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Adorable Valentine's Day card templates from PaperRockScisorz
Despite previous indications to the contrary, the Joystiq Qrew is actually pretty keen on Valentine's Day. We're all hopeless romantics, but you don't need to be as in love with being in love as we are to recognize how precious, touching and clever these gaming themed Valentine's Day card templates are.Made by Etsy user PaperRockScisorz and available at her shop, these print-your-own card templates feature Pokemon, Dr. Mario, Sonic, Zelda and Portal motifs with cutesy sayings and pixel hearts at $2.75 a pop. It's an easy and inexpensive way to show your significant other that you care, assuming you're lucky enough to share your life with a person that loves games as much as you do. If you're not that lucky, well, maybe get them a gift card or something. Single people are advised to dress up like a member of their preferred gender and have a romantic candle-lit dinner with themselves in a mirror. Ain't love grand?
Sex and violence: Rusty Hearts pulls out the stops for Valentine's Day
Poor Frantz! With Valentine's Day coming up, the pressure is on for him to find his long-lost love Amelia. Fortunately, the entirety of the Rusty Hearts crew has got his back and will do their best to help true love find a way. This next chapter of the game's storyline is coming on February 14th with Rusty Hearts' Requiem update. It's not just about wuv, twue wuv, but also about kicking butt in all sorts of new locales. An eight-person raid dungeon called The Altar will present one of the toughest challenges in the game to date -- and brand-new weapons for those who master it. If you're looking for something more bite-sized, however, Requiem has four standard dungeons on the docket as well: Opera House, Catwalks, Gallery, and Ramparts. Perfect World will also be adding several other features to the game, including a new character for sale (Roselle Vergerius), an increased level cap, a whopping 200 new and upgraded high-level skills, and the hub world of Training Camp. We have a trailer for Rusty Hearts' lonely hearts update after the jump!
February 14th is Valen... Angry Birds day
Forget poking: from February 14th, show you love someone by flinging a mis-tempered avian toward them. It's Valentines Day that Angry Birds will finally arrive on the ubiquitous social network -- just in time to ensure half the coupled population of the world misses its dinner reservation, in order to get past one more level. The basic game will be free, but upgrades like the Mighty Eagle, double-sized birds, an earthquake weapon and a max-strength catapult will cost you. It'll be launched in Jakarta around the same time you offer up that heart-shaped box of chocolates, so if you want to ensure the day remains romantic, we'd suggest waiting until the 15th before installing.
Apple Store is down (Update: Back up with Valentine's Day gift guide)
The yellow sticky note of doom has appeared, and the Apple Store is currently down. What sort of updates will this bring? Since it's early Friday on the East Coast, most likely maintenance. But with Macworld, it could be anything. We'll let you know of any changes once it's back up! Update: The store has come back up. No new items have been added, but Apple has a new campaign on the store focused on Valentine's Day. Apple has positioned it as a gift guide, and the iPad 2 with a (PRODUCT) RED Smart Cover is prominently displayed.
DCUO puts Valentine's Day on hold, plans seasonal events
Roses are red, violets are blue, Valentine's Day will be back eventually in DCU... O. Fortunately for those disappointed with the lackluster event last year, SOE agreed with the general sentiment and promised that the future version will be the snugglebunny event of the season. However, it looks like the new, improved Love Day feats won't make it to the game in time for February 14th. That said, the team is already focusing on several upcoming events to coincide with each of the major seasons. "Over the next cycle, starting with summer, we will be adding the following: Boss fights to Summer, Winter, and Spring, and open world content to Fall," Creative Director Jens Andersen writes. The next scheduled event in DCUO is for March's St. Patrick's Day. Hopefully, by this time next year DCUO will be in a more loving mood with Valentine's Day 2.0!
Angry Birds catapulting to Facebook on Valentine's Day
Mirroring the plans of every bitter, lonely soul the world over, Rovio will be filling Facebook with anger come Valentine's Day. Granted, Rovio's February 14 release of Angry Birds for the social-networking site will be quite a bit different from the vitriolic bile we'll be spewing as a projection of our own debilitating loneliness, but both activities do involve throwing things and impassioned rants about how things didn't go as planned.In addition to leaderboard support, the Facebook version of Rovio's darling will feature "higher quality animation" to take advantage of the game's full-screen capabilities. It will also include power-ups, which come in familiar bird flavors as well as more divine abilities, such as triggering earthquakes on command. Power-ups can either be earned in-game or purchased for $0.99, but you'll never be able to buy your way back into her heart. Please come back, Susan.
Pink Samsung Galaxy S II makes UK bow on cupid's bow, is the new Godiva
Pretty in pink, isn't it?! Sammy's already slapped a bit of rouge on the casing of its über-popular Galaxy S II for denizens of South Korea, making that special edition available for coloristas last November. But in an effort to share the "love," synchronize with a certain money-milking, greeting card holiday and maximize profits, the company's releasing this precious-hued wünderphone to our cousins across the pond on Phones4u and Very. Arriving just in time for you Brits to tell that special someone in your life, "I spent a few hundred pounds on this silly phone and I'm made of money, so let's seal this deal," the GS II packs the same boatload of specs that made it the undisputed smartphone king of 2011. So, come Valentine's Day, you can either give the gift of roses and chocolates or a blush-colored mobile. Or, you can stay at home, drink a bottle of red, watch Love, Actually on repeat, buy one for yourself and pretend you didn't. Go ahead, we won't tell.
Dear Esther coming to Steam on Valentine's Day for $10
The broad, early 2012 launch window of the pretty little Half-Life 2 mod-turned-full Steam game Dear Esther has been narrowed down to a sleek, streamlined release date. The game's official website just announced the title will arrive on Steam February 14 -- that's Valentine's Day, lovers -- for a cool $10. Or a hot $10, or any other temperature bill you feel like forking over. The site also posted a handful of new screens, such as the one above. See, it's got candles! That just screams "romantic Valentine's Day plans" to us.
Alter Ego: Scarred for life edition
Earlier this week saw the arrival of the highly anticipated February update in DC Universe Online. Like any other large patch in an MMO, this update not only added quite a bit of great new content and fixed some glaring exploits but introduced several issues that weren't there before. My personal pick for "worst new bug" since the patch? The F9 button no longer takes screenshots. First world problems, I know. Of course, this means I'll be dedicating this week's column to looking at some aspects of our new patchy overlord. Is it all that we hoped it would be? No. I don't think even Sony Online Entertainment would be boastful enough to make that claim. Still, I do think this first major content patch to DC Universe Online is an equally major step in the right direction. However, the tying together of PC and PS3 patches means that we won't likely see another major game-fixing update until next month since whatever the devs push out has to be able to pass muster on both platforms. That said, there's more than enough to talk about this week (and next, really), so let's get to it!
The bloody aftermath: RuneScape's Valentine's Day Massacre in numbers
Unless you had a really bad date that ended with fire and regret, "Valentine's Day" and "massacre" are typically not paired together. Of course this doesn't apply to RuneScape, which loves to break the rules and keep us guessing. RuneScape recently hosted a Valentine's Day Massacre as a tongue-in-cheek way to celebrate both the holiday and a PvP zone called the Wilderness returning to the game, and by all accounts, it was a huge success. Jagex reports that 625,347 players met their untimely end during the event, which spanned 48 blood-soaked hours. Before the massacre began, the company ran a contest to see who could predict the kill count, and one player carried away the top prize with a guess of 623,500. For anyone else who participated in the slaughter, Jagex is selling a limited edition t-shirt commemorating the event. Available in red, white, or black in the Jagex store, the tee says "I brought the Wilderness back" and can be purchased for $13.00.
Star Wars Galaxies developer webcast today shares the present and future of the game
Calling all Star Wars Galaxies adventurers -- the SOE community team is planning to pour its heart out with the fans in a developer webcast later today! If you want to get the inside scoop on the Ewok Festival of Love and the Bonus Everything Weekend, then you will definitely want to catch this chat. The webcast will take place today, February 17th, at 4:00 p.m. PST on Stickam, according to a Facebook announcement. The devs will be talking about the current in-game events as well as dropping "a few hints about what's coming up next." The Ewok Festival of Love is a month-long (February 10th through March 10th) event in which the cute and cuddly inhabitants of the forest moon of Endor celebrate good feelings, good food and their obsession with flight. By participating in the events, players can earn several special rewards including housing items, pets, and decorative wings. Because nothing strikes fear in Stormtroopers like Jedi with itsy-bitsy wings!
MMO Roundup: Blizzard's new MMO, latest RIFT trailer and more
Sometimes you'd like to know that there are other MMOs out there, right? It's not all WoW, all the time! Our sister site Massively can provide you with everything you need to know about all of the other MMOs around -- past, present and future. Blizzard speaks (briefly) about new MMO plans "To break the mold, sometimes you have to start over," says Blizzard CEO Mike Morhaime. "We're really trying to leverage all the lessons we learned through the years. Some of which we were able to address in World of Warcraft and others that maybe because of the design decisions we've made, you just can't address. So we're kind of taking a step back with all that knowledge to make something that's completely new and fresh." New RIFT trailer shows off dynamic invasions RIFT developer Trion is preparing for the MMO's impending release and has released another trailer. This trailer (titled Cry Havoc) is composed entirely of in-game footage, highlights of zone-wide invasions from the game's last phase of closed beta. The evolution of /dance Who doesn't love a good /dance? Even the most serious of gamers needs to break down and /dance once in awhile. In this weeks' edition of The Perfect Ten, Massively breaks down the ten best dances in all of MMO gaming. Did any of World of Warcraft's dances make the list? Massively's guide to Valentine's Day festivities World of Warcraft isn't the only MMO where love is in the air. From Lord of the Rings Online to Free Realms to DC Universe Online, gamers are celebrating Valentine's Day all across gaming. Interested in how other games celebrate the holiday? Head over to Massively to find out. Massively Speaking episode 134 Massively Speaking, Massively's MMO podcast, returns this week with possibly the largest collection of Massively writers ever! Hosts Shawn and Rubi are joined by Senior Editor Bree Royce, Contributing Editors Larry Everett and Brendan Drain, and Columnist Patrick Mackey to discuss the life and death of MMOs. Massively's week in review Don't let WoW Insider do all of the talking when it comes to Massively's best content of the week. The Massively staff themselves have picked out what they think is the best content their site has to offer in their own weekly roundup.
AMD can't even get through Valentine's Day without knocking Intel
Oh AMD, is no corporate-mandated, decidedly commercialist holiday sacred to you? While we were all snuggling with our snookums and/or cooing to our cohorts the marketing team at Advanced Micro Devices was shipping out something a little bit nasty -- and not in the "go get the fuzzy handcuffs" kind of nasty. The company sent out a mug of chocolates that, on the front, says "I ♥ APU," referencing the Fusion platform that's recently powered the HP Pavilion dm1z and Lenovo Thinkpad x120e to solid reviews. Sadly, that wasn't enough, as the note started like this: I heard that Sandy B. broke your heart and wanted to let you know that I'm here for you. Oh, and I have a cousin from Llano, Texas I'd like to introduce you to soon--I think you two will really hit it off! XOXO, AMD Fusion APU Cute, AMD. And here we thought maybe you and Intel had finally made up.
Win a developer's heart, win a date in Fallen Earth
Are you feeling lonely today? Kind of understandable -- as much as we like to say that this is the most commercial and pointless holiday ever, it's still hard not to feel a pang of loneliness, especially if you're wandering the wasteland of Fallen Earth alone. But the day's not over yet, and if you can scrounge up enough poker chips, you might just be able to buy yourself a date for the night with a developer, albeit via Skype. Yes, the development team behind Fallen Earth has decided to take the heart-ripping antics to the next level, placing the hearts of several developers on the Auction House for players to purchase. Winning a heart means winning a 10-minute date with the team member on Skype, and while you probably won't be asking what the other person is wearing, it's still a fun chance to get in on the spirit of the event. Besides, it's cheaper than roses, right?
Say it with Portal: Valentine's Day advice from Valve
When Left 4 Dead Valentine's Day cards can't quite express your love for someone anymore, it's time to whip out the Aperture Science Handheld Portal Device for some twisted, experimental cuddle creation.
Heart Story: One player's quest for iconic affection
The first character I ever made in WoW was a rogue named Lockette. She was an adorable little gnome with green pigtails who I played for 5 minutes while my boyfriend (who'd left himself logged in on the character selection screen) was in the shower. I don't recall much of what I did in the game during those few minutes, but I remember being fascinated by the sight of my character's footsteps on the snowy terrain of Dun Morogh. Looking back on it now, I know it probably sounds like a strange thing to be impressed by, but my gaming experience at that time was limited to sprite RPGs that didn't have those kinds of little details. I wasn't used to being able to affect the environment of a game. So I ran in circles, squiggles, and zigzags, then finally made a small effort at drawing something simple: a heart. That's when I realized the prints fade quite quickly.
EverQuest becomes ever after: A talk with Linda Carlson of SOE
When it comes to getting involved with community, Sony Online Entertainment's Director of Global Community Relations Linda Carlson knows it well. Most often seen tromping around conventions dressed as her beer-craving Dwarven alter-ego Brasse, Carlson was a fixture at SOE's Fan Faire events and author of her own gaming comic long before she ever started working for the studio. As we had the chance to find out recently, this was due at least in part to EverQuest changing her life many, many years prior. While these days meeting up with someone you've met online is considered fairly commonplace, when you look back to the earliest days of MMO gaming, it generally was not something many people did. Even if you did meet someone from "on the computer," they tended to be folks from one or another BBS -- local connections that were easily made and just as easily dismissed. The idea of not only meeting someone online in a romantic fashion but leaving the country you live in to see him/her was considered completely insane. "What if you don't get along? Or what if he/she is a murderer?" your friends might ask, since this was all really new territory and nobody quite knew what would happen. Still, some early MMO gamers like Carlson gathered up their courage and took that gamble. In honor of Valentine's Day, we interviewed Carlson about how her EverQuest connection became an "ever after" -- join us after the break!
The Daily Grind: Is your relationship with MMOs like courting?
Happy Valentine's Day everyone! Or, to the angry-slash-rebellious, The Day of Insufferable Expectations Sponsored By Hallmark. Whether you're with a significant other or are secure in your singleness, we just want you to know today that Massively loves you very much. The chocolates and plush teddy bears are on the way, promise. Speaking of love and dating, several people have made the observation over the years that players' relationships with MMOs are significantly different than players' relationships with other types of video games, almost as if these relationships mirrored romantic courting. There are periods of infatuation, lust over the hype, falling in love with the product, monogamy, secret affairs with other MMOs, moments with the game loses its luster, and the occasional break-up. So is this you? Are your relationships with MMOs like courting? Today, take a step back and analyze just how you relate to these games -- maybe you're a "player," maybe a faithful lover, or maybe just plain disturbed by this analogy altogether. What do you think? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
TUAW's Daily App: Rayman 2: The Great Escape
For a few different reasons (the recent Verizon iPhone release probably being the primary one), Valentine's Day has become another holiday for big sales on the App Store. We covered quite a few titles on sale last week, and of those, Rayman 2 is the one I'll recommend today. It's a port of an old Ubisoft title, so the controls aren't quite perfect, but it's an excellent platformer, and if you've never played through this game but like the genre, you should definitely give it a shot. There's no Game Center integration or any extra features, but if you just want to explore your way solo through the 45 different levels, the game is great. Plus, for Valentine's Day, it's only US 99 cents on the App Store, along with a bunch of other EA, Gameloft, Capcom, Sega and other developers' titles. Even if you don't have a big date planned tonight, odds are you'll find something on the App Store that you'll love.
The Daily Grind: Have you ever gone on a date in an MMO?
Fight it, avoid it or embrace it, Valentine's Day is almost here, and you know what that means: Well-meaning bloggers are going to pry into your love life! Just giving you the heads-up for the next paragraph. When our thoughts turn to sweethearts and romance, it's only natural for us gamers to incorporate our hobby into our love lives. Ew, not like that! Never like that! Put that away! I meant that MMOs can be just as much of a venue for flirting, relationships and courting as anywhere else, so it stands to reason that a segment of Massively readers have done just that. So have you ever gone on a date in an MMO, and if so, what happened? Did you map out an evening of adventurous delights, or simply play together as nature and MMO studios intended? And if you haven't gone on an in-game date, what do you envision being a fun way to spend time with a romantic interest? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
