GTA V Delayed Until September 17th

Coming as not much of a surprise to anyone, Rockstar Games today announced the delay of the highly anticipated Grand Theft Auto V. Originally scheduled to release this Spring, the game is has now been confirmed to release September 17th of this year.

Dear all,

 

Today, we have an official release date to share with you: Grand Theft Auto V will arrive in stores on September 17, 2013.

 

We know this is about four months later than originally planned and we know that this short delay will come as a disappointment to many of you, but, trust us, it will be worth the extra time. GTAV is a massively ambitious and complex game and it simply needs a little more polish to be of the standard we and, more importantly, you require.

 

To all Grand Theft Auto fans, please accept our apologies for the delay, and our promise that the entire team here is working very hard to make the game all it can be. We are doing all we can to help ensure it will meet if not exceed your expectations come September – we thank you for your support and patience.

 

Yours,

The GTA Team

Dan Howser of Rockstar Games also commented that there was no news to share on the possibility of PC and Wii U versions of the game. But we can be hopeful that if the games exist, these extra 4 months of development time could mean these versions of the game may release alongside their Xbox 360 and PS3 counterparts. It's also interesting that it's entirely likely next-gen consoles may have been announced by this time so who knows, maybe GTA V is next-gen too?

Update

Hello everybody!

Hopefully things should be rolling again soon and the content will again begin rolling out. Plenty of reviews and articles planned and hopefully there are some of you willing to drop by every now and again to see what i have to offer! After leaving New Gamer Nation a few months ago  i've been catching up on games i didn't have time for whilst writing full time for NGN. My love for writing about games is coming back and hope to move onto bigger and more exciting things very soon!

XCOM: Enemy Unknown & Dishonored This Week

As if i didn't already have a massive backlog of games on Steam to get through, it's now about to get even worse. This week see's the release of two huge releases, one of which personally being my most anticipated game of the year XCOM: Enemy Unknown. The other being a big one published by Bethesda and developed by Arkane, best know for their work on the brilliant but underrated Dark Messiah: Might And Magic. Check out the respective trailers for both below.

5 Things I Want This Year In PC Gaming

As every year passes, it seems more and more that developers are pushing PC gaming aside in favour of focusing on consoles.  The reasons are obvious for anyone to see, larger audience, and therefore more money. Sure we've been promised more focus and attention only to be let-down.  However mainly thanks to the release of 2011 blockbuster Battlfield 3 from EA's DICE, PC gaming has seen a new lease of life with console gamers buying gaming PC's after hearing the game would boast many PC exclusive features.  Whether they stayed is yet to be seen, but 2012 needs to be a year where PC games see as much attention as the consoles.  It sounds insane to say the developers are preferring to develop for a 6 or 7 year old piece of hardware rather than state of the art powerful machines capable of exceptional feats.  Money, money, money.

So what would i like to happen in the world of PC gaming in 2012?  Let's see....

5 - Call Of Duty 2012 given the same love as Call Of Duty 4 on PC

Rambo mode, off the hip style.

Let's be honest, the last Call Of Duty game PC players accepted as not being a shoddy console port was Call Of Duty 4.  It was a great game on all systems and completely set the bar.  With complete mod support, excellent map design and pure gun-on-gun gameplay the series has never been back to these heights since.  I'd like to see the series overhauled, and the PC version get the version it deserves.

4 - A greater PC presence at the E3 show June 5-7th

E3 isn't actually a shopping centre, promise.

Every year at what is the biggest game show on Earth, we're treated to tons of reveals, announcements, trailers and general surprises.  But we all know it's dominated by the big 3 conferences from Microsoft, Nintendo and Sony.  And of course the only worthwhile news is wondering if we will even get a port of the big console games being announced.  Anything PC related is normally very low key and you have to do some searching to hear about it.  Maybe things could be different this year?  I wouldn't count on Ubisoft giving PC any love in their conference but maybe EA?  

3 - A PC exclusive to win Game Of The Year 2012

Let's be honest, this was 2011 GOTY, and the PC version is the best

The award for Game Of The Year isn't exactly an official award, as there are many many websites and publications that state their Game Of The Year, so it kind of comes down to which title, won the most Game Of The Year awards.  So it's pretty unlikely the could be the case with a PC exclusive seeing as the majority of guys giving out these awards are sucking on Microsoft and Sony's teet's too much to even consider playing a PC exclusive.  Last year our greatest hopes were The Witcher 2 and Minecraft.  With both these titles seeing a port released on the Xbox 360 this year wouldn't it be just a little bit funny if one of them won Game Of The Year just because it was on the Xbawx360z?

2 - Steam keeps doing what it's doing

                   No Caption Needed

Steam's revenue manages to shoot through another roof with every year that passes, and with great reason.  While Steam has it's problems, there are improvements and new features being made all the time. If they can just sort out their customer service and maybe let us know if we actually own our games that we purchase through them that would be great.  It's a bit of an addiction of mine, i have a stupid amount of games in my library, many of which i havn't given the time they deserve.  Down to their stupidly good sales and Gabe Newell's smile mostly.  It goes without saying that Steam will continue to grow this year, but i'd like to see some big new features added, perhaps the built in video recording feature that has been previously mentioned?  

I may as well slip this under the bit about Steam.  This is in every list, every year, we want Half-Life 3.  It's getting to a point now where it just HAS to be coming.  Consoles are coming to the end of their lifespans and Half-Life 3 has almost certainly been developed on PC, Xbox 360 and PS3 so surely they don't want to leave it too late to announce this game.  Also fuck off Origin.

1 - Acceptance

                                                                                              Not relevant

I'm not sure if i want PC gaming to be accepted by console gamers, or whether they just need educating.  It's only getting worse, reading through forums and comments on videos made by console players makes me simply angry.  I'm not saying it's all of them, but fuck me it's the majority.  Things console players have actually convinced themselves to be the truth are insane, here are some examples....consoles have better graphics, a controller is more accurate than a mouse + kb for FPS games, pretty much the only games on PC are World Of Warcraft and The Sims.  So for fucks sake, please let there be some light shine down that let's them know this isn't the case.  The first step has already been taken thanks to Battlefield 3 and the common knowledge that the PC version is the definitive version with it's 64 player matches and beautiful graphics.  So education, acceptance, whatever it is, i just hope something makes them realise what the PC is capable of.

Medal Of Honor 2 in 2012?

As real as it looks, this ain't the real MOH2 picture.

In an unfortunate turn of events back in October 2010 we had the release of the Medal Of Honor reboot, seeing it take on the modern day war genre and kicking it's World War 2 games to the curb.  As I'm sure most of you are aware it didn't go well.  I pre-ordered the fucking thing for £29.99 so think how i feel.  Am i being too harsh?  It wasn't terrible, it just wasn't anywhere near as good as promised from a big name EA franchise was it.  The single player was forgettable, buggy and painfully short, and multiplayer was created by DICE (Battlefield, Mirrors Edge) and was alright, but was trying too much to be Call Of Duty and for the most part doing it worse.

Fast forward to 2011 and i remember a quote from someone from EA or DICE saying we they would put out a Battlefield game every year like it's competitor but instead a possible bi-yearly series cycling with Medal Of Honor.  So if this is true, we should see the next Medal Of Honor game this year, most likely during the October/November time period and announced at this years E3 in June.  We already know it exists, this was confirmed.

So what would you like to see in Medal Of Honor 2 that would make you forgive EA/Danger Close/DICE for 2010's cluster fuck?

Let me lay down some ideas...

- New Engine?
- Back to WW2?
- Frostbite 2.0?
- Less Call Of Duty, more Battlefield?
- More of the same but better?
- Fuck off and burn it with fire!?

Let me know in the comments!

Impressions - The Darkness 2 Demo

I never played the original console exclusive 'The Darkness' back in 2007 when it was released because frankly, it looked bad and i heard bad things.  Now four and a half years later the sequel is being released and why should you care if you never bothered with the first like myself?

Well from the first footage shown, it was obvious the game was going for a different feel.  I kind of liked what i saw and was all the more interested knowing that a different developer had taken over the reigns of creating the title from Starbreeze Studios.  Digital Extremes, best known for their work on the Unreal Tournament, Bioshock and Homefront Games have their own vision of what they want from the comic book adapted 'The Darkness 2'.  Now sporting cell-shaded graphics and a quad wielding system, it immediately catches the eye.  So when i noticed the demo appear on Steam i was inclined to give it a try.

Taking place 2 years after the previous game the story continues with you re-taking the role of the current holder of The Darkness.  The demo begins with seeing yourself with your hands nailed brutally into wood behind you, and in it's own special way the new art style makes it look beautiful.  And of course the guy doing to you is wanting to take your Darkness powers and you're provided with a variety of flashbacks.  Firstly we're treated to a walk through a posh restaurant, showing off the new art style to full effect.  And while it isn't the prettiest thing on PC by a long shot, it's better than most other console ports.  Anyway I'm not going to talk you through ever scene, let's get to the action (I'm sorry that sounded gay, it won't happen again in this article.)

Yes you can do that while not in a cut-scene, seriously.

After a bit of a commotion we get a nice hand-held tutorial section beginning with being dragged backwards to safety by a friend whilst having to shoot pop-up enemies with the aid of some very console aim-assist.  I'm not sure if there's an option to turn this off, i hope so it made me feel nauseous (but not as much as the console FOV...)  After some more pretty explosions and cut scenes the demo gets very interesting.  The game introduces us to quad wielding, that's fucking right.  Whereas the first game allowed us to dual-wield guns OR The Darkness demon arms, we can now use both at the same time and it works, really damn well.  You know you're having fun when you could easily be shooting your enemies and winning, but choose not to and instead go for the slower option of taking them out with your Darkness demon arms because it's so satisfying!  One arm slashes and the over grabs, combine their uses and pick up a bad guy, throw him up in the air and tear him in half.  The animations are beautiful and the art style fits like a glove.  This continues for the rest of the demo with the odd cut-scene and flashback and also with everything you do you earn points that you can spend on new abilities.  It all plays pretty well and i had a smile on my face the whole time.

Sure i didn't take much notice of the story, i don't really care, it was fun.  While it is a console port the frame rate stayed at a steady 60fps on highest settings on my system apart from the odd slowdown and stutter, which I'm sure will be fixed by release.  The game will be using Steamworks integration and is due for release on February 7th 2012 in the US, and the 10th in the UK.

Buy it here and/or download the demo - http://store.steampowered.com/app/67370/ 

Release Details - Alan Wake

Very excited to play the upcoming PC version of Alan Wake as the 360 version is one of my favourite games of all time.  I should have a review copy before release.

Info source - http://www.alanwake.com/alan-wake-is-coming-home/

Alan Wake is coming home!

Launch Details for the PC Version of the Critically Acclaimed Psychological Action Thriller “Alan Wake” 

HELSINKI; FINLAND (February 2^nd 2012)- That’s right folks. We’ve obtained the PC publishing rights, and we’re putting them to good use – Remedy Entertainment Ltd. is proud to announce that Alan Wake will finally be available on PCs through Steam on February 16^th and soon afterwards through other popular digital channels. Additionally, a boxed retail version of the game is coming soon. Steam pricing is confirmed as follows: $29.99 (game + DLCs) and $34.99 (LCE).
Alan Wake is a highly anticipated title among PC gamers and it’s finally coming home – sorry for the wait! Boasting 3 BAFTA nominations and named Game of the Year by TIME Magazine, Alan Wake combines inspiration from Alfred Hitchcock, Twin Peaksand Lost – but you probably already know all that if you’ve been paying attention.  It’s a modern cult classic, praised by critics and fans alike as one of those game experiences that brings something unique, engaging to the table. We’re not just making that up, either:

• ”Great entertainment … a tough game to put down once you’ve started” – Oh, well, thanks Mr. IGN!
• “Redefines interactive storytelling” – Hey, we appreciate it, Brian Crecente.
• ”Alan Wake is a brilliant piece of storytelling and one that is going to stand out as an example of single-player gaming done right.” – Aww shucks,we love you too Worthplaying.

Very soon our PC friends can enjoy the gripping, intense storyline and kick-ass action as our troubled writer faces darkness with light as his only ally. (Well, okay, some guns, too.) It’s like something out of a nightmare – a small Washington town, a missing wife, a darkness that stalks the woods, and a strange horror novel that Wake can’t remember writing, but which seems to be coming true before his very eyes.
PC gamers will face the darkness in stunning high-resolution graphics, refined and enhanced PC features and support for stereoscopic 3D and multiscreen.  “We’ve done our best to do justice to the PC version and do things the way they should be done for PC. The PC version looks absolutely beautiful. We’re bringing the game to life in a whole new way,” says Markus Mäki, CTO at Remedy.”
With our history of PC titles, such as Max Payne, Max Payne 2 and Death Rally, Remedy has always wanted to bring a PC version of Alan Wake to the gamers’ fingertips. Now we can! We’re glad to be able to self-publish the title on Steam and work with Nordic Games to bring Wake to retail.
We’re very proud of what we’ve done so far with Wake – but for gamers who’ve always wanted the “every setting maxed out” experience, the modern PC hardware takes Alan Wake to new heights… and we bring the high definition goods. Believe it: You’ve never seen Alan Wake looking like this.
Can’t get enough Alan Wake? Don’t forget that the standalone spin off adventure, Alan Wake’s American Nightmare, is coming to Microsoft’s Xbox LIVE Arcade on February 22 for 1200 MS Points.
The Key PC Version Enhancements

• Experience Alan Wake’s Pacific Northwest in higher resolutions and higher fidelity than ever before
• Fully configurable mouse and keyboard support (or if you prefer to play with the Microsoft gamepad connected to your PC, you can do that too!)
• A wide selection of customisable graphics settings and support for 4:3, 16:9 and 16:10 aspect ratios
• Multithreaded engine that takes advantage of quad core CPUs
• Additional features our fans have sought after, such as field of view adjustment as well as “hide HUD”.
• Works with AMD Eyefinity 3D 3-screen mode
• Works with NVIDIA NVISION2 Stereoscopic 3D

About Alan Wake
In this story-driven and intense Psychological Action Thriller, players assume the role of Alan Wake, a best-selling suspense author suffering from writer’s block, who escapes to a small town only to experience the mysterious disappearance of his wife. Set in the seemingly idyllic town of Bright Falls, Washington, Alan Wake draws players into an intense, cinematic world that enables players to explore the hyper-realistic and interactive environments. Alan Wake is structured in an episodic format, much like a thriller TV series, with a deeply engaging and suspenseful storyline unveiling plot twists and profound character revelations in nearly every episode.
Players will unravel the riveting plot through multilayered character interactions, unique problem-solving and intense combat against the darkest of enemies. In this nightmarish world, where the boundaries between reality and fiction become increasingly blurred and ambiguous, Alan Wake must use a variety of weapons to survive, including his most powerful ally against the darkness – light itself.