Since our staff is responsible for covering pretty much everything related to the video game industry on a daily basis, it can be tough to post all the stories we think our readers would like to see. Videos go unwatched, new release dates are missed and silly quotes just float away without ever being heard. So, instead of ignoring the news that slipped through the cracks each week, we decided to put it all in one convenient place!
This week, Double Fine outlines their plans for Broken Age’s release, Blizzard starts testing micro-transactions in World of Warcraft and much more.
‘ Broken Age’ to hit early access in January
Double Fine revealed their release plans for Broken Age this past week. There was some mild controversy, as studio head Tim Schafer explained to Kickstarter backers that the scope of the game had grown so much that the $3.3 raised on Kickstarter isn’t quite enough. As such Double Fine needs to raise a little extra to finish the game up. Their plan to achieve this is to first of all use revenue from Double Fine’s other games and secondly to release the first half of Broken Age to Steam’s early access service. Double Fine hopes this will give them enough to finish the game up and release the full thing in July 2014. It remains to be seen if this plan will actually work, either way this twist in the story has sparked a lot of debate about the Kickstarter model for games.
New details on Xbox One exclusive ‘D4’
Swery65 and Access Games have revealed some details about D4, which we first saw revealed at Microsoft’s E3 press briefing. Firstly the D4 stands for ‘Dark Dreams Don’t Die’ and the game itself will be download only, so many ds! If that’s not enough ‘d’ for you, the games stars a detective named David. He has has the power to touch objects and jump into their pasts, allowing him to solve crimes. D4 will use Kinect but it’s completely optional, if you choose to you’ll be able to use voice commands and motions to play. Swery’s trademark humor will also feature, so don’t be expecting a super serious crime drama here. Check out VG24/7 for a few more details.
The OWL is your drone buddy in ‘Killzone: Shadow Fall’
Lead designer of Killzone: Shadow Fall, Eric Boltjes, has shared some details on the OWL drone players will get to use in the PS4 launch title. You’ll use the Dual Shock 4’s touch pad to control the drone’s different modes, more details of those modes below.
- Attack Mode orders the OWL to move to an area and attack anyone within range; alternatively, you can tell it to attack a single enemy directly.
- Zipline Mode gets the OWL to fire a zipline, allowing the Shadow Marshal to traverse incredibly quickly from point A to B.
- Stun Mode is similar to Attack Mode, but lets the OWL use up its energy to create an area-of-effect shock blast that turns off all nearby electronics and stuns humanoid enemies within range.
- Lastly, Shield Mode creates an energy shield right in front of the Shadow Marshal, allowing bullets/projectiles to pass through from his POV but stopping bullets coming in from the other side.”
Head over to Killzone.com for a few more details.
‘Injustice: Gods Among Us’ heading to EVO 2013
NeatherRealm’s latest will be going this year’s EVO event, according to Shoryuken. Injustice will be using the latest patch (1.05) but General Zod, the newest DLC character, will be missing out due to his proximity to the event itself. Check out the patch notes on Shoryuken here.
Xbox 360 dashboard beta sign-up opens, then closes
The beta for the next big Xbox 360 dash update is hitting soon and as is tradition Microsoft will be allowing some 360 users to participate. Users could/can opt-in via a panel on the dashboard, and apparently a lot of people did because sign-ups have now been stopped indefinitely. Major Nelson has indicated it could open up again, so keep an eye on his twitter account if you’re interested.
Microtransactions may be coming to ‘World of Warcraft’
Blizzard appearing to be experimenting with microtransactions in WoW. A new item has appeared on their public testing servers, an ‘Enduring Elixir of Wisdom’ which apparently grants 100% boost to XP gained. Community manager Zarhym responded to the discovery: “We are currently exploring the possibility of adding a way for players in certain regions to make purchases directly within the game. As part of this process, elements related to this will be appearing on the PTR. We’ll provide additional updates on our plans as development progresses.”
So it sounds like this is just a test and even if it’s successful these types of microtransactions might not even reach all regions. WoW has been around since 2004 and while it still has a large and loyal fanbase, the numbers are not what they once were. It’s no surprise then to see Blizzard trying out new things to boost revenue made from the game, much like when they made the game free to play up til level 20.