Latest Video Games Features and Reviews

Naughty Bear is the title of an upcoming video game for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 consoles.Players will control the eponymous bear as they use various weapons to earn “Naughty Points”, with extra points being given for “deviant and maniacal” tactics.The game is a sandbox-styled world with thirty unique environments and weaponry to unlock through progression.The game sees players take control of Naughty Bear, using stealth and tricks to lure the inhabitants into situations where they can be executed. It features a system that rewards the player for creative acts of violence and debauchery against the inhabitants of the island.

Green Day: Rock Band allows players to perform simulated rock music by providing up to four players with the ability to play three different controllers modeled after music instruments (a guitar controller for lead guitar and bass guitar gameplay, a drum controller and a microphone for vocals). Players simulate the performance of rock music by using their controllers to play scrolling on-screen notes. For lead and bass guitar, this is accomplished by holding down colored buttons mimicking guitar frets and pushing the controller’s strum bar; for drums, this requires striking the matching colored drumhead, or stepping on the pedal to simulate playing bass drum notes. When singing vocals, the player must sing in relative pitch to the original vocals.

Skate 3 is an upcoming skateboarding title in the Skate series of video games, developed by EA Black Box, published by Electronic Arts and due for release in May 2010.Two new game modes have been added, one to simplify the trick system (Easy Mode) and one to make it harder (Hardcore Mode). Hardcore Mode restricts tricks to be performed at a lower height to make things such as flip-tricks and getting onto ledges harder; it has been said that you can bail on flat if you don’t flick a trick hard enough. Grinds are also much harder as there isn’t as much ’suction’ into ledges and rails. It also takes five pushes to get to top speed on flat as opposed to the three in the last two skate games. The videos on the main website also say that Hardcore Mode is for a more sim-oriented gamer-base. Easy Mode tweaks the games physics in the opposite direction of Hardcore Mode, allowing higher ollies, faster spins, and easier (more magnetic) grinds.
Create-a-park is also a big feature in Skate 3. This allows gamers to build skateparks similar to the Tony Hawk games. According to the skate website, players can build a variety of set-ups such as mega ramps and plazas.

Sam & Max: The Devil’s Playhouse is a graphic adventure video game developed by Telltale Games. It is the third “season” of the Sam & Max episodic series created by Telltale Games, following Sam & Max Save the World and Sam & Max Beyond Time and Space. Sam & Max: The Devil’s Playhouse is a series of graphic adventure games, requiring the user to control Sam and Max to specific locations, interacting with the environment, collecting and using objects, and talking to other characters in the game in order to solve puzzles and complete the game. The previous two seasons of “Sam & Max” have used a traditional point-and-click interface, which is well-suited for Windows and MacOS users but did not translate well to traditional gamepad controls. The game engine for The Devil’s Playhouse has been redesigned to handle both the point-and-click scheme and typical console-based controls for third-person perspective games. On a Windows or MacOS computer, the player has the option of plugging in a gamepad to use this second set of controls. Other aspects, such as inventory management, have also been refined to better suit console players or players not familiar with the adventure game genre. The iPad version of the game features direct touch interaction with the characters, scenery, and inventory.

Grand Theft Auto: Episodes From Liberty City is a standalone compilation of the DLC episodes for Grand Theft Auto IV, containing both The Lost and Damned and The Ballad of Gay Tony on one disc. It was released alongside the DLC release of The Ballad of Gay Tony on 29 October 2009 for the Xbox 360 and will be released on 13 April 2010 for Microsoft Windows and PlayStation 3.The Lost and Damned otherwise features similar gameplay to Grand Theft Auto IV. Additions to the game include new weapons, such as a grenade launcher, Automatic Pistol, half of a pool cue and pipe bombs, as well as sawn-off and automatic shotguns and new vehicles, such as Johnny’s custom-made motorcycle.The Ballad of Gay Tony follows the exploits of a new protagonist, Luis Fernando Lopez, a member of the Dominican drug dealers and the personal bodyguard of Anthony “Gay Tony” Prince.

Prison Break: The Conspiracy is an upcoming action-adventure video game based on the Fox Network television series Prison Break that is due to be released for Microsoft Windows, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. The release date has been set for March 26 2010The protagonist of the “Prison Break” game is Company agent Tom Paxton. He is sent to the Fox River State Penitentiary to find out why Michael Scofield (the hero of the TV series), a man without a previous criminal record, became a bank robber.The storyline runs parallel to the first season of “Prison Break”: Paxton encounters several characters from the series and experiences key events from his own perspective.According to the trailer, the protagonist narrates that he was already dead.

Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands is an upcoming videogame developed by Ubisoft Montreal and Ubisoft Quebec due for release on May 11, 2010, for PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Nintendo DS, Nintendo Wii, PlayStation Portable and Microsoft Windows. The game is a latest installment in the Prince of Persia series, and will mark a return to the storyline started by Prince of Persia: TheSands of Time.

A trailer for Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands was premiered worldwide on the 2009 Spike Video Game Awards.

While not a direct video game adaptation or containing elements of the film, the game’s release is coinciding with the May 2010 release of Disney’s film adaptation of the video game, Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time, starring Jake Gyllenhaal.

Super Street Fighter IV is a forthcoming competitive fighting game currently being produced byCapcom. It is an updated version of/sequel to Street Fighter IV scheduled to be released for thePlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 as a stand-alone product. Originally set to be released in Spring 2010, Capcom recently delayed the game to be released sometime after April 2010 with no official release date being given yet.The game is planned to feature ten additional characters, as well as tweaks and changes to the existing ones, such as new ultra combos.Among the added characters are T. Hawk and Dee Jay, who were initially intended to be in the original Street Fighter IV but later dropped. Also revealed was Juri, an all new character, along with Adon from the original Street Fighter, and Cody and Guy from Final Fight, characters who were last featured in Street Fighter Alpha 3.

Originally announced under the name Quantum, the game’s working title has been changed to ‘Quantum Theory’. Quantum Theory is an upcoming third person shooter video game developed by Team Tachyon and published by Tecmo.The game centers around two characters named Syd and Fillena who must fight through a “living tower.” The game will feature a cover system similar to Kill Switch, Gears of War, andUncharted: Drake’s Fortune. A unique twist to the cover system however is that the tower is “living” and thus constantly adding and taking away ideal cover locations.PlayStation: The Official Magazine calls “Quantum Theory’s two-character approach – buff fighter Syd and more agile female Fillena – and organic fantasy world…entirely unique

Homefront is an upcoming first-person shooter video game developed by Kaos Studios and published by THQ. It is scheduled to be released for Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and Microsoft Windows.Homefront is set in a near future America in 2027 when a now-nuclear armed Korean People’s Army invades the USA, defeating the United States Army and reducing it to nothing from the superpower it once was. The game is written by John Milius the writer of Apocalypse Now andRed Dawn.Homefront’s gameplay has been completely reworked from its origins in Frontlines: Fuel of War, with new game modes planned, a new suite of weapons and a totally new single player game. This game will not be following the reporter like in Frontlines: Fuel of War.