‘Rock Band VR’ is coming from Oculus and Harmonix in 2016
Oculus VR’s Palmer Luckey was going to be at The Game Awards but we didn’t know why. It turns out that he was going to appear onstage and debut Rock Band VR. All we know for now is that it’s coming next year and that, well, you’ll play a version of Rock Band in virtual reality, and that Dragon Force’s epic speedmetal track “Through the Fire and Flames” is going to be featured. So there’s that. Are you ready to play virtual instruments in virtual reality?
Watch The Game Awards with us tonight
The Game Awards kick off at 9PM ET (6PM PT) and we’re hosting the entire show live on Twitch, complete with ridiculous commentary from your trusted Playdate team, Timothy Seppala, Sean Buckley and myself, Jessica Conditt. This is The Game Awards’ second year running and it’s poised to be a big, fancy affair filled with new trailers, game announcements, famous guests (including Kiefer Sutherland and Shaq) and musical interludes. And, of course, awards.
There are 22 categories, but titles up for “Game of the Year” are Bloodborne, Fallout 4, Metal Gear Solid V, Super Mario Maker and The Witcher 3. Watch along with us in this post, on Twitch.tv/Joystiq or on the Engadget Gaming homepage.
Double Fine is making ‘Psychonauts 2’ but it needs $3.3 million
Psychonauts 2 is happening. It’s a sequel to Double Fine’s first-ever game, a quirky, beloved, 2005 platformer about a team of psychic spies-in-training. Most of the pieces are in order — the concept art is in, the characters are rendered, the narrative is prepped and Double Fine founder Tim Schafer is ready to roll. The studio needs just one more thing before diving into development: $3.3 million from investors and fans.
Sign up to try ‘Doom’ on PS4, XB1 or Steam this weekend
So you didn’t buy Wolfenstein: The New Order, but you still want early access to the new Doom game? Run, don’t walk to the sign-up page and get your information in (those who bought Wolfenstein last year should just search for the download on their respective gaming platforms), because this weekend it’s taking testers for the test version on PlayStation 4, Xbox One and Steam. The website is (predictably) crushed by gamers seeking a return to demon-filled corridors of their youth, but with access promised “first-come, first-serve” it’s time to give that F5 key or auto-refresh script a workout. Good luck, but if you don’t get in then maybe this quick taste of some multiplayer footage will help.
Source: Bethesda Softworks (Twitter)
Fashion brand Moschino is making a ‘Super Mario’ collection
Moschino is becoming known for sending bizarre collections down the runway, meshing interesting aspects of culture with fashion. The brand’s creative director, Jeremy Scott, has designed pieces based on fast food chain McDonald’s, cartoon character SpongeBob and, most recently, Barbie. But it’s not stopping there. Now, Moschino has partnered with Nintendo to unveil “Super Moschino,” a set of t-shirts, sweaters and leather accessories that use Super Mario characters as the subject.
Source: Moschino
The NX is not another Wii or Wii U, Nintendo’s new boss says
Tatsumi Kimishima has big shoes to fill as the new president of Nintendo, following the unexpected death of Satoru Iwata earlier this year. Kimishima laid out his winding path toward leadership to Time, noting his involvement in the Great Wii Shortages of the mid-2000s and painting himself as a silent puppet master pulling strings across Nintendo for decades. He also laid out bits of his vision for the future, including some insight into Nintendo’s mysterious new console, the NX.
Source: Time
Play god live on Twitch in ‘Legend of Dungeon: Masters’
Livestreaming sites like Twitch and YouTube Gaming are driving developers to rethink the way their games are played (and watched). One studio in particular has embraced this spectator-focused industry, and it’s pushing the boundaries between player and audience member. Robot Loves Kitty is the husband-and-wife studio responsible for Legend of Dungeon. Its latest spinoff, Legend of Dungeon: Masters, allows Twitch viewers to drop helpful items or dangerous foes into the games played by their favorite streamers, live. It’s almost like playing God, but in a dark, hellish dungeon — perhaps “playing Lucifer” is a more correct phrase.
An ‘XCOM’ game in Excel beats playing with spreadsheets
Who said that spreadsheet apps had to be dry and boring? Certainly not Reddit user Crruzi. As a test of Visual Basic skills, the budding programmer wrote and released an XCOM game, EXLCOM, for Microsoft Excel. That’s right — the same software you use to create charts and graphs will also let you fight invading aliens. It’s not what you’d call visually rich (just about everything on the map is represented by crude squares), but it’s a surprisingly thorough recreation of the game’s tactical battles, complete with unique character stats and terrain you can blow up. There’s even a basic level editor.
Via: Polygon
Source: Crruzi (Reddit)
‘Vampyr’ casts you as a creature of the night with a conscience
Since we last heard about developer Dontnod’s vampire role-playing game, Vampyr, set against the first World War, the studio released and wrapped the excellent episodic Life is Strange. But seeing as how that project has wrapped for now it’s time to focus on the post-World-War-I tale of the macabre once more. Turns out that it’s an action role-playing game focusing on makeshift weapons and the protagonist’s newfound vampiric ways.
Source: European PlayStation Blog
The ‘Uncharted 4’ beta launches ahead of schedule
We didn’t know the specifics of exactly when the Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End multiplayer beta would launch before, but that’s changed. Nathan Drake’s online adversarial adventures, and, by extension, yours, begin at 5 PM GMT (12 PM Eastern) tomorrow for European folks. Domestically, we’ll have to wait for Friday. We’ve reached out to Sony for exact timing of when the test phase will go live in the US and will update this post should the company respond. Remember, you still need a copy of Uncharted: The Nathan Drake Collection to access the beta at all.
Via: Kotaku
Source: PlayStation Europe
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