Forza Horizon Rally Expansion Pack Announced

Microsoft has revealed new details about Forza Horizon downloadable content, including the Rally Expansion Pack. The Rally expansion will offer “an outstanding off-road racing experience with deeper ruts, higher jumps, and new surface types to explore” along with rally-tuned cars and co-driver calls. The pack is set to arrive on December 18th for 1,600 Microsoft Points, or for free to players who purchase a Season Pass.

Microsoft also detailed the content that will be included in the Forza Horizon Season Pass. As Microsoft previously announced, the Season Pass will be available for 4,000 Microsoft Points and will offer access to six monthly packs each including six cars, and Microsoft has now detailed the first pack, set to arrive on October 23rd.

The Month One Car Pack will include:

• 2012 Ferrari 599XX Evoluzione
• 2012 Lamborghini Aventador J
• 2012 Gumpert Apollo Enraged
• 2012 Alfa Romeo 8C Spider
• 2012 Ford Mustang Boss 302
• 1957 Chevrolet Bel Air

The Month One Car Pack will be free to Season Pass holders or 400 Microsoft Points to everyone else. Microsoft promises that all future packs will include six cars each and will arrive between November 2012 and April 2013, also free to Season Pass holders or 400 Microsoft Points individually.

Season Pass holders will also receive a free bonus car on the third Tuesday of every month from November 2012 through March 2013, starting with November’s bonus car, the 2006 Lamborghini Miura Concept. According to Microsoft, “fans will be able to use their DLC cars in a variety of monthly DLC-focused community events, contests, and challenges, including photo contests, Rivals events, and more.”

Forza Horizon hits stores on October 23rd exclusively for Xbox 360. Curious whether or not you should pick it up? Read our Forza Horizon review.

Andrew Goldfarb is IGN’s associate news editor. Keep up with pictures of the latest food he’s been eating by following @garfep on Twitter or garfep on IGN.

Source : ign[dot]com

Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 – Multiplayer for Everyone

Millions of people play Call of Duty every year, but many of them don’t experience everything the games have to offer. For some, Call of Duty games have become campaign-only experiences with multiplayer being looked at as “too unapproachable” or “intimidating.” Even some of the players killing one another online every day never do things like Prestige or use the film systems, often because they don’t want to lose their progress or it’s too overwhelming, respectively.

Rather than just rehashing the same multiplayer modes and other tools, developer Treyarch is attempting to employ a number of smart tweaks to known systems in an effort to make Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 the most approachable Call of Duty to date. They want you, person-who-only-plays campaign, to jump into multiplayer and learn the ropes with people who make you feel competitive. They want everyone to create films with as little or as much effort as they want. They just want you to feel like Black Ops 2 was made for you, whether you’re a headshot master or the type of person who can’t seem to keep your gun straight.

Any of the millions of people who have gotten into Call of Duty over the years have probably experienced the hardships of starting out. You come into the game after the franchise has been out for years, or maybe even jump back in to the new game after it’s been out for a few months, and you get your ass handed to you. You just can’t compete with a legion of hardcore fans that have way more hours than you to hone their skills, and thus some of you put down the controller in frustration, never to return.

To combat this, Treyarch is first and foremost introducing Combat Training, a series of special takes on team deathmatch and Black Ops 2’s objective-based modes. Here players can level from 1-10, facing off against teams that have a mix of human and AI opponents. When they hit level 10 they’re no longer allowed to participate, though anyone can still do “Bot Stomps,” teaming up with five of their friends and just murdering AI opponents for no experience. The hope is that the Combat Training modes will ease new players into the game’s multiplayer in a less-harsh environment, and that things like Bot Stomps will allow them to fight easier enemies and experience some of the game’s cooler things, like the Kill Streak-replacing Score Streaks. Even skilled players could find something to enjoy in Bot Stomps, as Treyarch views this as an excellent way for clans to plan out tactics and practice them in private before taking them out in real matches.

Of course once you get a bit of multiplayer experience under your belt you get to build a class, and Treyarch is completely redoing Black Ops 2’s loadout system to make it intuitive for all users and still feel like something new for longtime fans. Referred to as the “Pick 10 system” (which you can read about more in our previous coverage), this is where you get the most flexible loadout system ever implemented in a CoD title. Every gun, attachment and perk has a value of one, and in the Pick 10 system you get to choose a loadout of your own devising that combines most any combination of them. For instance you could take a primary weapon with two attachments, a secondary weapon with the same, then two perks and two grenades. Or you could use Wild Cards, which take up a precious slot but in turn allow you to break a game rule, to go all out on a primary weapon and give it three attachments and then use another Wildcard to take four perks instead of three. The sheer number of combinations you can do is pretty incredible, and should give even seasoned fans a lot to think about and fun ways to experiment with their loadouts.

If the Pick 10 system sounds too overwhelming for new players they can also use pre-made loadouts or tweak these to suit your personal playstyle. Additionally, you won’t have everything unlocked at once, but instead will have to hit the right level to unlock the option to use tokens (earned through leveling) to permanently unlock the gear.

Maybe you don’t think the Pick 10 system lets you take enough gear, or maybe you wish that you could play multiplayer with just your friends. Well, for you Treyarch’s including a robust Custom Games mode in Black Ops 2. You can choose between any of the modes, add bots, restrict content, modify the Pick 10 system so you can choose as few as three or as many as 17 items, and more. If you want to create your own take on Capture the Flag or Kill Confirmed and then play with your buddies then Treyarch wants you to do so. With Custom Games it’s like Treyarch is trying to tell you that they don’t care how you play, just that you’re playing.

If all you want to do is play team deathmatch you can do that, but for people looking for something new you can check out the new Hardpoint mode, as well as multi-team battles. Hardpoint is essentially Halo’s Crazy King, with capture points that bounce around the level, forcing each team to see who can hold it the longest before it up and moves again. It’s nothing revolutionary, but it’s a great addition to Black Ops 2’s multiplayer suite.

The multi-team battles, though, they really change up the dynamic of a multiplayer match. You can play three teams of four or four teams of three, with up to 18 players in a Custom Game match. The only modes currently available in multi-team battles are team deathmatch, Hardpoint and the returning Kill Confirmed, but even with the limited list this mode makes for a great alternative to standard matches. Each team essentially turns into a roving pack, with teamplay and communication becoming crucial. Multi-team battles end up having the frantic pacing of a free-for-all match with the teamplay of TDM. It’s a weird mix that just works, and is a hell of a lot of fun.

If you decide to spend the time to level up you’ll have the option to Prestige in Black Ops 2, only now you don’t lose your Challenge and weapon progress. Let me restate that, because it’s a big deal: You don’t lose your progress when you Prestige in Black Ops 2. Instead, Prestiging earns you a token you can use to ignore level requirements and unlock an item permanently, as well as one of three additional options: an extra slot for Custom Class slot; reset your stats just like you would in previous versions of Prestige; a refund that you can use at any point during your Prestige level allowing you to get all your unlock tokens back and spend them how you see fit. The reset option is there for the hardcore players who liked the challenge of starting over, but the other choices exist because they want more people to participate in Prestiging, which previously the studio found people avoided. With 10 levels of Prestige available, and emblems available for each that showcase just how much of a badass you are, the hope is that Black Ops 2 Prestige system will draw people in like never before.

Once Treyarch has all of us playing hours and hours of Black Ops 2 multiplayer, they want us to get involved with the community. One part of this strategy is the built-in shout cast capabilities, which Treyarch hopes will build up a whole new wave of Call of Duty personalities. The other part of this is improved Theater. Just like before you can cut together your games, editing short films that showcase your skills or maybe show a hilarious failure. For some people, though, the system was too complicated and time consuming, thus they avoided it altogether. To better serve these parts of the audience, Treyarch has created a one-button system where you can take any match you’ve played and have the editor pick out the highlights and cut it together in seconds. After that it’s easy to upload it to the internet and spread it around, or go in with the editing tools and tweak it to your liking. On the flipside the Theater mode also has even more tools to let ambitious film makers create elaborate scenes, such as the “attach to object” tool that lets you stick the camera to parts of the world, including things like rockets as they fly out of an RPG. The goal is to cater to both extremes: the lazy or less-interested players who don’t want to take the time to create a film, as well as the future Martin Scorceses of the world.

Call of Duty: Black Ops 2’s multiplayer probably won’t change your mind if you dislike the franchise already, but with so many smart changes to previously established systems it just might manage to win over a few new fans, as well as surprise the hardcore with it's twists on the formula. The tagline for Black Ops 2 is “The future is black,” but with what I’ve seen so far I’d say it’s better written as “The future is bright.”

Source : ign[dot]com

Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 – Multiplayer for Everyone

Millions of people play Call of Duty every year, but many of them don’t experience everything the games have to offer. For some, Call of Duty games have become campaign-only experiences with multiplayer being looked at as “too unapproachable” or “intimidating.” Even some of the players killing one another online every day never do things like Prestige or use the film systems, often because they don’t want to lose their progress or it’s too overwhelming, respectively.

Rather than just rehashing the same multiplayer modes and other tools, developer Treyarch is attempting to employ a number of smart tweaks to known systems in an effort to make Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 the most approachable Call of Duty to date. They want you, person-who-only-plays campaign, to jump into multiplayer and learn the ropes with people who make you feel competitive. They want everyone to create films with as little or as much effort as they want. They just want you to feel like Black Ops 2 was made for you, whether you’re a headshot master or the type of person who can’t seem to keep your gun straight.

Any of the millions of people who have gotten into Call of Duty over the years have probably experienced the hardships of starting out. You come into the game after the franchise has been out for years, or maybe even jump back in to the new game after it’s been out for a few months, and you get your ass handed to you. You just can’t compete with a legion of hardcore fans that have way more hours than you to hone their skills, and thus some of you put down the controller in frustration, never to return.

To combat this, Treyarch is first and foremost introducing Combat Training, a series of special takes on team deathmatch and Black Ops 2’s objective-based modes. Here players can level from 1-10, facing off against teams that have a mix of human and AI opponents. When they hit level 10 they’re no longer allowed to participate, though anyone can still do “Bot Stomps,” teaming up with five of their friends and just murdering AI opponents for no experience. The hope is that the Combat Training modes will ease new players into the game’s multiplayer in a less-harsh environment, and that things like Bot Stomps will allow them to fight easier enemies and experience some of the game’s cooler things, like the Kill Streak-replacing Score Streaks. Even skilled players could find something to enjoy in Bot Stomps, as Treyarch views this as an excellent way for clans to plan out tactics and practice them in private before taking them out in real matches.

Of course once you get a bit of multiplayer experience under your belt you get to build a class, and Treyarch is completely redoing Black Ops 2’s loadout system to make it intuitive for all users and still feel like something new for longtime fans. Referred to as the “Pick 10 system” (which you can read about more in our previous coverage), this is where you get the most flexible loadout system ever implemented in a CoD title. Every gun, attachment and perk has a value of one, and in the Pick 10 system you get to choose a loadout of your own devising that combines most any combination of them. For instance you could take a primary weapon with two attachments, a secondary weapon with the same, then two perks and two grenades. Or you could use Wild Cards, which take up a precious slot but in turn allow you to break a game rule, to go all out on a primary weapon and give it three attachments and then use another Wildcard to take four perks instead of three. The sheer number of combinations you can do is pretty incredible, and should give even seasoned fans a lot to think about and fun ways to experiment with their loadouts.

If the Pick 10 system sounds too overwhelming for new players they can also use pre-made loadouts or tweak these to suit your personal playstyle. Additionally, you won’t have everything unlocked at once, but instead will have to hit the right level to unlock the option to use tokens (earned through leveling) to permanently unlock the gear.

Maybe you don’t think the Pick 10 system lets you take enough gear, or maybe you wish that you could play multiplayer with just your friends. Well, for you Treyarch’s including a robust Custom Games mode in Black Ops 2. You can choose between any of the modes, add bots, restrict content, modify the Pick 10 system so you can choose as few as three or as many as 17 items, and more. If you want to create your own take on Capture the Flag or Kill Confirmed and then play with your buddies then Treyarch wants you to do so. With Custom Games it’s like Treyarch is trying to tell you that they don’t care how you play, just that you’re playing.

If all you want to do is play team deathmatch you can do that, but for people looking for something new you can check out the new Hardpoint mode, as well as multi-team battles. Hardpoint is essentially Halo’s Crazy King, with capture points that bounce around the level, forcing each team to see who can hold it the longest before it up and moves again. It’s nothing revolutionary, but it’s a great addition to Black Ops 2’s multiplayer suite.

The multi-team battles, though, they really change up the dynamic of a multiplayer match. You can play three teams of four or four teams of three, with up to 18 players in a Custom Game match. The only modes currently available in multi-team battles are team deathmatch, Hardpoint and the returning Kill Confirmed, but even with the limited list this mode makes for a great alternative to standard matches. Each team essentially turns into a roving pack, with teamplay and communication becoming crucial. Multi-team battles end up having the frantic pacing of a free-for-all match with the teamplay of TDM. It’s a weird mix that just works, and is a hell of a lot of fun.

If you decide to spend the time to level up you’ll have the option to Prestige in Black Ops 2, only now you don’t lose your Challenge and weapon progress. Let me restate that, because it’s a big deal: You don’t lose your progress when you Prestige in Black Ops 2. Instead, Prestiging earns you a token you can use to ignore level requirements and unlock an item permanently, as well as one of three additional options: an extra slot for Custom Class slot; reset your stats just like you would in previous versions of Prestige; a refund that you can use at any point during your Prestige level allowing you to get all your unlock tokens back and spend them how you see fit. The reset option is there for the hardcore players who liked the challenge of starting over, but the other choices exist because they want more people to participate in Prestiging, which previously the studio found people avoided. With 10 levels of Prestige available, and emblems available for each that showcase just how much of a badass you are, the hope is that Black Ops 2 Prestige system will draw people in like never before.

Once Treyarch has all of us playing hours and hours of Black Ops 2 multiplayer, they want us to get involved with the community. One part of this strategy is the built-in shout cast capabilities, which Treyarch hopes will build up a whole new wave of Call of Duty personalities. The other part of this is improved Theater. Just like before you can cut together your games, editing short films that showcase your skills or maybe show a hilarious failure. For some people, though, the system was too complicated and time consuming, thus they avoided it altogether. To better serve these parts of the audience, Treyarch has created a one-button system where you can take any match you’ve played and have the editor pick out the highlights and cut it together in seconds. After that it’s easy to upload it to the internet and spread it around, or go in with the editing tools and tweak it to your liking. On the flipside the Theater mode also has even more tools to let ambitious film makers create elaborate scenes, such as the “attach to object” tool that lets you stick the camera to parts of the world, including things like rockets as they fly out of an RPG. The goal is to cater to both extremes: the lazy or less-interested players who don’t want to take the time to create a film, as well as the future Martin Scorceses of the world.

Call of Duty: Black Ops 2’s multiplayer probably won’t change your mind if you dislike the franchise already, but with so many smart changes to previously established systems it just might manage to win over a few new fans, as well as surprise the hardcore with it's twists on the formula. The tagline for Black Ops 2 is “The future is black,” but with what I’ve seen so far I’d say it’s better written as “The future is bright.”

Source : ign[dot]com

Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 – Multiplayer for Everyone

Millions of people play Call of Duty every year, but many of them don’t experience everything the games have to offer. For some, Call of Duty games have become campaign-only experiences with multiplayer being looked at as “too unapproachable” or “intimidating.” Even some of the players killing one another online every day never do things like Prestige or use the film systems, often because they don’t want to lose their progress or it’s too overwhelming, respectively.

Rather than just rehashing the same multiplayer modes and other tools, developer Treyarch is attempting to employ a number of smart tweaks to known systems in an effort to make Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 the most approachable Call of Duty to date. They want you, person-who-only-plays campaign, to jump into multiplayer and learn the ropes with people who make you feel competitive. They want everyone to create films with as little or as much effort as they want. They just want you to feel like Black Ops 2 was made for you, whether you’re a headshot master or the type of person who can’t seem to keep your gun straight.

Any of the millions of people who have gotten into Call of Duty over the years have probably experienced the hardships of starting out. You come into the game after the franchise has been out for years, or maybe even jump back in to the new game after it’s been out for a few months, and you get your ass handed to you. You just can’t compete with a legion of hardcore fans that have way more hours than you to hone their skills, and thus some of you put down the controller in frustration, never to return.

To combat this, Treyarch is first and foremost introducing Combat Training, a series of special takes on team deathmatch and Black Ops 2’s objective-based modes. Here players can level from 1-10, facing off against teams that have a mix of human and AI opponents. When they hit level 10 they’re no longer allowed to participate, though anyone can still do “Bot Stomps,” teaming up with five of their friends and just murdering AI opponents for no experience. The hope is that the Combat Training modes will ease new players into the game’s multiplayer in a less-harsh environment, and that things like Bot Stomps will allow them to fight easier enemies and experience some of the game’s cooler things, like the Kill Streak-replacing Score Streaks. Even skilled players could find something to enjoy in Bot Stomps, as Treyarch views this as an excellent way for clans to plan out tactics and practice them in private before taking them out in real matches.

Of course once you get a bit of multiplayer experience under your belt you get to build a class, and Treyarch is completely redoing Black Ops 2’s loadout system to make it intuitive for all users and still feel like something new for longtime fans. Referred to as the “Pick 10 system” (which you can read about more in our previous coverage), this is where you get the most flexible loadout system ever implemented in a CoD title. Every gun, attachment and perk has a value of one, and in the Pick 10 system you get to choose a loadout of your own devising that combines most any combination of them. For instance you could take a primary weapon with two attachments, a secondary weapon with the same, then two perks and two grenades. Or you could use Wild Cards, which take up a precious slot but in turn allow you to break a game rule, to go all out on a primary weapon and give it three attachments and then use another Wildcard to take four perks instead of three. The sheer number of combinations you can do is pretty incredible, and should give even seasoned fans a lot to think about and fun ways to experiment with their loadouts.

If the Pick 10 system sounds too overwhelming for new players they can also use pre-made loadouts or tweak these to suit your personal playstyle. Additionally, you won’t have everything unlocked at once, but instead will have to hit the right level to unlock the option to use tokens (earned through leveling) to permanently unlock the gear.

Maybe you don’t think the Pick 10 system lets you take enough gear, or maybe you wish that you could play multiplayer with just your friends. Well, for you Treyarch’s including a robust Custom Games mode in Black Ops 2. You can choose between any of the modes, add bots, restrict content, modify the Pick 10 system so you can choose as few as three or as many as 17 items, and more. If you want to create your own take on Capture the Flag or Kill Confirmed and then play with your buddies then Treyarch wants you to do so. With Custom Games it’s like Treyarch is trying to tell you that they don’t care how you play, just that you’re playing.

If all you want to do is play team deathmatch you can do that, but for people looking for something new you can check out the new Hardpoint mode, as well as multi-team battles. Hardpoint is essentially Halo’s Crazy King, with capture points that bounce around the level, forcing each team to see who can hold it the longest before it up and moves again. It’s nothing revolutionary, but it’s a great addition to Black Ops 2’s multiplayer suite.

The multi-team battles, though, they really change up the dynamic of a multiplayer match. You can play three teams of four or four teams of three, with up to 18 players in a Custom Game match. The only modes currently available in multi-team battles are team deathmatch, Hardpoint and the returning Kill Confirmed, but even with the limited list this mode makes for a great alternative to standard matches. Each team essentially turns into a roving pack, with teamplay and communication becoming crucial. Multi-team battles end up having the frantic pacing of a free-for-all match with the teamplay of TDM. It’s a weird mix that just works, and is a hell of a lot of fun.

If you decide to spend the time to level up you’ll have the option to Prestige in Black Ops 2, only now you don’t lose your Challenge and weapon progress. Let me restate that, because it’s a big deal: You don’t lose your progress when you Prestige in Black Ops 2. Instead, Prestiging earns you a token you can use to ignore level requirements and unlock an item permanently, as well as one of three additional options: an extra slot for Custom Class slot; reset your stats just like you would in previous versions of Prestige; a refund that you can use at any point during your Prestige level allowing you to get all your unlock tokens back and spend them how you see fit. The reset option is there for the hardcore players who liked the challenge of starting over, but the other choices exist because they want more people to participate in Prestiging, which previously the studio found people avoided. With 10 levels of Prestige available, and emblems available for each that showcase just how much of a badass you are, the hope is that Black Ops 2 Prestige system will draw people in like never before.

Once Treyarch has all of us playing hours and hours of Black Ops 2 multiplayer, they want us to get involved with the community. One part of this strategy is the built-in shout cast capabilities, which Treyarch hopes will build up a whole new wave of Call of Duty personalities. The other part of this is improved Theater. Just like before you can cut together your games, editing short films that showcase your skills or maybe show a hilarious failure. For some people, though, the system was too complicated and time consuming, thus they avoided it altogether. To better serve these parts of the audience, Treyarch has created a one-button system where you can take any match you’ve played and have the editor pick out the highlights and cut it together in seconds. After that it’s easy to upload it to the internet and spread it around, or go in with the editing tools and tweak it to your liking. On the flipside the Theater mode also has even more tools to let ambitious film makers create elaborate scenes, such as the “attach to object” tool that lets you stick the camera to parts of the world, including things like rockets as they fly out of an RPG. The goal is to cater to both extremes: the lazy or less-interested players who don’t want to take the time to create a film, as well as the future Martin Scorceses of the world.

Call of Duty: Black Ops 2’s multiplayer probably won’t change your mind if you dislike the franchise already, but with so many smart changes to previously established systems it just might manage to win over a few new fans, as well as surprise the hardcore with it's twists on the formula. The tagline for Black Ops 2 is “The future is black,” but with what I’ve seen so far I’d say it’s better written as “The future is bright.”

Source : ign[dot]com

TGS: How Dragon Ball Z for Kinect Misses the Point

The entire appeal of motion gaming is immersion -- ideally, Kinect would amplify player agency by more actively involving you in a given experience. Dance Central excels here, in particular. Using your body rather than thumb flicks and trigger pulls to control a character should make you feel as though you've become someone else.

The potential to empower players in Dragon Ball Z for Kinect is enormous, but actually playing it is a constant reminder of how much fun you should be having.

The first-person combat works like you'd expect: Punching the air fires projectiles or smacks your up-close enemy, crouching dodges incoming attacks and powers up your hero, and familiar poses unleash special attacks when you've filled your power meter. That's pretty much the extent of how Dragon Ball Z for Kinect functions, and that simplicity in itself would be a considerable issue, never mind that it doesn't work well.

Gestures are so similar, and player input is so frantic, that Kinect can't actually register the moves properly. I tried to boost my power, but it misread the crouched position as a dodge. In putting my fingers on my forehead to let loose Picollo's Beam Cannon, the game thought I was trying to punch. Arm movements are sensitive and the speed of the fight is chaotic, which is a disastrous recipe. I watched multiple players fail a fight because their Kamehamehas weren't getting picked up, or their dodges registered as power charging, before becoming a victim of the incompetence myself.

The other problem is that it's just not terribly entertaining to play. Your actions don't really interact with the world or characters, so you spend a lot of time watching. Did you punch the air fast enough to trigger the win or lose animation? Great job, take a break and watch Goku throw Vegeta through a mountain for the next 20 seconds. Repeat. What could possibly be interesting about this as someone putting their entire body into the equation?

It's difficult to get excited, or remain optimistic, about a game in such poor shape as Dragon Ball Z for Kinect. It's a conceptual misfire with the kind of poor execution that's become unfortunately commonplace in Kinect games. And if it's no fun to play in the first 10 minutes, why should you pay $60 to experience it for hours longer?

Use caution with this one.

Mitch Dyer is an Associate Editor for IGN's Xbox 360 team. He’s also quite Canadian. Read his ramblings on Twitter and follow him on IGN.

Source : ign[dot]com

IPTL Premier Division - Group B Preview

Welcome to IPTL Season 1 Premier Division Group B overview. Information that you can find in this article should help you in getting the best possible viewing experience while watching our live stream during IGN Pro Team League where the best teams and players in the world clash not only for the money, but also for the title! Fasten your seat belts or grab something to drink and enjoy.

Premier division of IPTL Season 1 consists of 8 teams that are divided into 2 groups. In Round of 8 we are going to have Round Robin system and matches will be played in an All-Kill format. Top 2 teams in every group advance to the Round of 4 while bottom 2 teams drop into the Up and Down Matches.

Round of 4 is a single elimination tournament for the IPTL’s championship crown. All 4 teams who qualify to Ro4 are instantly seeded in the next season Premier Division’s Tournament.

Premier Group B has everything that Starcraft 2 fans love: top Korean teams and superstar line-ups. With professional commentary provided by IGN’s casters done onh free high quality stream you get a perfect combination.

Team SCV Life have five strong players capable of winning, but what’s going to happen once they get eliminated? Read about TSL’s champions and runner-ups here Known for having super strong players like Bomber or PartinG, StarTale is ready for IPTL Season 1. They possibly have the highest number of players seeded in both Code A and Code S, but is that enough? Read IPL’s article on StarTale here. This is the team with the smallest number of players, but 80% of their roster is seeded in one of GSL’s leagues. Lead by MarineKingPrime and young Creator, Prime is a force to be reckon with. Apparently they believe in motto “quality over quantity.” Is it true? Read about them here Incredible Miracle is full of big names, but is it going to be enough? Lately most of their ace players weren’t performing well, so everybody’s looking forward to see them in action. Is IPTL going to be their event? Find out more about IM here.

We want to make sure that you know our schedule for IPTL Season 1, so that you won’t miss the most exciting games this season. Below you can find the schedule for Premier Group A matches.

Match 1: Incredible Miracle vs StarTale (09/11/2012)

Match 2: Prime vs Team SCV Life (09/19/2012)

Match 3: Incredible Miracle vs Prime (09/26/2012)

Match 4: StarTale vs Team SCV Life (10/03/2012)

Match 5: StarTale vs Prime (10/10/2012)

Match 6: Incredible Miracle vs Team SCV Life (10/17/2012)

I don’t remember if we ever had such an amazing and fun to watch group in any team event thus far. Four Korean power-house teams full of beastly players and long history of grand achievements in one league is just insane. I do not believe anyone who would say they are not going to watch this – you would be stupid. I am sorry, but that’s the truth – IPL did something that only GOMTV was able to do during their GSTL event. IPTL Season 1 is going to be the best team event outside Korea hands-down.

Isn’t it electrifying to watch TSL in what could possibly look like a group of death for them taking into consideration their GSTL performance and teams that were able to defeat them in the semi-finals of every tournament? It’s going to be insane!

MarineKingPrime isn’t as good as he used to be, but I feel that this event might be his great comeback. In June he did an all-kill on StarTale in KSL Team League Season 1, so why couldn’t he repeat this success in IPTL? I believe he can, especially when he’s being supported by Creator, current TeamLiquid StarLeague 4 champion.

I cannot wait to see Squirtle’s PvP – he’s the only player who can actually make this match-up look so interesting. StarTale have so many godly players on their team that they look unstoppable, but in All-Kill format even one small point counts.

We all know the story about NesTea who created the earth and people told by Tastosis during GSL matches, but is he going win at least a game during IPTL Season 1? He’s been in a slump for a very long time, yet there are still many people who would actually love to see him win again.

But fear not! There is still Seed, LosirA, Mvp and Happy who can come and save the day, and if they would fail IM have Yonghwa. On paper it looks like they simply cannot lose even one game.

However, these are all assumptions based on players latest performance. The results will verify everything. I just hope to watch six awing matches and get ready for the playoffs. IPTL Season 1 begins shortly and it’s going to be legen – wait for it – dary!

Source : ign[dot]com

The Death of Singular Experiences

Buying a game today no longer means buying the full experience. Whether it’s background information explained in a prequel comic, additional missions via DLC or a Facebook tie-in, what comes in the box is rarely the full and definitive package. Now more than ever, developers, publishers and their marketing teams are using supplementary material to keep players mentally, emotionally and - most importantly – financially invested and engaged with their products.

But in an effort to broaden their franchises, are they also running the risk of alienating their audience? Do these supplements add or subtract from the core experience? Let’s run through a few of the most common ways once-standalone games are being expanded upon. Have a read, and then let us know in the comments section if you think these developments are for better or worse.

Multiplayer

The addition of multiplayer to titles that once-upon-a-time would have been single player experiences only is obviously a reflection of the importance of multiplayer to gaming today. In a general sense, as long as the inclusion of multiplayer doesn’t take resources away from the single player component, then it’s a nice bonus that gamers can either take or leave. That said, it adds a whole new challenge for the completionists out there, who want to 100% their games. Getting all the achievements/trophies/what have you in single player is one thing, but adding in challenges that are contingent on other players can make truly finishing a game an incredibly long road.

Dead Space 2 introduced multiplayer. It was basically extra value for those that wanted it.

That’s a challenge for some (and a first world problem if ever there was one), but the more worrying prospect for single player puritans is cross-over between the two aspects of a game. With Mass Effect 3, for instance, BioWare tied the addition of competitive multiplayer to progress in the main campaign. Sure, success in multiplayer wasn’t necessary for success in single player, but it's quite possibly a sign of things to come. Still, at least the addition of multiplayer comes at no additional cost, unlike…

Downloadable Content

Plenty of arguments have been made for and against the rise of DLC in recent years. When implemented well, DLC can expand on the scope of a game’s world and narrative (Fallout 3, Skyrim) or use existing assets and characters to tell vastly different tales (Red Dead Redemption: Undead Nightmare, Infamous 2: Festival of Blood).

These expansions offer fresh takes on old favourites, allowing fans to play more of the games they love. Even so, it can still be confusing as to which DLC changes or adds to the core game, and which is kept separate. Saints Row: The Third we’re looking at you.

But is it canon?

On the other end of the spectrum, DLC can be used in a more cynical fashion to wring a few more dollars out of customers. In this regard, Final Fantasy XIII-2 and Asura’s Wrath come to mind. Both games finish with seemingly inconclusive endings. More definitive finales for these games can be purchased through DLC. Should gamers be grateful or outraged by this practice?

Comics and books

Releasing comic book series' related to upcoming games is a growing trend within the industry. Comics can be used to introduce a new game, bridge between two existing games (Portal 2, Arkham City), or to flesh out the greater mythology of the game world (Assassin’s Creed: The Fall). Tie-in novels are also common (Dead Space).

Gaining a new perspective and greater understanding of a game world can be interesting, though there is a fine line between using a comic series to bring depth, and using it to pave over plot holes or explain ideas that should have been expanded upon within the game itself. Arkham City is a fairly straightforward game, but a number of people queried plot points that were explained in the bridging comic series. Did this lack of information ruin the game? No, but it was only through reading the comics and playing the game that the full experience was achieved.

Bridging story summary: Batman is bad-ass.

Adding further confusion is the way the tie-in comic is marketed. The importance of the comic is usually emphasised (so that people will want to buy it) while it is simultaneously insisted upon that reading it is not necessary for enjoying the game itself. Either the information is important to the understanding of the game, or it's not… right?

Facebook and smartphone tie-ins

Social media and smartphone tie-in games are now almost standard practice in the industry, and while many are forgettable, that’s not necessarily the rule. Two of the more popular examples of this type of game extension are Mass Effect Infiltrator (smartphone) and Assassin’s Creed: Project Legacy (Facebook). Each offers a very limited version of their respective titles, with completion adding and unlocking features within their console counterparts. Quality of these games aside, do you find them necessary? What - if anything - do they bring to your gaming experience? Should content (no matter how trivial) in games you have purchased be locked away, their availability contingent on you paying for or playing other content? Should games for social and mobile platforms stand alone?

Let us know your thoughts on these trends in gaming below. Which do you enjoy, which could you do without? Are there any other practices that you love or hate?

Scott Clarke is a freelance games journalist based in Australia. You can follow him on IGN or Twitter, and why not join the IGN Australia Facebook community while you're at it?

Source : ign[dot]com

StarCraft II: Preparing for Heart of the Swarm

Sometime soon beta invites will start to go out for Heart of the Swarm, the second game in a planned three-part arc that makes up the complete StarCraft II experience. Along with an all new single-player campaign, Blizzard will also dramatically alter the multiplayer game by adding in new units to the Protoss, Zerg and Terran armies, as well as tweak existing units. The result, according to game designer David Kim, will be a more complex, challenging experience.

He gave an example of what some Zerg players had been doing in internal testing. Against an enemy army, players would set up Swarm Hosts, a new Zerg unit that can burrow and periodically and automatically birth offensive units on the battlefield that roll towards enemies from long range. Players would then move in Vipers to back up the Swarm Hosts, which are flying units that can set down a Blinding Cloud to dramatically reduce the sight range of affected biological units like Marines. They then immobilized part of the enemy army with Fungal Growths from Infestors, forcing the enemy to fight off the Hosts’ units while blinded, and used the Viper’s Abduct ability to yank any mechanical units like Siege Tanks away from the enemy pack in order to focus fire them into oblivion.

“That kind of micro is pretty crazy, right?” said Kim. “But at the same time, we don’t think it’s a requirement to have to be able to use all those things. We foresee players will stick to what they’re good at more so than trying to follow pro players as much as people are trying to do now. For the pro players, the bar is definitely higher. We definitely think a better pro player will be at the top, as compared to someone who just follows other peoples’ strategies. Originality, strategy, mechanics will definitely matter, because the game is harder to play. All those factors will contribute a little more than they did in Wings of Liberty.”

So because it’s going to be such a different experience, what will happen to your Wings of Liberty online rankings? “The current plan is to just wipe everything,” said Kim. “Even the MMR [matchmaking ranking]. Another option is we might be able to bring over your MMR from the beta, because the beta and the actual game are very similar. Wings of Liberty and Heart of the Swarm are pretty different. A diamond player in Wings of Liberty might actually be a masters player, and vice-versa. We’re going to reset that and people will just have to rank up again.”

Heart of the Swarm will also bring in unranked matchmaking, giving you a way to compete without having to worry about hurting your overall ranking. “It is less stressful for most players. And those players who do opt to play in the ranked modes will have an even more competitive experience.” If you do decide to play in leagues and ladders, you’ll also find it’ll require more skill to move up in the ranks. “If you’re fifth place in diamond and I’m fifth place in diamond, I could be way better. You could be way better than me. Because there are different tiers within diamond league. We’re going to flatten that out so that each rank actually matters. The flip side of that is, if you are not a top five percent diamond player, you’d never get there, whereas right now you could.”

Your Wings of Liberty ranking won’t disappear if you pick up Heart of the Swarm when it’s ready, though. “You could choose to play two different ladders. In your Wings of Liberty ladder, you’ll have your MMR still, so if you were masters last season, even after HotS comes out, you play one game and you’re back into masters.”

As Blizzard continues to spread out beta invites, it doesn’t have a set timeline on how long testing will run. “We’re going to spend as much time as we need to, especially on the multiplayer side, really making that right,“ said producer Kaeo Milker. “Wings of Liberty has been so great for multiplayer, the esports scene has been so great, we’re going to very cautiously going to make improvements to that for Heart of the Swarm. The beta is our real proving ground for that.”

Reaching that state of readiness isn’t a scientific process, because during the beta, which will initially offer 1v1 online play, anything could change. Any number of variables, from unit damage to armor to research times for upgrades, could be tweaked, and units could even be cut or completely new ones added in. So when will Blizzard know when to stop tinkering and ship the product? “We don’t really know one-hundred percent. It’s kind of the same as how we develop the game. We constantly change units, we add in new units, we polish a lot. I think if you keep doing it, you kind of get a sense of ‘yeah, it is so much better than before.’ The time it takes to improve further from this point on is just way too long, so that’s when we decide. It’s not one hundred percent perfect, but it’s close. I think that is the point where we say, it is done.”

After that, patches take care of what beta testing didn’t catch. Following the launch of Heart of the Swarm, Blizzard will continue to monitor both it and Wings of Liberty, but Heart of the Swarm will be the focus of the team’s attention. “If there are balance problems in Wings of Liberty we will definitely address it. But probably not to the degree that we will focus on HotS because Wings has been getting two years of attention already, so naturally it’s not going to have as many problems as Heart of the Swarm.”

If the testing period for Heart of the Swarm winds up being similar to Wings of Liberty, chances are it’ll last at least a few months, meaning Wings of Liberty isn’t going to necessarily fall out of favor for a while. Kim seems happy with the current state of the game, which Blizzard recently reassessed after analyzing new data. “The global [win/loss] level [for Wings of Liberty] was looking good for a long time now, it’s fifty percent in every matchup. Every map is very good, especially in the ladder maps. So we did a more focused study on just the pro level games . We took almost fifteen thousand professional games at the highest level tournaments only in the past two years. The graph looks like a constant decrease toward fifty percent, which means we have been on the correct direction. That’s also why we feel confident if any problem arises in Heart of the Swarm because we have that track record.”

Following launch, is there any chance Blizzard might add in another unit through a patch? “We don’t want to confuse players,” said Kim, “by changing the role of a unit completely. Or adding new units or removing units with a patch. That’s only for expansion. When the game goes live, we will not patch in new units, or change up abilities, or change the role of a unit.”

Blizzard says the team is putting the finishing touches on the campaign now, so assuming a beta testing period of four or so months, it seems likely Heart of the Swarm could launch in early 2013…maybe?

Source : ign[dot]com

Malicious Review

While playing Malicious – the PlayStation Network exclusive action game from Japanese developer Alvion – my feelings ebbed and flowed. I didn’t like it at first, only to ease into the experience after a bit more play time. But by the time I reached the last boss, I gave up, confused and frustrated. This array of conflicting feelings sums up Malicious wonderfully, because it provides gamers with something seemingly likeable, but ultimately bogged down by sloppy gameplay and design that lacks any sort of rhyme, reason, or even basic explanation.

Malicious revolves around your character, the Spirit Vessel, as it sets out to fight five different bosses in order to gain access to the big honcho at the end of the game. That’s right, there are no stages to work your way through, just boss fights. In Mega Man-esque fashion, you can undertake these boss battles in any order you desire, and you’ll receive weapons and other special powers and abilities from defeating each boss. Newly acquired weapons and powers can, in turn, be used on your remaining opponents to make things more manageable.

For a $10 downloadable game that’s bite-sized and focused, Malicious seems like a pretty good offering. It's undoubtedly short – skilled players can crank through to the last boss in only a couple of hours -- but its brevity doesn’t amount to much of a problem. Rather, Malicious suffers from some serious flaws regarding its gameplay, camera, and story that overshadow its pretty graphics and unique approach. And even though it can be purchased on the cheap, a slew of superior games much more worthy of your time populate the PlayStation Network at an equal price-point.

The third-person combat of Malicious will pit you against endless streams of various lesser enemies that accompany each boss, but make no mistake: the boss is the target. The ancillary enemies only exist to build up chains and feed your character aura to make you more powerful, as well as to distract you from the task at hand. The aura you build up can also be used to heal and sustain yourself, which is important considering each boss battle is timed to last a maximum of 30 minutes. You’ll need to prepare yourself for the long haul during each battle in Malicious... unless you're skilled enough to take out the game's various bosses rapidly.

But when you take into account Malicious’s borderline-broken camera, one that constantly gets stuck, moves around randomly and acts completely wonky at virtually every moment you dare lock-on to an enemy, the fun from combat is largely removed. For such a fast-paced game predicated on consequences (you have a limited amount of lives to get through all of the bosses and face having to beat the rest of the game with one life if you mess up), players should expect combat – and especially a camera – that function much better.

Making matters worse, the developers seemed to have used the streamlined focus of Malicious as an excuse to skip-out on the exposition necessary for players to understand both the story and the game’s mechanics. Answers are there if you look for them, but that’s the point: you shouldn’t have to search around for information on what’s going on or how to play. You shouldn’t be thrust into an experience as if you know what you’re supposed to do without any sort of tutorial. You shouldn’t have to read nearly 40 pages of in-game text spread across four chapters to understand a game’s story. Such a tactic isn’t only sloppy and ill-conceived, but comes off as a cut corner.

There are some positives worth focusing on, however. Malicious packs slightly-dated, but pretty graphics. Character and enemy designs underwhelm, but its vivid color palate pops. Likewise, its soundtrack is limited but pleasant. Even the premise behind the game – a Shadow of the Colossus-like singular focus on boss battles shrouded in deep mysticism – is something I can get into. It’s just poorly executed.

Should you choose to spend some time with Malicious, you’ll find more options apart from a mere handful of boss battles and some equippable weapons. Free Play Mode will unlock when you defeat the five bosses, and further unlockables, like Time Attack and Score Attack modes, and even an online leaderboard are there for you to acquire, too. I just couldn’t bring myself to try to sort out the nonsensical last boss battle and get most of these extra perks, and I guess that’s the point. Playing the game at various times over two days broke my will to see it through.

Source : ign[dot]com

Star Wars: Darth Maul - Death Sentence #1 Review

Darth Maul, in my experience, has been a character better taken in small doses. While many complain that he was “wasted” in Episode I, I’m of the mindset that if we had been given much more of the character his mystique would’ve grow thin. However, with the character’s re-emergence in the last season of Clone Wars, the character is back with his cybernetic legs and ready to slice him up some Jedi. Luckily, Death Sentence #1 manages to walk that fine line between exposing the character and keeping enough hidden behind the curtain so that the illusion isn’t spoiled.

Writer Tom Taylor quickly sets up Maul’s current predicament – he and his brother Savage Opress find themselves with a massive bounty on their heads – while managing to re-establish why Maul is such a badass in the first place. If you’ve been waiting for Maul to spill some blood, this is the book for you. The level of savagery that he displays is beyond even a Sith Lord to some degree, as he doesn’t merely settle on the act of killing itself, but goes about it in a much more flamboyant and sadistic fashion. Meanwhile, Taylor balances this out with the Jedi trying to take control of the situation and a dangling mystery of just where Obi-Wan is. The result is a fast-paced but engaging romp through the Clone Wars era that you probably never knew you wanted to see.

The art of Bruno Redondo is more traditional Star Wars fare than we’ve seen in other recent launches like Ghost Prison and Blood Ties, and the book is all the better for it. The storytelling is fast-paced and matches the script beat for beat, meanwhile achieving the necessary likenesses for established characters like Maul and Mace Windu. Redondo’s action sequences do have a bit of a freeze-frame quality to them, slowing down the blaster fire and lightsabers to a degree that makes the imagery feel like snapshots instead of flowing action. However, there are some instances that this works to the book’s benefit – like a particular explosion in the final scene that finds Maul and Opress infiltrating the facility of the man that put the bounty on their heads.

The only other problem with the artwork is that Maul and Opress are cloaked nearly the whole time and often drenched in shadow, leaving the reader a bit confused as to who is who. It can be figured out through dialog on occasion, but in general I wish there was a clearer indicator of which character was which that didn’t require me to stop the scene to backtrack.

In all, Death Sentence is a nice surprise for Darth Maul fans, and the first issue should particularly satisfy fans of the TV show until it finally returns in the fall.

Joey is IGN's Comics Editor and a comic book creator himself. Follow Joey on Twitter, or find him on IGN. He will love Star Wars until the end of his days.

Source : ign[dot]com