation 4s for $29.99, and tomorrow for EU PS4 and Xbox One for the same price. What a fun little surprise.

Phew, lot’s of news. I’m excited about a fair bit of it. Thanks for reading, everyone. Check back tomorrow for the latest and greatest in video game news. otherwise, Have a great night!

Friday 12-1-17: Chloe’s Voice Actor and Kid Buu in FighterZ

By Branden

On December 1, 2017

In daily update, News

Friday! the end of a week, and the first day of the month. I’ve started learning Japanese to help me with journalism. I digress, here’s the news:

Chloe’s voice actor returns
Kid Buu confirmed for Dragon Ball FighterZ

Life is Strange Voice Actor
Ashly Burch, the original voice actor for Chloe Price returns to the recording booth to reprise her role in Life is Strange. She did not do the voice in Life is Strange: Before the Storm due to the voice actors strike. She did act as a script consultant to stay true to the characters style during this time. Now that the strike has ended she is returning to record vocals for a bonus episode due to release alongside the game’s special edition.

Kid Buu Enters the Ring
The upcoming anime fighting game, Dragon Ball FighterZ, had another character announcement this morning. A youtube video posted by Bandai Namco showed off Kid Buu. This announcement came as little surprise, considering his inclusion was leaked in a Japanese magazine a while back. Regardless, a fun short video confirming his addition to the roster. You can watch the video HERE.

Thanks for reading everyone. I can’t wait to take it a bit easier this weekend, assuming it won’t be filled with more video work. Check back on Monday for the weekends worth of video game news. Otherwise, Have a great weekend!

Thursday 11-30-17: Star Citizen, Super Mario Cereal, Final Fantasy XV, Animal Crossing, and ARMS

By Branden

On December 1, 2017

In daily update, News

Guess who missed another day! This guy! I’m sorry for missing yesterday’s news. I got caught up editing an 18 minute video on Skyrim VR. Here are the last 2 days worth of news:

Star Citizen Sells Real Estate
Super Mario Cereal, that’s a real thing
Final Fantasy XV lets you swap characters in an update
Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp starts its winter event
ARMS gets a surprise update, introducing Springtron

Star Citizen Sells Land
The popular Kickstarter-funded space game will be implementing the ability to purchase your own plot of land in game. Backers will get the option to pay $50 in order to reserve a 4-kilometer square plot on a designated planet to do with as they please, be it commercial, private, ect. You can read their FAQ about this concept HERE. I find it hilarious, and I’m all for it.

Super Mario Cereal
Nintendo is partnering up with Kellogg’s to create their own cereal. The cereal, simply titled “Super Mario Cereal”, is a promotion effort for the recently released Super Mario Odyssey. The style is that of Lucky Charms, but with powerups as marshmallows. The most interesting part of this is that the box itself acts an an Amiibo. An NFC chip is implanted into the back of the box, allowing players to scan it into their Super Mario Odyssey game to be rewarded with coins and health. Amiibo Cereal, that’s a real thing. You can see pictures of the front and back of the box at a news post I wrote about it HERE.

Character Swapping in Final Fantasy XV
In a recent dev talk about the one year anniversary of Final Fantasy XV, Square Enix reveals that the game will soon be receiving an update to allow players to swap between any of the 4 main protagonists throughout the campaign. No longer are you restricted to operate purely as Noctis, except for during critical story moments. This update is expected to release alongside upcoming DLC, Episode Ignis. An expansion due on December 13. Square Enix also announced that more DLC will happen next year, implying that they will follow the exploits of the game’s antagonist, Ardyn. You can watch the dev talk video yourself HERE.

Animal Crossing Christmas
It’s not really Christmas, but the new Animal Crossing mobile game has begun their winter holiday event. From now until December 26, players will be able to collect Candy Canes as crafting equipment. They can then use these candy canes to build holiday themed furniture. The event encourages players to give the requested gifts to villagers as much as possible. For more information about the event, you can visit the announcements section in-game.

Springtron Joins ARMS
About 2 weeks ago, a video detailing update 3.2 ended in a teaser for a robotic looking fighter. Today ARMS updated to version 4.1 to include Springtron, a robotic variation of Spring Man. His arms, as well as all arm attachment options are the same as Spring Man’s. The main difference is that when Springtron charges up, he can release to blast out a shockwave that nullifies incoming attacks. You can play him right now, for free, on ARMS for the Nintendo Switch.

That’s all for today. More than normal, probably because I skipped yesterday. Be sure to check back tomorrow for the best in video games. Otherwise, have a great night!

Tuesday 11-28-17: Ports for A Hat in Time, PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds, and Yooka-Laylee

By Branden

On November 28, 2017

In daily update, News

I think I made the “Tuesday News Day” joke last week, so I should probably refrain from that this week. Today’s news is all port based, weirdly enough.

A Hat in Time comes to consoles
PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds Mobile Version
Yooka-Laylee coming to the Switch

A Hat in Time on Consoles
The adorable platformer released not long ago on PC and Mac. During this time it received amazing reviews. Developers Gears for Breakfast have announced that it will soon be releasing on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, specifically on December 4 (that’s about a week away). The game will cost $30. You can see the trailer announcing this HERE.

PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds Mobile Version
You heard(read?) right! A big name Chinese game publisher who has been in workings with developers Bluehole about a Chinese version of the game have recently announced that China will also be getting a mobile phone version of the game. No details have been given, or even if this version will come to the States. Stay tuned for more on that.

Yooka-Laylee coming to the Switch
This spiritual successor to the Banjo-Kazooie games announced a while back that they would be coming to Switch in the future. That future is about 3 weeks from now, on December 14. The game generated some controversy when popular YouTuber, JonTron, was originally a voice actor for the game. Until he made some racist remarks online and had his lines later patched out. The game had mixed reviews overall, unfortunately, and now that the hype of release has died down, I doubt the Switch version will do much better. Regardless you can get Yooka-Laylee for Nintendo Switch on December 14 for $39.99.

So many port announcements. December will be a repetitive month. Thanks for reading everyone. Be sure to check back tomorrow for the latest and greatest in video game news. Otherwise, have a great night!

Monday 11-27-17: Demon’s Souls Online Servers and Destiny 2 EXP Grind Controversy

By Branden

On November 27, 2017

In News

So begins another week in the wild world of video games. Not much today since I posted on Saturday. Let’s dig in.

Demon’s Souls will be shutting down their online servers
Bungie upsets community with experience gain changes

Demon’s Souls Online Stuff
That’s right, the online functionality of Demon’s Souls is shutting down. The first game in the famous “souls” series will be losing summoning, bloodstains, and messages. The shut down will happen February 28 of next year. Specifically at 3 AM ET in America. The Dark Souls Twitter account even gave it a goodbye. Originally this was going to happen in 2012, but some developments allowed it to stay. If you haven’t played, don’t worry. You can still play and complete the game just fine offline, albeit it’s less fun. I have a deep respect for the souls games, and I’m sorry to see this part of it go.

Destiny 2 EXP Gain
A few days ago, Destiny 2 players were upset at the discovery of diminishing experience returns from repeatable events in game. After you hit max level, the EXP works towards unlocking Bright Engrams, which are the game’s loot box like item, giving the player a randomly chosen cosmetic item. Aside from the EXP system, the other way to get Bright Engrams is to purchase them via microtransaction. With the heat of Star Wars Battlefront II still there, many grew angry at what they believed to be an attempt to further encourage microtransactions by restricting gameplay rewards. Bungie later apologized, and disabled the diminishing returns system in place.

Happily ever after, right? Later on, the Destiny 2 help Twitter made a post saying that the EXP cost for the Bright Engrams will be changing to 160,000 XP

The Destiny 2 API has yet to be adjusted to reflect the recent in game change to earned XP. We are working on an API update to address the discrepancy. The correct value to earn an additional level is 160,000 XP.

That’s nearly double what it once was. Again players were outraged. With this change, the time it takes to unlock a new Bright Engram is dangerously close to what it was when the diminishing returns system was still in place. Now players felt cheated, insulted even that Bungie would think they wouldn’t realize this change. This is all that has happened so far and ill be sure to report any updates that come in the later days.

That’s it for today. It seems to have generally been a negative news day. that’s no fun. Be sure to check back tomorrow for the latest and greatest in video game news, maybe it’ll be a more positive one. Otherwise, have a great night!

Saturday 11-25-17: Namco Bandai’s Egg, Black Mesa Delays

By Branden

On November 25, 2017

In daily update, News

Let me start off by apologizing. It was a busy few days and I may have missed a few posts. My bad, I’ll keep that to a minimum. While I don’t normally make weekend posts, this is to make up for missing Friday. Here’s whats new:

Bandai Namco confuses me with an egg
Black Mesa is being delayed more
Destiny 2 is changing their XP Grind

Bandai Namco’s Microwaved Egg
The Japanese publisher is causing some confusion when they put up a webpage. The only thing of notice on this page is a stylized microwave that, when clicked, will cook for a moment, open up, and reveal an egg. The screen then says “_ days left” with however many days until December 4th (today it says “9 days left”). What does this mean? I have no clue. It is counting down to something, but if it’s in reference to a game series, it’s not one I know. You can check out the website here.

Black Mesa Delay
The popular remake of the original Half-Life, Black Mesa, was originally supposed to update to include the Xen this December. In an announcement on the Steam Community, they tell us that the Xen will not be coming in that update. They apologize for having to delay further. They will, however, be releasing an engine update in its place. Mostly lighting based, this update will improve the graphical aspects of the game. More details about Xen will come with that update. You can see the details here.

Destiny 2’s XP Changes
Fans were upset when it was discovered that repeating events would yield a diminishing return on XP. Since you can get Bright Engrams either with XP or real-world money, people feared that this action was in an effort to encourage more microtransactions. Bungie has recently made a statement saying that they were concerned about how repeatable events would impact the internal economy. They have removed the diminishing system in place and said that they will be watching how XP is made for now so that it can be fair and balanced while still being enjoyable. You can read the full post here.

Thanks for your understanding, I’ll be back on Monday to bring you the rest of the weekend’s news. Be sure to check back then. Otherwise, have a great night!

Tuesday 11-21-17: Neverwinter Nights, Endless Space 2 Scam, and Splatoon 2 Major Updates

By Branden

On November 21, 2017

In daily update, News

Another Tuesday, another news day. Heres whats on the wire:

Neverwinter Nights: Enhanced Edition
Endless Space 2 and their questionable free weekend
Splatoon 2 has a major announcement

Neverwinter Nights: Enhanced Edition
The well-known fantasy RPG from 2002 will be receiving a special “enhanced edition.” What this really means is the game will now support 4K UI and add in some new post-processing effects. You can buy this version of the game, which comes with the base game, and all DLC (plus 2 soundtracks) for $20. Old save files will still be compatible, thankfully. Check out the trailer for it below

Endless Space 2 Being Sneaky?
The Space Opera style game recently had a free to play weekend on Steam. To further encourage new players, the developers announced a special event in which the more new players they get to try Endless Space 2 during this weekend, the more new content they will release for said game. There were 6 tiers of new content that could be unlocked.
Why did this strike me as odd? The free weekend was a massive success. The daily player count prior was around 300-500 players. During its peak, the daily player count hit as high as 16,000. One would expect the event goals to be hit very early on, yet they were gradually “reached” over the span of the entire weekend. The final goal was achieved right at the end of the final day of the event. This is when I noticed that they do not actually say any player numbers. these goals were undefined and entirely arbitrary. My theory: they never made goal marks and planned on posting the “success” at a predetermined rate in an effort to create artificial popularity, and in turn hyping up players and gaining attention.
Its clever, but I’m not falling for it.
Check out their Twitter to see what I mean.

Splatoon 2 Update
Nintendo recently announced that some major updates will be coming to Splatoon 2. These changes will be added over a span of time between now and mid-December and will include the following:

4 New Battle Stages (MakoMart, Shellendorf Institute, Walleye Warehouse, and Arowana Mall)
1 New Salmon Run Stage (Salmonid Smokeyard)
140 New Pieces of Gear
4 New Hair Styles
Level Cap Raised to 99
Prestige Option
New Game Mode, Clam Blitz

You can read more about at this news post I wrote.

That’s all for today folks. Thanks for reading, it’s always appreciated. Let me know what you think of my Endless Space 2 con theory. Be sure to check back tomorrow for more news about games and stuff. Otherwise, have a great night!

Monday 11-20-17: Desert Bus, Shades of CD Projekt Red, Animal Crossing Mobile Game, Street Fighter V-Triggers

By Branden

On November 20, 2017

In daily update, News

Monday marks the dawn of a new week, and with a new week comes new news. Overall its a generally positive weekend in the world of gaming. here’s what we have:

Desert Bus for Hope is back.
CD Projekt Red remarks on the industry.
Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp release date
Street Fighter V: Arcade Edition trailer taunts V-Triggers.

Desert Bus for Hope
Desert Bus is Back for its 10th charity drive! For those who don’t know: The Desert Bus for Hope is a charity event where a group of people plays the desert bus mini-game from an old Sega CD game by Penn & Teller. This game has you drive a bus for 8 hours on a straight road in the desert. when these people reach a donation goal, the longer they have to play this incredibly boring game. This is a wonderful cause, raising money for Child’s Play, a charity about bringing toys and games to children’s hospitals. They’ve been living streaming the event for about 48 hours so far, and still have 144 hours to go. You can check out the live stream of the event, which will include more details, at their twitch page.

CD Projekt Red Throwing Shade
With all the recent drama about loot boxes and video games “as a service” going around, some concern has spread to the studio being the Witcher game series. Their CEO in an interview remarked on how to better commercialize future games, and many took this to mean they will be implementing microtransactions. When a popular youtube page posted on twitter expressing this concern, CD Projekt Red responded with a statement that reassured peoples doubts, while also taking a jab at the studios that do use microtransactions. The response can be seen below.

.@PrettyBadTweets Worry not. When thinking CP2077, think nothing less than TW3 — huge single player, open world, story-driven RPG. No hidden catch, you get what you pay for — no bullshit, just honest gaming like with Wild Hunt. We leave greed to others.

— CD PROJEKT RED (@CDPROJEKTRED) November 19, 2017

Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp Release Date
Nintendo has been entering the mobile game market. With a powerful arsenal of big name (and child-friendly) titles behind them, there is a lot of potential for them in this field. Animal Crossing: Pocket camp is their mobile take on the Animal Crossing series. For the last month, the game has been on a soft launch in Australia only, with the promise of a worldwide release in “late November.” This morning Nintendo of America announced via twitter when that release date is. This Wednesday. That’s right, 2 days from now on the day before Thanksgiving, the game will release on mobile stores worldwide. That’s one thing I know I’m thankful for.

Have you heard the news? Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp will be coming to mobile devices worldwide on 11/22! #PocketCamp pic.twitter.com/jShJwDgnls

— Nintendo of America (@NintendoAmerica) November 20, 2017

Street Fighter V: Arcade Edition Trailer
Capcom recently released a new trailer showing off the V-Triggers that are due to appear in Street Fighter V: Arcade Edition, the updated and complete version of the latest Street Fighter game. At first glance, it looks like stuff we already knew, but the implications behind it are far more important. With these new V-Triggers will come new combo and mixup options for many (if not all) characters. A change to the game of this degree will have an equally large impact on the competitive Street Fighter scene. See the trailer for yourself below.

That’s all for the weekend. Thanks for reading, everyone! Be sure to check back tomorrow for the latest and greatest in video game news. I also have a new longform coming soon, stay tuned. Otherwise, have a great night!

Friday 11-17-17: Nintendo Sales, Golden Joystick, and Skyrim Ports

By Branden

On November 17, 2017

In daily update, News

Friday marks the end of the weekday. Good job everyone, you worked hard and deserve to enjoy the weekend. Here’s Friday’s news:

Nintendo tops hardware sales in October
The 35th Golden Joystick Awards
Skyrim comes out for Switch and VR

Nintendo October Sales
Nintendo announced in a press release to have the top hardware sales in October. The NPD Group, which tracks this kind of thing, stated that the number 1 selling hardware that month was the Nintendo Switch. This is no surprise. What is interesting is that the number 2 spot was also Nintendo, specifically the Super NES Classic Edition. The mini version of the old console sold out immediately everywhere. Supply couldn’t meet demand, making the product a rarity. They made enough to take 2nd place in units sold, at least. Good on ya, Nintendo. Though with the release of the Xbox One X this month, I’m willing to bet it won’t happen 2 months in a row.

The 35th Golden Joystick Awards
The UK based award organization takes the public’s votes to determine what the community thinks the best games of the year are. The award ceremony took place recently and the results aren’t surprising. The winner of the Ultimate Game of the Year Award went to… The Legend of Zelda, Breath of the Wild! You can read the 40-something other awards that were given away at this event at the news post I made about it HERE.

Skyrim Ports
Sure the gaming community likes to joke about Skyrim being ported to everything. Well, now those fruits are coming to… fruition. Skyrim has officially released on Nintendo Switch. The portability of the legendary game has people ranting with enjoyment. Skyrim also released for VR. I had about an hour to try out Skyrim on the PSVR last night, and I admit that I was having a lot of fun running around smacking things with a mace and shooting fire from my hands. I might write a feature about Skyrim VR, we will see.

Another day of positivity! I always enjoy news days like this, they make me happy. Knowing that once I’m done with my writing I can go play Skyrim in VR only adds to my excitement. Thanks for reading everyone. Your viewership genuinely is important to me. Its Friday so there won’t be another daily update until Monday. Be sure to check in than to read about the latest and greatest in video game news. Until then, Have a great weekend.

Thursday 11-16-17: New ARMS Fighter, Dragonball FighterZ Fighters, and The Surge DLC

By Branden

On November 16, 2017

In daily update, News

Thursday is upon us like Mothra upon Japan. For once its no bad news either. Nothing but announcements for new content. Such as:

ARMs gets a new fighter, Misango
Dragonball FighterZ confirms 3 fighters
The Surge Announces upcoming DLC

ARMs’ new fighter
Popular Nintendo fighting game, ARMs, released a trailer recently showing off their newest fighter, Misango. He appears to be inspired by Native American styling, with a new stage of the same sort. His theme is poison based, with his ARM options the same (my favorite is the scorpions for hands). He also can absorb a spirit to gain additional powers. This is part of the Version 4 update, which will be free to all players. Check out the trailer below.

Dragonball FighterZ
In a Japanese magazine, more details about the upcoming Dragonball game were revealed. Gotenks, Kid Buu, and Adult Gohan have now been confirmed as playable fighters. They also confirm a shop option where you can buy alternate colors for your characters and an Arcade Mode. You can see the scan of the magazine page, and read more information about it via the post I made about it on a different site. CLICK HERE FOR THAT.

The Surge: a Walk in the Park
The sci-fi RPG has announced their upcoming DLC. Here the player explores a broken down and corrupted amusement park full of hostile mascots and crazy rescue teams. The DLC will release alongside a “Complete Edition” of the game on December 5th. Admittedly I don’t know much about this game, but the trailer for it looks solid. I may need to check the full game out.

That’s all for tonight folks. I always enjoy a day with no bad news. Be sure to check back tomorrow for the latest and greatest in video game news. Otherwise, have a great night!

Wednesday 11-15-17: Call of Duty Servers, Resident Evil Motion Controls, Marvel Heroes is Closing, and Destiny 2 DLC Live Stream

By Branden

On November 15, 2017

In daily update, News

It’s Wednesday my, dudes. (I’m sorry)
Today is another one of those “some good, some bad” news days. Here’s what we have:

Call of Duty: WWII fixed their dedicated servers
Resident Evil Revelations on Nintendo Switch has motion controls
Marvel Heroes will be shutting down
Destiny 2 live stream shows off details about their first expansion

Call of Duty Gets Dedicated
When Call of Duty: WWII launched, it was a slew of technical problems. Dedicated servers were failing, Headquarters wasn’t working, unreliable network connections. It was rough. Sledgehammer Games, the developers of CoD: WWII, shut down the dedicated servers and disabled the multiplayer aspect to Headquarters, the game’s social lobby, so that they could minimize unpleasant gameplay. These issues even led them to decide to delay the implementation of microtransactions until they were confident it could be fixed (as reported in yesterday’s post). Now Sledgehammer Games is pleased to announce that with a patch to PC, dedicated multiplayer servers are back again. They have been working hard this last week trying to resolve these issues, and its great to see them making progress in the name of fixing the game.

Resident Evil Motion Controls
Resident Evil: Revelations was originally released on Nintendo 3DS in 2012. It was a decent game that struggled to stand out in the crowd of handheld hits. Capcom had announced that Revelations 1 and 2 will both be coming to the Nintendo Switch on November 28. In a video (seen on the left) released by Capcom, its revealed that the Switch port will have a collection of motion controls added. While motion controls are definitely Nintendo’s thing, nearly all cases before this were gimmicky and quickly tiresome. I can’t help but believe this would be the same.

Rest in Peace Marvel Heroes
The free-to-play RPG, Marvel Heroes, will be shutting down in the near future according to a Disney representative. A statement made in an email to Kotaku from a Disney rep says that business with the game’s developer has come to an end and that the game itself will be closing as a result. No date was given as to when this will happen. My sympathies to the players.

Destiny 2 Livestream
Bungie ran a live stream showing off some of the details of their upcoming expansion for Destiny 2, Curse of Osiris. Here the player explores the decaying planet of Mercury. Some changes include a new power cap of 330, a new experience cap of 25 and the return of heroic strike playlist. While that’s the only details revealed so far, 2 more live streams will be taking place before the expansion launches of December 5th for console and PC. You can watch the video of the live stream on their Twitch.

Thanks for reading everyone. It’s been a busy day personally, but as newsworthy as any other. Feel free to leave a comment about today’s news down below. Be sure to check back tomorrow for the latest and greatest in video game news. Until then, have a great night, everyone!

Tuesday 11-14-17: Starcraft 2 is Free, CoD: WWII delays, and EA Some More

By Branden

On November 14, 2017

In daily update, News

Tuesday is upon us and with it another day of news. While today isn’t as dramatic as yesterday, it has its fair share of interesting topics.

Starcraft 2 went mostly free to play
Call of Duty: WWII delays microtransactions
Battlefront 2: the finale

Starcraft 2 is Free Now
Starcraft 2, Blizzard’s famous real-time strategy game, has gone mostly free to play. When I say mostly, its because there are a few conditions. Ranked ladder matches are granted after 10 victories in unranked or AI mode and you can only achieve level 5 or below in co-op mode. While the Wings of Liberty campaign is free, the other campaigns will cost 15 dollars. If you purchase any of the other campaigns or a war crate, then the previous restrictions are lifted. This is a nice model idea, in my opinion. This will let players get a taste of the game, and then support it how they want. for more details go to the Starcraft 2 website.

Call of Duty: WWII Delays Microtransactions
When the most recent Call of Duty game launched, it was met with a number of technical issues. This would eventually lead the developers to disable the multiplayer aspect to the Headquarters, a social zone for players to stand around outside of combat. Now they have announced that they will delay the activation of COD Points, an in-game currency used to purchase loot crates. While you can earn these points in-game, they can also be purchased with microtransactions. The studio promised on Sunday that they are working non stop in order to get things back up and running as quickly as they can. The current estimation is no sooner than November 21. My sympathies to those who are playing CoD: WWII.

EA and Star Wars Battlefront II
If you saw yesterday’s post, you saw a summary of all the drama around EA games and their newest game, Star Wars Battlefront II. I suggest reading the previous post if you haven’t, or this update won’t make as much sense.
EA has responded in 2 ways to all the criticism. The first way was by lowing the price of heroes by 75%. Less iconic heroes now cost 5,000 credits, semi-important heroes at 10,000, and the big 2 (Luke and Vader) costing 15,000 credits. While this is a vast improvement to the initial 60,000, it only validates that they could have made these prices that low from the start. Another less noble action taken by EA is the sudden disappearance of a refund button on Origin, EAs game distribution system. This is a clear effort to dissuade people from actually following through with preorder cancellations, scummy move.

Like usual, thanks for reading. Be sure to check back tomorrow for the latest and greatest in video game news. Have a great night, everyone.