Call Of Duty Modern Warfare 3

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 is coming Nov. 8, 2011, Kotaku has learned, delivering with it mammoth battles that engulf a dozen cities around the world including New York, Paris and London.
Multiple sources have shared details of the game's story, art, sounds and game modes with Kotaku, noting that the game will reshape the landscape of the Call of Duty franchise, bringing an impressive number of eclectic settings, deep multiplayer gaming and a story that ties up nearly all loose ends from previous titles, including the final moments of key figures in the series' history.
While we haven't seen the game in action ourselves, we've gone to great lengths to nail down as much as possible the veracity of our sources. We believe that the imagery and chief details are accurate. That doesn't mean things can't change before release, but this appears to be a full run down of where Infinity Ward, Sledgehammer Games and Raven Software is on Modern Warfare 3 as they add the final polishing touches.


The game opens moments after the cliffhanger ending of Modern Warfare 2 with the U.S. struggling to stave off a surprise Russian attack. The single-player campaign will ping-pong players around the world as they take on the multiple throwaway roles as a Russian Federal Protective Services agent, SAS Operative, tank gunner, and AC-130 gunner as well as key characters from previous installments and new recurring characters. The game will feature about 15 missions, kicking off with the invasion of Manhattan by a Russian force and wrapping up with a final encounter in Dubai. The plot, as described, seems to be keeping with developer Infinity Ward's habit of delivering complex, short sequences punctuated by lots of gunfire and scene changes. The game also has players take control of several vehicles, returning gamers to the AC-130 gunship as a gunner and plopping them down in a tank as part of a U.S. Armored Division.

The single-player campaign, which appears to wrap up most of the unanswered questions and character fates of the first two Modern Warfare titles, also introduces new characters who appear to be destined for future Modern Warfare games, especially two Delta Force operatives codenamed "Frost" and "Sandman". Multiplayer in the game returns with a chunky list of playable maps as well as two types of Spec Ops modes: "Survival" and "Mission".
Activision, the series' publisher, still hasn't officially unveiled any details about the game, though executives have said that a new Call of Duty game was coming this year. Last year's Call of Duty: Black Ops, developed by Treyarch, sold more than 7 million copies in the first 24 hours and within six weeks reached $1 billion in sales.
We've contacted Activision for comment and will update the story when and if they provide reaction.

PlayStation 4 (PS4)

We have all been waiting for news on the PlayStation 4, the next generation of PS gaming, but what has been released is both positive and negative.
Kaz Hirai, the Sony Computer Entertainment head, has announced that they aren’t even deliberating on the next PlayStation console. In fact, they believe that the PS3 is only half-way done, he told PC Impress Watch.
What do they mean by that? Well, in the past, consoles like the PS2 and xBox were replaced within five years. By then, newer and better technology was released, so they had to keep up with gamer expectations. But the PS3 is predicted to have a ten year life cycle.
This is slightly good news, because that means Sony will continue to add new additions to the already multi-functional media hub. Since the PS3 already has a video store, Vudu, and Netflix. Plus all of the major game companies are attempting to make their games downloadable, so if the console were changed, all of these games would need to be altered.

Sony PS4 Concept Design

But is this likely? When the PlayStation 2 was released, it was expected to have a ten-year life as well. Five years later, the PS3 came out. So even though Sony may now claim that their focus will be on the PS3 for five more years, it is entirely possible these numbers may change, as well.
Sony has already released the PlayStation Move, their version of a motion-based gaming device. It no longer needs to upgrade to compete with the already popular motion-consoles around, such as Wii or xBox Kinect.

So it may be another five years before the next generation of gaming consoles, so don’t expect to see the PlayStation 4 too soon. Besides, Sony is releasing something new that can compete with gamers and keep them entertained even away from home: the Sony Ericcson Xperia Play and their next generation portable, codenamed NGP.
Expected to release in March 2011, the Xperia Play is a Sony-based smartphone. It has a sliding game pad with a digital D pad, two analog touch pads, two shoulder buttons, and the four PS buttons. It’s everything you love about a PS—but on your phone.
I guess this will have to hold us over until the PlayStation 4 finally knocks on our door. The release date still may be up in the air, but technology advances so quickly these days, they will have no choice but to upgrade.

While the PlayStation 3 is just now hitting its stride, and has its best days still ahead of it, Sony is not one to rest on its laurels, and with the intense competition in the video game world at present, plans for the PlayStation 4's future release are already being put into motion. In fact not only is the PlayStation 4 getting this treatment, but even the PlayStation 5 and PlayStation 6 are in the early stages of planning and conceptualization at Sony's R&D labs.

Although we've yet to see what the PS3 can fully do when really put through its paces (in fact Sony states that games currently on the market are not even close to pushing the system to its full potential), the thought of an even more powerful console looming on the horizon has gamers worried about the holes it will leave burning in their pockets, but giddy at the possibilities of what this new behemoth of a console will be able to pull off. Just imagine the hardware on this thing, it will be insane!
The Question Everyone Wants the Answer To...
As a result, the question on everyone's mind is, when will the PlayStation 4 see the light of day?!?!? While Sony has not released any official information concerning the system's future launch, the generally accepted release date is pegged as late 2012, which would follow the trend of Sony's previous console generations. The PlayStation 1 was first released in late 1994 in Japan and 1995 throughout the rest of the world. The PlayStation 2 hit stores in 2000, giving the PS1 a retail shelf life of 6 years from its Japanese launch. Likewise, the PlayStation 3 came out in 2006, 6 years after the release of the PS2. Following this trend that Sony has established would give us a late 2012 release for the PS4.
Other rumours have also circulated of late which backs up these claims. At last year's Game Developer's Conference in Germany, the CEO of Crytek announced that his company's development of their next-generation graphics engine, the CryEngine3, will release in 2012, around the same time as the PlayStation 4. Although he stated he had no concrete information that the PS4 would be released around this time, and that even if he did, he would not be at liberty to share that information, he expected this to be the release window of the new system.
The Business of Sales (Or How to Get a PS4 Sooner by Not Buying a PS3)
It's possible that how the PlayStation 3 fares in the current console war may also determine the release date of the PS4, for a couple of reasons. If the system continues to flounder in 3rd place in the console wars, failing to generate the revenue which was initially expected of it, Sony may be far more eager to cut their losses and rush the PS4 to market sooner rather than later, possibly as early as late 2011.
If the PS3 does indeed fail to make ground on the Wii and Xbox 360, it may also convince Sony to try and jump the gun on the next generation console wars and get their system out the door first. Both the PlayStation 1 and PlayStation 2, which dominated their generations of the console wars, came to market at the same time or earlier than their competition. The PlayStation 1 was launched just after the Sega Saturn, and well before the Nintendo 64, while the PlayStation 2 was released before both the Xbox and Nintendo Gamecube.
This enabled Sony to get a head start on the competition and gave developers time to build their skills at developing games for the console, to the point that even as more powerful consoles came after, games released on the older system were just as good technically, providing no real incentive for players to move to the new consoles.
This same effect has worked against the PlayStation 3 to some extent, as though considered to be far more powerful than the Xbox 360, the one year head start the 360 received has allowed developers to more quickly maximize the system's potential, resulting in games that rivaled games on the PS3 when it released. Only as the system's life spans come to an end will we likely see the PlayStation 3 come out with games that clearly trump what the 360 can do graphically.

How Sony plans to play their hand is cause for much speculation. What we do know is that the PlayStation 4 is coming sooner than we may think, and it will take gaming to a whole new level.
Let us know what you think. Will we see the PlayStation 4 within the next 2-3 years, or is the release further off? Feel free to comment below. You can also join our forums to voice your opinion on everything PlayStation.
Update - July 2009 - In a recent interview, Doom and Quake creator John Carmack speculated that Sony will likely attempt to be first to the dance floor with their new console, before Microsoft launches their next console. As talked about above, there is plenty of rationale in this line of thinking. On the other hand, Sony has long maintained they have a long-term plan for the PS3, and with the lower production costs of the new slim model PS3, and the increased sales of the new version, the PS3 may just be coming into its own. Whether Sony will try to launch before Microsoft (by all accounts Nintendo will actually launch first, but they're not considered direct competition to the others like Sony and Microsoft are to each other) remains to be seen. Let us know what you think.
Update - June 2010 - In an interview with Gamespot at this year's E3, Activision COO Thomas Tippl shed some up-to-date, though still quite vague light, on the PS4's future release. When asked when he expected the next generation consoles to release, Tippl stated that it was unlikely they would see release within the next 2-3 years, as Activision still had no information on any new consoles. With development times for next gen games running 2-3 years on average, it makes sense that if the new consoles will come with third party games at launch (a near certainty), it will be at least 2 years from the time third parties first get the development toolkits in their hands to the point where the console releases. In the meantime all we can do is speculate and continue to wait

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L.A Noire Review (PS3,Xbox360)

L.A. Noire is different. It's not like most video games developed by Rockstar. You don't play the outlaw running wild, free to kill, steal, and cause destruction. You're a cop. A good cop at that, determined to restore order to the violent streets of 1940s Los Angeles.

L.A. Noire's not like most games. Sure, there are car chases, gunfights, and a point-tally to judge the quality of your police justice, but it's a slow-paced, meditative experience. The focus isn't on how good you are at scoring headshots with a pistol but instead your ability to read a suspect's face and determine if he or she is telling the truth, holding something back, or flat out lying.
Using a brand new technology called MotionScan, L.A. Noire delivers pure performances from a talented group of actors. Every wrinkle, twitch, downward glance, grimace, and hard swallow is from an actor playing a part, not an animator manipulating things from behind the scenes. It's a striking, sometimes unnerving effect certain to help push video games closer to true cinematic experiences. It's easy to fall into old video game habits like checking your phone while listening to a line of dialogue, but you're setting yourself up for failure. The actors' tells are in their faces, their posture, their eyes – rarely is it revealed in what they say.

This is where L.A. Noire shines. The interrogations are like lengthy dialogue scenes you'd see in an RPG -- but they're captivating. This is the core of L.A. Noire and that core is very good.

You're a detective, so you're going to scour crime scenes searching for clues. And when you question witnesses, you have to think less like a gamer and more like a sleuth. It's not easy. In fact, it's often a real challenge to judge the trustworthiness of a witness' statement. The line between "doubt" and "lie" is very narrow. Though L.A. Noire's hero, Cole Phelps, is regarded as one of the best case men ever, I still managed to falsely accuse dozens of suspects, doubt witnesses who were actually forthcoming, and use the wrong clues to try and catch killers in lies.

After every question, selected from Phelps' trusty notebook, you get a response from the suspect. Then you must choose to believe, doubt, or accuse them of lying. Get it right and you can open them up and get more clues. Get it wrong, and they offer less. The better you do over the course of a case, the more you'll understand the suspect's motivations. The worse you do, the tougher it is to get at the truth, but there's no possibility of failure in any conversation. L.A. Noire won't abruptly end if you fail to catch a killer's lie or miss an important clue. The bad guy only gets away if it's pre-determined in the story. The only game over screen comes from dying or allowing a fleeing suspect to escape. This makes you less of a real detective and more of a page turner, destined to always reach the next chapter so long as you make a choice -- any choice.

L.A. Noire isn't all about badgering people, though. This is still an open-world game. You're free to deviate from a case, explore faithfully recreated 1947 Los Angeles, and tackle more action-oriented missions. No, you can't run wild like in Grand Theft Auto (you're a cop, accept it), but there are some other things to do. Forty "unassigned cases" come in as calls on the radio. These aren't random; they're single-scene missions where you'll stop a bank robbery, chase down a bat-wielding lunatic, or shadow a crook to his hideout.

A few other distractions can be had -- finding all of the famous L.A. locations and discovering more than a dozen hidden cars -- which earn you points towards leveling up your rank. New ranks mean new clothes, hidden car locations, and intuition points (which can be spent to reveal clues and narrow choices when interrogating a suspect). This is the "game" portion of L.A. Noire, the part built for those who aren't ready to release their old needs as gamers. And maybe Rockstar is struggling to release that same hold. I like going about town, but L.A. Noire would have been stronger with greater focus on the experience and less concern for including traditional game elements.

Each time I start getting immersed in the world, I'm reminded "you're playing a game" with unnecessary text popping up on the screen or a score tallying my lie-detecting ability.

There are moments when L.A. Noire comes together brilliantly, when the threads from multiple cases lead to a darker ringleader. But more often, things are perhaps too true to real police work – repetitive, redundant, and unsurprising. Despite having 21 cases, some of which can take more than an hour to complete, L.A. Noire drags at times because it recycles the same drama.

Ten cases in, I knew what to expect. I come to a crime scene and search for some clues that then open one or two new locations in L.A. to investigate. From there, I know I'll end up chasing someone on foot through the back-alleys of the city or through the streets in my car. All this leads to a final interview with a suspect in the police station interview room, where even screwing up completely still leads to an arrest. I might think the guy's innocent, but except on rare occasions, I'm just going through the motions and have no control over the end result.

When L.A. Noire breaks free from the formula, it can be stunning. A great example comes at the end of Phelps' time on the Homicide desk, when you are freed from the usual case work and instead have to solve riddles that lead you to landmarks across Los Angeles. The end of the homicide desk is refreshing, startling, different, and necessary to hold interest in what is generally a series of the same song and dance.


Even with its redundancies, L.A. Noire is still entertaining. Normally, I'd say a game like this has "great voice acting," but with its amazing new technology, L.A. Noire has great performances. It's more than just the voice – it's the mannerisms, the way someone's mouth thins after telling a lie, the unease of a wrongdoer being grilled in the box. There have been games with graphics far superior to L.A. Noire's, with a level of fidelity that makes the world seem more real than what's outside your door. But I've never seen an Adam's apples move when people talk or throat muscles tense when someone almost says too much. It's fascinating to watch a sort of hybrid between an action game and an episode of Law & Order.

With that gift of having detailed, human faces, Rockstar and developer Team Bondi have the vehicle to deliver an incredibly emotional and engaging story. L.A. Noire falls short, though. Despite great performances, some killer dialogue, and one of my favorite game soundtracks in years, L.A. Noire left me cold. Cole Phelps begins as a paragon of the LAPD, but his true past is eventually revealed. Whether hero or pariah, I just never liked him that much because his story is told at times haphazardly.

There's an omniscient narrator in the early missions of L.A. Noire who disappears halfway through and never returns. Cole has a wife he almost never talks about until the plot needs a complication to Phelps' pristine image. There's a confounding "twist" with three cases left that changes the focus of the story and left me scratching my head.

L.A. Noire has issues, but it's also a bold and unique take on games as entertainment. The core gameplay mechanics work -- no issues with driving, chasing perps across town, taking cover, shooting people, figuring out what to do next, or understanding how to interrogate a suspect. The various elements never come together at the same time to create something spectacular, but there are a lot of good things going on. Some will love L.A. Noire for being different and others are going to find the slower pace a deal-breaker.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Brink (May 10 2011) Quick look

A man-made floating city called the Ark, made up of hundreds of separate floating islands, is on the brink of all-out civil war. Originally built as an experimental self-sufficient and 100% "green" habitat, the reported rapid rise of the Earth's oceans has forced the Ark to become a refuge for humanity. With 25 years of social unrest, the inhabitants of the Ark have reached their breaking point. It's up to you to decide the future of the Ark and the human race.

Brink is an immersive shooter that blends single-player, co-op, and multiplayer gameplay into one seamless experience, allowing you to develop your character across all modes of play. You decide the role you want to assume in the world of BRINK as you fight to save yourself and mankind's last refuge for humanity. Brink offers a compelling mix of dynamic battlefields, extensive customization options, and an innovative control system.

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Mortal Kombat Review

 After years of spin-offs, 3D fighters, and other efforts, the developers at the newly coined NetherRealm Studios are bringing the series back to its core: violent, 2D fighting with an outrageous aesthetic.
While many Mortal Kombats in the past were remembered for their excessive gore and not for their fighting engines, the latest Mortal Kombat is a legitimate competitive fighter... and it has enough gore to make parents run for the hills. Even though the single-player modes are rife with imbalances, the core experience in Mortal Kombat is exciting, challenging, and hella bloody.
I think we all know that the plotlines in Mortal Kombat are a little ridiculous. Ice ninjas, half-dragons, thunder gods, and busty policewomen are commonplace in this series. In Mortal Kombat, you'll be reliving the events of Mortal Kombat 1, 2 and 3, so newcomers to the series won't actually be lost here. I don't know the lore well and I felt comfortable following along with the zaniness. Here's a summary: big, bad Shao Kahn is seriously f*****g up the world. He kills everybody at the end of the Mortal Kombat storyline, so Raiden sends a message back through time to prevent it. The result? Alternate history!

The story is weak compared to other recent, non-MK video game efforts. I was entertained from start to finish -- partly because of all the dismembered limbs and the fact that Baraka is a total joke -- but it was a cheesy ride.

Master Mortal Kombat Fatalities / Babalities list Unlockable characters Alternate costumes Kombat Kodes Send us your tips » Tweet us your tips »

 

 

Mortal Kombat has returned to a 2D plane, which I've always preferred for fighting games. Both one-on-one and tag team matches are available, so there's plenty of options when you're setting up a fight. When it comes to the basics, each character has a set of simple moves as well as a bunch of special attacks. I found combos and special attacks easy to execute, but stringing together attacks and keeping an opponent stunned/juggled will take some time to get.
The crux of Mortal Kombat's fighting engine is the super gauge, which fills as you give and receive damage. This is where a fair amount of Mortal Kombat's strategy comes into play. The gauge is divided into three segments, and those segments can be spent in different ways. Expending one segment will enhance any of your character's special moves. So instead of Nightwolf's single glowing green arrow, he fires three.

If you fill the gauge more and spend two segments, you can break out of an opponent's combo. This is a critical defensive option if you find yourself flailing through the air with a rapidly depleting health bar. Lastly, spending the whole shebang will unleash a devastating x-ray attack, which deals terrible, terrible damage to your victim. It can turn the tide of a fight, but missing it will put you in an awful spot with no super gauge to spend.

To me, this gauge is one of the best parts of Mortal Kombat. It's a simple concept (spend more, do cooler things), but it's rich with possibilities. I found myself favoring the combo breaker and x-ray attack, but I'm sure there will be players that use enhanced specials more often.
The gameplay in Mortal Kombat will be different for those of you accustomed to the speed and fluidity of games like Super Street Fighter IV. I appreciate those types of fighters as much as the next guy/gal, but the savage, deliberately paced fighting in Mortal Kombat feels great to me. Landing a combo and executing special moves is more visceral here then in other fighting games. This is, in part, thanks to the glorious sound design, because effects like Kitana's fans and Jade's staff sound incredibl

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Battlefield 3 Quick Look

Battlefield: Bad Company 2 was an amazing first-person shooter. But with every Bad Company release and spin-off, I couldn't help but wonder what DICE was doing with its main Battlefield franchise. As it turns out, it had something to do with earthquakes.

The core games, including Battlefield 1942 and Battlefield 2, helped define what's possible in multiplayer first-person shooters. It's been more than five years since Battlefield 2 on PC, and now DICE is finally getting ready to deliver the next numbered entry. Battlefield 3 has a release date for this fall on Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and PC, and from what's been shown off, it looks incredible.

That's because Battlefield 3 is being built using all-new technology developed in-house at DICE. It's the next version of the Frostbite engine used in the Bad Company games, appropriately called Frostbite 2. It allows for a range of advanced graphical effects and destructible terrain. "We actually started with the engine three years ago," said executive producer Patrick Bach. "When we finished Battlefield 2 and 2142 we talked about what's the next big step that changes gaming. We're good at technology and we wanted to create something that scaled better than Frostbite 1 did. The PCs were already -- three years ago -- starting to get ahead of the consoles. How could we make good use of that?"

Battlefield 3 Rewind Theater

The result was, at the end of a demo recently shown to members of the press, a detailed scene of a US Marine unit getting tossed around on a quaking bed of asphalt in a war-torn city on the border of Iraq and Iran. Buildings crumbled into pieces, sending up plumes of smoke and dust as the ground fluttered like a flag in the wind. One even toppled over onto an attack chopper hovering in mid-air. It looked strikingly realistic.

"We knew we could do better stuff with audio, we needed a core streaming system for the whole game," said Bach. "Everything from animations to objects to textures to audio we can stream. If you look at the consoles today they still have the same amount of memory, so how do you make a denser experience with the same amount of memory? You need to be able to flush things in and out of that memory that you have. Frostbite 2 was more or less a necessity for us to be able to build Battlefield 3. If we didn't build the engine we couldn't build the game because then it would just be an iteration instead of a big step forward."

So far DICE isn't showing off any gameplay footage of the multiplayer component, which is too bad. I really wanted to see jets streak across the sky and launch precision strikes against unsuspecting targets. But even without the spectacle of controllable vehicle sequences to gape at, the story mode still looks pretty good. The characters are in no way related to those in the Bad Company games. What you get in Battlefield 3 is a fresh start. It's set in 2014, and an early mission follows a squad of Marines as they charge through cramped, dangerous streets and take cover from sniper fire on rooftops. "It's based on a 'what if' scenario," said Bach. "We see the world as quite unstable. We see it as the shot in Sarajevo where a small event can create a butterfly effect to start a world war." Even though the mission was early in the game, it sounds as though the scale of the conflict shown is going to ripple out into the rest of the world.

Though the mission features a group of Marines, DICE notes that these characters won't necessarily be in subsequent sorties because it's not a squad-based game like Bad Company. You play as Sergeant Henry Blackburn who, at the mission's outset, emerges from an armored personnel carrier with an M16 equipped with an ACOG (that's a scope). The road ahead is packed with smoke and fire, cowering citizens, military humvees and an LAV reconnaissance vehicle.

According to Bach it's not possible to simply hop into these vehicles and start driving, as many Battlefield veterans may want to do. While there will be several vehicle sections in the single-player portion, the game makes it clear when you're meant to hop into a machine and when you're supposed to proceed on foot. "When you tell a story you need to control the player in some ways, even though we have very sandbox-y elements as well. We make sure you get to try out everything…so we pace the game as a tutorial so when you go into multiplayer you don't feel scared. If you play through single-player you will feel quite safe to go online because you tried everything once."

Battlefield 3 Gameplay Footage

The PC version was beautiful even in its current pre-alpha state. DICE is focusing on using lighting and animations to create a more realistic look for Battlefield 3. For animation, DICE is utilizing Electronic Arts' technology called ANT, developed for sports games like FIFA. So what does that actually mean? "We can now more or less blend from any animation to any animation without any glitches. Some animation systems are very rigid. The cool thing with this is that you can blend from one animation to another at any time. You can see that with FIFA --, it's super quick and nimble."

The animations were especially impressive to watch during a first-person hand-to-hand combat sequence. Black was underground in a bunker attempting to disarm an explosive device when he was accosted by a waiting enemy. To subdue the assailant you need to hit buttons at specific times to deliver viscous strikes and chops. The attacker eventually crumples to the ground, but not without getting in a few solid shots on Black, which causes the perspective to tilt and whip appropriately with the force.

A lot of work is being done at DICE on the moment-to-moment mechanics of gun fights too. When you open fire the screen shakes, your weapon effects dominate the speakers, and the bits of user interface flicker when . "The challenge with weapons is actually not to get them to look realistic or record sounds, the research is quite easy. The hard part is to transform the emotion when you fire a gun and turn that into picture and sound."

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Gear Of War 3 Release Date September 20, 2011

Gears of War 3 is the spectacular conclusion to one of the most memorable and celebrated sagas in video games. Developed by Epic Games exclusively for Xbox 360, Gears of War 3 plunges you into a harrowing tale of hope, survival, and brotherhood.

In Gears of War 3, fight on as Marcus Fenix, the grizzled war hero and leader of Delta Squad. Eighteen months after the fall of the last human city, the war against the Locust rages on. Meanwhile, deep beneath the surface, a fearsome new threat is infecting the planet from within. With survivors scattered and civilization in ruins, time is running out for Marcus and his comrades as they fight to save the human race.

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