OPINION: Is it fair that the previous-generation consoles are being left out?

Good afternoon readers. I know I published a post earlier saying that I wouln't be posting a blog post this week, but I thought instead of doing a news update, I would go back to my roots and post a post on my views on a subject or topic, so here we go!

The previous-generation
consoles will still get zombies
though...

Earlier this week, Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 publisher Activision said that the PS3 and Xbox 360 version of Black Ops 3 won't have a single-player campaign, which will be the first this has happened in the Call of Duty series. Activision explained in a statement saying that:
"The ambitious scope of the 1-4 player co-op Campaign design of the PS4, Xbox One and PC versions could not be faithfully recreated on old generation hardware". They went on to say that:
"Other features built to leverage the next generation hardware like the new Weapon Paint Shop and the new suite of eSports tools will only be available on Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 for PS4, Xbox One, and PC."

Activision are basically saying that the previous-generation consoles wouldn't be able to handle what Activision has in store for Black Ops 3. The campaign has been designed and developed for the current-generation of consoles, meaning those of us who still play on the older consoles are going to be left out.
This leads me to todays question, 'Is it fair that us who still play the previous-generation of consoles are being left out?'

Another example of this is in the popular football game series, FIFA. In previous iterations of the game, everyone, no matter what console, could play the popular game-mode 'Pro Clubs'. In this game-mode, you can create your own virtual player and virtual club, and take them to the top. However, In FIFA 15, last years iteration of the game, the Pro Clubs game-mode was removed from previous-generation consoles, and as EA stated in a blog post last August:

That game-mode that never was...
for the previous
generations

"There are some things we couldn't do for FIFA 15 on PS3 and Xbox 360, either based on the limitations of these consoles, or our time and resources. Most notably, Pro Clubs will not be a mode in FIFA 15 on Xbox 360 and PS3."

Okay, so first of all, the limitations of the consoles. I understand that the previous-generation of consoles aren't as high tech as the Xbox One and PS4. This doesn't mean that you have to remove one of the biggest game-modes from the game. Gamers will understand if it isn't as high-res as it's current-generation counterpart, just make visually less impressive. As a fan of the FIFA series, I'd much rather be able to play a crappier version of Pro Clubs than not be able to play it at all.
Next, time and resources. They are obviously going to be focusing on the current-generation versions of the game, as they are likely to make EA more money, and EA are a business, so making money is a top proiority. However, the fact that they are saying they do not have enough time shows that the previous-generation consoles are no longer a concern for EA, which, again, I find is wrong. How hard can it be to implement a simpler version of a game-mode. Just 'copy & paste' from last years game. I mean, EA have been doing this for years anyway, whats the problem with doing it another year?

Some of us cannot afford a new £300-£400 console, and we have to rely on our ol'faithful 360 or PS3, and we shouldn't be made to pay or left out because of it.

Maybe one day...

Going back to Call of Duty, the fact that the single-player campaign is being left out of the game, which has been one of the main selling points since the series began, is ridiculous. As said previously, just de-res it and leave out some features instead of completely removing the campaign. But hey, if you are getting Black Ops 3 on a previous generation console, you'll get a code for the first Black Ops. Well that makes everything better right?!

So, to conclude, I think it's unbelievable that the older consoles are being left out. Make eveything equal and give all gamers the same features and such. Some of us cannot afford newer consoles, and the fact that we are being forgotten about is absurd.

How do you guys feel about this? Do you agree with me or do you disagree with me? Let me know in the comments down below!

Thanks for reading!

Connor :)

P.S. Sorry for not posting a news update this week. The news has been super slow and nothing noteworthy has been announced or reported. Hopefully the news will start flowing again next week!

NEWS | Week beginning September 14th | Star Wars Battlefront Bundles, Star Wars Battlefront Beta & Xbox One Elite Controller Release Date Revealed

Good evening Ladies and Gentlemen, and welcome to this weeks video game news round-up! Enjoy!

Star Wars Battlefront Bundles

First up, EA have announced a new $130 bundle for Star Wars Battlefront. Seems a bit pricey right? However, not only does the bundle come with a copy of the game and a few extra in-game items such as weapons and emotes, it also comes with a mini-fridge!

Poor Han...

It seems like mini-fridges are the new thing to bundle in with games. Back in July, I wrote about Black Ops 3's pre-order bonuses, as they too are including a mini-fridge with their Collectors Edition of the game. The Black Ops 3 fridge resembles the Nazi Zombies Perk 'Juggernog', looking exactly like the dispenser that gives you the perk in-game. The Battlefront fridge however is a throwback to Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back (Episode 5), when Han Solo is frozen in Carbonite by Jabba the Hut. On the front of the fridge you can see the silhouette of a frozen Han Solo, much like how it looked in Episode 5. 

The fridge is a really mini mini-fridge, with it only being able to hold 6 cans of Coca-Cola (or any other brand), but hey, you can't really complain, it's a mini-fridge!

Unfortunately, for everyone that's not in the US, it seems like this bundle is only being offered by American retailer Walmart, meaning only you American readers can pre-order this cool bundle. 

In other Star Wars Battlefront bundle news, EA have announced a limited edition PS4 Battlefront system themed around Darth Vader, which will cost around £300-£350, so if you want a Darth Vader PS4, go pre-order it soon!

Star Wars Battlefront Beta

Next up, with more Battlefont news, EA have released some details for the upcoming Star Wars Battlefront Beta.

The Beta will be available to everyone, even if you haven't already pre-ordered the game yet, and will host both offline and online modes, including 'Drop Zone' on the map 'Sullust' and 'Walker Assault' on the map 'Hoth'. The Beta will also include a 'Survival Mode' on 'Tatooine', which will be available both for offline play and non-competitive online play.

What game-mode are you most excited
to play?

Although no official start date has been announced, it is expected that the Beta will begin during October sometime, with Community Manager Mathew Everett stating that "the final date will be announced as soon as we have the final details locked in". Exciting times!

He also went on to answer some Beta-related questions from the community:

Q.) Can I upgrade my vehicles in Star Wars Battlefront?
A.) Vehicles in Star Wars Battlefront come with their own weapons and abilities that make them authentic to the Star Wars universe.

Q.) What comes with the various editions, i.e. Deluxe vs. Standard?
A.) The Standard Edition of Star Wars Battlefront will include the base game. The Deluxe Edition will include the base game and have the Ion Grenade, Ion Torpedo, and DL-44 unlocked right away along with the exclusive Ion Shock and Victory emotes.

Q.) Can I buy the Deluxe Edition on disk in a retail store, or is it just digitally online?
A.) The Star Wars Battlefront Deluxe Edition is available as a physical item for Xbox One.

Q.) Will there be any AI bots in multiplayer in addition to other players?
A.) Yes! Our Fighter Squadron mode features AI units (10 on each side).

Q.) Will there be sidearms or only primary guns?
A.) We offer a primary blaster along with a hand of Star Cards. How you customize your Star Card hand will be up to you.

Star Wars Battlefront is set to be released November 17th on PS4, Xbox One and PC.

Xbox One Elite Controller Release Date Revealed

Finally, the release date for the Xbox One Elite controller has been revealed, along with what will come within the box for the controller.

The Elite controller is set to release on October 27th, with a host of different retailers set to stock the £100 controller. 

For those of you avid Xbox users, you may know why the Elite Controller is set to be released on October 27th, if not, it's because that the much anticipated Halo 5: Guardians is also scheduled to release on the same day. Now I hardly believe that the two releasing on the day is just some fortunate coincidence

For around £100, you may be thinking that the Elite Controller is hugely overpriced. However, it is a major upgrade from the standard Xbox One console. 

Gamespot recently used and tested the new Elite Controller, and know exactly how the controller works and operates.

Will you be purchasing the Elite
Controller?

"The Xbox One Elite controller, which also works on PC, is more than twice as expensive as the standard unit. For the premium price, you get a first-of-its-kind Xbox controller that features interchangeable rear paddles and hair trigger locks. It also lets you adjust the trigger minimum and maximum values, thumbstick sensitivity, and button assignments. In short, you can assign any of the controller's 14 different inputs to the ABXY buttons, paddles, D-pad, triggers, and thumbstick clicks."

The Elite Controller also comes packaged with a bunch of different accessories for the controller:

• Xbox One Wireless Elite Controller (obviously)
• Carry Case
• Set of 6 thumbsticks (2 standard, 2 tall and 2 domed)
  
• Set of 4 paddles
• Set of 2 D-Pads
• USB Cable
• AA Batteries
• Setup guide and manual

Much like a gaming mouse, once you have finished attaching all the different attachments and are done adjusting the different button configurations, you can save them into seperate custom controller profiles into an app, and switch between the different custom configurations at will. Kinda cool!

This is definitely a very expensive investment. However, it does completely change gaming on the Xbox One. If I had an Xbox One I'd even consider getting one myself! Just make sure you have a spare £100 lying around...

That's it for this weeks video game news round-up! What did you think of this weeks news? Will be buying one of the many Star Wars Battlefront Bundles? Will you be taking part in the Battlefront Beta? Will you be investing in the Xbox One Elite Controller? 

Let me know in the comments down below!

As always, thanks for reading!!

Connor :) 

NEWS | Week beginning September 7th | Pokemon Go, GTA Online Updates & The End for XBL Indie Games

Good afternoon guys and welcome back to another video game news round-up! Let us get right into it!

Pokemon GO

First up, The Pokemon Company have recently revealed a new project that will bring our favourite Pokemon into the real world!

The Pokemon Go + device
Gotta catch em' all ??

The premise for the app is that Pokemon will be brought to life, via smartphones. The app, which will be called Pokemon GO, will allow players to go out into the real world and hunt and capture their favourite Pokemon. Pokemon will appear in real world locations (this could be anything from a local park to a supermarket!) and players will have to go on the hunt and search for these Pokemon when the app notifies you.

The app is to be intergrated with a little device called 'Pokemon GO +'. The device is designed to worn with a wristband and will connect to your smartphone via Bluetooth. Once connected, it will also notify you when you are near a Pokemon by both flashing and giving off a slight vibration.

If you successfully find a Pokemon, you can battle it, capture it and add it to your virtual collection, if you're one for collecting things. If not, you could also trade your unwanted Pokemon with your other Pokemon GO players.

Taking it back to last year, Google added a feature onto Google Maps allowing users to capture Pokemon on the Map intself. Type in a location, if you find a Pokemon on the map, you've collected it, and so on. Maybe the guys behind Pokemon have taken inspiration from last years April Fools? Who knows. 

All we know is that it will probably be a while before we see this app available on app stores, so just be patient, it'll be here eventually!

Here's the video The Pokemon Company released showing it all off:

GTA Online Updates

Next up, GTA Online will receive a 'Freemode Events Update' next week. This brand new update will add a wide range of new features and events into GTA Online's Freemode.

The update is scheduled to release on the 15th (Tuesday) and will 'change the way you play GTA Online', apparently. 

On Friday, Rockstar posted an update on their SocialClub Blog, outlining some of the new events we can expect to see in the new update.

"Feeling locked and stocked? Look out for King of the Castle – an every man for himself turf war where you’ll need to ascend and claim the designated ‘castle’ as your territory – and then fend off everyone else as they go all out to dethrone you. Form fragile alliances and work together in modes like Hunt the Beast, where one volunteer is temporarily transformed into a faster, stronger, beastly character who must escape relentless pursuers. 

Freemode Events also take the shape of insane stunt challenges, such as popping the longest wheelie, catching the most air in a land vehicle, or performing the most near misses in a vehicle without crashing.” 

Yet another free update
from Rockstar...

These are just two of many new events that you can expect to see available this coming Tuesday. Not only that, Rockstar are also implementing an editing tool into the online mode, where users can edit clips and images they have taken from their GTA Online adventures.

However, there is some bad news too. GTA Online will no longer be updated on previous generation consoles (Xbox 360 and PS3). 

Rockstar did warn of this back in May, and it finally looks like the day of reckoning has arrived. 

"As we mentioned previously, we always knew there might be a point where we would reach the technical capacity of what the older generation of consoles can handle as each downloadable update requires additional memory both for assets and for additional scripting.  We have continued to optimize the entire game over time in order to squeeze as much memory as we possibly could out of the last-generation hardware and at some point, continuing to add content for those systems could cause the risk of instability to the game overall."

So it looks like that's it for previous generation owners. It was good while it lasted!

The End for XBL Indie Games

Finally, it looks like it is the beginning of the end for Xbox Live's Indie Games. 

Microsoft has confirmed that it is to close the Xbox Live Indie Games program by the end of 2017.

The program, which launched in 2006, allowed smaller independent developers to make and release games for the Xbox 360 as well as them give them a fee. Creators will have until September 2016 to publish any games that they may not have already published, and a year later the program is to be closed down completely, with creators getting their final payoff by November.

Rest In Peace, Sweet
Prince...

The quality of games that were released in the Indie Games program most definitely varied. Sometimes, you might find a gem or two, such as 'IMAED A S0NG W1TH Z0MB1ES 1N IT!!!1', 'The Impossible Game' and 'Mount Your Friends'. 

However, on the other end of the spectrum, you'd also find pretty terrible games that would either try and directly copy another bug game like Minecraft or Call of Duty, or you would just find games that don't work at all.

This program brought us some great games, but I definitely feel it's time to say goodbye to XBL Indie Games...

That's it for this week! What did you think of this week's video game news? Will you be downloading Pokemon GO? Do you still have GTA on a previous generation console? Will you be sad to see XBL Indie Games go?

Let me know in the comments down below!

As always, thanks for reading!

Connor :)

NEWS | Week beginning August 31st | Slave Tetris?!, Jimmy Kimmel causes a stir & Steam Malware

Good evening guys, and welcome back to another video game news round-up! Let's begin, shall we?

Slave Tetris?!

First up, the supposedly educational game 'Playing History 2: Slave Trade' has had to push out an update removing a slightly(?) controversial mini-game simply called 'Slave Tetris'.

Playing History 2: Slave Trade was originally released in 2013. Much like most games, due to its size, the game didn't gain as much traction as it would have liked. However, back n 2014, Playing History made its way through Steam Greenlight and eventually made it onto Steam itself. The only reason that this game is gaining traction now is because developer Serious Games tweeted saying that the game was live on Steam and was launching with a 25% launch discount. Serious Games then received a multitude of negative tweets about the game and its contents. Victims of their own demise?

Yup, this is it...

The mini-game requires players to pack slaves into a slave ship. Much like Tetris, there are different shapes and you have to fit each shape into the necessary gap. The mini-game was supposed to teach players how cramped these slaves ships were, and how the slaves in these ships suffered. 

Due to the media backlash that followed the tweet, Serious Games decided to re-edit the trailer for the game, removing all trace of the Slave Tetris mini-game, as well as pushing out a patch for the game, which removed the controversial mini-game, however, they didn't seem too happy about it. Serious Games later tweeted out saying:

"The game and trailer was updated Monday. Slave Tetris has been removed as it was perceived to be extremely insensitive by some people."

It seems like they're trying to blame us, the consumer!

I can see what Serious Games were trying to do. As were intending to create an educational game covering a period in history, it's important that you cover all angles to ensure you are covering every aspect. However, the way they went about it may have not been the best way to do so!

Jimmy Kimmel causes a stir

Next up, the American TV host Jimmy Kimmel has caused a stir this week following the launch of YouTube Gaming. Kimmel aired a sketch on his show, "Jimmy Kimmel Live!", framing his jokes around the launch of YouTube Gaming, a service that allows users to stream themselves playing games live, a move made by YouTube to compete against rivals Twitch, a similar streaming service.

The sketch made by Kimmel simply asked the question, "where does it end?". Basically, he doesn't understand why people watch over people play games. He is also confused by the fact that people watch others play games, by saying that:

The man behind the controversy...

"To me, watching another person play video games is like going to a restaurant and having someone eat your food for you.".

I personally don't understand that comment. I mean, why watch Kimmel talk to a camera when you could just do that yourself? 

As you can imagine, the gaming community became rather flustered by these comments, and sent some comments back of their own, most notably containing death threats and other forms of negaitivity, such as "Get cancer", "Go hang yourself with that fat string of baconin the kitchen you f*cking degen" and "Jimmy your a f*cking egg". Us gamers can be a lovely bunch, can't we?

I obviously disagree with Kimmel's comments, as I myself own and run my own YouTube channel (check it out here!). I enjoy making content for people to watch and enjoy, and I do hope that you watch and enjoy my videos! However, people like those who leave hateful comments give us gamers a bad image and reputation. If you're unhappy by what somebody says, either accept it as somebody else's opinion and move on, or just leave some constructive feedback! No hate is needed!

I'll leave the sketch below. What do you make of it?

Steam Malware

Finally, another Steam Greenlight game has been causing gamers problems this week. The game, called 'Dynostopia' offered buyers a beta to download and play. The only problem is that the available beta contains a type of Malware.
Once you have installed and begin playing the beta, the the game will use your Steam profile to upvote the game on Steam and leave some positive feedback on your Steam profile, without any permission from you required.

The install adds a background task to your PC that not only posts some good feedback on your behalf, but also accesses your webcam, tracks your keystrokes and can even lock you out of your computer. Sounds like a bargain of a game!

Did this game have potential?
We'll never know...

Fortunately, this issue was tracked and found out pretty swiftly, and the game has been not only removed from Steam, but refunds are also being offered to any unfortunate souls who purchased the game.
Due to the use of Malware within the Dynostopia's installer, developer Matt Harding has been bombarded with some pretty negative comments and feedback, and as a reuslt, it seems he has locked up his YouTube account. Any gameplay footage from Dynostopia has been made private so it can no longer be viewed.

Sometimes, developers can go a little too far when creating and marketin a game. This is just one of many examples!

So what did you think of this week's video game news round-up? Was Slave Tetris a good idea, or just plain stupid? Where you offended by Kimmel's comments? Have you ever been affected by a virus in a video game?
Let me know in the comments down below!

As always, thanks for reading!

Connor :)