52 items found for your search. If no results were found please broaden your search.
(08/22/17 2:53am)
By Nolan Leahy
Blizzard Entertainment live streamed a video conference today at Gamescom that showed news regarding DLC and patches for their current IPs.
[embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OmgIpNh3Re8[/embed]
The topic introduced in the above preview was news regarding StarCraft II. Blizzard announced that they are working on a new co-op Commander for the popular two player coop mode. The commander is known as Dehaka. According to Heart of the Swarm’s story, Dehaka is a pack leader of some primal Zerg found on the planet Zerus, the Zerg home world. His commander abilities in the co-op mode will include being able to summon primal Zerg heroes and the ability to use an ability to "devour" opposing units and pick up their specific traits. David Sum, the lead designer, mentioned as an example that the "Devour" ability would allow for a unit to instantly kill any unit and take a specific trait like being able to attack air units.
Next is World of WarCraft, where Ion Hazzikostas (Game Director) and Morgan Day (Lead Encounter Designer) mentioned World of WarCraft Legion’s new upcoming dungeon in patch 7.3. The new five-man dungeon is known as The Seat of the Triumvirate. In addition, Gamescom will be hosting the European Regional Finals for WoW Arena World Championship, where European players will be competing to be able to go to the Grand Championship at Blizzcon. The final matches are going to take place on Saturday, August 26th.
Finally, Production Director Chacko Sonny discussed the new map called Junkertown. The map is “a brand new escort map set in the outback of Australia,” according to Sonny. What followed then was a new video that gave insight to the aesthetics of what the map will look like. Though not entirely informative, it proved to be a comical clip starring Junkrat and Roadhog with a Cowboy Bebop-like introduction.
More news from Blizzard will follow during Wednesday’s Blizzard Gamescom presentation on August 23rd at noon.
Source: Gamescom
Image: buffed
(07/12/17 2:40am)
by Nolan Leahy
On July 12th, 2017, a massive protest headed by numerous computer hardware, software, and website companies will ensue along with millions of Americans in an effort to sway Congress and the FCC to stop the repeal of Net Neutrality. Those included in the protest are giants such as Vimeo, ThinkGeek, Kickstarter, Amazon, Reddit, Netflix, and Twitter. Roughly 60 companies are involved with the protest. Facebook and Google both aren’t fans of the possible repeal. To be clear though, the interest of this repeal comes from the top players such as AT&T, Verizon, Comcast, and Time Warner Cable. Smaller and less known ISPs have cosigned a letter with their desires for stopping the repeal.
To those unfamiliar with Net Neutrality, Net Neutrality is a principle that states Internet Service Providers (ISPs) cannot interfere with what everyday individuals engage in online through the Internet. Without Net Neutrality, ISPs would be able to prioritize connections to various websites that could benefit that specific ISP.
A great example of who would benefit from this repeal is Comcast because of their ownership of NBCUniversal Media. With that in consideration, Comcast is currently planning on creating a Netflix-style website to compete with Hulu and other streaming sites. What could happen after the repeal of Net Neutrality, is that Comcast could immensely slow down video loading speeds of their customers that try to watch NBCUniversal shows on other sites. In other words, if a Comcast customer is watching American Ninja Warrior on Netflix, then poor streaming is to be expected because Comcast would rather have people watching American Ninja Warrior on its websites. This would generate more clicks for Comcast and earn them more money through viewership and potential advertising. This repeal can also allow for Internet censorship, blocking, and creating massive priorities on what ISPs want their customers to consume through the media.
As of right now, Net Neutrality dictates that the Internet is considered a public utility, which is similar to how individuals would pay for a water, gas, and electric bill. This is because of the interpretation of Title II of the Telecommunications Act of 1934 in how the 2015 ruling classified Internet usage to be under the Common Carrier rulings. These rulings within Title II in Sec. 202a state that…
“It shall be unlawful for any common carrier to make any unjust or unreasonable discrimination in charges, practices, classifications, regulations, facilities, or services for or in connection with like communication service, directly or indirectly, by any means or device, or to make or give any undue or unreasonable preference or advantage to any particular person, class of persons, or locality, or to subject any particular person, class of persons, or locality to any undue or unreasonable prejudice or disadvantage.”
Along with the FCC Chairman Ajit V. Pai’s desire to repeal Net Neutrality, he also wants to repeal Title II as well, which would allow for ISPs to accomplish consumer discrimination based off of consumer preferences in their business practices.
Internet and broadband companies are getting rather greedy with the desire for Net Neutrality to be repealed. Kaitlyn Tiffany, a writer for The Verge, wrote an article how Verizon is silencing Tumblr’s fight for Net Neutrality. Her article states that when Verizon bought Yahoo last month, Tumblr CEO David Karp went silent on Net Neutrality, because Yahoo is the parent company of Tumblr. Her sentiment is supported by the fact that, David Karp doesn’t have the reputation of being shy when it comes to social or political issues.
With Comcast and Verizon being against Net Neutrality, it seems that this is more major ISP greed vs. the Internet consumer base. This should be a non-partisan issue because the Internet has become such a dire necessity to function at home, work, school, and even for recreational activities. Repealing Title II has the potential to drastically change how the US consumes Internet content. Everyone can be harmed by this repeal which would allow ISPs to have influence on Internet trafficking and what the people can or cannot see, and the Internet is arguably the paragon for freedom of expression and the free market; and the major ISPs want to change that.
Netflix, Amazon, and Google are creating messages that will appear on their websites and phone applications to let people know about the possible repeal in an effort to gain more of the public’s majority support. As for right now, a poll that consists of United States registered voters said that about 61 percent approved of Net Neutrality, while 18 percent oppose, and 21 percent either had no clue or no opinion about Net Neutrality. People are joining the protest at battleforthenet.com and are sending letters to the FCC and Congress, voicing concerns about the future of Net Neutrality. The deadline for public commentary is on July 17th, 2017.
Sources:
The Verge
Battleforthenet
Cnet
Bloomberg
Investopedia
New York Times
FCC
Broadcastingcable
Scmagazine
The Hill
Los Angeles Times
(06/29/17 8:00am)
by Nolan Leahy
ARMS is one of those games that merely looks like a goofy version of regular boxing. Numerous times when beginning to play the game, it was easy to think that this could very well be a glorified Wii Sports Boxing on the Nintendo Switch. A $60 price tag is a lot to ask for when deliberating on such a thought, but thankfully there’s far more to it than just smacking your opponent.
Silly strategic boxing
While difficult to see initially, the numerous options and strategies present are a pleasant surprise from ARMS and are a clever addition in reinventing the classic sport of boxing. There are ten fighting characters to choose from, and each has his/her own specific abilities that highlight a specific play style. Play as the Master Mummy to tank punches or as the hip-swaying Twintelle to hover above the ground and slow opposing attacks. While these characters are the foundation of the game, the interchangeable ARMS chosen at the beginning of the round can determine victory or defeat.
Within the game the left and right ARMS, the fighter’s weapons, are selected prior to the beginning of a round. They can be identical or separate weapons when choosing one of three for each arm. This choice is absolutely vital to the game, because these different ARMS determine attack speed, range, charging attack effects, and rush attack abilities. More ARMS can be unlocked for each character through spending in-game currency to complete GET ARMS challenges. With the combination of characters and weapons within the game in addition to the random bombs in every round, it has strategic depth that rivals that of other modern day fighting games.
It’s not just about the competition
Although ARMS proves to be a fantastic competitive fighter, it also has other modes for when the main game gets stale. There’s a Grand Prix mode, which is similar to a fighting ladder. There’s a 2v2 mode, where two players are tethered together to fight another team that’s in the same situation. There’s also V-Ball, which is simply volleyball but ARMS style, where players punch the ball. Skillshot is a target practice type of game where multiple targets are present, and you must hit more than your opponent. Then there is the Super Smash Bros.-influenced mode of 1-on-100, where the player takes on 100 slime monsters that are each taken out in one punch.
Each of these modes adds a good deal of fun and variety to the game, but one mode doesn’t quite hit that mark. The Hoops game mode, where players compete to grab and throw each other through a basketball hoop, just tends to be a repetitive montage of grab attacks.
Although most of these modes are a pleasant addition to the game, it does feel as though there needs to be more activities in the game. ARMS doesn’t need anything like a story mode to provide narrative, as the game functions extremely well without it, but there is still something missing to make it feel like a complete fighting experience that will keep the player consistently coming back. Despite this flaw, Nintendo does deserve a tip of the hat, because more DLC is coming to the game at no cost to the players with plans of adding a Boss and a Spectator Mode as the first batch of DLC.
Immersion vs. ease of play
One part that isn’t mentioned much within the marketing of ARMS is that there are multiple control formats to choose from. Any play style from the Joy Con to the Pro Controller are viable ways to play, but is it better to use motion controls or a typical controller format? It depends on what sort of experience the player desires. For one, motion controls are incredibly fun and makes the experience feel more real and exciting, but the learning curve is higher because aiming the punches with real life arms isn’t as easy as it sounds.
That’s where the button controller layouts come in. It’s definitely easier to play with any form of button layout in calculating your punch’s aim with a joystick than it is with motion controls, and it makes the learning curve much less steep. The motion controls felt a bit alien because your fighter's movement is also judged through the use of these controls unlike Wii Sports Boxing where only motion controls were required to attack.
All images from Nintendo, Game Informer, and Siliconera
(06/11/17 8:44pm)
by Nolan Leahy
In the early 90s, console manufacturers and developers went to the Consumer Electronics Show (CES), which is, for them, solely remembered as an unpleasant experience. The organizers of CES didn’t recognize the growing importance of the gaming industry. According to an article from Kidzworld, a statement from Tom Kalinksi, the CEO of Sega America said that in 1991 “The CES organizers...” had “put us in a tent, and you had to walk past all the adult-entertainment vendors to find us. That particular year, it was pouring rain, and the rain leaked right over our new Genesis system. I was just furious with the way CES treated the video games industry,…”
With that type of feedback, it’s difficult to imagine that an annual showcase for video games with such poor quality could last so long. Thankfully, it didn’t.
In 1995, Infortainment World and the Digital Software Association, which is now known as the Entertainment Software Association, put on a showcase program known as E3. E3, or the Electronic Entertainment Expo, is a video game conference that’s usually held in the Los Angeles Convention Center where the top video game development companies gather from all over the world to make announcements and updates on the latest video game hardware and software.
During that first year at E3, Nintendo, Sega, and Sony all showed up with incredible new information and nearly 50,000 people attended. Nintendo started discussing the “Ultra 64” which became the Nintendo 64 and Sega unveiled the Sega Saturn. Sony also stepped into the ring and showed its highly praised first PlayStation.
The annual attendance records haven’t quite shifted because of the normally strict standards of entry. Despite these strict standards, it doesn’t mean that the big announcements stopped coming. In some highlighted years, these gaming companies made some of the most groundbreaking announcements of games that would alter the expectations for the consumer all the way up into today. To make more sense of this, here is a list of some of the best E3 announcements and years:
1. 1996: Nintendo reveals the Nintendo 64
The Nintendo 64 was the first 3D console for Nintendo. Some of the greatest games ever created were solely onto the Nintendo 64. Nintendo showcased the launch title Super Mario 64, where critics raved about the dynamic camera controls. Three years later, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time released and is still considered by many to this day to be the greatest game of all time.
On a side note for the 1996 E3, Sony displayed Naughty Dog’s Crash Bandicoot, Tomb Raider made its first appearance, and Blizzard Entertainment’s StarCraft was also shown, which is a competitive game that is still holding massive tournaments to this day.
2. 2001: Microsoft and Nintendo steal the show
During this E3, Nintendo revealed Super Smash Brothers Melee, a fighting game featuring characters across a variety of Nintendo titles. The game is still heavily played today considering that tournaments like the Evolution Championship Series still have thousands of players come to compete in Super Smash Brothers.
Xbox made its first appearance at this E3 as well as Bungie’s First Person Shooter game Halo: Combat Evolved, which was the phenomenal beginning to a multibillion-dollar franchise. The Xbox host at the time said that it was so confident in the Xbox because of its design of the online broadband environment, which paid off with Xbox Live and the release of Halo 2 to take full advantage of its features.
3. 2006: Anticipation for the next generation
Video games for new upcoming consoles got people excited. Nintendo presented Super Mario Galaxy and The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess. The Wii also received an official release date.
Microsoft proudly showed off Halo 3, which featured the first installment of forge mode, allowing players to edit multiplayer maps to their liking with relative ease. Improvements upon this mode came along later with downloadable content, and later installments of the franchise. This mode spawned a massive creative community that made crazy maps filled with tons of weapons in addition to more casual, innovative creations like Rube Goldberg machines and even golf courses. Yes, that’s right, a First Person Shooter game that allows you to make a golf course. It was a great time.
Lastly there was Sony’s PS3. Introducing the next generation for PlayStation meant big changes for Sony; however, they introduced it with the massive asking price of about $500 for a 20 GB console. This set the stage for Microsoft to take over the market in the console wars in the seventh generation of video games.
4. 2011: Announcing Phenomenal Third Party Games and Sequels
2011’s E3 introduced games that shook up the industry as to what a video game narrative could actually mean in the entertainment medium. Not only were these games continuations of various universes made in previous games, but also many of the following were highly praised by critics. 2K made incredible impressions on viewers when showing Bioshock: Infinite. Electronic Arts revealed Mass Effect 3. Warner Brothers gave us Batman: Arkham City and Square Enix had Tomb Raider (2013).
It was a huge year for video game storytelling, and it shifted the mood to how well the gaming format would spend so much effort into something more real with these stories. When Bioshock: Infinite released, it featured classic Disney-like animations with its character movement. Batman: Arkham City has one of the best graphic novel video game narratives to date with it’s multitude of villains, character bios, a well constructed world, and phenomenal voice acting by Mark Hamill in his role as the Joker.
On top of all that, Bethesda’s Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim and From Software’s Dark Souls appeared at this E3. It was huge, and there were many, many games coming to consoles that both PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 owners could look forward to.
5. 2017?
There’s a great deal to come within this year’s E3. Electronic Arts already had their press conference and showcased Star Wars: Battlefront II and A Way Out. Microsoft will present on Project Scorpio, which will be the most powerful console to date and will be featured during a 90 minute press conference. Super Mario Odyssey could very well make an appearance from Nintendo. Sony will show the Final Fantasy VII remake, and Bethesda’s announcements are still relatively unknown, but could very well make an intense announcement such as an Elder Scrolls VI or a rumored game called “Starfield."
Whether you’re a gamer or not, the industry is constantly changing. For many people, it’s the preferred medium of modern entertainment and it’s growing so fast that it’s making more money than the film and music industries combined. With that much of a monetary foothold in today’s entertainment, it’s definitely worth paying attention to, because these annual conferences are a glimpse into the future of how we’re going to be consuming content.
Keep up with live coverage of E3 @ByteBSU
Sources:
YouTube
Reddit
Metacritic
KFVS News
Polygon
IGN
kidzworld
(04/02/17 9:13pm)
by Nolan Leahy
Within the past month, the video game 1-2-Switch released alongside the Nintendo Switch. The game features 28 simple mini games. Among these mini games is a cow milking game, where players cartoonishly simulate milking a cow.
The President of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), Ingrid E. Newkirk, wrote a letter of complaint in saying that Nintendo has “taken all of the cruelty out of milking” and how the milking process is “NEVER that pleasant for these animals.”
What’s even more interesting about this letter is that it doesn’t end there. The letter includes suggestions “to simulate cow milking accurately,…”
President Newkirk writes, “1-2-Switch would need to show all aspects of dairy farming, including the violent insemination of female cows on what the dairy industry itself refers to as a ‘rape rack.’ Cows produce milk to feed their babies, but their young are torn away from them soon after birth so that human beings can use their milk instead…”
“We’d be happy to provide you with video footage of the filthy conditions that cows endure on farms for you to include in your game,” President Newkirk states.
It may be possible that she is taking it slightly too seriously for a party game that’s rated E10+ with less than favorable review scores. It’s also a consideration that Nintendo has included actions in their previous games that portray harm to common farm animals.
For instance, in The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time as well as The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, has moments where players can strike chickens with a weapon This causes a swarming frenzy attack or allow you to temporarily control a chicken. These actions are typically not taken seriously to any extent by the player base and is more of a joke than any other possibility, so why would 1-2-Switch be any different if the sole purpose is to entertain?
It only takes a Google search or a questioning of a local farmer to find the real facts of how the cow milking process truly works and its issues. When bearing in mind that 1-2-Switch is a party game that’s intended for a large audience range both young and old, it is doubtful that Nintendo will update the game to include cruel changes due to the marketing of the game.
You can see the full letter here.
Sources: Nintendo Everything, Polygon
Image: Polygon
(04/02/17 5:15pm)
by Nolan Leahy
On March 23, the US Senate voted to permit Internet Service Providers to vend consumer web browsing history. This vote repealed the FCC’s rules and regulations regarding the practice of selling this data that was set back during the Obama Administration.
Recently, United States citizens have been concerned about the safety of their browsing information and articles discussing how to obtain and use a Virtual Private Network to protect browsing histories have been appearing as a response.
Comcast, AT&T, and Verizon alike have all made statements saying that they will not sell their customers’ browsing histories in a statement of reassurance according to Michael Potuck, a writer for 9to5mac.
AT&T’s blog states that they have no plans to change after President Trump signs the repeal. The privacy policy currently states that it “will not sell your personal information to anyone, for any purpose. Period.”
Verizon Spokesperson Richard Young and Comcast’s Chief privacy officer said that their companies have no plans to sell browsing histories of consumers, and that the future repeal will not change anything.
Sources: Seeking Alpha, Beta News, AT&T
Image: Digital Trends
(03/24/17 10:39pm)
by Nolan Leahy
On March 23, the US Senate voted to permit Internet Service Providers to sell their consumers’ web browsing history to advertisers that would have previously required customer permission to accomplish, according to The Verge.
Previously in October, the Federal Communications Commission created privacy rules that the ISP’s initially needed to stand by in order to sell Internet browsing data and other private information. ISPs at this time were against the rules and FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler rebutted with a statement saying:
“Last week, I visited Consumer Reports’ headquarters in Yonkers, New York, where I toured their product testing facility and met with senior leadership. When looking at a smart refrigerator that collects and shares data over the Internet, the discussion turned to privacy. Who would have ever imagined that what you have in your refrigerator would be information available to AT&T, Comcast, or whoever your network provider is?“
He also argued that it is commonly difficult for individuals to swap ISPs and how easily they can examine their customers’ online activities because of this difficulty.
As time passes, the consumer market is changing into a more digitally involved environment where information is vital to everyone whether being a government employee working in foreign intelligence to being a simple teenager following the next big-budgeted video game release. With consumer browsing history being sold from ISPs, advertisers are looking into making ads even more tailored to the individual. But how is this different than something such as tracking cookies?
With cookies, browsing information is sent from personal logging and browsing history to third party websites who gather information on how long a person visited or looked at a product. With browsing history being sold from ISPs, there’s much more potential in terms of information that they can gather. For one, smaller ISPs are going to be a game-changer considering that they only geographically cover a certain area unlike Comcast or AT&T. Companies like Metronet, who provide fiber optic services in two states, could prove to be valuable to advertisers since a more specific demographic based on a geographical standpoint would be shown.
With the ISPs getting aggressive on browsing history and the first amendment invasion of privacy protection, it is considerable that futurist claims are following through with privacy becoming more difficult to behold. Amy Webb, a futurist who writes for the New York Times, wrote in August 2014 covering how children are becoming targets for databases, and with today’s Senate vote, so will your ISPs from ad agencies in the competitive information market.
Sources: FCC, Recode, New York Times
Image: Tech Times
(02/22/17 3:00pm)
In an earlier report, published on Friday, it was reported that a few customers had received their Nintendo Switch consoles early. The NeoGAF user known as hiphoptherobot was one such customer who showed the operating system, claiming that it was luck that got him his pre-ordered Nintendo Switch weeks in advance. Well, according to Nintendo, that was not the case.
(02/20/17 9:45pm)
Producers:Michael Robb, Wesley Womble
(02/20/17 8:00pm)
by Nolan Leahy
In an earlier report, published on Friday, it was reported that a few customers had received their Nintendo Switch consoles early. The NeoGAF user known as hiphoptherobot was one such customer who showed the operating system, claiming that it was luck that got him his pre-ordered Nintendo Switch weeks in advance. Well, according to Nintendo, that was not the case.
Nintendo stated that some of the consoles were lost and stolen by a distributor in the United States. Hiphoptherobot’s Switch was retrieved from the US distributor, which he shipped back upon Nintendo’s request, due to the fact that the console was stolen property. He said in a private online interview with Kotaku, that “I understand why they want it back and it sounds like that Switch might have been obtained in not the legalist [sic] of ways before I received it so them wanting it back is within their rights.” The NeoGAF user claimed that he did not realize that the Switch console that he purchased was previously stolen.
In Nintendo’s statement to IGN, they said that they would like for “everyone being able to discover the wonders of the new system for themselves at that time.” With all of the hype surrounding the console, people have been excited to discover what all the system has to offer and how powerful it truly is. But, from the sound of that statement, they will have to wait as Nintendo wants to keep every secret that they can about this console until its release on March 3.
Sources: Kotaku, Polygon
Image: The Sun
(02/17/17 10:00pm)
by Nolan Leahy
The Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences launched an interview-style short film series titled The Game Makers: Inside Story on Feb. 15 on YouTube. The series goes over big video game titles from the viewpoint of the writers and designers. It also touches upon other topics from storytelling in video games to experiences with working on larger funded titles. The videos include developers such as Neil Druckmann, a writer and developer from Naughty Dog, and Kiki Wolfkill, an executive producer at 343 Industries.
(11/24/15 3:04pm)
When I entered StarCraft 2: Legacy of the Void, I was rather excited to experience the final chapter within the trilogy. As I was going through the story, there were moments that definitely caught me awestruck with amazement upon improvements that previous StarCraft campaigns most certainly lacked. When it comes to the multiplayer, it definitely offers new modes that new players and old will find to bring a sense of excitement as players battle in competitive and cooperative environments across the galaxies.