Author: Sean Patterson

Capcom this week released the first real DLC for its Devil May Cry (DmC) reboot. Titled “Bloody Palace,” the extra content includes the popular Bloody Palace Mode in which players can battle through over 100 levels against progressively harder enemies. The content is free, aside from some optional weapon packs that also went on sale this week for $1 or 80 MIcrosoft Points each. The launch preview for the add-on, which includes plenty of gameplay footage, can be seen below.

Today’s real news, though, is that Capcom has finally put a date to the first story-based DLC for DmC. The “Vergil’s Downfall” DLC will be released on March 5 for Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC. The add-on will cost $9, but is free for players who pre-ordered DmC at GameStop.

“Vergil’s Downfall” will feature a new campaign starring Datne’s brother, Vergil. The content will include new locations, enemies, move sets, and weapons.

U.K. Electronics retailer HMV is set to close 37 more stores and lay off 464 more employees. This is in addition to the 66 store closures and 930 employee lay offs that were announced earlier this month.

No date has been set for the store closures, but individual stores will be closing in the next four to six weeks. Adding in the other closures, HMV will be left with just over 100 stores in the U.K. The individual stores to be closed have been announced:

Ashford, Basildon, Bolton, Cheltenham, East Kilbride, Enfield, Folkestone, Glasgow Argyle, Gloucester, Grimsby, Hatfield Galleria, Heathrow T5 Departure Level, Heathrow Terminal 1, Heathrow Terminal 3, Heathrow Terminal 4, Hemel Hempstead, High Wycombe, Isle of Wight, Lancaster, Leadenhall, Mansfield, Middlesbrough, Newbury, Newcastle Silverlink, Newport, Nuneaton, Redditch, Salisbury, Scarborough, Southport, Stafford, Staines, Stockport, Swindon, Taunton, Torquay, Woking.

Word of the extra closures comes via Deloitte, which was chosen to administrate HMV in Jaunary after the company failed to come to terms with its creditors. Administrators appointed by Deloitte are currently restructuring the retailer for a possible sale.

“As part of our ongoing review of HMV’s financial position, we have undertaken a further review of the store portfolio and have identified an additional 37 stores for closure,” said Nick Edwards, joint administrator of HMV. “This step has been taken in order to enhance the prospects of the restructured business continuing as a going concern. Together with the previously identified 66 closures, this restructuring will result in a residual portfolio of some 116 stores.

“We are extremely grateful to the staff for their continued strong support and commitment during an understandably difficult period. All other key stakeholders including suppliers and landlords remain supportive and we appreciate their ongoing assistance.”

Around one year ago, Draw Something hit iOS and took the mobile gaming world by storm. The Pictionary-type game averaged one million downloads per day during its first 50 days on the market.

Of course, this success has to be measured against more recent successes, such as Angry Birds Space, which reached 50 million downloads in only 35 days, or Temple Run 2, which reached 50 million downloads in only 13 days.

Though it turns out that Draw Something was largely a short-term fad, there are still some mobile gamers trading drawings with each other. Also, the game has spawned a TV show project (basically a reboot of Win, Lose, or Draw).

Today it was announced that Draw Something has officially reached 100 million total downloads.

The announcement was made by Zynga, which acquired Draw Something developer Omgpop for $180 million soon after the the game became a sensation. Since that time, Zynga has announced massive layoffs and the company’s stock has taken a nose dive. In its latest financial results, the company announced that it hopes to shift its focus toward building social gaming franchises on mobile platforms.

(Infographic courtesy Zynga)

NASA this week revealed that a “chance encounter” with solar wind around Saturn has allowed the Cassini probe to detect particles being accelerated to high energy states. The phenomenon is similar to the acceleration of high-energy cosmic rays found coming from supernova remnants just last week.

The findings, published this week in the journal Nature Physics, show how certain kinds of solar winds can accelerate electrons. NASA in a statement today said that solar wind around Saturn’s magnetic field forms a shockwave that Cassini can use to study the particle acceleration effect.

“Cassini has essentially given us the capability of studying the nature of a supernova shock in situ in our own solar system, bridging the gap to distant high-energy astrophysical phenomena that are usually only studied remotely,” said Adam Masters, lead researcher on the paper and a researcher at the Institute of Space and Astronautical Science.

The detection of electron acceleration around Saturn came just as a strong shockwave was detected by Cassini. The researchers are looking for “quasi-parallel” shockwaves, which occur when a magnetic field and the direction of the shock are closely aligned.

Shockwaves, such as those from a supernova or solar wind, are common in the universe. When they hit magnetic fields with certain orientations, particles from the shockwave can be accelerated to close the speed of light. These interactions, scientists believe, could be the source of much of the cosmic rays seen in the universe.

(Image courtesy ESA)

We’re only hours away from Sony‘s big PlayStation 4 announcement, and rumors about the console are still flying.

The latest rumors about the console come from Kotaku, which is reporting that Sony’s next-generation console could feature smartphone or tablet interaction in the form of chat or controls. The report cites a “reliable source” as saying that mobile apps could allow players to purchase and download content to their consoles remotely.

The report also states that Sony will have two different SKUs for the new PlayStation at launch – a $429 version and a $529 version. Those dollar amounts do seem fishy, though, and posts over at the NeoGAF forums have pointed out that $429 is suspiciously close to the yen-to-dollar conversion for ¥40,000.

Another rumor from the Kotaku report states that Sony will be “following the path first set by Xbox Live” and will put “most” of the new console’s online features into a new subscription service called “PlayStation World,” which would take over for PlayStation Plus.

If that means new added services, such as Gaikai streaming, will be tacked onto PlayStation Plus, that seems expected. If, on the other hand, Sony is rolling back free services such as Netflix streaming or online gameplay into their subscription service, that could upset many Sony gamers who are used to playing online multiplayer and watching streaming video that isn’t locked behind a paywall.

For a while now, Square Enix has been hosting an alternate reality game (ARG) from the website murdered.com. Today the publisher has officially announced an upcoming game called Murdered: Soul Suspect.

The game’s tentative release date has been set for “early 2014,” though it’s not uncommon for dates of that sort to be pushed back. Soul Suspect will definitely be coming to the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC. No word yet on whether the title will also show up on next-generation consoles, which are expected to go on sale this holiday season.

Earlier this week, gamers and ARG fans sifted through clues to uncover a short teaser trailer for the game. It seems that players will be tasked with solving “the hardest case of all…their own murder.” Whether this means the game detective work or ghostly gunplay, as the trailer suggests, but the preview does seem to indicate the game will have will have a noir styling and flavor.

The U.S. Postal Service (USPS) has announced a new partnership with Cleveland apparel manufacturer Wahconah Group. The companies will create the “Rain Heat & Snow” line of apparel and “accessory products.”

The clothes will be designed around the unofficial USPS creed, “Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds.” The clothing will feature USPS branding and could include some sort of “smart apparel” electronic devices.

“This agreement will put the Postal Service on the cutting edge of functional fashion,” said Steven Mills, USPS Corporate Licensing Manager. “The main focus will be to produce Rain Heat & Snow apparel and accessories using technology to create ‘smart apparel’ – also known as wearable electronics.”

This announcement comes soon after the USPS announced a net loss of $1.3 billion during the first quarter of its 2013 fiscal year. As a result of that announcement, the company has planned to use a congressional loophole to end Saturday mail delivery on August 5. USPS estimates that cutting Saturday mail delivery could save as much as $2 billion each year. Though that may be enough to help the Postal Service limp through another year of declining First-Class Mail volume and government-mandated pre-funding of retiree health benefits, it seems that the company is now looking for outside-the-box solutions (such as fashion) to its money woes.

It’s the eve of Sony‘s big PlayStation 4 announcement, and rumors are beginning to give way to leaks.

The news broke today that multiple internet domains for the phrase “PlayStation Cloud” have been registered. The domains PlayStation-Cloud.com and PlayStation-Cloud.org, as well as PlayStation-Cloud and PS-Cloud on many different domains. The domains were all registered last Friday, February 15.

What makes this news relevant is that the contact info for the domains refers to Gaikai, the streaming gaming company that Sony acquired in 2012. The Gaikai connection and the PlayStation Cloud name confirms that the websites will point to a Sony product or service at some point. Whatever it is, PlayStation Cloud is coming soon.

With the PlayStation 4 announcement just one day away, the registration of these new domains suggests that an announcement involving PlayStation Cloud could be coming during that presentation.

The word “Cloud” is vague in terms of what service could be offered, since many PC digital right management (DRM) schemes and the PlayStation Network itself already feature “cloud saves” that sync player stats and data across platforms. The connection to Gaikai, however, lends credence to reports yesterday that stated Sony’s new console will be backwards-compatible with PlayStation 3 games via Gaikai streaming technology.

Needless to say, a PlayStation 4 that comes with on-demand access for PlayStation 3 (and other console) games would be easier for Sony to market than the normal route of touting a small lineup of (often lackluster) launch titles.

(via the NeoGAF forums)

Amnesia: The Dark Descent revitalized the survival horror genre on PC with its Lovecraftian atmosphere and distinct lack of offensive weaponry. The indie title went on to sell over one million copies.

The sequel to that game, Amnesia: A Machine For Pigs, was originally scheduled to be out in time for Halloween 2012. Instead, gamers on last year’s Halloween got a teaser trailer full of darkness and eerie sounds.

Today, Frictional Games has finally announced that A Machine for Pigs is nearing completion. The developer has updated its website with a message stating that the “final version” of the game has been received from indie developer thechineseroom. It is now undergoing testing and optimization, and is expected to be ready for release “around Q2 2013.”

From the update:

How come a game meant for Halloween 2012 has been delayed for so long? Originally we thought it would be a short, experimental game set in the universe of Amnesia, but thechineseroom had a vision that was bigger than that. As their work progressed, the potential for a much greater project emerged. What we ended up with is no longer what we had first imagined, but a fully fledged Amnesia game. A different kind of Amnesia, but definitely not a short experiment.

Frictional stated that pricing, PC requirements, and “more information on the game” will be coming soon.

Electronic Arts (EA) and Ubisoft today announced that a few of their published titles will grace each others’ online storefront.

Ubisoft titles, such as Assassin’s Creed III and Far Cry 3, can now be purchased through EA’s Origin store, with more titles such as Splinter Cell Conviction on the way. Likewise, EA games such as Dead Space 3, FIFA Soccer 13, The Sims 3, and Mass Effect 3 will soon be found in Ubisoft’s Uplay store.

“Making our biggest franchises like Assassin’s Creed and Far Cry available on Origin is a great way of exposing even more PC gamers to these great titles and giving them another choice in where and how they buy their games,” said Chris Early, VP of Digital Publishing at Ubisoft. “Also, by adding excellent titles from EA to the Uplay shop, we’re taking another important step in making Uplay the most rewarding set of services available to our customers.”

This is undoubtedly a nice get for both EA and Ubisoft, which will see the quality and number of titles in their stores rise as a result of the deal. Both companies publish multiple AAA games each year that are generally well-reviewed.

It does raise the question, though, or what exactly these publishers hope Origin and Uplay will become. Since PC DRM for each publisher’s game is tied to their store, gamers will have to have Uplay to play a copy of Far Cry 3 downloaded from the Origin store, or would have to have Origin to play a copy of Dead Space 3 purchased from Uplay. Why bother purchasing either publisher’s titles from the other’s store?

It’s understandable that EA and Ubisoft want to emulate the success of Steam, but that platform has slowly built success using sales and a burgeoning indie game selection – all on the back of trust Valve has earned through the years. EA does not have the same customer-focused track record, and Ubisoft only just ended its failed experiment with always-on DRM.

Today HTC officially announced its new flagship Android smartphone, the HTC One.

The device will feature a 4.7-inch screen with a 1080p resolution and 468 pixels per square inch. It has a 1.7GHz quad-core Snapdragon processor, 2GB of RAM, and a 2300mAh battery. It also has NFC and Bluetooth 4.0 capabilities, and includes most of the features expected in a premium-priced Android smartphone, plus support for infrared remote control. Also, it has the requisite Beats audio branding for the devices two front stereo speakers.

It will ship running a heavily modified version of Google’s Android platform called HTC Sense, which has been updated to a more Windows Phone-like style. The phone’s body is fully metal, which should help make it one of the more durable smartphones on the market. HTC is known for making durable phones, and last year’s HTC One X made a capable hammer.

HTC announced that AT&T, Sprint, and T-Mobile will all carry the HTC One in the U.S. The smartphone will come in two models, one with 32GB of memory and one with 64GB of memory. The device will be offered in two defferent colors: steel grey and black.

Prices have not been announced, but HTC will be offering a trade-in deal for old smartphones. Users who send the company their old phone and proof of purchase for the HTC One will receive $100 or the value of the old phone, whichever is greater.

Though Far Cry 3 ended up on many 2012 best-of lists, it hasn’t seemed to be Ubisoft’s focus. Instead, the publisher has been touting its new Assassin’s Creed III alternate history DLC and appeasing upset Wii U Rayman fans.

This week, though, an Ubisoft developer over on the Uplay forums revealed that, although there hasn’t been any true post-release DLC, the game will be getting some quality-of-life upgrades that may tide gamers over until future DLC is announced.

Perhaps the most vital upgrade the game will get is the ability to reset outposts. The option will allow players to set all outposts to hostile, as if they had never been taken over. They can then be re-taken, allowing gamers to experiment with different strategies and abilities. Also, if players are finding outpost-taking a little too easy now that all of their skill trees are filled, a new “Master” difficulty setting could be just the challenge they need.

For multiplayer content, Ubisoft will be revamping the feedback system for user-created maps and adding beta map testing and a spectator mode for map-making. The player kick for being idle in custom and private matches matches will also be removed.

These features will be released in “upcoming patches,” and no dates have been announced. It’s likely that these changes will hit PC versions of Far Cry 3 first, and come to consoles once they go through approval processes.

(via Joystiq)

Assassin’s Creed fans have been waiting nearly four months for some solid campaign DLC for Assassin’s Creed III. Today, as Ubisoft is working desperately to appease Wii U Rayman fans, the wait is over. The first in a three-part DLC campaign story called “The Tyranny of King Washington” has been released.

The first DLC, titled “The Infamy” drops players into an alternate history where George Washington has declared himself King of America. Evidently, the king rules with an violent flair, as fire and blood (and sunset silhouettes) seem to be the theme of the new gameplay trailer. Of course, blood really is the standard method for dealing with problems in the Assassin’s Creed series.

The content is now available for PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and the PC for $10 or 800 Microsoft Points. The subsequent episodes in the tragedy of America’s king will be coming on March 19 and April 23.

Though it’s often baffling that the shooter genre has spawned the most successful console franchises, a little observations could reveal why. Game franchises such as Call of Duty and Borderlands are well-supported by their developers and new content is being released for the titles on a nearly bi-monthly basis. Now, this could be a chicken-and-the-egg problem of which came first, but new, quality DLC certainly has helped shooter titles emerge as the most popular video games of this console generation.

Today, 343 Studios detailed its new multiplayer map pack for Halo 4. The “Majestic Map Pack” will launch next week, on Monday, February 25. Instead of the sprawling vehicle-filled maps Halo players got with the last map pack, these new maps will be “small to medium sized.” The pack will also come with new multiplayer playlists and the new “Infinity Rumble” game type.

The “Landfall” map will be set in the ruins of Tribute’s capital city and encourages close-range combat while providing plenty of “jump routes.”

The “Monolith” map features man-cannons and “open sightlines” that 343 states “harkens back to more classic Halo arana-based maps.”

The “Skyline” map is a small rooftop arena that offers lots of cover, but also has “explosive fuel cells” that can be exploited.

Last week, as astronomers around the world turned their attention toward the passing asteroid 2012 DA14, a meteorite entered Earth’s atmosphere and broke up over Chelyabinsk, Russia. The blast shattered windows and injured hundreds in the small town.

The European Space Agency (ESA) today announced that it is studying the event, which isn’t quite as rare as humans might hope. Astronomers predict an event of this sort may happen every “several of tens to 100 years.”

This particular meteorite was around 17 meters wide when it entered Earth’s atmosphere, traveling at around 18 kilometers per second (around 40,000 miles per hour). It exploded around 15 to 20 kilometers above the planets surface with the force of a 500 kiloton bomb. That’s around 30 times the energy released by the atomic bomb detonated over Hiroshima.

In a statement, Detlef Koschny, head of the Near-Earth Object activity division of the ESA’s Space Situational Awareness (SSA) program, said that the meteorite was unrelated to the passing of 2012 DA14. This was determined due to the trajectory of the meteorite and the time of its impact in relation to the passing asteroid.

“The terminal part of the explosion probably likely occurred almost directly over Chelyabinsk. This was perhaps the single greatest contributor to the blast damage,” said Koschny. “As the explosion and fireball progressed along a shallow trajectory, the cylindrical blast wave would have propagated directly to the ground and would have been intense.”

Koschny stated that the airburst was the likely cause of most of the damage seen, and that window damage is expected starting at air pressures of 10 to 20 times normal air pressure.

(Image courtesy Eumetsat/ESA)

As Samsung and Apple continue to corner the smartphone market, other handset manufacturers are still bringing out their competitor smartphones. Whether or not they make any headway may have to do with branding as much as the hardware they are able to pack into the devices.

Today, LG announced its latest product, the Optimus G Pro. The smartphone will feature a 5.5-inch screen with a 1920 x 1080 resolution – an incredible 400 pixels per inch. It’s a display that’s less than two inches away from mini-tablet territory, and clearly positioned to compete with Samsung’s 5.5-inch Galaxy Note II smartphone.

The Korean manufacturer has also packed a huge 3,140mAh battery into the G Pro. The processor is a 1.7GHz quad-core Snapdragon, and the smartphone comes with 2GB of RAM. 32GB of memory is standard, but the device will also have a microSD card slot. The cameras (13MP front/2.1MP back) are an upgrade even for this class of smartphone, and the G Pro will ship running Google’s Android 4.1.2 Jelly Bean OS.

“The Optimus G Pro was developed specifically to deliver vivid and superb picture quality in a large display smartphone form factor,” said Jong-seok Park, CEO of LG Electronics Mobile Communications. “We will continue to expand our position in the premium LTE smartphone segment with our superior display technology and unique user experience.”

It’s clear that LG is making a play for high-end consumers who want a long-lasting device with which to play HD games and video, and the price of the Optimus G Pro will no doubt reflect that. Whether the company can make a dent in Samsung’s impressive Galaxy Note sales remains to be seen.

Paramount Pictures today released the newest teaser for its upcoming Star Trek Into Darkness, the sequel to J.J. Abrams‘ 2009 reboot of the iconic science fiction franchise. The new preview portrays the movie as an action thriller meant to keep audiences on the edge of their seats, rather than the often cerebral Star Trek TV series or the character-focused original-timeline Star Trek movies.

“The goal for this movie was definitely to up the ante as much as we could,” Abrams says in the trailer. “The action in this movie, the scale of the movie is light-years beyond what we did in the first movie.”

Zoe Saldana, who plays Uhura in the new Star Trek movies, backs up Abrams by saying, “This is the kind of film that 3D was made for.”

Though these types of statements may be exactly what Star Trek fans don’t want to hear, a movie of that sort will be well-positioned for summer blockbuster hit status. If Star Trek fans ever want to see a continuation of Gene Roddenberry’s universe in TV series form again, a successful movie franchise could go a long way to making that happen.

A new study has found that excessive TV watching in childhood could portend antisocial or criminal behavior later in life.

The study, published in the journal Pediatrics, followed 1,000 children between the ages of 5 and 15. Every two years their TV viewing habits were sampled. Those who watched more TV were also more likely to have a criminal conviction in adulthood and more likely “to have antisocial personality traits.” Every extra hour spent watching TV on an average weeknight corresponded with an estimated 30% increase of having a criminal conviction in adulthood.

“Antisocial behavior is a major problem for society,” said Bob Hancox, associate professor in the department of prevantive and social medicine at the University of Otago. “While we’re not saying that television causes all antisocial behaviour, our findings do suggest that reducing TV viewing could go some way towards reducing rates of antisocial behavior in society.”

Children who viewed more TV were also found to have “aggressive personality traits, an increased tendency to experience negative emotions, and an increased risk of antisocial personality disorder” as adults.

Though it was not able to prove that TV viewing caused personality problems, the study was able to rule out the idea that children who are more antisocial simply gravitated to watching more TV.

“Rather, children who watched a lot of television were likely to go on to manifest antisocial behaviour and personality traits,” said Lindsay Robertson, co-author of the study.

With Sony‘s big announcement of its next-generation console just days away, rumors about the device are running rampant. Just this weekend, the Wall Street Journal reported that the PlayStation 4 (or whatever Sony ends up calling it) will offer backwards compatibility with previous PlayStation systems through cloud gaming service Gaikai.

Now, The Times of London is reporting that Sony could sell its next-gen console for as little as £300 (about $465). That would be a huge shift from the PlayStation 3, which began selling at €499 (Pricing in the U.S. started at $499). The high cost of that console initially led to slow sales, and was a large factor in Sony falling behind in the early part of this console generation. £300 would not necessarily mean a $465 PlayStation 4 launch in the U.S., as the pounds-to-dollar conversion of video game pricing is rarely one-to-one.

If the rumor is true, it would seem that Sony learned its lesson from the PlayStation 3 launch well. It’s unlikely, though, that any pricing or SKU announcements will be made at Sony’s February 20 presentation, at least for the upcoming console. The prevailing assumption is that the company will play pricing options close to the vest until Microsoft has announced its next-gen console.

There may, however, be an announcement about a price cut for Sony’s handheld console, the PS Vita. The price of the portable console has just been reduced to the equivalent of $215 in Japan.

The violin of Wallace Hartley, bandleader on the RMS Titanic, will be put up for auction on April 20. The news comes courtesy The Daily Mail, which reports that the violin is currently undergoing tests to prove its authenticity.

Wallace Henry Hartley is famous for leading the Titanic’s band to play as passengers were loaded into lifeboats. Hartley and all of the band members died when the ship sank on April 15, 2012. Popular accounts recall that Hartley and his band continued to play until the ship went under. The event was depicted in the 1997 movie Titanic, with the band playing “Nearer My God to Thee” as the horrific events of the ship’s sinking take place.

The Mail reports that the violin, if authentic, could sell for “hundreds of thousands of pounds.” There is also mention that the instrument could sell for a “record price.” The seller of the violin has chosen to remain anonymous, but has claimed that the violin was owned by Hartley’s fiance, who obtained it after Hartley’s body was retrieved.

The item will be auctioned off by Henry Aldridge and Son, a well-known Titanic auctioneer. The company bills itself as the “premier auctioneers in the sale of Titanic and White Star Line Material.”