Eutechnyx and Activision have announced the release of their NASCAR the Game 2011 for the Nintendo Wii platform. They also released some new screenshots of the Wii version, which you can see in the gallery below. NASCAR the Game 2011 featuresa full racing field of 43 cars populated with real-world drivers such as Dale Earnhardt jr and Joey Logano. The game promises unprecedented game physics and racing simulation gameplay.
Sideshow Collectibles has revealed a really neat-looking Predator display mask set as a special 2011 San Diego Comic-Con exclusive pre-order item. The Predator display mask set will go on pre-sale exclusively for San Diego Comic-Con attendees starting May 26th at 10 AM PT. Non-attendees can pre-order the set one day later, May 27th at 10AM PT. The San Diego Comic-Con runs from July 21st through July 24th at the San Diego Convention Center.
EPIC Games has announced that the NECA Retro Lancer will be available as part of the various Gears of War 3 game editions. The standard GoW 3 bundle with the Retro Lancer retails for $139.98 while the other editions will of course cost more. Checkout the Gamestop page for more information.
Activision has released the official reveal trailer for their upcoming shooter, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3
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CD Projekt RED’s new RPG, The Witcher 2, is a fantastic adult role-playing game that, despite its flaws, will astound and amaze you. The game puts you in the role of a monster-slayer, known as a “Witcher”, named Geralt who has been framed for a regicide he did not commit. The game features an engaging, mature storyline with several twists and turns to keep you guessing as well as fast-paced combat and a visceral style.
Adult Themes – If you follow a top-down approach to selecting responses to questions directed at you, you will see full frontal nudity within the first ten minutes of the game. The Witcher 2 is an ADULT RPG – meaning that it is the equivalent of watching a hard R-rated film. There is nudity, foul language, giblet-tossing violence, and a lot more. Thankfully, none of it feels gratuitous and it all works within the bounds of The Witcher 2’s universe and plot.
Story – The game’s story features an intricate web of characters, each with their own desires and motivations. Not only that, but the player ends up shaping the story greatly as the game goes on. Responses to questions as well as your actions can have serious implications. Thankfully, going back to the point about it being an adult RPG, the game never really clarifies what those outcomes will be (good, bad, etc) when you are making them. It is up to your judgment to do what you think you must and the game readily-adapts to those choices. The game also makes use of lengthy cutscenes to move the story along. Sometimes these are pre-rendered, but they are very often rendered in real-time using the game engine and look incredible.
Visuals and Audio – The Witcher 2 is one of the best-looking games I have ever had grace my computer monitors. The environments are lush and believable while characters are very lifelike without hitting the uncanny valley – it is a nice blend of stylization and realistic human features. Monsters are more of the same – beautiful to behold and very fun to slaughter. On the audio front, the character voice over work is very good and the environmental audio lives up to the visuals in making you feel a part of the world. Additionally, creature noises are very important to tracking them down in sometimes very lush scrub, bush, etc and the sound department did a great job to this end. In the previously-mentioned cutscenes, the voice actors pull through and give great performances.
Character Progression – The Witcher 2 features a traditional RPG, experience-based leveling system whereby the player acquires talent points to spend in new abilities, actions, etc. The tree is separated out into multiple paths and players can pick and choose as they like so long as they stick with the tree branch system. The system is excellent and makes enhancing Geralt’s abilities a breeze.
Crafting & Alchemy – The Witcher 2 features an alchemy and crafting system by which you can collect herbs and a multitude of other objects to craft together various items, potions, etc for your use. While not a “bad” system, I found that the mindless running around and collecting all the crap needed to make some of these items took away from what I loved most about the game – the involvement in the storyline. If the game were not so strong in that department, the crafting might have been a real bonus to the gameplay.
Sluggish Actions – An unfortunate edition to the “meh” portion of this review, the game’s controls can sometimes be very sluggish. Several actions can be performed just by clicking the left mouse button – in this it is almost too simple for its own good. This is because the triggers for searching, climbing, descending, and using items (all left-clicks mind you) can be very easy to miss while running about. Not only that, but it seemed to take several clicks of my mouse to get Geralt to climb or descend – as if it was not detecting the initial clicks or something. Also, while if you get in front of a monster and click, Geralt will attack with his sword, if you are next to one of these triggers and try the same thing – monster or no, he will trigger the action instead of swinging his sword. I would much rather have seen a space bar that triggered a real “jump” action and, perhaps, grabbing on to a ledge than the less dynamic system currently in place.
Bugs – Unfortunately, the game is suffering from some launch bugs, such as the inability to run the game in fullscreen on some SLI and Crossfire rigs. Thankfully, CD Projeckt RED has a long-history of updating their titles for quite some time after release, so it probably won’t take them long to fix this stuff.
If you are 17 years of age or older, you owe it to yourself to pickup The Witcher 2 right away. This is EXACTLY the kind of gameplay experience that shows off what the PC platform is capable of and it is just a shame that more companies are not willing to take the risks that CD Projekt RED has with this title. Despite its flaws, The Witcher 2 is easily one of the best games of 2011 on any platform and I hope it spurs some console gamers to put down their gamepads for a moment and pickup a mouse and keyboard for once to see what it’s like.
Sony Online Entertainment’s PSN titles like DC Universe Online are now back online with the re-enabling of the PlayStation Network after the crippling virtual attack which brought the service down. In order to make it up to their customers, SOE has announced that customer’s accounts have been awarded 45 days of game time (30 days plus 1 day for each day of the outage). Additionally, SOE has worked out an agreement with Debix to provide customers with 12 month’s complimentary AllClear ID Plus service. This is an identity protection service which helps protect and monitor various information sources to keep tabs on how your personal information/identity is being used (or abused).
Customers must login by 11:59 pm PST on August 31st, 2011 to claim their free game time. Also, you can checkout this link for more details on the AllClear ID Plus service.
505 Games has announced that its upcoming MMA title, Supremacy MMA, will be released on September 20th, 2011 for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 platforms. Supremacy MMA promises a one-of-a-kind blend of arcade action and MMA fighting styles while featuring some of today’s hottest MMA fighters – including the only female fighters features in an MMA title so far.
“Supremacy MMA is an extremely important new IP for 505 Games and represents another level of depth to our growing roster of games,” said Ian Howe, President, 505 Games North America. “With that in mind, we believe the tremendous value of the title combined with the overwhelmingly positive response we’ve had from consumers and writers during early gameplay sneak peeks, tells us this title deserves to launch in the thick of the fall buying season.”
“There’s a huge opening in the market with no retail fighting games, and specifically no MMA games, hitting this fall so we’re ready to deliver a title that exceeds the expectations of MMA and arcade fighter fans alike,”said Ricci Rukavina, creative director, Kung Fu Factory.
2k games and Gearbox Software have released a new behind the scenes trailer for their upcoming Duke Nukem Forever. Due out on June 14th for the Windows PC, PlayStation 3, and Xbox 360 platforms, this trailer goes more into detail on the history of the IP as it led up to the coming release of the game.
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OnLive and Square Enix have announced that the upcoming action-RPG, Deus Ex: Human Revolution will be coming to the OnLive streaming game service starting on August 23rd – which coincides with the game’s retail launch for the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and Windows PC platforms. Customers who pre-order Human Revolution on OnLive will be eligible for bonuses such as a full OnLive game system should they pre-order the limited edition of the game. Checkout full details at OnLive’s pre-order web page.
Top Chef winner, Chef Michael Voltaggio confirmed plans for opening his new Los Angeles-based restaurant, ink., in July. Prior to this official opening, however, Voltaggio will open the restaurant by hosting a special video game event for online game publisher, Nexon America. The menu at this E3-timed media event? Chinese-inspired eggs benedict as well as a dragon fruit and frozen yogurt dish.
Why Chinese? Nexon America will be heavily promoting their upcoming social MMO, Dragons Nest, which is schedule to launch later this Summer.
