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Red Faction Battlegrounds review: Get your half-ass to Mars
Man, is there anything more pretentious than a game reviewer? Just look at him, stirring his whole leaf Darjeeling tea with a gold-rimmed monocle, sneering at any game that doesn't aspire to turn Roger Ebert into a weepy Gamestop customer. Why can't he just enjoy a four-player vehicular combat game for its simple pleasures and stimulating explosions? I tried, between sips. Despite ticking some appealing boxes and crates of TNT, Red Faction Battlegrounds is a tepid pursuit of the bare minimum, resistant to the creative nudge that could have made it feel like something worthwhile. Everything works, it does what it says on the tin, but there's not a spark of personality in there. Even the ties to Red Faction are superficial -- the tanks, armored cars and bipedal mechs could have been from any game and any planet.%Gallery-120476%
XBLA in Brief: Red Faction: Battlegrounds
This ain't your granddaddy's Red Faction. We'd wager it's not your daddy's Red Faction either. Nope, Red Faction: Battlegrounds is a horse of an entirely different color. Specifically, it's a fixed-view car combat game with a focus on party-style multiplayer. Quite the departure, right? Check out the latest XBLA in Brief and see it for yourself. [iTunes] Subscribe to XBLA in Brief directly in iTunes. [Zune] Subscribe to the XBLA in Brief directly. [RSS] Add the XBLA in Brief feed to your RSS aggregator and have the show delivered automatically. [M4V] Download the M4V directly.
Red Faction: Battlegrounds launch screens and trailer roll out
Man, it seems like our whole day has been about Red Faction: Battlegrounds. Not only is THQ Digital's destruction derby available today on PSN (and tomorrow on Xbox Live), but the studio has released a metric ton of screenshots and a launch trailer, both of which are posted after the jump.
Red Faction: Battlegrounds beta extended to Oct. 26
If you were one of those lucky few PlayStation Plus members selected for the Red Factions: Battlegrounds beta, you'll have an extra week to zoom around and blow junk up. Word comes via the PlayStation Blog, where Volition community manager J Goldberg also announced that 1,000 more PlayStation Plus members will be invited into the beta. Red Faction: Battlegrounds is a twin-stick shooter in which up to four players engage in vehicular-based combat both online and off. It's expected to launch on Xbox Live Arcade and PlayStation Network in early 2011.
Red Faction Battlegrounds trailer blows up
Curious what Red Faction Battlegrounds – the downloadable title from THQ Digital – is all about? We told you this morning that it's a "topdown car, mech and rover combat title" but what does that even mean? Lucky for you, there's a trailer just after the break and some screens in the gallery below, all designed to communicate what Red Faction Battlegrounds is all about. And that, to quote the trailer's unnamed narrator, is simply "to blow shit up."%Gallery-99560%
Red Faction: Battlegrounds announced for XBLA, PSN by THQ Digital
In a panel at the just-kicked-off GDC Europe conference in Germany, THQ Digital creative director Don Whiteford revealed his studio's first major title, Red Faction: Battlegrounds, being built by a core team of just four people. As reported by Gamasutra, THQ Digital Warrington – formerly known as Juice Games – is working on the companion game, due for release on Xbox Live Arcade and PlayStation Network before next year's March retail release of Red Faction: Armageddon. THQ's Danny Bilson previously said it would be available "three or four months" before Armageddon, putting the downloadable title's launch somewhere around December of this year. Gamasutra reported that Battlegrounds is a "topdown car, mech and rover combat title [...] with up to four players on the same screen" and offers the ability to "unlock unique elements in Red Faction: Armageddon." As for why a downloadable Red Faction game comes so close to a major retail release, Whiteford said that while " margins were looking very healthy in this space," a key part of the strategy is "building awareness and loyalty for the company's core brand products." And it seems to be working. This is our fourth post mentioning the game and it's only just been announced! [Update: THQ has dropped the press release – found after the break – and it's got some additional details. First, it's due for release in 2011 so, keeping with Bilson's earlier comments, we imagine an early 2011 launch. The game features destructible environments, just like its console cousins, and supports four-player local and online "pick-up-and-play multiplayer." The game is described as "a fast-paced multiplayer-focused vehicular combat game in which fast-attack vehicles, heavy tanks and combat walkers wreak havoc above ground and beneath the surface of Mars." It's apparently playable at Gamescom this week in Germany, so expect some impressions here shortly!] [Update 2: We've got the first trailer and screens from the game here. Or you can always click the handy "screens" or "video" tabs above.]
