General gaming

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• On the Scene at PAX Prime 2011
• Twister Mania for Kinect Will Turn You Into a Pretzel
• Eight-Year-Old Fighting Game Expert Noah Gets a Sponsorship
• Unlike Battlefield 3, Modern Warfare 3 Will Use Steamworks
• You Can Choose to Buy Crimson Alliance for $10 or $15
• Zynga May No Longer be Rushing to Go Public
• Re-Reviewing God of War: Chains of Olympus and Ghost of Sparta
• Get Gears of War 3's First Four DLC Packs with the $30 Season Pass
• New Professor Layton, its 100-Hour RPG, and Tetris: Axis All Dated
• Gold Wii Remote Included with $70 Version of Zelda: Skyward Sword

On the Scene at PAX Prime 2011 Posted: 29 Aug 2011 06:33 PM PDT Feature Share it: Tweet On the Scene at PAX Prime 2011 By: Jeremy Parish, Bob Mackey, Tina Sanchez, and Sam Kennedy August 29, 2011 At this year's PAX Prime, we decided to focus less on previews and news, and more on "postcards from the show," where the staff on hand posted photos and text blurbs to give the experience of being there as it happened. We posted a lot of those over the weekend, but given that it's been tough to track them all, we figured we'd collect them in one place, right here, with a few extra bonus entries thrown in for good measure. Here we go!

Twister Mania for Kinect Will Turn You Into a Pretzel Posted: 29 Aug 2011 06:09 PM PDT A Kinect version of the classic game Twister will be out in about two months, just in time for the holiday shopping season. Majesco will have the game ready for a November 1 release, reports Reuters. It'll cost $49.99, supports up to eight players ("in turn based pairs"), and features 16 different ways to play. Additional details on Majesco's website reveal the game's name to be Twister Mania. It's being developed by Naked Sky, the team behind Star Trek D-A-C, Microbot, and RoboBlitz. Among the 16 ways to play are Shape Frenzy (mimic the shape and earn points for how well you fill its silhouette), Twist & Fit (position your body so you fit through the moving wall), and Spot On (a take on basketball's HORSE where you create a shape and see if other players can recreate it).

Eight-Year-Old Fighting Game Expert Noah Gets a Sponsorship Posted: 29 Aug 2011 04:30 PM PDT Noah Solis turned some heads at the EVO fighting gaming tournament one month ago. He's now gotten himself a sponsorship and his own t-shirts. Solis is eight years old but managed to win several fights against some of the world's best competition in Marvel vs. Capcom 3 at EVO. The crowd was strongly behind him, booing whenever his opponents managed to get any offense in on him. He also plays Super Street Fighter 4 Arcade Edition, according to The Traveling Circus' announcement today. "I went with TTC as my sponsor because they treat me good, they are nice people, they give me hope in my future, and they believe in my ability, I like their name, [they] are nice to me, my dad is comfortable with their character and my brothers approve," he said of the new sponsorship.

Unlike Battlefield 3, Modern Warfare 3 Will Use Steamworks Posted: 29 Aug 2011 04:01 PM PDT You'll be using Steam to play and manage Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 when it's released on PC later this year. Valve announced today that Steamworks is being employed for the PC version of Modern Warfare 3. That's not a change from Black Ops, which also used it, but it does come as good news for PC shooter fans considering what the game's most direct competition is doing. Modern Warfare 3 will use Steamworks for the usual: to handle Achievements, auto-update the game, and so on. It'll be included no matter where you buy the game. For many, that's a good thing, but those with a disdain for Steam will be unable to avoid it unless they choose not to play the game altogether.

You Can Choose to Buy Crimson Alliance for $10 or $15 Posted: 29 Aug 2011 03:40 PM PDT We knew there would be something strange or different about the way Crimson Alliance is sold when a Summer of Arcade promotion talked about getting "all three characters" as a gift. As it turns out, Certain Affinity is offering players a way of saving themselves a few bucks by locking in their character class choice from the start. Crimson Alliance is an action RPG coming to Xbox Live Arcade with three character classes to choose from: the Assassin, Wizard, and Mercenary. Each has different specializations that can make two of same character classes mesh well together when playing in a party of four online (where there will inevitably be at least two players playing the same class). The game is set to cost 1200 Microsoft Points ($15) when it comes out on September 7. If you decided to buy all five Summer of Arcade titles, you'll land a free copy of the game with all three classes. Alternatively, you can buy one of three individual character class packs and pay only 800 points ($10), Game Informer reports. You'll be able to play online alongside other classes and access all of the game's content, the other two classes simply will never be available to you.

Zynga May No Longer be Rushing to Go Public Posted: 29 Aug 2011 03:24 PM PDT It was big news, if not especially surprising, when Zynga announced that it planned to become a public company. Now, with the stock market not exactly in record-setting-highs territory, the company is reportedly considering a delay of its entry into that space. Two sources who spoke with the New York Post indicated Zynga could delay its initial public offering because of the current troubles on Wall Street. One source suggested it may not happen until November after Zynga initially hoped it could get it done as quickly as possible. This comes just a few weeks after the United States credit rating was downgraded from AAA to AA+ by Standard & Poor's. "It wouldn't be illogical for the bank to delay a sale, given the markets," one source told the Post. "It makes sense for a bank to protect its clients from a market that could potentially be a bottomless pit."

Re-Reviewing God of War: Chains of Olympus and Ghost of Sparta Posted: 29 Aug 2011 12:15 PM PDT Prior to Ghost of Sparta, I reviewed every mainline God of War game for 1UP. It's kind of ridiculous, actually -- to the point that I'm typecast as, "the guy who likes God of War" around here, but that's better than a lot of things I could be known for on the Internet. Then Ghost of Sparta -- the series' second PSP entry -- came along, and we decided to pass the review to Chris Pereira, mostly because of comments on the site saying they were looking for a fresh perspective (see, we listen to you people!), and because we wanted the review to be more about the game and less about me. Which, given the way I just started this review, doesn't seem like something we care about anymore.

Get Gears of War 3's First Four DLC Packs with the $30 Season Pass Posted: 29 Aug 2011 12:03 PM PDT Microsoft today announced the Gears of War 3 Season Pass, making Gears 3 the latest example of two trends we're seeing more and more of these days: announcing downloadable content ahead of the game's release and asking gamers to pay for that DLC before it's even available. The Season Pass entitles those who buy it to the first four downloadable content packs for Gears 3 and an exclusive liquid metal weapon set. The first of these downloadable add-ons will be released in November, followed by three more over the next year. There are no details on exactly what the DLC packs will include; presumably they'll be adding new maps, but it's not specified how many maps they'll each offer, when they're coming, or anything else you'd want to know before spending any money. The Season Pass won't begin being sold until Gears 3 is out on September 20, and hopefully by then Epic or Microsoft will give us some additional information so potential buyers don't have to buy in while knowing so little. 2400 Microsoft Points ($30) is the asking price for the pass, which is a 33 percent discount over buying each of the four DLC packs. That means the foursome will cost 3600 points ($45) total if you purchase them individually as they are released.

New Professor Layton, its 100-Hour RPG, and Tetris: Axis All Dated Posted: 29 Aug 2011 10:55 AM PDT A pair of games headed to Nintendo handhelds this year have been dated today, one of which brings a very nice surprise with it. Professor Layton and the Last Specter is the fourth game in the Layton series and has already been available in Japan for almost two years now. It's a prequel that kicks off a new trilogy and will finally be coming out on DS in North America on October 17. That's all well and good, but the best bit of information lies with Professor Layton's London Life. We've heard from some time now about an RPG included with Specter that had you running around London as Layton himself. It's being developed by Mother 3 developer Brownie Brown and is said to last more than 100 hours, which is a hell of a lot for a bonus feature in a Layton game. It's nice to see that it won't be left out of the the North American release, but what's even better is that you won't have to first unlock it as you do in the Japanese game -- it can be played right out of the box.

Gold Wii Remote Included with $70 Version of Zelda: Skyward Sword Posted: 29 Aug 2011 09:49 AM PDT Fans of The Legend of Zelda who desire a Wii Remote demonstrating their loyalty to the series can get just that by spending a little extra on Skyward Sword come November 20. What's described as a "special limited-edition" bundle includes a gold Wii Remote Plus, which today's press release is sure to note "will simply be gold in color and will not contain any actual precious metals." Real gold or not, it will cost extra; the bundle is priced at $69.99, $20 more than a standard copy of the game. The Wii Remote Plus packs in the functionality provided by the Wii MotionPlus attachment. You'll need one of the two in order to play Skyward Sword, due to the need for the extra precision. With a regular Wii Remote Plus costing $40 on its own, it's not a bad deal for those in need of an extra controller or those who don't already have MotionPlus or a Remote Plus. The bundle will also be the only place you can get this gold-colored controller, so collector's will want to spend the extra $20.

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