The WWE is continuing their slow crawl into every avenue of digital media with the release of a WWE app for Xbox 360. Fans will be able to watch this Sunday’s Wrestlemania 29 and every monthly PPV after on the app from your Xbox 360. You will still pay the normal PPV cost of the event, but it is an alternative for people who are without cable.
It is a shame that they are launching the app in front of what may be the weakest built Wrestlemania in years. It is a yearly event for me, but this year has gone so vanilla and by the books that it feels like we may be in for the weakest entry since 2000.
Well it appears the honeymoon is over for Lucas and Disney. Shit got business real today when Disney laid off 150 employees at LucasArts and said that it would become a “licensing model” and stop internal development and publishing. Effectively this means that Disney just killed LucasArts, makers of games like Rebel Assault, Rogue Squadron, Jedi Knight, Shadows of the Empire and Battlefront.
Here is the official statement from Disney:
“After evaluating our position in the games market, we’ve decided to shift LucasArts from an internal development to a licensing model, minimizing the company’s risk while achieving a broader portfolio of quality Star Wars games,” LucasArts parent company LucasFilm said in a statement. “As a result of this change, we’ve had layoffs across the organization. We are incredibly appreciative and proud of the talented teams who have been developing our new titles.”
This news especially sucks for Star Wars: 1313 and First Assault which were essentially cancelled. Since LucasArts will be used in name only for future Disney/Star Wars releases these two in house games will most likely never see the light of day.
It has been a joy ride so far between Disney, Star Wars and fans with high hopes of the new trilogy directed by J.J. Abrams, but this is not going to go over well in the already cynical nerd community. I know Disney is a business and honestly will not give two shits about how fat guys like myself feel about this, but I know that I was looking forward to 1313, more so than any Star Wars game in a very long time and have a little bitterness that it may never surface. I also feel bad for those 150 people that lost their jobs today. Hell, you would think that LucasArts would be a safe place to work after the Disney acquisition. Your job is the job of making Star Wars for a digital medium. If that is not safe, what is?
Activision has laid off forty employees at High Moon Studios after they completed their upcoming Deadpool game. It is not news when studios have layoffs, but it is always sad news to hear. Activision released a statement about the move.
“Activision Publishing consistently works to align its costs with its revenues – this is an ongoing process,” Activision says. “With the completion of development on Deadpool, we are taking a reduction in staff at High Moon Studios to better align our development talent against our slate. Approximately, 40 full-time employees will be impacted globally. We are offering those employees who are impacted outplacement counseling services.”
We hope all those affected find new work quickly and we look forward to playing [amazon_link id=”B008LW4SCU” target=”_blank” container=”” container_class=”” ]Deadpool[/amazon_link] when it releases this summer.
Yesterday saw the release of the [amazon_link id=”B0083SBMGW” target=”_blank” container=”” container_class=”” ]Marvel Phase One Blu-Ray Set[/amazon_link] that came encased in a handy briefcase and housed a glowing Tesseract replica. Oh and there were 10 discs and six movies in there also. One of the special features was a five minute clip of what to expect from Marvel’s Phase Two which begins with the release of Iron Man 3 on May 3rd. In it we are treated to some test footage from Edgar Wright’s Ant-Man and some early shots of Guardians of the Galaxy storyboards. There is also new footage from Thor: The Dark World and the first artists renderings of Winter Soldier and Falcon from Captain America: The Winter Soldier.
Check out some still shots below from the video and then realize that despite what people may say about the character, Ant-Man is going to be completely bad ass in the hands of Edgar Wright.
I can already hear classic Thief fans as they watch this trailer with their cries of “suck it Assassin’s Creed”.
The minute long trailer features protagonist Garrett as he stalks his prey which happens to be a rather expensive looking necklace. I know Thief fans have been more than excited ever since this game was announced, especially with the classic Thief being known for not holding players hands and being a tried and true stealth game. For some reason when I see Garrett’s one green eye at the end of the preview I think there will be some kind of detective mode like in the Arkham games and I already don’t want to hear the bitching of fans when that happens. Just give me a fun game and I don’t care.
Thief releases in 2014 for next generation consoles.
The Kickstarter darling is in the hands of its backers now and is almost in the hands of gamers nationwide. On June 4th the Ouya console will make its way onto shelves and we will get to see if it can make a mark in the game industry. The $99 little black box comes with a quad-core Tegra 3 processor running a version of the Android OS. We have all heard of the bells and whistles that they have fit into the system, but one thing we have not known is what will be available on June 4th game wise until today.
A full list of launch games can be found below. There are 100 titles as well as NES, SNES and N64 emulators that can be downloaded on the Ouya shop. Don’t worry if most of these games sound unfamiliar because every game that will be released on the Ouya will come with a free-to-play demo so you know what kid of game you will be downloading.
If the first trailer for This Is The End looked a bit funny, but you wondered how much funnier it would be unedited and filled with the dirty words, wonder no longer! The red band trailer shows off a massive party at James Franco’s house that is filled with celebrities. Fun is had by all until strange events happen and the end of the world seems imminent.
Want a few reasons to click play?
1. A drunk Michael Cera getting the shit beat out of him by Rihanna.
2. Cera then subsequently getting impaled
3. Seth Rogen telling of a childhood memory of being fat and getting titty fucked.
Xbox Live is having another sale and there are some great XBLA titles available for 50% off. With all these sales over the past few months it’s almost like Microsoft is realizing how right Sony has been getting it with their Playstation Store sales. No complaints on this end, especially when I can get Mark of the Ninja or Deadlight for half off.
Check out the list of titles that are getting price reductions from Microsoft Studios:
Wait…is that a Grand Theft Auto cover? How could you tell? I wonder if it is because it looks like every other GTA cover?
Don’t worry Rockstar, I’m not busting your balls. If it’s not broke, don’t fix it and the covers are not broke, but the driving and cover combat system are, especially after playing [amazon_link id=”B0076ZQSFI” target=”_blank” container=”” container_class=”” ]Sleeping Dogs[/amazon_link] and realizing how good they could be in an open-world game. I am excited for GTA V, but cautiously excited.
[amazon_link id=”B0050SXKU4″ target=”_blank” container=”” container_class=”” ]Grand Theft Auto V[/amazon_link] releases on September 17th.
If all of this Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon work is for an elaborate April Fool’s Day joke I may just go out in public and start throwing full cans of soda at people’s heads like the machines in Maximum Overdrive. Not only did we get a teaser trailer for the supposed DLC, but the official website was also launched today.
If there was any doubt about the 80’s insanity, the video and website put it to rest with the trailer having a old VHS look to it and the website….well it speaks for itself. It looks as though Far Cry asked John Carpenter of 30 years ago to create a futuristic tale that would make Snake Plissken proud.
Here is the official synopsis for the game from the website:
The year is 2007. It is the future. Earth has been ravaged by a nuclear war and new paths for peace must be found. A U.S. cyborg army may have found a solution: a powerful bioweapon on a distant island. A Mark IV Cyber Commando, Sergeant Rex Power Colt has been sent over to gather information and figure out what the hell is going on.
Go and take a look at the website, but get your eyes ready for oncoming assault of awesomeness.
