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Watch Assassin's Creed 3's main man stalk a deer
Your prey in Assassin's Creed 3 extends beyond that of mortal man. No, you won't be fighting ghosts, you silly goose – bears, deers, and a smattering of other Northeastern US fauna populate the lands of AC3, offering yet another avenue for your assassination arts. Oh, and yes, this is another leak. Really.
Play Again for the first time on March 30
Here's some refreshing news: Tecmo announced the release date for a handheld game whose existence isn't totally humiliating: the supernatural murder mystery Again for DS. The publisher gave a specific day to its former March release date: March 30. In addition to the date, Tecmo provided some more evidence of Again's gameplay in the form of a trailer. Fans of Rorschach tests, full-motion video and, particularly, totally intense headache pantomime would do well to have a look. Seriously, this trailer contains the most intense fake headache we've seen in the game. %Gallery-77901%
Tecmo Koei lowers profit forecast after Q3 losses
Tecmo Koei has announced that it's lowering its annual operating profit forecast (essentially its guess for how much profit it will bring in before taxes) by a painful 95%. In addition, stock fell 9.5% to 630 yen ($7). This comes after the announcement of disappointing third-quarter losses (PDF link) totaling 1.842 billion yen ($20.4 million), and after the announcement that two high-profile games, Quantum Theory and Trinity: Zill O'll Zero, have been delayed, thus eliminating whatever they would have contributed to the current fiscal year. Now it's all up to Dead or Alive: Paradise and the Western releases of Monster Rancher DS and Again. Source [PDF]
Hands-on: Again
CING's Again (once known as Again: Eye of Providence) is just the latest in a surprising bumper crop of DS mystery adventure games, joining peers like the Phoenix Wright series, Jake Hunter, Miami Law, and the developer's own Hotel Dusk. The Tecmo-published Again brings a couple of unique quirks to the genre, while not straying too far from the sort of "visual novel" gameplay we've come to expect from these titles. Again stars a pair of FBI investigators, Jonathan "J" Weaver and Kate Hathaway, as they investigate an apparent serial killer. The murders they are looking into happen to share characteristics with an unsolved serial killer case from 19 years ago, with which J was also involved -- as seen in subtle clues like the note written to J telling him that what happened 19 years ago is going to happen again. Most law enforcement officials would probably call an agent's personal involvement in a case a conflict of interest -- CING would call it drama. %Gallery-79767%
See this Again media for the first time
Tecmo just sent over a bunch of new media for CING's upcoming DS CSI-er, Again. Created by the Hotel Dusk dev house, Again follows supernatural FBI agent Jonathan Weaver -- a man looking for answers to his family's death. He does this through his uncanny ability to look at past crimes while examining those same locations in the present. It's kind of like that black light they use on hotel rooms in news exposes, except there's less chance of seeing something that will scar you for the rest of your life because this is a DS game. Aside from a healthy amount of new screens to examine, we've also got two new videos showing off puzzles surrounding a clock and a shower curtain, the latter of which shows you how Jonathan uses his special ability. You can check out the first video above, but you'll need to see your way past the break for the other. %Gallery-79767%
Again and Monster Rancher DS also headed to Europe
Tecmo has just announced a spring release date for Monster Rancher DS and Again ... again. But in Europe this time! Last week, Tecmo announced March release dates for the Cing-developed adventure game and monster training game. Tecmo Koei Europe has followed suit, though with a less specific spring release window. Monster Rancher DS, of course, is a game about creating and training monsters -- in this game, monsters are generated either by speaking into the microphone or drawing. Again is an adventure game about an FBI agent who investigates crime scenes in both the past and the present. %Gallery-77902% %Gallery-77901%
Tecmo dates Again, dusts off Monster Rancher DS
Tecmo just sent out a release date for Again, the latest mystery adventure game from Hotel Dusk and Trace Memory developer Cing. North American gamers will be able to watch digitized actors explore the past and get headaches from dollar bills in March 2010. In addition, the company surprised us with another March 2010 release date for a Cing-developed DS game: Monster Rancher DS. Two DS games in Tecmo's once-massive monster generating and collecting series came out on DS in Japan in 2007 and 2008, featuring the ability to unlock monsters by drawing on the screen or talking into the microphone, but nothing was ever said about a North American release until now. Monster Rancher DS features both local and online monster fighting, and the return of many of the nostalgic monsters you may remember from the older games, like that one with the big eye. %Gallery-77902% %Gallery-77901%
TGS 08: Hotel Dusk devs reveal 'Again' for the first time
Hotel Dusk and Trace Memory developer CING is teaming up with Tecmo to deliver another atmospheric adventure on the Nintendo DS, this time in the form of a supernatural murder mystery. Again: Eye of Providence follows FBI special agent Jonathan Weaver as he investigates his family's death and its connection with a series of murders that occurred 18 years earlier. Again's title is derived from Jonathan's ability to see into the past and experience crimes -- you know, again.Producer Koichi Yamaguchi walked us through a very early build of the game, demonstrating how this helpful hindsight would help us piece together the events that occurred in a given crime scene. In what is essentially a game of spot-the-difference, you'll view the environment in a first-person perspective on both DS screens (in book orientation). The touch screen allows you to interact with the scene, while the screen to your left displays the same area, but as it was in the past. As Yamaguchi noted, it makes sense to confine history to the non-interactive screen. You can't change the past, you can only learn from it.%Gallery-34146%
