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Welcome to another GamesBeat weekly roundup! This time, we reviewed some of the most anticipated games of the year, including Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS and Forza Horizon 2 and checked in on Civilization: Beyond Earth. And Blizzard fans ponder what’s next after the cancellation of Titan.
Happy reading, and have a great weekend!
Pieces of flair and opinion
- The DeanBeat: Tearing down barriers to games and building them back up
- The 5 backend tools every game developer needs
- Beyond China and the U.S.: Finding the next gaming growth market
- This real-life Hearthstone card game from China shows why Blizzard chose digital
- Shark-diving is way scarier in virtual reality than on a big screen
- 5 things Destiny could learn from World of Warcraft
- With Titan gone, World of Warcraft fans consider what’s next
- Titan’s death may leave Blizzard’s future in the hands of Hearthstone and Heroes of the Storm
- Oculus VR’s ‘Crescent Bay’ prototype shows why VR still has a long way to go
News
- Watch Rome burn. Sega reveals its next major empire game, Total War: Attila
- OnLive teams up with London’s Green Man Gaming to resell its cloud-gaming service
- Those New 3DSes are actually coming out this year … in Australia
- Super Smash Bros. for 3DS continues sales dominance in Japan
- Titanfall’s IMC Rising map pack launches tomorrow
- Major FIFA 15 bug turns soccer matches into a crazy free-for-all
- 26 years later, Wasteland 2 makes $1.5 million in four days
- Major League Gaming announces its own arena in Columbus, Ohio
- Why Rudy Giuliani wants Noriega to get his bloody hands off Activision’s Call of Duty profits
- First Destiny player hits level 30 after 107 hours
- Xbox One will make Chinese debut this month despite minor delay
- Activision brings in ex-NYC mayor Rudy Giuliani as it moves to dismiss Manuel Noriega’s ‘absurd’ Call of Duty lawsuit
- Pokémon-friendly transparent 2DS systems on the way … in Europe
- Nexon reassigns its top American brass to deal with star developers
- Steam’s store has become a mess — this is how Valve plans to fix it
- Ubisoft animated a lady for its 2.5D Assassin’s Creed: Chronicles spinoff
- PlayStation TV — Sony’s Vita-powered microconsole — hits in October
- After 8 years, Final Fantasy XV is about 50% to 60% complete
- PlayStation 4 online multiplayer is free for all PSN members this weekend
Mobile and social
- Americans are embracing mobile gaming — mostly by playing at home
- Real-money mobile-tournament company Cashplay closes $3M funding round
- Retro-inspired mobile hit Timberman gets real-money tournaments with Cashplay
- Alan Wake creator Remedy Entertainment taps Flaregames to publish Agents of Storm on mobile
- Google’s mobile game Ingress enables 7M players to create user-generated missions
- Kiip offers ‘rewarded video’ at the right moment in mobile apps and games
- Sega’s Crazy Taxi: City Rush rolls over its mobile game rivals in August downloads
- Social-casino games on mobile are making up for the shrinking Facebook market
- Grantoo pivots into multiplayer mobile gaming, raises $3.5M, and renames itself Fuel
- Big brands want ‘nothing to do with’ incentivized ads on mobile games
- $100K revenue via 1 in-app message? Mobile app marketing automation is taking off
- Swrve finds that only 1.35% of players spend money in mobile games
- Mobile gamers crave dumb, glitchy goats as well as clashing clans
Previews and interviews
- Cilvization: Beyond Earth: offers more than just hexes in space
- Liquid Entertainment’s Battle Realms Legends will treat gamers like shareholders, ‘not cows’
Reviews
- Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS is the Melee sequel we’ve waited for (review)
- Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor is dynamic and exciting with a crazy flaw (review)
- Wasteland 2 blends apocalyptic clichés, bad graphics, and unforgiving play into a surprise masterpiece (review)
- Fenix Rage will provide you the greatest rage-quit experiences of 2014 (review)
- Forza Horizon 2: Exhilarating moment after exhilarating moment (review)