Tag Archives: PC gaming

Train2Game News: UK Top 20 Games – 03.04.13

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Bioshock InfiniteThe game charts have been released a little later this week because of the bank holiday. BioShock Infinite has made its debut at number 1 and in my opinion, rightly so. Look out for my review of the game coming soon. Luigi’s Mansion came in at number 5 just ahead of other new comer, Army of Two: The Devils Cartel. The final two new additions to the chart are Tiger Woods PGA Tour 14 which came in at number 8 and Lego City Undercover which came in at number 12.

All formats

Week ending 30 March 2013

POS.  TITLE  PUBLISHER  LAST
WEEK 
1 BIOSHOCK INFINITE 2K GAMES –
2 – TOMB RAIDER SQUARE ENIX 2
3 GEARS OF WAR: JUDGMENT MICROSOFT 1
4 – FIFA 13 EA SPORTS 4
5 LUIGI’S MANSION 2 NINTENDO –
6 ARMY OF TWO: THE DEVIL’S CARTEL EA GAMES –
7 CALL OF DUTY: BLACK OPS II ACTIVISION 10
8 TIGER WOODS PGA TOUR 14 EA SPORTS –
9 ASSASSIN’S CREED III UBISOFT 13
10 CRYSIS 3 EA GAMES 12
11 FAR CRY 3 UBISOFT 9
12 LEGO CITY UNDERCOVER NINTENDO –
13 SNIPER: GHOST WARRIOR 2 CITY INTERACTIVE 5
14 THE WALKING DEAD: SURVIVAL INSTINCT ACTIVISION 3
15 SKYLANDERS GIANTS SKYLANDERS 14
16 SIMCITY EA GAMES 8
17 NEED FOR SPEED MOST WANTED EA GAMES 15
18 HALO 4 MICROSOFT –
19 LEGO BATMAN 2: DC SUPER HEROES WARNER BROS. INTERACTIVE 20
20 GOD OF WAR: ASCENSION SONY COMPUTER ENT. 6

Leisure software charts compiled by Chart Track, (C)2013 UKIE Ltd

These charts cannot be reproduced either in print or online without obtaining permission from Ukie. If you wish to reproduce the charts in print or online, please contact david.smith@ukie.org.uk for the appropriate license.

Train2Game News: Injustice: Gods Among us final contestants announced

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BatmanWarner Bros. Interactive Entertainment and DC Entertainment reveal the two iconic characters headed to the ultimate finals of the Injustice Battle Arena. The semi-final rounds kicked off last week, advancing legendary powerhouse characters to the final showdown.

The speed and agility of The Flash was pitted against quick-witted skill and gadgetry of Batman, while in the second match-up, Green Lantern harnessed the power of his ring against Superman himself, a clear fan favourite throughout the Battle Arena.

The thousands of fan votes have been tabulated, and the victors have been chosen.
Fighting their way through four weeks of preliminaries, the quarter-final and semi-final rounds, to now face off in the Finals – the Battle Arena will come down to a final match between Batman and Superman, kicking off April 8th.

You can view the videos of the contenders below that ultimately sealed their fates.

In addition, the demo for Injustice: Gods Among Us will be released on Xbox360 and PlayStation 3 on April 3. The Injustice: Gods Among Us demo features Batman, Wonder Woman and Lex Luthor – three playable characters pulled from the game’s robust DC Comics roster.  Set in the Gotham City arena, fans can get a taste of the included characters’ unique super powers and individual move-sets as they destroy elements of the world and fight through the multi-tiered arena.

Train2Game News: Accountant makes game using Excel

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Arena.XlsmA young accountant from Canada has created a game using just Microsoft Excel. This shows that anyone can make a game with the right knowledge and imagination.

The game was created using Macros which are designed to make using the programme easier in an accountants every day job. Chartered accountant Cary Walkin built the game during the spare time he had while studying for an MBA in Toronto.

The game, called Arena.Xlsm, is a turn-based fantasy game in which players fight monsters and gather loot to make their character more powerful. Much of Arena is regenerated every time the game is played to lend variety to the way it is completed.

In the game, players take on a series of increasingly tough enemies in an arena drawn using only the basic characters and punctuation marks available in Excel. Defeating enemies such as anacondas, black widow spiders and hyenas bestows fame points. As a player builds up fame points they go up levels and get points to spend to boost the fighting abilities of their character.

The story framing the game is presented to the player in a series of letters. The ending for each game is chosen randomly from four potential conclusions.

Mr Walkin said “It took about four months to create the game which has about 2,000 possible enemies, eight tough encounters with bosses and lots of different items players can gather to boost their fighting or defensive abilities.”

The game is designed to work with Excel 2007, 2010 and 2013. It does not work on Mac versions of the spreadsheet program.

You can download the game here http://carywalkin.wordpress.com/2013/03/17/arena-xlsm-released/

Train2Game News: Games Industry News – 29.03.13

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Pokemon It is the end of the week so it is time for the Train2Game games industry news round up!

In exciting news for Pokémon video game players across Europe, The Pokémon Company International announced the long-awaited dates and locations for the Pokémon European Video Game Championships. The English competition will be held in Birmingham on June 2. Players will battle for the chance to earn a Travel Award to the 2013 Pokémon World Championships in Vancouver, Canada, this August. Visit www.pokemon.co.uk for more information.

Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment and DC Entertainment today announced Infinite Crisis, an all-new multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA) game developed by Turbine, the award winning studio behind free-to-play online games including The Lord of the Rings Online. Infinite Crisis is a free-to-play game that features a deep roster of DC Comics characters and is scheduled for release in 2013 for the PC.

In further news from Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment, they announced two of its biggest mobile games, Batman: Arkham City Lockdown and Scribblenauts Remix, are coming to Android, exclusively in the Amazon Appstore for Android. Expanded to and completely optimized for the Kindle Fire and Kindle Fire HD offers gamers with new ways to connect to their favorite franchises.

Xbox Live Arcade and PlayStation Network have started their Spring Sales. Xbox Live’s sale runs from March 26 – April 2, and includes such titles as Dead Rising 2, Walking Dead, LA Noire, Max Payne 3, Resident Evil 6 and some of their movie offerings. The PSN kicked off its spring sale yesterday and it is running until April 9. In addition to the sale, it’s going to have a number of limited time offers, the first of which is Killzone HD, available till the April 29. Some of its games up for sale are Rayman 3 and Trine 2.

Electronic Arts, Sega, Sony, Codemasters and more have pledged support for the first Game QA & Localisation forum, taking place June 25-26 in London. The event will focus on best practices for test plans, QA budgeting and strategy with a mix of keynotes, sessions, panels and workgroups. Paradox, Outplay, Ganz, Plarium and Abertay University are also involved with the event. Full details can be found at the official site.

Train2Game News: Double Fine Kickstarter game named

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Broken AgeFor any Train2Game student who backed Double Fine, the impressively funded Kickstarter game by Double Fine now has an official title. The world also got its first look at the game.

Late last year a Kickstarter campaign by Tim Schafers company, Double Fine, brought attention to the funding service when it reached its goal of $400,000 in mere hours. The campaign went on to raise $3.3 million, astounding everyone.

The game that was funded, previously known as Double Fine Adventure, has been named as Broken Age. It is a point and click adventure which follows the stories of a young girl and boy leading parallel lives.

The game’s website explains “The girl has been chosen by her village to be sacrificed to a terrible monster, but she decides to fight back.

“Meanwhile, a boy on a spaceship is living a solitary life under the care of a motherly computer, but he wants to break free to lead adventures and do good in the world. Adventures ensue.”

The company announced the game at the PAX event in America last weekend.

New backers can still submit funds via Double Fine’s website, with $30 gaining access to the final game via Steam, a video documentary series, PC and Mac beta access and more.

You can enjoy the trailer and the first look at the game below:

Train2Game News: Unity game engine developers working with Facebook

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unity-logoUnity technologies is working with Facebook to improve the games on the social media site. This is good news for Train2Game students who are using the engine to develop games.

Unity Technologies, provider of the Unity multi-platform engine and development tools, have announced its collaboration with Facebook to launch an improved Unity experience on the social platform. The collaboration will improve the user experience of Unity games, continue to drive core games that build on the Unity Web Player, and make it easy for developers to build amazing cross-platform experiences.

With over 200 million global installs, the Unity Web Player is the best solution for core games and AAA visuals on the web, making the collaboration with Facebook a natural fit. Unity’s construction of a new social network API in the Unity Web Player has enabled Facebook to improve the “full screen” and the “full canvas” experience of Unity games by eliminating the need to leave full screen for social interaction, and to make it easier for developer to integrate tightly with Facebook’s social graph. Over 75m active Facebook users have installed the Unity Web Player to enjoy popular Unity games such as Offensive Combat, Robot Rising, Wizard of Oz, Uberstrike, Kings Bounty and I AM Playr. The new integrations will help make these existing experiences better while laying the foundation for further Unity Web Player adoption and feature expansion.

“The Unity Web Player is an incredible browser based platform for core games”, said Sean Ryan, Director of Games Partnerships, Facebook, “People on Facebook are looking for the type of immersive games that have traditionally existed on consoles and desktop PCs. This collaboration will drive discovery of the Unity Web Player for Facebook users, make it easier for Unity games to integrate with Facebook, improve the full-screen experience on our games platform, and make it easier for these developers to build cross platform games across desktop and mobile.”

“The experience of playing a Unity game in Facebook is vastly improved in Unity 4, and working with Facebook makes it even better,” said David Helgason, CEO of Unity Technologies. “We are already seeing an amazing crop of quality games coming to Facebook, and can’t wait to see how developers make use of this new opportunity.”

As an addition to the recently released Unity 4.1 update, Unity 4.1.1 includes the new social network API. Unity 4.1 includes a complete overhaul of the Memory Profiler, updates to the Mecanim Animation system, Apple AirPlay support, and new shader features. To download the latest product cycle release for Unity 4 visit http://unity3d.com/unity/download/.

Train2Game News: Borderlands 2 additions on additions!

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Borderlands-2-KriegExciting news for all you Train2Game Vault hunters out there! 2K and Gearbox have announced a new Downloadable character for Borderlands 2.

The new character is based on one of the in game Psychos! The character, Krieg, rewards players for high-risk behaviour such as running into crowds, with skills allowing him to, among other things, regain health while attacking enemies.

The new character will be available in May for 800 Microsoft points or $9.99

In addition to the new character, on April 2 the level cap will be raised from 50 up to 61. This is the same level rise the original game saw. This addition will cost $4.99 for console and PC but those with the season pass will get the level rise for free.

That’s not all however! A new level of gun rarity is being introduced. Pearlescent gun’s will be added making them the rarest loot in the game to date.

Finally, in a free update, an Ultimate Vault Hunter mode will be added which will be playable by anyone who has completed the True Vault Hunter mode. Giving you plenty of time to rise those extra 11 levels. In simple terms this game now has a Game Plus Plus!

With this plethora of additions it will give you another game play experience for a very low price.

Gearbox confirmed that a fourth DLC campaign is still set to arrive before the end of June.

You can enjoy Krieg’s reveal trailer from PAX below (Mature audiences only):

Train2Game News: BOOMBA! launches like a three pronged bazooka with the help of Train2Game

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Boomba LogoTrain2Game helps to achieve national and international coverage for student’s studio’s title with the support of Train2Game’s PR team.

Student Fee Stewart has been working with Train2Game internal PR team to deliver worldwide coverage for Radiation Burn’s latest title Boomba! Fee, who is an Artist and Project manager at the studio, took advantage of the additional support Train2Game offer and coordinated withTrain2Game’s PR team to draft and distribute a press release on behalf of the studio.

Coverage was achieved on sites in the US, Spain, France and of course the UK. Highlights include Nintendo Everything and Develop Online

Nintendo EverythingDevelopThis support is available to all students commercially releasing games, whether they be independent student studios or working at organisations outside of Train2Game. Train2Game love to support the successes of its students and the student body love to hear about them, so make sure to keep us informed of everything you are working on.

You can see some of the international articles in the links below, including sites from Spain, France and Brazil.

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Well done Fee!

Train2Game News: Mass Effect 3 infographic

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Mass Effect 3 With the close of Commander Shepards story, Bioware have released an infographic detailing everyone’s choices in Mass Effect 3.

The graphic shows that despite the vocal popularity of the female Commander Shepard only 18% actually played as her and the most popular character is Liara.

The info-graphic was released on Bioware’s Facebook page and obviously contains some spoilers.

Mass effect 3 info-graphic

Train2Game News: UK Top 20 Games – 25.03.13

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Gears of War JudgmentTrain2Game brings you the top 20 games in the UK this week with Gears of War: Judgment debuts this week at number 1 pushing Tomb Raider down a place. The Walking Dead: Survival Instinct also debuted this week, coming in at number 3 and Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate saw it’s first week in at number 7.

All formats

Week ending 23 March 2013

POS.  TITLE  PUBLISHER  LAST
WEEK 
1 GEARS OF WAR: JUDGMENT MICROSOFT –
2 TOMB RAIDER SQUARE ENIX 1
3 THE WALKING DEAD: SURVIVAL INSTINCT ACTIVISION –
4 FIFA 13 EA SPORTS 6
5 SNIPER: GHOST WARRIOR 2 CITY INTERACTIVE 4
6 GOD OF WAR: ASCENSION SONY COMPUTER ENT. 2
7 MONSTER HUNTER 3 ULTIMATE CAPCOM –
8 SIMCITY EA GAMES 5
9 FAR CRY 3 UBISOFT 7
10 CALL OF DUTY: BLACK OPS II ACTIVISION 9
11 METAL GEAR RISING: REVENGEANCE KONAMI 19
12 CRYSIS 3 EA GAMES 8
13 ASSASSIN’S CREED III UBISOFT 11
14 SKYLANDERS GIANTS SKYLANDERS 13
15 NEED FOR SPEED MOST WANTED EA GAMES 14
16 ALIENS: COLONIAL MARINES SEGA –
17 THE ELDER SCROLLS V: SKYRIM BETHESDA SOFTWORKS 16
18 SONIC & ALL STARS RACING TRANSFORMED SEGA –
19 HITMAN ABSOLUTION SQUARE ENIX 12
20 LEGO BATMAN 2: DC SUPER HEROES WARNER BROS. INTERACTIVE 17

Leisure software charts compiled by Chart Track, (C)2013 UKIE Ltd