King of Fighters 13 now available through Steam
King of Fighters 13 is now available worldwide through Steam. The game includes an improved Netcode for online versus matches, 36 characters and other nice nuggets. You can download it here for $29.99 A video for the game is below.
http://www.vg247.com/2013/09/13/king-of-fighters-13-now-available-through-steam/
The digital effect - Total War: Rome II was last week's real No.1
Total War: Rome II would have been the UK’s real No.1 last week, if we counted digital sales, MCV can reveal.
The strategy game was No.2 in the UK retail charts with over 32,000 units sold, narrowly missing out on the No.1 spot by just 200 copies.
Yet if you factor in UK digital sales of 73,000, and the game would not only have comfortably been top of the charts, but it would have been one of the biggest single format launches of the year, with 105,00 games sold.
This is further evidence of the growing importance of including digital data in the weekly charts.
Despite the popularity of Total War as a digital download, Sega’s digital VP John Clark insists retail has nothing to fear.
He told MCV that the launch sales of Rome II at retail were 4,000 higher than they were for the original title.
“It’s an incredible number and the biggest, most significant number we’ve seen,” said Clark.
“Based on other stats that we’re looking at it also shows that this isn’t a digital shift – we’re now adding consumers.”
100K+ copies in the UK alone paints a good picture for how well it has sold globally dispite it's problems.
Company of Heroes 2 map editor due soon, new maps plotted
Company of Heroes 2 may have been out now for a few months and potentially sitting at the bottom of your ‘done’ pile, but Relic has plans to drag you back into the fight. Kind of like a Soviet Commissar, really. But rather than pointing a gun at your head and shouting, Relic is offering new maps, a new mini-campaign for Theatre of War mode, and a fully-featured map editing tool.
Talking in a letter over at the Company of Heroes website, producer Greg Wilson explained that two new maps were on the way: Langreska and Semoskiy. Inspired by some of the most popular battlefields from the first game, the maps feature both summer and winter variants, so if you’re not so keen on the divisive snow mechanics you can remain in the warm and dry.
Co-op junkies can jump back to 1942 with a new mini-pack for Theatre of War mode, which depicts the mid-point of the war from the German’s perspective. If you’re a Company of Heroes fan who brought a Collector’s Edition of the game - digital or physical - you can pick these missions up for free, as can those who pre-ordered. If you don’t fall into either category, then you can purchase the mini-pack on Steam.
The team at Relic have also been working on World Builder, the map editing tool for CoH that should be hitting v1.0 very soon. It will be released for free sometime in the near future.
Wilson emphases that Company of Heroes 2 is still very much in its infancy, and that it has a long life ahead of it. There hasn’t been much noise from the Eastern front since CoH2 launched, but the promise of community-made maps dropping in could be the reinforcements that the game needs.
http://www.pcgamesn.com/companyofheroes/company-heroes-2-map-editor-due-soon-new-maps-plotted
Payday/Left 4 Dead crossover might be in the works again
The marriage between Payday and Left 4 Dead last year was almost inevitable. How could you not crossover two games with such blatant similarities, especially when their narrative tones hit the sweet spot of ‘mental’. Bank robbers and zombie-infected blood samples? Yeah, why not. Roll on one year, throw in the massive success of a Payday sequel that’s more than twice the game it’s predecessor was, and you’ve got to ask the question: “Why not again?”
It’s something Payday 2’s director David Goldfarb has asked himself. He seems to be confident the team will be doing it again.
Talking to Rock, Paper, Shotgun, Goldflarb explained how the original concept came together. “The story I heard is that the [original Payday developers and Valve] met at GDC. they hit it off, and they were like “Hey, why don’t we do a crossover?” and I think they was a mutual agreement. And we just sort of did the Mercy Hospital stuff and Valve was super cool about it.”
He’s clearly very happy about No Mercy. Perhaps so happy with it he’d like to give the crossover treatment to his own Payday 2? “I’m sure we will be doing another thing, but I can’t say what that is. Yet.”
Tantilizing. It’s not the definitive “Yes we’re doing it” we’d like to hear, but being sworn to silence suggests that there’s something happening. Another Payday/Left 4 Dead crossover? A crossover with another game completely? Imagine robbing banks with portals….
http://www.pcgamesn.com/paydayleft-4-dead-crossover-might-be-works-again
Child Of Light Devs On Poetry, Female Characters
Ubisoft is making an art game. Or at least, Child of Light is as close to an art game as any major publisher is likely to get for quite some time. It’s being put together by a tiny team (headed up by Far Cry 3‘s directors, of all people, because we are living in Bizarro Land) with incredibly little in the way of bellowing blasts from Ubisoft brass. The result? A gorgeously painterly JRPG Metroidvania with a story that takes the form of a 120-page epic poem. The yarn itself, meanwhile, is a highly metaphorical spin on a young girl’s struggles growing up. I sat down with creative director Patrick Plourde and lead writer Jeffrey Yohalem to discuss poetry, influence from both JRPGs and classic PC adventure games, creating a female character who’s not defined by her search for a “Prince Charming,” choices that cut off large chunks of content, and more.
http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2013/09/13/child-of-light-devs-on-poetry-female-characters/
Blue Estate Is A Motional Fringe Game
Blue Estate is a “dark comedy shooter” (but aren’t they all, in a way?) based on the comic, and designed to show off the Leap Motion controller. Leap Motion, in case you aren’t familiar with it, is a hand-tracking system, not unlike the good ol’ Kinect. Anyway, what’s interesting about Blue Estate is that you play Tony Luciano, a gangster with a black mop of greasy hair, and that hair occasionally flops in front of your face. Which suggests you must need to brush back your fringe with hand motions in the game? The trailer and other promotional clutter doesn’t make that requirement clear, but surely it MUST be the case. And if not WHY NOT.
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