Kiss the wife and kids goodbye. In just eleven days (five if you’re lucky) is the official release of BioWare’s highly anticipated MMO, Star Wars: The Old Republic.
I was fortunate enough to finally get some hands on with the game during a recent beta weekend and I think this may be the most immersive MMO that I have ever played.
I like to consider myself a veteran to world of MMOs, it wasn’t too long after the launch of World of Warcraft: Cataclysm that I was able to beat my addiction to such games (thankfully in part to Activision marketing the fun out of WoW). I have lost six years of my life to World of Warcraft, I have spent an unhealthy amount of time in Karazahn. My Hunter has THE ghost wolf, not that bullshit re-release spirit animal version. My Druid ran the full quest line for his epic flight form, before it was reduced to being a trainable talent that’s practically free. I’ve done forty man raids. That is just a passing glance of the time I’ve spent playing WoW when I wasn’t collecting one of my 100+ non-combat pets (before you could just buy digital pets for $10… fucking Activision). I’m not ripping on WoW and their desperate attempt to regain players by shamelessly throwing Kung-Fu Pandas and Pokemon into the game; that’s for another day. I’m just saying that this isn’t my first time to the rodeo.
From the moment I watched the opening cinematic for SWTOR, I was hooked. I decided to play around with a Bounty Hunter in honor of my hero, Boba Fett. As soon as the game began, I felt that I had a purpose. Unlike WoW, I knew instantly what my place was in the war between the republic and the empire. I wasn’t tasked with killing X amount of boars for no good reason. I was a bounty hunter and as such I was taking jobs that a bounty hunter would take. A woman offered me money to retrieve her kidnapped child. The beautiful thing about taking the mission was that she actually asked me to help her. Interacting with NPCs in this game activates something called a Flash Point which is basically an interactive cut scene where you’re able to choose your responses in this fully voiced conversation via text wheel (as seen in Mass Effect and Knights of the Old Republic). I found that with each mission I was becoming more and more immersed in the game itself. I soon realized that I wasn’t just developing my character by tweaking gear, stats and talents; I was developing his personality. My bounty hunter was a wise cracking guy that cared only for the credits but was honorable in the sense that he never backed down from a contract or allowed himself to be bought out by his mark.
While running the first few missions on Huttah, I was surprised to see how vibrant the game environment was. There is always something going on at all times. I walked out to the door to see NPCs in combat with a rival group of smugglers that were waging war on the Hutts. Not once during my game play did I see any MOBs standing idly by, waiting for me to come though and kill them. The worlds are massive and beautifully rendered, I was genuinely excited to learn that there are hidden holochrons on each world that reward you with permanent stat increases for exploring the maps.
I could go on all day about how excited I am to jump back into the Star Wars universe but I don’t want to ruin the experience for anyone that hasn’t had any hands on yet. In the first few hours of the game, I was able to predict that I’m going to lose a few more years of my life to SWTOR. If you’re in a committed relationship, you might want to make the first step and break it off now. The dark side is coming and it will take over your soul.

-Patient Zero
Bounty Hunter for Hire

::End Transmission::

High Mind
iOS

Angry Zombies!! is a top-down arcade strategy title by High Mind. The goal is to wipe out the living across the world, one country at a time.
Angry Zombies features three levels of difficulty, (Normal, Hard and Angry) and two save slots.
You take control by placing zombies of varied types and abilities on a map and watch as they go about their business, infecting/destroying the living.

Completion of each stage rewards you with gold that you can spend on upgrading your zombies or purchasing new types to add to your growing horde.
Angry Zombies!! features an in-app purchase feature where you can spend your real money on in-game gold. The beautiful thing about this system is that you’re not required to spend real cash for upgrades that would otherwise be unavailable. It is possible to max out your zombies without paying a cent.
The only noticeable flaw that I have encountered was some lag when too many sprites appear on screen at once.
For the amazing price of FREE, Angry Zombies!! is a must have for any iPhone owner or zombie enthusiast.

Get Angry Zombies!! Here: http://bit.ly/o2Vg59

The prophets at Nintendo have revealed more information from the 3DS’ book of Revelations. During the 3DS conference, earlier today, Nintendo announced some more details about the Slide Pad add-n for the 3DS.
The new Slide Pad is priced at about $20USD. The add-on will require the use of one AAA battery. Games that will support the new hardware will include Ace Combat 3D: Cross Rumble, Dynasty Warriors VS, Kingdom Hearts 3D, Metal Gear Solid: Snake Eater 3D, Monster Hunter 3G and Resident Evil: Revelations. It has not been confirmed if the listed games will require the Slide Pad or if it’s simply supported. There is no set release date for the new hardware; however, with an inbound system update scheduled for November, it will most likely be released some time afterwards. There is still no word of a new dual analog model of the 3DS (which I have named the WiiP) but looking at the numerous incarnations of previous Nintendo handhelds, I still feel it is inevitable.
What do you think about the post release hardware? Is is a curse or a savior? Do you even care?

EDIT: Release Dates added and additional games notes
I just finished tuning in to Nintendo’s live stream of the 3DS conference. Since I don’t speak Japanese, I’m going to speculate what it is that I saw… ahem.

Announced games:
SD Gundam 3D (I made up the title because I don’t understand Japanese)
Tekken 3D
Animal Crossing (Taller characters, companion animal, boys in skirts and swimming)
Fire Emblem – 2012
Mario Tennis
Ace Combat 3D: Cross Rumble
Dynasty Warriors VS
Kingdom Hearts 3D
Metal Gear Solid: Snake Eater 3D
Monster Hunter 3G
Resident Evil: Revelations

More videos of games we’ve already seen:
Luigi’s Mansion 2
Super Mario Land 3D – November 13th
Mario Kart 7 – December 4th – First Person view and gyro controls

Expanded speculation of Kid Iccarus:
Delayed-2012
Dark Pit, possibly the main antagonist? Bringing back the 80′s with an evil twin story line?
There appears to be a card reader that applies Ally, Weapon and Enemy cards to the main game.
If you had seen the brief AR card battle at the end of their video from E3, you’ll be happy to hear that the AR battles are an implemented feature of the game and it looks as though there are hundreds of cards to use. The most notable card I saw was a Metriod (that was also eating Pit’s head during a flight scene in the game)

Nintendo also announced over twitter that. The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords will be free in the eshop on September 28th. There are also new features coming to the 3DS via system update in November. The 3D camera will receive a video capture function. Nintendo also stated that there will be more content added to StreetPass Mii Plaza; no further details have been given.

Dead Island
Techland 2011
Xbox 360
PS3
PC

I’m sure by now, if you have had any interest in Techland’s Dead Island, you have read a ton of reviews that cover its numerous and often times trivial flaws. This is another one of those.

Dead Island takes place on the beautiful resort island of Banoi. After a long night of partying, you wake up to the island transformed into a feeding ground for the undead.
The game begins by choosing one of four available character classes (Tank, Leader, Assassin, or Jack-of-all-Trades). Much like Borderlands, each character has his own special ability [Fury ability] that compliments his play style. The different classes also have their own talent trees that cover Fury, Combat and Survival. While each character has fundamentally similar talent trees, they vary slightly to fit his specific weapon proficiency and team role.
The tank is exactly what you would expect, he can draw the attention of the zombies and is able to build up his defense in order to take more of a beating [but not by much]. The Leader, deceptively, plays more of a support role by specializing in ranged weapons as well as being able to activate a healing aura. The Assassin specializes in bladed weapons and has an ability to do massive damage with her Fury attack. The Jack-of-all-Trades is a fairly generic character that is proficient in throwing weapons, however; he is capable of building his proficiency with most melee class weapons.
Dead Island is fun to play alone but it is meant to be survived as a team. During normal play, a notification may pop up and tell you that another player with similar progress is nearby. With the touch of a button you are able to jump into his game and cooperatively complete quests and progress through the story together.
The story of Dead Island is sinple, you’re stuck on an island of zombies and you want to get off of it. Throughout the story, you’ll encounter survivors that ask for your help finding medicine, food, fuel or… teddy bears. After completing a quest you are rewarded with XP and cash or a useful item. Certain story line quests “reward” you with a “touching” cut scene that is littered with bug-eyed, emotionless characters and cheesy dialogue. The graphics engine is a bit dated in comparison to other new game released with its poor texture mapping and shifting focus, however; it isn’t so bad that the game is unplayable.
During my play through of the game, I have come across some fairly annoying bugs. The first bug I noticed was during a mission where I had to turn on a series of power generators in a basement. Everything was going well, I found the room I was looking for, skipped down the stairs and turned on the generators, easy-peasy. I left the room and tried to get up the steps to go turn in my quest but I was stuck. Each time I tried to make it up the steps I would slow down and get pushed backwards as if I was trying to walk through an invisible slingshot. Luckily for me, I’m a buggy game vet and I knew that walking backwards while jumping is THE way to get around this bug. Here is a video of someone else with the same problem:

Occasionally, a zombie has a hard time navigating around a simple obstacle or maybe it’ll get stuck trying to stand up after you kick him down. Here is another player’s video:

I wouldn’t really complain about this bug because I’m usually fighing off sever other zombies when it happens. Aside from invisible walls and dumber than average zombies there have been more severe bugs that have been reported [Bing the shit out of that topic].
With a few minor bugs and less than stellar graphics, Dead Island is still very fun and addictive. The first person action of Dead Island is capable of breathing new life into the zombie game genre. If you’re still unsure about the game, rent it; but do give it a try. If you’re a fan of zombie games, Dead Island is a must have.

I score Dead Island a 4 out of 5
+ Solid RPG Elements
+ Interesting weaponry
- Ugly texture mapping
- Annoying Bugs
= Must play