E3 2012: SimCity preview

Heading into E3, the big news surrounding SimCity was the new multiplayer feature.  Up until now, SimCity had only been a single-player experience. Cities, however, are always part of something bigger, and that was EA’s goal with the latest installment to the long-running, popular franchise.  They wanted to make it bigger, and they wanted players to interact with other town’s mayors — trade resources, work together for common goals, and thrive off of each other’s cities — like real cities should do.

In our E3 preview, we were shown a few separate, but very distinct towns working together to create an airport, one of several major buildings that can benefit everyone.  The distinct cities, which included a friendly neighborhood, thriving metropolis, and a booming but rundown coal town, each provided the necessary resources to build this airport.  The goal was for each of them to benefit in some way from it being built.

Outside of them benefiting from the airport, each town relied on the neighbors in some form.  Some of the examples showed to us include one city providing electricity to the other. The multiplayer spreads beyond just providing resources.  The cities relied on neighbors in other ways.  For instance, the metropolis was looking to expand its commerce and retail, but it needed people to run the businesses.  Therefore, it relied on the neighborhood which needed to increase its population to provide the necessary workforce.

Here is where the airport enters.  In addition to the extra people it would bring in to the newly built stadium, it could help people arrive in the neighborhood suburb.  The airport also allowed goods and resources to be flown in for the coal town.  It may sound complex, but SimCity simplifies everything.

From electricity to water pipes to public transit, SimCity says goodbye to spreadsheet numbers and introduces color-coded or other useful symbols to convey the message.  They showed us building an above-ground electrical railcar, and instead of just building tracks, a colorful line showed where traffic would be heavy for the railcar.  Green was good, yellow was medium, and red is heavy.

Multiplayer isn’t the only addition, however.  EA showed off SimCity’s new Glassbox Engine which literally simulates everything going on in the city.  From the street lamps turning on to the street lights switching from red to green, Glassbox simulates everything going on in the city and presents it as if it were real life.  Individual lighting for buildings, cars’ headlights, street lamps, and more are all present in the game.  It doesn’t only simulate lights either.  It simulates sims’ actions.  In our preview, the devs showed us a bank robbery play out as a result to crime from the neighboring city pouring in.

Neighboring cities don’t only help your town, but can also harm it. The coal city focused heavily on production and business, but lacked the necessary police stations. Because of that, the city was littered with graffiti and crime began spreading into adjoining towns. Unfortunately, that friendly neighborhood we saw was right next to the coal town.  As a result, crime began spilling into the streets and the aforementioned bank robbery occurred.

SimCity was already a fun game, but this added multiplayer component just adds a whole new level of interesting gameplay.  You can choose to help or harm friends’ cities.  And it’s not like everyone’s city is the same.  You can choose to make the city you desire.  If you want a bustling city, create it.  Just remember, you need people to work there and that is where the fun begins. There’s an all-new aspect to , and EA has done a remarkable job incorporating multiplayer.

Source : gamezone[dot]com

IGN Forecasts: The Xbox 720 Launch Lineup

Though Microsoft didn't utter a single peep about its next-generation console during last week’s Electronic Entertainment Expo, IGN has been able to piece together an early launch lineup through information gleaned from various backroom E3 demos, tips, leaks, surveys, and hints.

While we can’t guarantee Day One-availability for all of these, we can confidently surmise that all of these titles should be available during the still-unnamed system’s launch window. Naturally, there will be more, but this is what we suspect right now.

Watch Dogs

The Ubisoft Montreal development team has affirmed that their surprise E3 darling will be hitting current-generation consoles. However, they also more or less confirmed an Xbox 720 version, if you read between the lines of their quote: “As far as the platform goes, we're running on PC at the current E3. It's official for PS3 and 360. And since we don't have any ship dates, we're also hoping for any other platforms, multiple platforms, for the future.” Two additional bits of evidence here, as if that wasn’t enough: first, Ubisoft has an established corporate strategy of giving any and all platform launches heavy support. From Xbox 360 to Kinect to PlayStation Vita and the upcoming Wii U, they take a double-barreled approach to new consoles. And second, the incredible demo we witnessed at E3 was being played on a high-end PC with an Xbox controller. Odds are very good that their configuration is a ballpark approximation of the Xbox 720 specifications.

Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six: Patriots

Remember what we just said about Ubisoft betting big on any new console? Expect them to make a huge play for the Xbox Live audience on the 720 with their biggest multiplayer franchise. As you may recall, Rainbow Six 3 dominated Xbox Live in the original Xbox days, and the two Rainbow Six Vegas games were hugely popular in the first couple years of the 360’s lifecycle. Then, however, the series disappeared and Call of Duty swooped in and stole all of Rainbow’s thunder (and then some). We’re quite certain the publisher is not keen on seeing one of their biggest brands eclipsed again when the next-generation systems level the playing field. Furthermore, Patriots was originally announced as a 2013 title, and its no-show at E3 this year lends plenty of credence to the idea that it will resurface as a next-gen offering next holiday. Like Watch Dogs, the next Rainbow Six might also make an appearance on current-gen machines, but we suspect the 720 version will lead the way.

Destiny

We don’t even need to speculate on this one – we have official, court-documented proof courtesy of Activision’s recently settled court case with Vince Zampella and Jason West! Heck, the Xbox 720 is even mentioned by name in the official contract. Who would’ve thought that despite not only losing Bungie as the developer of Halo but also as a Microsoft-owned studio that The House That Bill Gates Built would still manage to launch a new Xbox with a Bungie game as the killer-app anyway? Yes, there will be an Xbox 360 version, but there won’t be a PlayStation SKU of any sort – not for at least a year, anyway, again per the contract details. Look for Destiny, a first-person shooter with massively multiplayer features of some kind (be they minor or major) to be the ace up Microsoft’s sleeve when they finally do being touting their next console.

Star Wars 1313

LucasArts isn’t even really hiding it on this one. They haven’t so much as hinted at a current-gen release for their epic, M-rated new Star Wars action franchise, and their E3 demonstration used a high-end PC and showcased things no Xbox 360 can do. The visual effects, character models, and scale/scope of the scenes shown made no attempt to look like they could be done on existing platforms, and we seriously doubt LucasArts is going to release a PC-exclusive Star Wars game that’s not an MMORPG. Also, continuing a theme from E3, all current-gen games we saw were given release dates of no later than Q1 2013 (so as to land squarely within this console cycle). Star Wars 1313, conversely, was issued no such launch window.

Other likely titles:

Forza Motorsport 5 – Longtime series developer Turn 10 has been on a semi-annual release schedule since the franchise was born, and with new partner Playground Games handling the spinoff Forza Horizon this year, it frees Turn 10 to quietly hammer away on a whiz-bang next-gen launch title – the Xbox 720’s Project Gotham Racing 3, if you will.

Call of Duty 2013 – Of course it will come to every platform known to man, but you can bet on Activision and Infinity Ward having something special in store for the Xbox 720 version. Will it be Modern Warfare 4, or will the developer take the opportunity to launch a new sub-franchise? Either way, they’re not going to want to lose their grip on the die-hard Xbox crowd when the new console launches.

…And many more will be unearthed in the coming months. Are these enough to get you to buy the next Xbox as soon as it’s available? Sound off in the comments below.



Source : ign[dot]com

Mario Creator Wants to Make a First-Person Shooter

In a new interview, Mario and Zelda creator Shigeru Miyamoto has revealed that he’s interested in making a first-person shooter but doesn’t have enough time.

"I actually do kind of want to make a first-person shooter," Miyamoto told Kotaku, "but I don't have time."

According to Miyamoto, the game wouldn’t be violent but would instead be focused on the idea of exploring an environment in a 3D space.

"Rather than necessarily the question of 'What kind of weapon do I have?' in a first person shooter or 'What kind of effect does that have on an enemy?', I think that the structure of a first-person shooter is something that's very interesting," he said. "Having that 3D space that in theory you are in and being able to look around and explore that—particularly being able to do that in conjunction with another person—is very interesting."

Miyamoto added that Wii U’s support of two GamePads could make a first-person shooter “very fun,” suggesting that two people viewing a game’s world through GamePads “could create a very fun and unique gameplay experience” if they’re in the same room.

Miyamoto most recently worked on Pikmin 3 and Luigi’s Mansion: Dark Moon, two titles shown off last week during E3. In addition, he was said to be working on an all-new original game earlier this year.



Source : ign[dot]com

Sesame Street: Once Upon a Monster Preview

If there’s one thing I can’t stand, it’s an educational game based on a popular kids’ property that doesn’t really bring anything to the table. It’s one thing to try and teach kids something they don’t know about, but how you do it is just as important as getting the lesson across. For years, so many games have failed to do this, starting with the Sesame Street games on the NES (“I don’t think that’s a word!”). It continued on with Barney’s Hide-and-Seek, a Genesis game that was so practically bad that it played itself, which I believe would discourage kids worse than letting them discover the solution for themselves.

I’m going off on a tangent here. Kids’ games aren’t really that bad anymore, though there are still a number of releases that are aimed at younger players (mostly on Wii, like Sesame Street and – gag – Smurfs Dance Party) while shutting out older players from having any fun. However, Tim Schafer and his team at Double Fine could very well change how this formula works with its upcoming release for Xbox 360/Kinect, Sesame Street: Once Upon a Monster. This isn’t your typical foray down the familiar license – Tim and his team are actually doing something genuinely new, and something that…wait for it…all ages can seemingly enjoy.

The game is presented in a storybook format, telling a tale that involves a series of monsters that just want to have fun with their days. The two main stars are familiar characters from the Sesame Street lexicon – the sweet-eating Cookie Monster and the high-pitched, red-furred Elmo. They appear in this monstrous world and guide the player through the actions of a newly created monster character named Marco. You’ll start out coming upon this creature, as he’s the only attendee at his birthday party (insert sad face here), but rather than discouraging him, Elmo and Cookie Monster engage in a number of mini-games to help perk him up, eventually getting to a birthday party he truly deserves. This is just the first part of the game; other chapters in the story tell different monster tales.

So how does this manage to involve adults along the same lines as kids? Well, keep in mind that this production is the work of Double Fine, the same savvy studio that produced Brutal Legend, Stacked, and the recently released mech game, Trenched. It’s got his style of humor in it, but never to the point that it’s raunchy or questionable for younger gamers. Tim worked very carefully to make sure that the tone stayed in the Sesame Street realm, but by the same token, also made sure that entertainment went hand in hand with education, without the latter overshadowing the former.

   

As a result, a number of Once Upon a Monster’s mini games are quite entertaining. One, for instance, has Marco taking part in a tandem race while Elmo playfully rides on his shoulders. Utilizing the Kinect, players must move left and right to avoid colliding with objects that could slow Marco’s momentum, while also ducking so that Elmo doesn’t hit his head on a passing tree branch. It’s never to the point that the activities are impossible, and young and old players alike will actually get into them more than you would’ve expected. Other activities include dancing (not hardcore Dance Central style either – we’re talking playful jumping around) and blowing out candles on a birthday cake. The game is packed with all kinds of enjoyable music, so kids can dance along to it, while parents won’t be worn out by it being loaded with thematic messages. Double Fine is making sure it’s fun all around, and not for a certain kind of audience. That’s where Once Upon a Monster’s main appeal lies.

To assure that the game had the same likable tone as the popular public television show, Double Fine worked closely with the teams at Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment and Sesame Workshop to assure that the new monsters fit in with the classic ones, while the stories reflected the kind of proper tone that would be expected from the world of Sesame Street. Considering that many Double Fine staffers were fans of the show when they were growing up definitely helps, as their memories help fuel the events that occur in the game. We still have yet to see what later stages have to offer, but you can bet there will be some sort of fun motion activities that everyone can easily get into. Maybe we’ll even have a cookie-eating mini-game for good measure. I mean, Cookie Monster IS in the game, after all…

As far as presentation goes, the game features the authentic voicework of both Cookie Monster and Elmo, and the new creatures sound great as well. What’s more, the small monster universe that they dwell in is never to the point of being threatening. In fact, it’s quite comfortable, with its relaxed design and its fun, little atmospheric touches, like the mini swamps and the forests. Being able to check it out through the eyes of the Kinect is definitely a smart move, as it simply wouldn’t be the same experience by using a routine controller.

Okay, so maybe we’re a little bonkers previewing a Sesame Street game right after the release of the ultra-violent Gears of War 3. But what can we say? This isn’t typical licensed fare where the point of education is hammered into skulls. This is a delightful take on a classic franchise, going in an unexpected direction thanks to a devoted studio. We’re actually interested to see how ends up when it hits stores on October 11. We’ll be back with a full verdict then, along with a desire to eat a bunch of cookies. Actually, we feel that now. OM NOM NOM!!

Oh, and there will be a demo available next Tuesday on Xbox Live. Check it out if you can.

Source : gamezone[dot]com

Mario & Sonic at the London 2012 Olympic Games Preview

I think most gamers were surprised that Mario and Sonic's first major interaction was destined to take place in an Olympic brand title, yet it seems the colorful take on the classic events was worthy of a sequel. So now we have Mario & Sonic at the London 2012 Olympic Games, which should prove to be another thrill geared toward the younger crowd. We went to an exclusive event showing off the new title and saw how the game has evolved since its last inception. The main focus is on the new party mode, a four-player romp through a Mario Party series of events--rampaging through the gameboard streets of London and collecting stars stickers, for example. All of the characters from the original return; in other words, there are no new characters. Given the wealth of options from the first game, it will be hard for fans not to find a favorite in the roster. 

One exclusive event we got to see behind closed doors was the new Rhythmic Ribbon event. In it, Princess Peach took to the athletic mat for what resembled a simplified version of Elite Beat Agents, with the player performing various moves with the Wiimote as the shrinking target circles demanded. While it was entertaining to watch a middle-aged Japanese game developer show off his twirling skills, I was disturbed to see Princess Peach in such a high-cut leotard. More exciting were the dream events, designed to involve all four players without the use of split-screen. First was a break-neck obstacle course, with Mario and friends dodging buses and traffic signs. Another was a simple race through the streets of London, with characters gobbling up coins like Pac-Man. And then finally, we watched a giant scripted chase sequence, with all the players working to maneuver a cart around obstacles and away from enemies to keep a cache of Yoshi eggs intact. 

Again, this is obviously a game made for a younger audience, but there's a lot to like. All the familiar characters are perfectly rendered. With events like the Ribbon and Equestrian events, there's definitely a nod to bringing in some young female gamers, too. Overall, Mario & Sonic at the London 2013 Olympic Games looks like a great party game for the Wii crowd.

Source : gamezone[dot]com