rss:9d9437cc2bdadfdb0c2a6594385b5cf5548bd329 rss_modified:rss:9d9437cc2bdadfdb0c2a6594385b5cf5548bd329 http://www.gamespot.com/mashup/ Gamespot's Everything Feed! News, Reviews, Videos. Exploding with content? You bet. en-us Thu, 31 Jul 2014 05:40:16 -0700 http://www.gamespot.com/videos/borderlands-the-pre-sequel-nisha-is-a-cowgirl-with/2300-6420558/ 2300-6420558Thu, 31 Jul 2014 05:00:00 -0700 http://www.gamespot.com/articles/strong-ps4-sales-raise-sony-profits/1100-6421406/ 
Strong sales of the PlayStation 4 have helped Sony reach a better-than-expected profit during the quarter ending 30th June 2014, the company reported today.
Sony's Game and Network Services division--of which PlayStation is a part--posted a profit of 4.3 billion yen ($41.8m, £24.7m), compared with a loss of 16.4 billion yen a year earlier. That's an impressive 96 per cent increase on the same period last year.
Overall, net profit was 25.7bn yen ($249.8m, £148m), up from 3.1bn yen a year ago.
Sony attributed its successful financials to strong sales of the PS4, as well as a "significant increase" in network services revenues (which includes PlayStation Plus). Sony Pictures also helped boost the financials, posting a profit of 7.8 billion yen ($75.9m, £44.9m) compared with earnings of 3.7 ($35.9m, £21.3m) billion yen a year earlier.
While Sony didn't break out individual sales figures for its consoles, combined, 3.5m PS3s and PS4s were shipped during the quarter. This compares favourably to the 1.1m combined Xbox One and Xbox 360 units Microsoft shipped during the same quarter.
Combined, the PSP, PS TV, and Vita shipped 750,000 units, which is up on the 600,000 reported last year. 85m games were sold during the quarter, up from 68m.
Despite all the good news, Sony still expects to post a net loss of 50bn yen ($486, £287.5m) for the financial year through March 2015.
]]> 1100-6421406Thu, 31 Jul 2014 02:04:00 -0700 http://www.gamespot.com/articles/sony-discusses-playstation-now-refinements-but-won/1100-6421404/
Sony's streaming games service, PlayStation Now, launches into open beta tomorrow, July 31, on PlayStation 4 in the United States and Canada. If you're a PS4 owner in either of those countries, you'll be able to pay to play certain PlayStation 3 games without ever downloading them or putting a physical disc in the system. Even with so many new users about to begin using it in less than a day, there remain numerous questions about Now and how it'll work--questions Sony continues to avoid providing answers to.
GameSpot recently spoke with PlayStation Now senior director Jack Buser and Gaikai senior VP Robert Stevenson about the service, which they are happy to note is the first of its kind on consoles. Sony says more than 50 publishers have signed on to offer their games through Now, although an exact list of games planned for it has not been made available. (More will be added "all the time," according to Buser.) The company still won't give exact numbers for how much data you can expect Now to use--a real issue for those in dorms or with ISPs that have data caps--but Stevenson says, "You can think of it [as] very comparable to movie streaming. It's not exactly the same, but it's similar." We'd previously heard you will need a 5 megabits-per-second connection for a "good experience."
A closed beta that's been running since earlier this year has provided Sony with a lot of data to work with--more than 300,000 hours have been streamed so far--that it's already used to improve Now. "Some areas we've really focused on have been in the [user experience], making sure that users really understand the service as we go into open beta," Stevenson says. The Now beta has been using its own dedicated app, but the PlayStation Store itself will become the home for the service as it enters open beta, which presents new challenges. Sony has changed the messaging it uses and tried to ensure people aren't confused when they go to rent a game.
Stevenson also highlighted the addition of cloud saves partway through the closed beta, which allow users to save their game and then resume it on another device at a later time. There are also plans for a new $1.99 price option for certain rentals that is $1 less than the lowest price we've previously heard about. And Sony will make it clearer when streaming games offer DLC, which is said to be part of the reason why rentals during the closed beta could be more expensive than buying a brand-new physical copy.
These kinds of refinements are to be expected, and are no doubt critical to Now achieving a real degree of success. But just as important are many of the issues gamers have been wondering about since Now was announced in January: How will a subscription option work, and when will see one? Can I get free or discounted access to games that I can verify I already own (reportedly the answer is no)? Who is this for? Unfortunately, neither Buser nor Stevenson were willing to provide us with the kinds of answers we were looking for.
"I think, ultimately, you look to this vision of expanding to a wide number of devices and you can imagine that there is this very rich catalog of PlayStation 3 games available to them." -- Jack Buser
Repeatedly describing the service as being in "early days," the two shied away from answering questions about the particulars of a subscription option. Sony is aware of the interest in such an option, and Stevenson says it's "researching exactly how to deliver that. We've got some really strong ideas, but nothing to disclose today in terms of timeline or pricing or anything of that sort."
Fair enough, but how about the way Now will deal with users who own a supported game and would like to stream it to their PS4? "[We have] nothing to discuss at this time," Buser says. "As I mentioned, we are going into open beta on PS4. It will be a rental offering, you'll see a variety of different durations, and, again, a variety of different price points. You'll see durations as short as four hours for an evening of fun--something where maybe you maybe want to come in and just check out a game--you'll see longer durations, like 30 days, 90 days. And Robert talked a lot about the cloud save feature, where you can try out a game for a short duration, save your game to our cloud servers, decide you want to continue playing, rent for a longer duration, and pick up where you left off.
"You know, this is a beta, we are listening to our customers, and if customers want to see features or functions as part of PlayStation Now, they should feel free to let us know. And we'll be collecting that feedback as part of this open beta process."
You'll notice there was no specific mention of what we asked about, something which happened again when we asked about The Last of Us, which has been shown to be playable using Now but was released this week on PS4 as The Last of Us Remastered. Considering PS4 owners who never owned a PS3 now have a way to play the game, who is Sony targeting with the Now version of a game like this? "We're entering into open beta on PlayStation 4, so this particular period is all about the beta and hearing about people's experiences and how things are going," Buser answers. "I think, ultimately, you look to this vision of expanding to a wide number of devices and you can imagine that there is this very rich catalog of PlayStation 3 games available to them.
"It's all about giving the PlayStation community options on how they want to access content." -- Jack Buser
"We're making this available to the PlayStation 4 community. Many of these titles are going to be brand new to these folks, because they're new to the PlayStation ecosystem, and the PlayStation 4 is maybe their first PlayStation device. And as we expand beyond there, you can imagine an entirely new type of customer who maybe doesn't even have a game console of any sort, who is going to be experiencing this rich catalog for the very first time, and really understand the thing we, in the industry, have known for so long, which is how wonderful these experiences are. The different types of content will fill different kinds of needs depending upon who that target customer is as we move forward."
Stevenson reiterated the idea that Now presents PS4 owners who never got to play The Last of Us on PS3 with a way to do so. (He didn't mention that Remastered does this.) We brought up the fact that Sony is, in a way, competing with itself in a case like this; for a PS4 owner who can choose to pick up Remastered--an improved version of the game--what is the appeal of being able to stream the PS3 version? "Well I think, in general, we're just interested in providing options for our gamers, just to give them the freedom to discover and play games in ways never before possible," Buser says. "So I think we look at all these options as existing symbiotically with one another. It's all about giving the PlayStation community options on how they want to access content. And I think PlayStation Now is really a part of that larger vision for the platform itself."
This was similar to what Buser tells us when asked about the possibility of new games being released directly onto PlayStation Now. "I couldn't comment on that concept specifically," he says. "One thing that's exciting about PlayStation Now is that you have a whole bunch of people who are new to PlayStation in general who own a PlayStation 4, and they might have missed out on a lot of these great PlayStation 3 titles. I think that's one of the things that show some of the power of PlayStation Now as a game-streaming service. So both ourselves at PlayStation as well as publishing partners are really exciting about introducing these amazing PlayStation 3 games to customers who own PS4 but are maybe new to PlayStation. I think that's really exciting."
Even with the open beta kicking off on PS4 tomorrow, many issues will remain unanswered for the time being; the beta will only offer rentals and Sony can point to the beta label to explain why it has so few answers about the service.
But at least we'll have options.
| Chris Pereira is a freelance writer for GameSpot, and you can follow him on Twitter @TheSmokingManX |
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| Got a news tip or want to contact us directly? Email news@gamespot.com |
Activision today released a teaser trailer for Nemesis, the fourth and final expansion for Infinity Ward's 2013 first-person shooter Call of Duty: Ghosts. The 15-second trailer is a wild montage of images for what appear to be score streaks.
You'll also notice that at the very end, the "g" and the "s" in the word "Ghosts" come into focus last, which makes the word "host" flash on the screen for a brief moment. How or if this is tied to the Nemesis expansion for Call of Duty: Ghosts remains to be seen.
The Nemesis expansion follows previously released add-ons for Call of Duty: Ghosts, including Onslaught, Devastation, and Invasion. All four expansions are included with the $50 Call of Duty: Ghosts season pass or can be purchased separately for $15 each.
Activision has not announced a release date for Nemesis. When it does arrive, however, it will be exclusive to Xbox platforms for a period of 30 days per Activision's longstanding arrangement with Microsoft.
The next Call of Duty game is November's Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare, which developer Sledgehammer Games says is "not the same old Call of Duty." Characters in Advanced Warfare can wear exoskeletons that grant players superabilities. We will get to see how these abilities, like increased dexterity and super-jumping, affect multiplayer when Activision takes the lid off the mode on August 11.
]]> 1100-6421405Wed, 30 Jul 2014 14:29:00 -0700 http://www.gamespot.com/articles/buy-a-399-xbox-one-at-best-buy-get-a-50-xbox-gift-/1100-6421403/
Best Buy has rolled out a special deal on the Xbox One where, if you buy a $399 system, you will automatically receive a $50 Xbox gift card for free. The deal is only valid for the $399, no-Kinect version. There is no indication as to how long the deal will last, so you may want to act quickly.
You'll need to add the system to your cart to see the free $50 Xbox gift card.
The $499 Xbox One system (with Kinect) comes with a free copy of Forza 5 at Best Buy. And of course, Best Buy--and other retailers--continue to sell the $499 Xbox One Titanfall bundle that comes with a system, Kinect, and a copy of Respawn Entertainment's shooter.
The Xbox One launched in late November 2013 and sold more than 3 million units by the end of the year. Microsoft has not provided a new official sales number since then, though we do know that the number of units shipped is somewhere north of 5 million units. That's well behind Sony's PlayStation 4, which has sold more than 7 million units as of early April.
The $399 Xbox One went on sale on June 9 and immediately flew off the shelves at GameStop. Likely due to the arrival of the new, less expensive Xbox One SKU, Xbox One sales in the United States "more than double[d]" in June, compared to May. However, the PS4 was still the top-selling console for June in the US.
If you're taking advantage of Best Buy's Xbox One deal, what do you plan to spend your $50 on? Let us know in the comments!
]]> 1100-6421403Wed, 30 Jul 2014 13:16:00 -0700 http://www.gamespot.com/videos/halo-cosplay-event-at-comic-con/2300-6420557/ 2300-6420557Wed, 30 Jul 2014 12:24:00 -0700 http://www.gamespot.com/videos/the-gist-why-the-walking-dead-is-so-good-at-storyt/2300-6420552/ 2300-6420552Wed, 30 Jul 2014 12:00:00 -0700 http://www.gamespot.com/videos/quick-look-pure-pool/2300-6420556/ 2300-6420556Wed, 30 Jul 2014 12:00:00 -0700 http://www.gamespot.com/articles/nintendo-files-three-qol-trademarks-covering-handh/1100-6421402/
Nintendo has filed three new trademark applications that give us a hint at what form the company's mysterious "Quality of Life" initiative may take. On July 25, Nintendo filed three different trademark applications with the United States Patent & Trademark Office for something called "QOL."
One of the QOL trademarks is for "providing games via communication by handheld game apparatus with liquid crystal displays." Another covers "controllers and joysticks for consumer video game apparatus." A third, meanwhile, is for "electronic circuits, optical discs, ROM cards, ROM cartridges, CD-ROMs, and memory cards storing programs for consumer video game apparatus."
A common thread between the three trademark applications is that they are all tied to "handheld game apparatus with liquid crystal displays." What does it all mean? We have reached out to a Nintendo representative for comment, but have not heard back as of press time.
In May, Nintendo president Satoru Iwata outlined Nintendo's vision for its new "Quality of Life" program, but failed to offer anything in the way of specifics about it. One thing that Iwata did make clear, however, is that that Nintendo's Quality of Life initiative, whatever it is, won't be like another Nintendo product before it.
"When we use 'health' as the keyword, some may inevitably think about Wii Fit. However, we are considering themes that we have not incorporated to games for our existing platforms," he said at the time. "Including the hardware that will enable such an idea, we will aim to establish a blue ocean."
Nintendo's Quality of Life project is described as a "completely new field of business," and one that will involve some form of "non-wearable" technology. More information about this initiative will be shared later on in 2014 (perhaps soon, if the trademarks are any indication), with a full launch of the product scheduled for sometime during Nintendo's fiscal year, which begins in April 2015 and runs through March 2016.
Nintendo reported earnings today for the quarter ended June 30, and the results were not great. Despite strong Mario Kart 8 sales and an uptick in Wii U hardware units sold, Nintendo still posted a $97 million loss for the period.
]]> 1100-6421402Wed, 30 Jul 2014 11:47:00 -0700 http://www.gamespot.com/articles/destinys-endgame-raids-only-playable-with-friends-/1100-6421401/
Last week, we had the opportunity to play the Destiny beta test and check out some of the content that will be available in the game. Story missions, a Strike mission, and competitive multiplayer were all playable. But what we didn't get a glimpse of is what the game has in store for high-level players after they complete the story. What will developer Bungie do to keep these players coming back to its game?
Bungie has big plans for its endgame, and these include raids. Similar to MMO raids, these events in Destiny will be challenging and demand you to strategize and cooperate to complete them. They are for high-level players, and there will be very large rewards if you manage to complete them.
They are so difficult and complex, in fact, that Bungie isn't building matchmaking into raids. Talking to IGN, Bungie's Luke Smith explained that the developer wants players to form teams that have a desire to work together. It's hoping to accomplish this by taking the dangerous step of forcing players to team up with their friends, without matchmaking. "It's a bit of a risk," Smith said, "because the activity requires you to have a group of five other friends to play with. [But] if the worst thing that happens is you get your group together and you all have a great time? Wow, that's going to be awesome. I bet you'll want to come back. Hopefully the gear makes you want to come back."
"We don't adhere to any of the standard rules for the rest of the game."
But what exactly are these raids? Bungie's keeping the exact details a mystery, but the developer promises that they'll be unique. "We don't adhere to any of the standard rules for the rest of the game," Smith described. "Like, raids don't have waypoints, they don't tell you where to go, they don't tell you what to do."
The enemies will be different from other games, as well. He explains, "They're still big monsters, much like what you're going to see, they're still scary, but they have a bunch of abilities that are unlike anything you've really experienced in a shooter before."
Recently, Bungie revealed that 4.6 million people had played the Destiny beta, making it the biggest beta for a new IP on consoles in history. Destiny launches on September 9 for Xbox One, Xbox 360, PlayStation 4, and PlayStation 3.
What do you think about Destiny's raids? Let us know in the comments.
| Alex Newhouse is an editorial intern at GameSpot, and you can follow him on Twitter @alexbnewhouse |
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| Got a news tip or want to contact us directly? Email news@gamespot.com |
The former Silicon Knights director and founder of Precursor Games, arrested in June 2013 on child pornography charges, has been sentenced. According to a report from Welland Tribune (via Polygon), Kenneth McCulloch, 43, appeared in Ontario court Tuesday and pleaded guilty to making child pornorgaphy available. He was sentenced to time served--12 months. He had been in jail for the entire year since his arrest.
But that's not all. According to the report, Niagara Regional Police also charged McCulloch with sexual assault, forcible confinement, and sexual interference. As a result, he remains in custody and is scheduled to return to court on August 26 to face those charges.
Upon his arrest, Niagara Regional Police found "videos and images of young prepubescent boys engaged in sexual activity with adult women," attorney Richard Monette said at the hearing. A judge ordered McCulloch to stay clear from anyone under the age of 16 and to not come near any schools, parks, recreation centers, or public schools for a period of ten years. McCulloch's name will also be featured on the local sex offender registry for the next two decades.
During McCulloch's sentencing, judge Joseph Nadel told him, "You have a penchant or an attraction to looking at young persons and children in perverted circumstances. You are potentially a danger to young persons and children."
Immediately following McCulloch's arrest in June 2013, his then-employer--Precursor Games--was quick to distance itself from him. "Having just learned of these disturbing charges today and based on the serious nature of them, Ken McCulloch is no longer affiliated in any way with Precursor Games," CEO Paul Caporicci said at the time.
McCulloch was a founding member of Precursor Games and, prior to his arrest, was listed on the company's website as "Lore-keeper. World-Builder. Dream-merchant."
A crowdfunding campaign for Shadow of the Eternals, a spiritual successor to GameCube game Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem, ended unsuccessfully last year. The game has since been put on hold, but Precursor Games says it has not given up on the project.
]]> 1100-6421399Wed, 30 Jul 2014 10:49:00 -0700 http://www.gamespot.com/articles/crytek-lays-off-staff-after-selling-homefront-cryt/1100-6421398/
Update: Kotaku reports that, prior to today's layoffs, the "bulk" of the staff at Crytek USA had quit (some more than a week ago) as a result of not being paid. With so much of the studio gone, Crytek had no choice but to move development of Hunt to Frankfurt.
Original Story: Following the announcement that Deep Silver has purchased the Homefront IP from Crytek and will establish a new studio to continue work on Homefront: The Revolution, Crytek has explained what's happening on its end.
Most notably, as suspected, the Crytek UK employees who had been working on The Revolution will move to the newly founded Deep Silver Dambuster Studios which, like Crytek UK, is based out of Nottingham, England. This is according to a statement issued by Crytek, which doesn't indicate whether this means Crytek UK--formerly Free Radical Design--has been shut down. We've followed up with Crytek for clarification about whether this leaves any staff still at Crytek UK, which not long ago had talked about the prospect of making a new TimeSplitters, the series for which it is best known.
As part of Crytek's "internal restructuring," staff at its Austin, Texas location (Crytek USA) will be laid off, although "several" employees will remain behind to assist with CryEngine support for North American developers who have licensed the game-development engine. The game that the studio had been developing, Hunt: Horrors of the Gilded Age, will now be handled by Crytek's Frankfurt studio, developer of the Crysis series and Ryse: Son of Rome.
Several of Crytek's studios--including Budapest, Istanbul, Kiev, and Sofia--will "continue to operate as usual," while a "closer collaboration between Crytek's studios in Shanghai and Seoul is under review."
"As we look to cement Crytek's future, this strategic deal with [Deep Silver parent company] Koch Media would allow us to continue with our ambitious goals to become an online publisher," Crytek CEO Cevat Yerli said in a statement. "With Warface, Arena of Fate, and Hunt, we believe we have the perfect portfolio and teams to make that happen. We would like to thank all our staff--past and present--in both Nottingham and Austin for their contributions to the company, and we wish all the very best to anyone who may no longer be under the Crytek banner moving forward."
Reports have circulated for months that Crytek was in trouble, with staff at Crytek UK not being paid for extended periods of time. This resulted in a number of staff leaving the studio. Crytek denied anything was wrong until last week, when it described itself as being in a "transitional phase." It also said it had secured capital to ensure the company's future, presumably in reference to today's Homefront announcement.
| Chris Pereira is a freelance writer for GameSpot, and you can follow him on Twitter @TheSmokingManX |
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| Got a news tip or want to contact us directly? Email news@gamespot.com |
When Microsoft started the ID@Xbox program with the launch of the Xbox One, the company aimed to make it as easy and cheap as possible for independent developers to put their games on the system. But according to one developer, the costs associated with porting a game to the Xbox One are still very high.
In a post on his blog, Happion Laboratories' Jamie Fristrom outlined exactly how much it cost him to bring Sixty Second Shooter from the PC to the Xbox One. He was surprised by just how much money console development still requires, especially because Microsoft gives Xbox development kits out for free to qualifying teams. He wrote, "You might think, since Microsoft is giving away their dev kits to early adopters of the ID@Xbox program, as long as you have no offices and pay everyone with rev[enue] share you could ship a game for just about nothing. But that's not quite the case."
He presents a breakdown of the costs associated with the program, which you can see below.
- Maintaining the Sixty Second Shooter URL -- $19
- Sending the second dev kit to a friend -- $63
- Hardware -- $72
- Video capture device -- $181
- Localization -- $729
- Error and Omission Insurance -- $2037
- Foreign Ratings Boards -- $2042
- Total -- $5143
For a small developer with very limited funds, this can be prohibitively expensive. According to Fristrom, Microsoft requires specific Errors and Omissions insurance to protect against copyright infringements. To launch on the console in other territories, Microsoft also requires that a game pass through the ratings boards in those areas, resulting in a spike in cost. He wrote also that he wanted to launch the game in Australia and New Zealand, but getting it rated would have cost $2000 in each of those countries.
Fristrom does, however, say that getting a game out on a platform with the reach of the Xbox One is worth the cost. "Although we haven't gotten our first sales report yet, there were at least ten thousand entries on the leaderboards last we checked, so we've certainly covered our costs and made a living wage to boot--which is kind of rare in the indie game development world, in my experience--so I'm really happy we jumped aboard the ID@Xbox wagon."
Microsoft does have plans to make indie development even easier. Last year, the company announced that any Xbox One would eventually be able to act as a dev kit, and earlier in July Microsoft debunked rumors that this project was canceled. However, the company has given no official word on when this functionality will launch.
| Alex Newhouse is an editorial intern at GameSpot, and you can follow him on Twitter @alexbnewhouse |
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| Got a news tip or want to contact us directly? Email news@gamespot.com |
MMORPG Neverwinter is coming consoles, beginning with Xbox One, publisher Perfect World Entertainment announced today. The free-to-play game developed by Cryptic Studios and based in the Dungeons & Dragons Universe will launch first in China this September, before it comes to North America and Europe in the first half of 2015.
Interestingly, Perfect World said in a statement that Neverwinter is "coming to consoles, starting with Xbox One," suggesting other platforms are also in the works, including potentially the PlayStation 4.
Neverwinter was originally released for PC in June 2013. The Xbox One version will require an Xbox Live Gold subscription, which will cost you $10/month or $60/year. You might think that consoles aren't a great match for MMOs, considering that a game controller is often less functional than a keyboard and mouse, but Perfect World doesn't see it this way.
"Consoles are a perfect fit for action-oriented MMORPGs like Neverwinter, and we are thrilled to be one of the first publishers to bring premium free-to-play titles to leading next-gen platforms," Perfect World CEO Alan Chen said in a statement. "Being able to bring Neverwinter to the Xbox One is a critical achievement for Perfect World. It is our first step taking our games beyond the PC market."
While gamers await the console version of Neverwinter, they can play the new Tyranny of Dragons expansion for the PC version. Launching August 14, this expansion adds the new Scourge Warlock character, among other things.
Another high-profile MMO coming to consoles is The Elder Scrolls Online, which was recently delayed, and is now coming to Xbox One and PlayStation 4 sometime this holiday.
]]> 1100-6421396Wed, 30 Jul 2014 09:50:00 -0700rss:9d9437cc2bdadfdb0c2a6594385b5cf5548bd329 rss_modified:rss:9d9437cc2bdadfdb0c2a6594385b5cf5548bd329 http://www.gamespot.com/mashup/ Gamespot's Everything Feed! News, Reviews, Videos. Exploding with content? You bet. en-us Thu, 31 Jul 2014 05:40:16 -0700 http://www.gamespot.com/videos/borderlands-the-pre-sequel-nisha-is-a-cowgirl-with/2300-6420558/ 2300-6420558Thu, 31 Jul 2014 05:00:00 -0700 http://www.gamespot.com/articles/strong-ps4-sales-raise-sony-profits/1100-6421406/
Strong sales of the PlayStation 4 have helped Sony reach a better-than-expected profit during the quarter ending 30th June 2014, the company reported today.
Sony's Game and Network Services division--of which PlayStation is a part--posted a profit of 4.3 billion yen ($41.8m, £24.7m), compared with a loss of 16.4 billion yen a year earlier. That's an impressive 96 per cent increase on the same period last year.
Overall, net profit was 25.7bn yen ($249.8m, £148m), up from 3.1bn yen a year ago.
Sony attributed its successful financials to strong sales of the PS4, as well as a "significant increase" in network services revenues (which includes PlayStation Plus). Sony Pictures also helped boost the financials, posting a profit of 7.8 billion yen ($75.9m, £44.9m) compared with earnings of 3.7 ($35.9m, £21.3m) billion yen a year earlier.
While Sony didn't break out individual sales figures for its consoles, combined, 3.5m PS3s and PS4s were shipped during the quarter. This compares favourably to the 1.1m combined Xbox One and Xbox 360 units Microsoft shipped during the same quarter.
Combined, the PSP, PS TV, and Vita shipped 750,000 units, which is up on the 600,000 reported last year. 85m games were sold during the quarter, up from 68m.
Despite all the good news, Sony still expects to post a net loss of 50bn yen ($486, £287.5m) for the financial year through March 2015.
]]> 1100-6421406Thu, 31 Jul 2014 02:04:00 -0700 http://www.gamespot.com/articles/sony-discusses-playstation-now-refinements-but-won/1100-6421404/Sony's streaming games service, PlayStation Now, launches into open beta tomorrow, July 31, on PlayStation 4 in the United States and Canada. If you're a PS4 owner in either of those countries, you'll be able to pay to play certain PlayStation 3 games without ever downloading them or putting a physical disc in the system. Even with so many new users about to begin using it in less than a day, there remain numerous questions about Now and how it'll work--questions Sony continues to avoid providing answers to.
GameSpot recently spoke with PlayStation Now senior director Jack Buser and Gaikai senior VP Robert Stevenson about the service, which they are happy to note is the first of its kind on consoles. Sony says more than 50 publishers have signed on to offer their games through Now, although an exact list of games planned for it has not been made available. (More will be added "all the time," according to Buser.) The company still won't give exact numbers for how much data you can expect Now to use--a real issue for those in dorms or with ISPs that have data caps--but Stevenson says, "You can think of it [as] very comparable to movie streaming. It's not exactly the same, but it's similar." We'd previously heard you will need a 5 megabits-per-second connection for a "good experience."
A closed beta that's been running since earlier this year has provided Sony with a lot of data to work with--more than 300,000 hours have been streamed so far--that it's already used to improve Now. "Some areas we've really focused on have been in the [user experience], making sure that users really understand the service as we go into open beta," Stevenson says. The Now beta has been using its own dedicated app, but the PlayStation Store itself will become the home for the service as it enters open beta, which presents new challenges. Sony has changed the messaging it uses and tried to ensure people aren't confused when they go to rent a game.
Stevenson also highlighted the addition of cloud saves partway through the closed beta, which allow users to save their game and then resume it on another device at a later time. There are also plans for a new $1.99 price option for certain rentals that is $1 less than the lowest price we've previously heard about. And Sony will make it clearer when streaming games offer DLC, which is said to be part of the reason why rentals during the closed beta could be more expensive than buying a brand-new physical copy.
These kinds of refinements are to be expected, and are no doubt critical to Now achieving a real degree of success. But just as important are many of the issues gamers have been wondering about since Now was announced in January: How will a subscription option work, and when will see one? Can I get free or discounted access to games that I can verify I already own (reportedly the answer is no)? Who is this for? Unfortunately, neither Buser nor Stevenson were willing to provide us with the kinds of answers we were looking for.
"I think, ultimately, you look to this vision of expanding to a wide number of devices and you can imagine that there is this very rich catalog of PlayStation 3 games available to them." -- Jack Buser
Repeatedly describing the service as being in "early days," the two shied away from answering questions about the particulars of a subscription option. Sony is aware of the interest in such an option, and Stevenson says it's "researching exactly how to deliver that. We've got some really strong ideas, but nothing to disclose today in terms of timeline or pricing or anything of that sort."
Fair enough, but how about the way Now will deal with users who own a supported game and would like to stream it to their PS4? "[We have] nothing to discuss at this time," Buser says. "As I mentioned, we are going into open beta on PS4. It will be a rental offering, you'll see a variety of different durations, and, again, a variety of different price points. You'll see durations as short as four hours for an evening of fun--something where maybe you maybe want to come in and just check out a game--you'll see longer durations, like 30 days, 90 days. And Robert talked a lot about the cloud save feature, where you can try out a game for a short duration, save your game to our cloud servers, decide you want to continue playing, rent for a longer duration, and pick up where you left off.
"You know, this is a beta, we are listening to our customers, and if customers want to see features or functions as part of PlayStation Now, they should feel free to let us know. And we'll be collecting that feedback as part of this open beta process."
You'll notice there was no specific mention of what we asked about, something which happened again when we asked about The Last of Us, which has been shown to be playable using Now but was released this week on PS4 as The Last of Us Remastered. Considering PS4 owners who never owned a PS3 now have a way to play the game, who is Sony targeting with the Now version of a game like this? "We're entering into open beta on PlayStation 4, so this particular period is all about the beta and hearing about people's experiences and how things are going," Buser answers. "I think, ultimately, you look to this vision of expanding to a wide number of devices and you can imagine that there is this very rich catalog of PlayStation 3 games available to them.
"It's all about giving the PlayStation community options on how they want to access content." -- Jack Buser
"We're making this available to the PlayStation 4 community. Many of these titles are going to be brand new to these folks, because they're new to the PlayStation ecosystem, and the PlayStation 4 is maybe their first PlayStation device. And as we expand beyond there, you can imagine an entirely new type of customer who maybe doesn't even have a game console of any sort, who is going to be experiencing this rich catalog for the very first time, and really understand the thing we, in the industry, have known for so long, which is how wonderful these experiences are. The different types of content will fill different kinds of needs depending upon who that target customer is as we move forward."
Stevenson reiterated the idea that Now presents PS4 owners who never got to play The Last of Us on PS3 with a way to do so. (He didn't mention that Remastered does this.) We brought up the fact that Sony is, in a way, competing with itself in a case like this; for a PS4 owner who can choose to pick up Remastered--an improved version of the game--what is the appeal of being able to stream the PS3 version? "Well I think, in general, we're just interested in providing options for our gamers, just to give them the freedom to discover and play games in ways never before possible," Buser says. "So I think we look at all these options as existing symbiotically with one another. It's all about giving the PlayStation community options on how they want to access content. And I think PlayStation Now is really a part of that larger vision for the platform itself."
This was similar to what Buser tells us when asked about the possibility of new games being released directly onto PlayStation Now. "I couldn't comment on that concept specifically," he says. "One thing that's exciting about PlayStation Now is that you have a whole bunch of people who are new to PlayStation in general who own a PlayStation 4, and they might have missed out on a lot of these great PlayStation 3 titles. I think that's one of the things that show some of the power of PlayStation Now as a game-streaming service. So both ourselves at PlayStation as well as publishing partners are really exciting about introducing these amazing PlayStation 3 games to customers who own PS4 but are maybe new to PlayStation. I think that's really exciting."
Even with the open beta kicking off on PS4 tomorrow, many issues will remain unanswered for the time being; the beta will only offer rentals and Sony can point to the beta label to explain why it has so few answers about the service.
But at least we'll have options.
| Chris Pereira is a freelance writer for GameSpot, and you can follow him on Twitter @TheSmokingManX |
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| Got a news tip or want to contact us directly? Email news@gamespot.com |
Activision today released a teaser trailer for Nemesis, the fourth and final expansion for Infinity Ward's 2013 first-person shooter Call of Duty: Ghosts. The 15-second trailer is a wild montage of images for what appear to be score streaks.
You'll also notice that at the very end, the "g" and the "s" in the word "Ghosts" come into focus last, which makes the word "host" flash on the screen for a brief moment. How or if this is tied to the Nemesis expansion for Call of Duty: Ghosts remains to be seen.
The Nemesis expansion follows previously released add-ons for Call of Duty: Ghosts, including Onslaught, Devastation, and Invasion. All four expansions are included with the $50 Call of Duty: Ghosts season pass or can be purchased separately for $15 each.
Activision has not announced a release date for Nemesis. When it does arrive, however, it will be exclusive to Xbox platforms for a period of 30 days per Activision's longstanding arrangement with Microsoft.
The next Call of Duty game is November's Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare, which developer Sledgehammer Games says is "not the same old Call of Duty." Characters in Advanced Warfare can wear exoskeletons that grant players superabilities. We will get to see how these abilities, like increased dexterity and super-jumping, affect multiplayer when Activision takes the lid off the mode on August 11.
]]> 1100-6421405Wed, 30 Jul 2014 14:29:00 -0700 http://www.gamespot.com/articles/buy-a-399-xbox-one-at-best-buy-get-a-50-xbox-gift-/1100-6421403/Best Buy has rolled out a special deal on the Xbox One where, if you buy a $399 system, you will automatically receive a $50 Xbox gift card for free. The deal is only valid for the $399, no-Kinect version. There is no indication as to how long the deal will last, so you may want to act quickly.
You'll need to add the system to your cart to see the free $50 Xbox gift card.
The $499 Xbox One system (with Kinect) comes with a free copy of Forza 5 at Best Buy. And of course, Best Buy--and other retailers--continue to sell the $499 Xbox One Titanfall bundle that comes with a system, Kinect, and a copy of Respawn Entertainment's shooter.
The Xbox One launched in late November 2013 and sold more than 3 million units by the end of the year. Microsoft has not provided a new official sales number since then, though we do know that the number of units shipped is somewhere north of 5 million units. That's well behind Sony's PlayStation 4, which has sold more than 7 million units as of early April.
The $399 Xbox One went on sale on June 9 and immediately flew off the shelves at GameStop. Likely due to the arrival of the new, less expensive Xbox One SKU, Xbox One sales in the United States "more than double[d]" in June, compared to May. However, the PS4 was still the top-selling console for June in the US.
If you're taking advantage of Best Buy's Xbox One deal, what do you plan to spend your $50 on? Let us know in the comments!
]]> 1100-6421403Wed, 30 Jul 2014 13:16:00 -0700 http://www.gamespot.com/videos/halo-cosplay-event-at-comic-con/2300-6420557/ 2300-6420557Wed, 30 Jul 2014 12:24:00 -0700 http://www.gamespot.com/videos/the-gist-why-the-walking-dead-is-so-good-at-storyt/2300-6420552/ 2300-6420552Wed, 30 Jul 2014 12:00:00 -0700 http://www.gamespot.com/videos/quick-look-pure-pool/2300-6420556/ 2300-6420556Wed, 30 Jul 2014 12:00:00 -0700 http://www.gamespot.com/articles/nintendo-files-three-qol-trademarks-covering-handh/1100-6421402/Nintendo has filed three new trademark applications that give us a hint at what form the company's mysterious "Quality of Life" initiative may take. On July 25, Nintendo filed three different trademark applications with the United States Patent & Trademark Office for something called "QOL."
One of the QOL trademarks is for "providing games via communication by handheld game apparatus with liquid crystal displays." Another covers "controllers and joysticks for consumer video game apparatus." A third, meanwhile, is for "electronic circuits, optical discs, ROM cards, ROM cartridges, CD-ROMs, and memory cards storing programs for consumer video game apparatus."
A common thread between the three trademark applications is that they are all tied to "handheld game apparatus with liquid crystal displays." What does it all mean? We have reached out to a Nintendo representative for comment, but have not heard back as of press time.
In May, Nintendo president Satoru Iwata outlined Nintendo's vision for its new "Quality of Life" program, but failed to offer anything in the way of specifics about it. One thing that Iwata did make clear, however, is that that Nintendo's Quality of Life initiative, whatever it is, won't be like another Nintendo product before it.
"When we use 'health' as the keyword, some may inevitably think about Wii Fit. However, we are considering themes that we have not incorporated to games for our existing platforms," he said at the time. "Including the hardware that will enable such an idea, we will aim to establish a blue ocean."
Nintendo's Quality of Life project is described as a "completely new field of business," and one that will involve some form of "non-wearable" technology. More information about this initiative will be shared later on in 2014 (perhaps soon, if the trademarks are any indication), with a full launch of the product scheduled for sometime during Nintendo's fiscal year, which begins in April 2015 and runs through March 2016.
Nintendo reported earnings today for the quarter ended June 30, and the results were not great. Despite strong Mario Kart 8 sales and an uptick in Wii U hardware units sold, Nintendo still posted a $97 million loss for the period.
]]> 1100-6421402Wed, 30 Jul 2014 11:47:00 -0700 http://www.gamespot.com/articles/destinys-endgame-raids-only-playable-with-friends-/1100-6421401/Last week, we had the opportunity to play the Destiny beta test and check out some of the content that will be available in the game. Story missions, a Strike mission, and competitive multiplayer were all playable. But what we didn't get a glimpse of is what the game has in store for high-level players after they complete the story. What will developer Bungie do to keep these players coming back to its game?
Bungie has big plans for its endgame, and these include raids. Similar to MMO raids, these events in Destiny will be challenging and demand you to strategize and cooperate to complete them. They are for high-level players, and there will be very large rewards if you manage to complete them.
They are so difficult and complex, in fact, that Bungie isn't building matchmaking into raids. Talking to IGN, Bungie's Luke Smith explained that the developer wants players to form teams that have a desire to work together. It's hoping to accomplish this by taking the dangerous step of forcing players to team up with their friends, without matchmaking. "It's a bit of a risk," Smith said, "because the activity requires you to have a group of five other friends to play with. [But] if the worst thing that happens is you get your group together and you all have a great time? Wow, that's going to be awesome. I bet you'll want to come back. Hopefully the gear makes you want to come back."
"We don't adhere to any of the standard rules for the rest of the game."
But what exactly are these raids? Bungie's keeping the exact details a mystery, but the developer promises that they'll be unique. "We don't adhere to any of the standard rules for the rest of the game," Smith described. "Like, raids don't have waypoints, they don't tell you where to go, they don't tell you what to do."
The enemies will be different from other games, as well. He explains, "They're still big monsters, much like what you're going to see, they're still scary, but they have a bunch of abilities that are unlike anything you've really experienced in a shooter before."
Recently, Bungie revealed that 4.6 million people had played the Destiny beta, making it the biggest beta for a new IP on consoles in history. Destiny launches on September 9 for Xbox One, Xbox 360, PlayStation 4, and PlayStation 3.
What do you think about Destiny's raids? Let us know in the comments.
| Alex Newhouse is an editorial intern at GameSpot, and you can follow him on Twitter @alexbnewhouse |
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| Got a news tip or want to contact us directly? Email news@gamespot.com |
The former Silicon Knights director and founder of Precursor Games, arrested in June 2013 on child pornography charges, has been sentenced. According to a report from Welland Tribune (via Polygon), Kenneth McCulloch, 43, appeared in Ontario court Tuesday and pleaded guilty to making child pornorgaphy available. He was sentenced to time served--12 months. He had been in jail for the entire year since his arrest.
But that's not all. According to the report, Niagara Regional Police also charged McCulloch with sexual assault, forcible confinement, and sexual interference. As a result, he remains in custody and is scheduled to return to court on August 26 to face those charges.
Upon his arrest, Niagara Regional Police found "videos and images of young prepubescent boys engaged in sexual activity with adult women," attorney Richard Monette said at the hearing. A judge ordered McCulloch to stay clear from anyone under the age of 16 and to not come near any schools, parks, recreation centers, or public schools for a period of ten years. McCulloch's name will also be featured on the local sex offender registry for the next two decades.
During McCulloch's sentencing, judge Joseph Nadel told him, "You have a penchant or an attraction to looking at young persons and children in perverted circumstances. You are potentially a danger to young persons and children."
Immediately following McCulloch's arrest in June 2013, his then-employer--Precursor Games--was quick to distance itself from him. "Having just learned of these disturbing charges today and based on the serious nature of them, Ken McCulloch is no longer affiliated in any way with Precursor Games," CEO Paul Caporicci said at the time.
McCulloch was a founding member of Precursor Games and, prior to his arrest, was listed on the company's website as "Lore-keeper. World-Builder. Dream-merchant."
A crowdfunding campaign for Shadow of the Eternals, a spiritual successor to GameCube game Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem, ended unsuccessfully last year. The game has since been put on hold, but Precursor Games says it has not given up on the project.
]]> 1100-6421399Wed, 30 Jul 2014 10:49:00 -0700 http://www.gamespot.com/articles/crytek-lays-off-staff-after-selling-homefront-cryt/1100-6421398/Update: Kotaku reports that, prior to today's layoffs, the "bulk" of the staff at Crytek USA had quit (some more than a week ago) as a result of not being paid. With so much of the studio gone, Crytek had no choice but to move development of Hunt to Frankfurt.
Original Story: Following the announcement that Deep Silver has purchased the Homefront IP from Crytek and will establish a new studio to continue work on Homefront: The Revolution, Crytek has explained what's happening on its end.
Most notably, as suspected, the Crytek UK employees who had been working on The Revolution will move to the newly founded Deep Silver Dambuster Studios which, like Crytek UK, is based out of Nottingham, England. This is according to a statement issued by Crytek, which doesn't indicate whether this means Crytek UK--formerly Free Radical Design--has been shut down. We've followed up with Crytek for clarification about whether this leaves any staff still at Crytek UK, which not long ago had talked about the prospect of making a new TimeSplitters, the series for which it is best known.
As part of Crytek's "internal restructuring," staff at its Austin, Texas location (Crytek USA) will be laid off, although "several" employees will remain behind to assist with CryEngine support for North American developers who have licensed the game-development engine. The game that the studio had been developing, Hunt: Horrors of the Gilded Age, will now be handled by Crytek's Frankfurt studio, developer of the Crysis series and Ryse: Son of Rome.
Several of Crytek's studios--including Budapest, Istanbul, Kiev, and Sofia--will "continue to operate as usual," while a "closer collaboration between Crytek's studios in Shanghai and Seoul is under review."
"As we look to cement Crytek's future, this strategic deal with [Deep Silver parent company] Koch Media would allow us to continue with our ambitious goals to become an online publisher," Crytek CEO Cevat Yerli said in a statement. "With Warface, Arena of Fate, and Hunt, we believe we have the perfect portfolio and teams to make that happen. We would like to thank all our staff--past and present--in both Nottingham and Austin for their contributions to the company, and we wish all the very best to anyone who may no longer be under the Crytek banner moving forward."
Reports have circulated for months that Crytek was in trouble, with staff at Crytek UK not being paid for extended periods of time. This resulted in a number of staff leaving the studio. Crytek denied anything was wrong until last week, when it described itself as being in a "transitional phase." It also said it had secured capital to ensure the company's future, presumably in reference to today's Homefront announcement.
| Chris Pereira is a freelance writer for GameSpot, and you can follow him on Twitter @TheSmokingManX |
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| Got a news tip or want to contact us directly? Email news@gamespot.com |
When Microsoft started the ID@Xbox program with the launch of the Xbox One, the company aimed to make it as easy and cheap as possible for independent developers to put their games on the system. But according to one developer, the costs associated with porting a game to the Xbox One are still very high.
In a post on his blog, Happion Laboratories' Jamie Fristrom outlined exactly how much it cost him to bring Sixty Second Shooter from the PC to the Xbox One. He was surprised by just how much money console development still requires, especially because Microsoft gives Xbox development kits out for free to qualifying teams. He wrote, "You might think, since Microsoft is giving away their dev kits to early adopters of the ID@Xbox program, as long as you have no offices and pay everyone with rev[enue] share you could ship a game for just about nothing. But that's not quite the case."
He presents a breakdown of the costs associated with the program, which you can see below.
- Maintaining the Sixty Second Shooter URL -- $19
- Sending the second dev kit to a friend -- $63
- Hardware -- $72
- Video capture device -- $181
- Localization -- $729
- Error and Omission Insurance -- $2037
- Foreign Ratings Boards -- $2042
- Total -- $5143
For a small developer with very limited funds, this can be prohibitively expensive. According to Fristrom, Microsoft requires specific Errors and Omissions insurance to protect against copyright infringements. To launch on the console in other territories, Microsoft also requires that a game pass through the ratings boards in those areas, resulting in a spike in cost. He wrote also that he wanted to launch the game in Australia and New Zealand, but getting it rated would have cost $2000 in each of those countries.
Fristrom does, however, say that getting a game out on a platform with the reach of the Xbox One is worth the cost. "Although we haven't gotten our first sales report yet, there were at least ten thousand entries on the leaderboards last we checked, so we've certainly covered our costs and made a living wage to boot--which is kind of rare in the indie game development world, in my experience--so I'm really happy we jumped aboard the ID@Xbox wagon."
Microsoft does have plans to make indie development even easier. Last year, the company announced that any Xbox One would eventually be able to act as a dev kit, and earlier in July Microsoft debunked rumors that this project was canceled. However, the company has given no official word on when this functionality will launch.
| Alex Newhouse is an editorial intern at GameSpot, and you can follow him on Twitter @alexbnewhouse |
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| Got a news tip or want to contact us directly? Email news@gamespot.com |
MMORPG Neverwinter is coming consoles, beginning with Xbox One, publisher Perfect World Entertainment announced today. The free-to-play game developed by Cryptic Studios and based in the Dungeons & Dragons Universe will launch first in China this September, before it comes to North America and Europe in the first half of 2015.
Interestingly, Perfect World said in a statement that Neverwinter is "coming to consoles, starting with Xbox One," suggesting other platforms are also in the works, including potentially the PlayStation 4.
Neverwinter was originally released for PC in June 2013. The Xbox One version will require an Xbox Live Gold subscription, which will cost you $10/month or $60/year. You might think that consoles aren't a great match for MMOs, considering that a game controller is often less functional than a keyboard and mouse, but Perfect World doesn't see it this way.
"Consoles are a perfect fit for action-oriented MMORPGs like Neverwinter, and we are thrilled to be one of the first publishers to bring premium free-to-play titles to leading next-gen platforms," Perfect World CEO Alan Chen said in a statement. "Being able to bring Neverwinter to the Xbox One is a critical achievement for Perfect World. It is our first step taking our games beyond the PC market."
While gamers await the console version of Neverwinter, they can play the new Tyranny of Dragons expansion for the PC version. Launching August 14, this expansion adds the new Scourge Warlock character, among other things.
Another high-profile MMO coming to consoles is The Elder Scrolls Online, which was recently delayed, and is now coming to Xbox One and PlayStation 4 sometime this holiday.
]]> 1100-6421396Wed, 30 Jul 2014 09:50:00 -0700
The paucity of menus allows you to focus on the action. 
The ability to draw your own maneuvers feels revelatory, but a bit limited by the era. 
Battles hinge on your units' ability to endure. 
Hopefully, grammar errors will be repaired in future updates. 
Ain't nobody gonna break my stride, except for the Money Bags card. 
Today is a good day to die. 
04.jpg)
Welcome to the parlor. Pay no attention to the jittery mouselook. 33.jpg)
In this level, references to "crack" and "pot" are what pass for clever dialogue. 28.jpg)
Hopelessness. Despair. Unclear rules. 25.jpg)
What does it all mean? Nothing. Well, it's the straight-up answer to a puzzle. But nothing beyond that. 
Joel and Ellie are unlikely companions thrown together by circumstance. 
Left Behind is just wonderful. 
