Q&A – Remedy Talks Alan Wake’s American Nightmare

Remedy Alan Wakes American Nightmare Interview
Embracing the best of the horror genre, 2010′s Alan Wake left a fair amount of questions lingering after its conclusion, with two subsequent DLC chapters furthering the narrative while still leaving plenty of room for interpretation regarding the fate of the writer in his battle against a malevolent darkness. While the upcoming Xbox LIVE Arcade release, American Nightmare, picks up the threads with Alan and his dark half Mr. Scratch, the events that unfold serve as a spin-off tale rather than a direct continuation of the original release.

In a move that certainly caught me by surprise, American Nightmare builds an arcade mode around the combat mechanics of light and evasion from the 2010 title, offering a survival challenge that hopes to find longevity after players have chewed through the standalone pulp horror story.

With the game releasing this week, I managed to gather a few of my endless questions regarding digital content and American Nightmare’s direction, which Remedy CEO Matias Myllyrinne was good enough to answer.

More…

Posted: February 20, 2012 at 9:07 am By | 1 comment

Mutant Blobs Attack Your Ears

Mutant Blobs Attack Shaun Hatton
Following up on last year’s retro science-fiction platformer, Tales from Space: About a Blob, Toronto’s DrinkBox Studios is unleashing another dose of blob mayhem and carnage this year, this time on Sony’s new handheld with the upcoming Vita release of Tales from Space: Mutant Blobs Attack!!!

In addition to the in-game soundtrack created by musician Peter Chapman, it was recently revealed that game journalist, musician, and long-time Sugarfriend, Shaun Hatton, will be lending his audio talents to the game by contributing a song for the ending-credit sequence of the game. This weekend I had a chance to catch up with Shaun to talk briefly about that project as well as his work for the upcoming Indie game, They Bleed Pixels – which I’ve since distilled into convenient MP3 format for your listening pleasure.

Catch a rare audio sugar fix below, along with Shaun’s track for Mutant Blobs Attack!!!

More…

 
Posted: January 29, 2012 at 8:51 am By | No comments yet

Q&A – Gaijin Games Talks Runner2

QandA Runner2 Gaijin Games
With the BIT.TRIP series wrapped up on WiiWare and recieving a retail release on both the Wii and 3DS last year, Gaijin Games has been working away on Runner2, which intends to extend the familiar feet of Commandervideo to digital release on Xbox LIVE Arcade and the PlayStation Network later this year. As a spiritual extension, or perhaps deviation on BIT.TRIP RUNNER, fans of the series likely have a good idea of what to expect when the game releases. And yet, following updates on the Runner2 blog and wondering what Gaijin might bring to the Xbox 360 and PS3 has left me with plenty to ponder.

Since I like to get my answers straight from the horse’s mouth whenever possible, I took some questions about Runner2 to the nearest horse available, only to find it rather stubbornly silent on the subject. Fortunately, Gaijin’s Alex Neuse happened to be standing next to the horse at the time and generously agreed to help me out.

More…

Posted: January 17, 2012 at 11:27 am By | 2 comments

Hands On with NeverDead, Again

NeverDead
Konami’s starting the year off with a fresh IP, with NeverDead hitting the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 on January 31st, and they were good enough to give us some more hands-on time with the game earlier today.

This time around Bryce and his partner Arcadia were investigating another demon hive in an abandoned hospital, offering me a chance to watch Bryce have his limbs torn off repeatedly while I attempted to clear areas and rack experience points.

Following up on my previous time with the game, I’m going to attempt to narrow down and itemize what stood out during this trip, which you can catch below.

More…

Posted: January 13, 2012 at 12:25 am By | 1 comment

Interview – Alien Trap talks Capsized and Apotheon

Interview Alien Trap
The developers of the Indie game Capsized, released on Steam last April, are working on having it ported to console and iOS, and also have a new unannounced project on the way. Capsized is a retro inspired side-scrolling action/platformer that combines shooter elements with physics-based puzzle solving.

In an interview with Jesse McGibney, Co-founder of the developer, Alien Trap, he says Capsized will be available on Xbox LIVE Arcade by the end of December followed by an iPad version.

More…

Posted: December 22, 2011 at 11:07 pm By | 1 comment

Operation Kingfish Debuts at XP

Call of Duty Operation Kingfish
One of the more interesting bits to come out of Call of Duty XP this weekend was Operation Kingfish, the successor to the fan film Find Makarov from earlier this year.

Operation Kingfish is something of a success story; after many mistook Find Makarov for a part of Activision’s MW3 marketing campaign, the publisher hunted down the men and women behind it—but not to shut them down. Instead, they wanted to put the team to work crafting a sequel.

More…

Posted: September 5, 2011 at 8:51 am By | 3 comments

The Last Call (of Duty) at XP

Call of Duty Modern Warfare 3 Spec Ops XP
Saturday was the last hurrah for Activision’s first fan-event for Call of Duty, and I made sure to sit down with the new Spec Ops Survival mode before tactically ex-filtrating via zipline (followed by epic shuttle bus).

I was teamed up with a girl who hadn’t yet played Survival herself, and she asked me if it was akin to zombie mode from Treyarch’s parallel series. I hadn’t though of it that way, but the comparison is apt; Survival is the Modern Warfare stab at the now ubiquitous horde mode concept, much like zombie mode was for Treyarch.

The difference, of course, is that Modern Warfare puts a slightly more in-universe spin on things—and a little more traditional, too. Treyarch’s zombie maps have been increasingly experimental, putting bizarre twists on Call of Duty gameplay—but Survival takes a different approach, instead packaging the standard COD trappings in a reasonably straightforward Battle Royale, though that’s not to say there are no new ideas.

More…

Posted: September 4, 2011 at 9:12 am By | No comments yet
← Older Articles