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Fans are creating a Harry Potter role-playing game inside 'Minecraft'
There have been some ambitious Minecraft projects before, but this one may win for sheer sophistication. The modding team Floo Network is creating Minecraft School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, a Harry Potter-themed role-playing experience inside a Minecraft map. You're not just there to admire the accurate (if blocky) renditions of Hogwarts and its environs, although those are meticulous in their own right. You can solve puzzles, undertake quests, shop at Diagon Alley and fly over the Quidditch pitch -- this is more of a game than a sightseeing trip.
The original 'Pillars of Eternity' RPG comes to Switch on August 8th
Obsidian promised months ago that Pillars of Eternity 2 would come to Switch owners, but what good is that if you're a newcomer to the role-playing revival? Don't worry, you won't have to read a wiki to catch up. Obsidian has confirmed that the original Pillars of Eternity will reach the Switch on August 8th, with pre-orders already available. It's a Complete Edition, too, with the two White March expansions included to fill out the saga.
New Ys RPG announced for PS4, Vita
A new game in the Ys series was announced during Sony's pre-Tokyo Game Show 2014 press event today. The role-playing game is being created by Nihon Falcom, the series' longtime developers. It will launch in 2015 for PlayStation 4 and PS Vita.
Star Ocean: Material Trader is social, card-based RPG
The next Star Ocean game, Star Ocean: Material Trader, will incorporate the series' universe of characters and items into a social-oriented, role-playing card game, according to Siliconera's translation of Gamer's report. Series Producer Yoshinori Yamagishi is working with Circle of Mana developer Hippos Lab, Square-Enix's smartphone division, to lead Material Trader's development. The game will reach iOS and Android devices this year. Players help the game's protagonist Tina by collecting "star shards," tackling quests, gathering experience and hoarding money. Hunting for materials and characters while exploring seems to be essential to boosting odds of success in the game. The series' trademark Item Creation mechanic also returns, allowing players to create and equip powerful accessories to their favorite cards. Those who register before it releases will get a special card of Star Ocean: Till the End of Time's Peppita Rossetti.
New info and trailer for Techland's Hellraid
The first few details of Techland Hellraid have been revealed to Eurogamer's Polish site. The game is a horror/fantasy-style first-person RPG using Techland's Chrome Engine 5 to portray melee and spell-based fights with various demons, skeletons, and other bad guys. Just like Dead Island, the game will have four player archetypes that can work together, though they'll be classes rather than characters: Warrior, Paladin, Mage and Rogue. The game will be influenced by older games like "the first Quake, [and the] second Hexen or Diablo," says producer Marcin Kruczkiewicz. Hellraid's maps will be less open than Dead Island, and the experience system will be simpler, with skill trees that unlock as characters level up. Techland is currently looking for a publisher for the game, which it expects to have out this year on the Xbox 360, PS3, and the PC.
Sacred Citadel will feature four classes to level up and a gear stash
Sacred Citadel isn't just a goofy beat-em-up spinoff of Deep Silver's long-running Sacred series - turns out it's also an action RPG. When the game was announced last year, all we knew about it was that it featured co-op action and some groovy graphical flairs, but now we're seeing how Citadel relates to its big role-playing brother.Players will be able to play as three characters at a time, picked from four character classes (including a Khukuri Shaman, an Ancarian Ranger, a Safiri Warrior, or an unrevealed class), and each has their own set of skills to be leveled up and unlocked. Additionally, characters can equip weapons or armor that can be stashed in town, or pop potions to refill either a health or a power meter.Sacred Citadel, says Deep Silver, will serve as a prologue to the upcoming Sacred 3, and should be out for Xbox Live Arcade, PlayStation Network and the PC sometime this year.
Daily iPhone App: Poker Knight combines poker hands with an RPG
Poker Knight is a game that I was really excited to see coming to the App Store. I'm a big fan of poker, and I'm a big fan of role-playing games, so when that trailer arrived, I was right away looking forward to seeing what this one was like. Unfortunately, it didn't quite live up to my expectations. It's not a bad game, but the original premise of combining poker with an RPG isn't exactly what this is. Instead, it's a game that combines poker hands with an RPG. You wander around a fantasy world fighting monsters and earning XP as usual, but instead of actually playing Texas Hold'em, you're just choosing cards and putting them together into the best hands possible. You can see it in action below -- it's not the best card game ever made, but the graphics do look nice, and as you play it more and more, you do start thinking in that poker mindset of seeing how the cards fit together. There's also a magical amulet mechanic later on that mixes up the gameplay a bit more, but basically this is a matching game with that RPG foundation. It's not bad, and if the game still intrigues you, it's worth the US$1.99 to see how it plays, especially on a newer iPhone or iPad. But unfortunately this isn't exactly the most hardcore poker game around. For that you'll still have to stick to one of the many variants already available on the App Store.
Sony takes SOEmote live for EverQuest II, lets gamers show their true CG selves (video)
We had a fun time trying Sony's SOEmote expression capture tech at E3; now everyone can try it. As of today, most EverQuest II players with a webcam can map their facial behavior to their virtual personas while they play, whether it's to catch the nuances of conversation or drive home an exaggerated game face. Voice masking also lets RPG fans stay as much in (or out of) character as they'd like. About the only question left for those willing to brave the uncanny valley is when other games will get the SOEmote treatment. Catch our video look after the break if you need a refresher.
Amazon Game Connect links free-to-play, MMO games to store accounts, turns 1-Click into way too many
Amazon must have a lot of free time for gaming during its summer vacation: just a day after unveiling GameCircle as a cloud infrastructure, it's trotting out Game Connect to make buying game content that much easier. Once it's integrated into a title, the new platform will let customers buy content in free-to-play games, or subscribe to massively multiplayer online games, directly from their Amazon accounts -- no copy-and-paste juggling involved, even if the game account has to be made on the spot. A handful of game developers have already lined up, including Super Monday Night Combat creator Uber Entertainment and World of Tanks' Wargaming.net. If you're engrossed in gaming enough that you'll need 1-Click to buy virtual goods and MMO renewals that much faster, Amazon has you covered... although you may also want to slow down and relax.
Logitech G600 mouse targets button-craving MMO gamers, social life costs extra (video)
If you thought that Logitech was just going to let Razer's Naga MMO mouse go unanswered, you've got another thing coming. The G600 MMO Gaming Mouse matches the Naga's 12 side-mounted buttons and one-ups the rival across the aisle with a toggle that gives each key a second function -- if you can't bind it to a mouse button, odds are that it doesn't belong there. Just in case the prospect of spending an evening programming a mouse isn't all that enticing, the G600 has three profiles right from the start, two for online role-playing and one for when you'd rather play a Call of Duty shooter instead. Of course, the laser tracking and USB response times are fast enough to keep up when you pull aggro from monsters. Gamers willing to wait until July can drop $80 for a G600 in black or white, although we'd also set aside the costs of stepping outside every now and then.
Diablo III becomes fastest-selling PC game ever, deluge of broken PC mice likely to follow
Chalk one up for an at least temporary resurgence in PC gaming. Blizzard can vouch that Diablo III has set a new record for the fastest-selling PC game to date: at 3.5 million copies trading hands through Battle.net downloads or retailers in the first 24 hours, and 6.3 million after a week, that's a whole lot of people battling the biggest of Prime Evils in a very short time. Naturally, a Blizzard-obsessed South Korea is accounting for even more activity, where over 39 percent of play at local gaming houses can be pinned on the action RPG, and the tally doesn't even include the 1.2 million bonus copies coming through a World of Warcraft annual pass promo. Before console gamers start packing up their PlayStations and Xboxes in symbolic resignation, D3 isn't the record-setter for the most copies of any game sold in one day -- that distinction goes to Modern Warfare 3's 6.5 million copies spread across multiple platforms. That's still enough to spur on some furious clicking and possibly a glut of dead mouse buttons, but you'll be glad to know there are suitably-themed replacement mice waiting in the wings.
App Review: Battle Map lets you create huge worlds in small doses
The essence of a role playing game is, well, ... playing a role. Theoretically, you can play a tabletop RPG with not much more than your thoughts, a rule book or two, and some dice. In practice, though, an entire industry is engaged in releasing products to make imagining and inhabiting fantastical worlds a multimedia experience. Maps, adventures, miniatures, special dice, decks of item cards, and so much more are readily available. The latest entry is a full-featured iPad and iPhone app called Battle Map [US$29.99], which is now available on your iPad or iPhone as a Universal app. At 30 bucks, Battle Map is not cheap compared to most App Store offerings, but look at it against the similar Mac (or PC) program Dundjinni, which costs $39.99, or the PC-only map program called ProFantasy, which tops out at $605 for the whole shebang. Of course, these programs can do a lot more than Battle Map can, but they've also been around for many years. Perhaps in 2015, Battle Map will be as full-featured. In any case, other reviewers have called Battle Map "geek heaven" and a "must have," so read on to see if these words of praise apply to you. %Gallery-104489%
PlayStation UK Blog brings BioWare doctors in for Dragon Age live chat
BioWare fans should start polishing up their Dragon Age: Origins related questions, because the good Canadian doctors from the famed studio will be on hand for a live chat with fans this Friday, October 23, on the PlayStation UK Blog. Beginning at 7PM BST (2PM EDT), BioWare co-founders Ray Muzyka and Greg Zeschuck will be on hand taking questions about its latest role-playing game. The hour-long event will give fans a chance to ask about upcoming content, exclusive bonuses and what it's like working with that evil clown from Steven King's It Tim Curry.
Konami registers 'Genso Suikoden' in US
Late last week, Konami registered the title Genso Suikoden with the United States Patent and Trademark office. While no further details are available, the filing may be one of many different possibilities: a new game in the series (known simply as Suikoden in North America), a remake of the original Suikoden or a US release of the poor-selling Japan-only PSP compilation, which included slightly enhanced versions of Suikoden I & II.The nearly 15 year old series has been getting quite a push from Konami in recent months. In late 2008, Konami released the original PlayStation version of Suikoden on the PlayStation Network, while the Nintendo DS received the latest game in the series -- Suikoden Tierkreis -- in March.[Via Superannuation]
The Daily Grind: What do you think of table-top games?
There exists a very close relationship between MMOs and table-top games.Yesterday saw the launch of Ethernauts, the fifth expansion to EverQuest-related collectible trading card game Legends of Norrath. LoN is digital, but gameplay-wise, it's totally a table-top game. World of Warcraft has an entirely material trading card game. Warhammer Online is of course based on the Warhammer miniatures game, and WoW is getting a miniatures game of its own. And of course, the RPG genre originated on the table-top with Dungeons & Dragons.We're wondering: how much crossover is there between digital and table-top games? How many of our readers play them? Tell us! What do you think of table-top games?
Joystiq impressions: Fallout 3 (360/PC/PS3)
click to enlarge var digg_url = 'http://digg.com/gaming_news/Fallout_3_impressions_new_details_images '; In a hotel conference room, Bethesda's Pete Hines recently demoed the latest version of the Fallout 3. He trudged through a collapsed building, firing a machine gun at ambling, radiated mutants. The gore made me wince a little, with blood gurgling from zombie limbs. Earlier, he shot the head off another enemy, and blood arced straight out of the neck, as if it was trying to reach the brain one last time. Only minutes earlier, he'd shown me how the player's character grows up in an underground bunker, with those moments acting partly as tutorial and partly as a character creator. Your father, for example, stays hidden in the shadows after your birth until he checks out how the infant will look grown up. Players use a medical gadget to see (read: design) their appearance, then he emerges with roughly similar, paternal features.We've covered the game a few times before, so in addition to my general impressions, I talked with Hines about some recently revealed features.%Gallery-3507%
D&D creator Gary Gygax passes away at 69
The man known as the "founding father of the modern role playing game," Gary Gygax passed away this morning , March 4, at 69 years-old. Gygax, known for creating the massively popular pen-and-paper series Dungeon & Dragons, was a staple in the miniature war game scene in the late '60s and helped propel fantasy writing and creativity into what it has become today.Although Gygax had been in poor health, suffering multiple strokes and a near-fatal heart attack, he was a mainstay on fantasy forums and gaming sites before his passing at his studio home at Lake Geneva, Wisconsin ."I would like the world to remember me as the guy who really enjoyed playing games and sharing his knowledge and his fun pastimes with everybody else.," Gygax once described himself during a 2004 interview with GameSpy.Ernest Gary Gygax is survived by his wife, six children and seven grandchildren.
Angel Love Online brings cuteness to PS3
Tetsuya Mizuguchi is known for creating some off-the-wall games. I mean, this is the same guy who helmed Space Channel 5, Rez and Lumines, but Angel Love Online could be the strangest one yet.While the free-to-play MMO features the standard RPG knights, mages and robots, you'll also apparently be able to command humanoid pigs, cats, dogs, zombies with candles on their heads, Native Americans and several creatures the English language has no names for.Although, it's difficult to understand what's going on in the video since it's all in Japanese and the screen is obscured by disturbingly cute characters, Mizuguchi and his team definitely know what they're doing ... at least we think they do.
Tales of Phantasia 2 for DS?
Rumor alert! NamcoBandai is allegedly planning a load of new, and new-ish, games in their Tales series for Nintendo consoles. The rumor gives titles for three new (potential) games, one of which is headed for the DS. If internet rumormongering is to be believed, Namco is working on a 2D sequel to the oft-ported Tales of Phantasia. We can't comment on the veracity of the rumor's specifics, but it seems likely that more Tales games are headed, in abundance, to every platform that Japanese gamers like. Not only has the series already made its dual-screened debut, RPG-spamming has been their modus operandi since before the DS was popular. Now that the most popular console in Japan by far is also the cheapest to develop for (being a handheld), continuing the trend seems like a Tale of the Obvious.
Two new Tales games for Wii?
Rumor has it that NamcoBandai is planning two new games in their popular Tales series-- well, one new game and one new-ish game-- for the Wii. The PS2 Tales of the Abyss, as the Internet would have us believe, will get an upgraded port on the Wii, with new content and improved loading. In addition, a new game called Tales of Harmony is possibly in the works, which will take place 10 minutes (!) after the end of Tales of the Abyss. Get 'em both (if they're real) and you've got an epic RPG marathon!For unattributable rumors, they seem awfully specific, which makes them either more credible ... or credible enough fakes that we will reward the con artists responsible by believing them. We choose to believe, because the Wii could use some Japanese RPGs! We think that the one-handed Wiimote would be a great, relaxing way to play an RPG.
