Darksiders 2 trailer shows Death in action
The first bit of in-game footage of Darksiders 2 has been spotted by VG247, showing Death’s fighting style. He’s much, much faster than War from the first game, and has a wide range of weapons hidden about his person. He switches between a pair of scythe blades, a normal scythe, a bloody massive scythe, a hammer and various purple energy attacks as he combos his way through a helpless room of demons. The plot of the second game will run alongside the first, but the locations we’ll be fighting through will be up to twice the size. Darksiders 2 is due out next year.
Disney Universe trailer and screenshots reveal Wall-E World
Disney Universe will gather a number of different Disney worlds together in one place, and mash them all together into one brightly coloured ball of mischevious multiplayer platforming. Wall-E is the latest character to join a team that already includes the cast of Monsters Inc and Alice in Wonderland. Players will be able to work together or use items like magnets and laser blasters to hinder each other’s progress through each world.
Varying costume pieces collected along the way will let each character dress up as strange and occasionally slightly terrifying versions of everyone’s favourite Disney personalities. Hopefully there will be a button that will let your character go “Wwwwaaaaalll-E” in the way that made this lady cry. You’ll find the new Disney Universe screenshots below. It’s due out in October.
SSD drives to replace RAM?
Solid state storage drives based on NAND flash memory provide more performance per pound than DRAM, and will eventually become the “memory of choice” in a new PC. So says a report by Objective Analysis cited on Computer World today.
Researchers at Objective ran 300 benchmarks comparing aspects of system performance. They tested various combinations of DRAM, SSD drives and traditional hard drives for system storage. While they don’t conclude that DRAM will vanish any time soon, they do reckon that dollar for dollar, buying an SSD is a much better upgrade for a current PC. That will improve further in SSD’s favour as prices drop and drive technology gets faster.
Dota 2 release date coming “this fall” says voice actor
The voice of the Sniper in Team Fortress 2, John Patrick Lowrie, has been talking on the Impetuous Windmills podcast about his recent work voicing heroes for Dota 2. He says that Valve are “planning on releasing it in the fall,” and drops details on the seven heroes that he’s done voices for already. The roster includes a couple of old favourites from previous versions of Dota, the butcher, Pudge and the lightning fast Storm Spirit.
Dawn of War 2: Retribution patch buffs Orks, Ulthwe DLC out now
Orks are the winners of the latest Dawn of War 2: Retribution patch. The greenskins get a series of health buffs across the board, making those vast, snot coloured mobs even more intimidating. Love them or hate them, you won’t be able to kill them quite as easily as you could yesterday.
In fact, every race has received balance tweaks, and a sizeable list of bugs have been quietly taken out back and shot with a plasma pistol. You’ll find the full patch notes below, nabbed from the Dawn of War 2 Retribution forums. On a related side note, the Eldar Ulthwe DLC mentioned yesterday is available now on the Steam store for £4.99 / $7.50.
Homefront map pack will send players to Alcatraz
The Rock map pack will be heading to Homefront soon. It’ll hit the Xbox 360 first, but we can expect it to appear on PC sometime thereafter. The pack will include four new maps, including one set on the prison island of Alcatraz from which there is no escape except death, or disconnection due to high ping. You’ll find a summary of the maps below.
Darkness 2 release date pushed back to 2012
The first game was bound by dark magic to the console-boxes, but The Darkness 2 will be coming to PC, which is a good thing because there aren’t many games that let you quad wield two demonic snake limbs with a brace of automatic weapons. Originally slated for Autumn, The Darkness 2 has now been pushed back to the gloomier winter months of 2012. We’ll be flipping cars with monster limbs on February 7 in the US, and February 10 internationally. For more on the game, check out the official Darkness 2 site and the first trailer.
Batman: Arkham City collectors edition comes with bat-art, bat-statue, bat-animation
Joystiq have spotted that Best Buy are listing a Batman: Arkham City collectors edition in their store, with a description of the contents, including an art book, a statue and the Batman: Gotham Knight animation.
PC Gamer US, September issue: BioShock Infinite
BioShock Infinite stole the show at E3, and now it steals our September issue cover with an in-depth look at the high-flying shooter sequel and interviews with Ken Levine and his team at Irrational. We also got hands-on with two real-time strategy heavyweights, StarCraft II: Heart of the Swarm and Age of Empires Online, took an exclusive look at Diablo III’s followers, and reviewed indie tactical strategy hit Frozen Synapse and gorgeous racer DiRT 3. Oh, and we show you how you can strap a heavy machine gun to a cow in Arma 2.
And in other PC gaming news…
The world was shocked today when Rupert Murdoch was attacked with a shaving foam pie during an MPs’ hearing. PC Gamer have been investigating the incident thoroughly, and we believe we have a photograph of the assailant. He apparently blended in the crowd before striking, his bald head and bar code tattoo allowing him to flawlessly pass as a member of the catering staff. Parliamentary security explained the breach, saying “He was wearing the right clothes, there’s no way we could tell!”
Check inside for a round up of the day’s gaming news.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 getting £250 “Ear Force” headset
How much would you be prepared to pay to hear Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 at its best? If the answer is “between £90 and £250″ then you might be interested in the range of new premium headsets from Turtle Beach, improbably named “Ear Force.” Ear Force!
Minecraft screenshot reveals intriguing new UI and massive mountain
Notch’s ever-revealing Twitter feed has turned up more interesting hints about the upcoming Adventure Update for Minecraft. Some tweaks to Minecraft’s height settings have temporarily caused the terrain generation system in Notch’s build to go a bit haywire, spawning vast mountains with sheer cliff faces. Notch posted an image of one such mountain, in the process revealing a new UI. In addition to the traditional inventory taskbar, there’s now a food bar, and another progress bar which looks as though it might well be used to keep track of experience points.
Carmack attacks “snooty attitude” towards mainstream shooters
id founder John Carmack has been talking to Industry Gamers about the success of mainstream shooters like Call of Duty. He defends the series, saying “As long as people are buying it, it means they’re enjoying it,” and criticises the “snooty attitude” of indie developers who criticise the lack of innovation in the military squad shooter format. “It’s almost as if it’s popular, it’s not good. And that’s just not true,” he says.
Team Fortress 2 maps invaded by crashed rockets
Crashed rockets have started appearing in Team Fortress 2′s maps. Players have been posting on the Steam Forums with snaps showing battered spacecraft sticking out of background buildings on 2Fort, Badwater and Barnblitz. When taking a closer look using the Source SDK, fans discovered that the cosmic intruders are called Grockets, but what are they doing in TF2?
Deus Ex: Human Revolution trailer has proxy mines and explosive revolver
The latest trailer for Deus Ex: Human Revolution shows another “pillar” of the game, it’s a pillar made of guns and proximity mines. The assual rifle is quite nice, but why fire ten bullets when you can fire one that explodes? It could be fun to do a revolver-only run through when the game comes out. And by “fun”, I of course mean “badass.” Human Revolution is out on August 23 in the US and August 26 in Europe. Check out the recent Human Revolution stealth trailer for some more sneaky combat strategies.
