Those Spartans in Halo: Reach get all the luck — cutting-edge weaponry, awesome vehicles, and now new locales to wage war in.
News Blips:
Microsoft announces that the first map pack for Halo: Reach, entitled Noble Map Pack, will be released on the Xbox Live Marketplace on November 30. The pack (which will cost 800 Microsoft Points, or $10) contains three new multiplayer maps — Tempest, Anchor 9, and Breakpoint — for your fragging pleasure. Tempest pits 8-16 players in an "abandoned shoreline facility." The smaller Anchor 9 is a 2-8 player map of a "low orbit dry-dock" featuring "mirrored interior hallways" and an "open central hangar bay." And finally, Breakpoint is an 8-16 player map that features "modular archaeological labs" perched precariously atop an "icy precipice." Am I reading a press release or a travel brochure?
Netflix streaming will become disc-free for PlayStation 3 owners starting next Monday, Otctober 18. In addition to dispensing with the previously required streaming disc, the new (and free) downloadable app brings a slew of new enchancements for PS3 Netflix subscribers. The refined user interface improves the speed of finding movies. Select movies and TV shows can now be displayed in both 1080i and 1080p resolutions in addition to treating your ears to Dolby 5.1 surround sound. Also, an increased number of movies will be viewable with subtitles. Thank goodness for all this. I don't think I have the perseverance to heave myself out of my couch to swap discs on my PS3 anymore.
Sean Murray, managing director of Hello Games (Joe Danger), thinks that console game publishers who avoid "risky," innovative titles are "short-sighted." Speaking with GamesIndustry.biz, Murray paired the end of the current console cycle with a push to embrace more creative games. "I'm really excited that there are these new ways to create games, like digital download, XBLA, PSN," he said. He added, "People want innovation. It's just that at this stage, publishers don't want risk — and that's what they're saying. I think that's really short-sighted, to me, but then I'm a small developer. I think it would be really risky not to innovate at the moment."
Disney Interactive axes Pirates of the Caribbean: Armada of the Damned. Kotaku confirmed the game's demise with Disney in addition to the rumored downsizing of developer Propaganda Games. "Disney Interactive Studios confirms the cancellation of the Pirates of the Caribbean: Armada of the Damned video game which was scheduled to be released in 2011," said Disney in an official statement. "As a result of this decision, Disney Interactive Studios completed a restructuring of Propaganda Games, its Vancouver, BC internal studio, affecting one of the studio's two development teams. The studio is still in active production of Tron: Evolution." I'm not sure if Davey Jones' locker is big enough to fit an armada, but I think the analogy still fits.
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