Apocalypso's Atomic Arcade

2010/02/10

BioShock 2 Action Figures Available now: Have Your Very Own Big Daddy

The game’s out this week, the soundtrack’s out this week. What else is there to add to your BioShock 2 collection? These action figures perhaps?

I read about it the other day, and then when I was stocking my Amazon aStore, I saw them (they’ve been added too), and I decided to do a post.

I’m not big on action figures. I used to play with Corps, which were similar to G.I. Joes, but I am amazed at some of the detail and effort that goes into making them. And not to mention, this is BioShock 2 inspired stuff. Now I do like stuff to do with games.

At the moment, on Amazon there are about 7 figures by NECA, one which has been available since last year: the Big Daddy Deluxe version. The others are likely scheduled to coincide with the release of the game and soundtrack this week (probably all ready happened). No doubt the best selling figure so far is the Big Daddy plush doll.

----

Sources: Big Download

2010/02/09

Fallout: New Vegas - Details, Features, Vegas, Baby

Fallout: New Vegas details were given in issues of various magazines lately, one of them none other that PC Gamer. I used to read that magazine a lot, but it costs a lot to buy here, I think, and the availability is also a problem seeing as Paperweight in Tygervalley Centre closed down.

Anyway, about those details. Everyone else is doing these lists, so I thought I would too. They’re not exactly the same as other blogs though. I did take the time to read through most of them, reword them, and add in my own little comments, as well as exclude all the fluff. Fun!

It's a first-person RPG. Fallout 3 had third person view as well, so whether they will opt to incorporate this or not will become apparent as time goes by.
It uses the same engine as Fallout 3: Gamebryo.
A new "Hardcore mode" will be available, in which stimpacks heal over time instead of instantly, ammo has weight (Fallout 3’s ammo didn’t), and players can suffer from dehydration, unless they drink something.
The story focuses on a conflict between three factions: the New California Republic, supposedly from Fallout 2, and located at McCarran Airport, Caesar's Legions, located on the Vegas strip, and the residents of New Vegas. The Super mutants are at Black Mountain.
Instead of the Capital Wasteland, like in Fallout 3, this wasteland is referred to as the “Mojave wastelands”.
The city of Las Vegas is mostly still intact, but it’s probably not in the same condition as it was hundreds of years ago.
There are new super mutants, as well as ones from Fallout 2 and 3 with different attributes, including the elite Nightkin.
Locations in the game include Fremont, Primm, the Hoover Dam, and Area 51 (Yeah!).
The player is not a Vault Dweller like in Fallout 3 but a courier who is rescued by a friendly robot.
You will have a Pip-Boy, but it’s given to you by a vault dweller.
New weapons will be available. Apparently one that looks like an M4 assault rifle (part of the M16 family. Come on, you’ve played Modern Warfare!). Wonder if the H&K 33A2 (or G3A3) model and the Chinese assault rifle will come back?
Followers can be managed via a context-sensitive menu. Thank you. No more having to keep going back and forth and talking to them all the time.
There are special moves for melee weapons in VATS.
Skills have a bigger effect on conversation choices.
There is a Reputation system in addition to Karma, like in the Elder Scrolls games such as Morrowind.

In related and covered news, a trailer was released for New Vegas recently, and the release date was given as Fall 2010.

----

Source: Duck and Cover

TrailerBlazer: Aliens vs. Predator Marine Trailer

Aliens vs. Predator Marine trailer

I was lucky enough to catch a good look at the AvP Marine trailer before The Verge went off air the other night. Most of the show was boring, but this two minute long video managed to grab my attention.

In this trailer we see a lone marine who seems to be communicating with someone over the radio. It’s almost pitch black besides the ominous blue lighting in the distance, as well as the flares and intermittent flashes of pistol fire as the Xenomorphs run rampant on floors, walls, and ceilings. You can hear the hisses in the darkness punctuating the techno music blaring.

The player manages to dispatch most of them before running over to a corpse and picking up the old faithful Pulse Rifle and going back in to the fray of frantic scratching and clawing as the aliens attack remorselessly. But eventually he succumbs as the screen goes black, and the aliens crawl all over his lifeless body.

This game looks pretty good, but be warned, Game Informer wasn’t very impressed when it came to reviewing it – the first review of AvP. It scored only 5.75 out of 10. Not very impressive, but the game still has to be released and reviewed by others. Not everyone will like a game. I mean, remember D’toid with Assassin’s Creed II? Everyone else thought it was pretty grand…

Aliens vs. Predator should be out later this month, the 16th of February, for the PC, Xbox 360, and PS3. Let the heart-attacks and night shrieking begin…

BioShock 2 Soundtrack Coming 9th of February: Same day as the Game

BioShock 2 is going to flood retail stores and digital distribution outlets when it’s released… today. Now BioShock was known for having a great soundtrack (in fact as I remember it was released for free at one stage - seriously), so where is BioShock 2’s soundtrack?

Well, it’s releasing on the same day as the game. It will be released digitally, including Amazon, in two forms: the standard and the deluxe edition. The Standard Edition has 12 tracks and the Deluxe has 18. The difference in price is about a couple of dollars.

I was reading that until it’s released, you can listen to it (not download) on Rapture Radio.

Here’s the tracklist:

STANDARD EDITION:

The Boogie Man - Todd Rollins & his Orchestra
How Much Is That Doggie In The Window? - Patti Page
20th Century Blues - Noel Coward
Nightmare - Artie Shaw & His New Music
Daddy, Won't You Please Come Home? - Annette Hanshaw
Praise The Lord and Pass The Ammunition - Kay Kyser & His Orchestra
Dawn of a New Day (Song Of The World's Fair) - Horace Heidt & His Music Knights
Night and Day (Song of the World’s Fair) - Billie Holiday & Her Orchestra
My Heart Belongs To Daddy - Eddie Duchin & His Orchestra
Chasing Shadows - Quintette of the Hot Club of France
Jitterbug Waltz - Fats Waller & His Rhythm
I Cover The Waterfront - Connie Boswell

DELUXE EDITION:

The Boogie Man - Todd Rollins & his Orchestra
How Much Is That Doggie In The Window? - Patti Pag
20th Century Blues - Noel Coward
Nightmare - Artie Shaw & His New Music
Daddy, Won't You Please Come Home? - Annette Hanshaw
Praise The Lord and Pass The Ammunition - Kay Kyser & His Orchestra
Dawn of a New Day (Song Of The World's Fair) - Horace Heidt & His Music Knights
Night and Day - Billie Holiday & Her Orchestra
My Heart Belongs To Daddy - Eddie Duchin & His Orchestra
Chasing Shadows - Quintette of the Hot Club of France
Jitterbug Waltz - Fats Waller & His Rhythm
I Cover The Waterfront - Connie Boswell
Mental Strain At Dawn - Jack Purvis, trumpet solo, with rhythm accompaniment
Bei Mir Bist Du Schon - Benny Goodman & His Orchestra, with vocal by Martha Tilton
The Trouble With Me is You - Red McKenzie
The Skeleton In The Closet - Putney Dandridge
We Saw The Sea - Fred Astaire
La Mer - Django Reinhardt

----

Source: D’toid

Release the Payload: BioShock 2, Dante’s Inferno

Well, BioShock 2 should be out today, and will no doubt thrill a lot of people. Reviews so far indicate that the game is a successful and worthy sequel to the original.

The game is supposed to be out today, the 9th of February, in North America, but I was listening on The Verge the other night, and Pippa said it would be out in South Africa on the 11th, which is Thursday. She also talked about some competition coming to The Verge, where there would be some giveaway of a BioShock 2 Collector’s Edition sometime. So make sure to watch The Verge this week, and get the details.

The Verge appears on Vuzu, Channel 123 on DSTV, and to win these competitions you usually have to SMS or text from your Vuzu account online to stand a chance.

You can order BioShock 2 on Amazon for the PC, Xbox 360, and PS3. You can also get the game at Direct2Drive, and the offer is still on where you can get both BioShock 2 and BioShock 1 and save 10%, but I doubt it'll last long.

BioShock 2 at Amazon BioShock 2 at Direct2Drive

Another game that releases today for consoles in America is Dante’s Inferno, although other territories like Europe and Australia should all ready have it. Reviews for this game have been lukewarm to good, with critics saying it’s really just a God of War clone and doesn’t bring much originality to the table, but it’s still worth playing if you’re a fan of the genre.

You can pick up Dante’s Inferno from Amazon for the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and PlayStation Portable.

Dante's Inferno at Amazon

2010/02/08

ROTT Reboot isn’t Really a Reboot: Coming to iPhone

Man, this was a bit of a let down, don’t you think?

For months, rumours having been going around that Rise of the Triad, that all but forgotten classic FPS from the 90’s, would be getting a reboot. It turns out that reboot is actually just the game coming to the iPhone, iPod touch and iPad. It’ll be available on the App store, but as for a release, they said “soon.”

Apogee Software and Mobila Interactive are working together on this project.

That’s fine for some folks, but here I was expecting something a little bigger. I may have gotten my hopes up a little. But one wonders if this may just be the start of something else. I don’t know if ROTT with all its quirkiness would actually work with today’s technology, and demanding standards, and “fans”.

From what I’ve read on the game so far, it looks as though it may be getting a few tweaks. But I’m probably getting the same functionality out of playing around with ROTT on the PC with WinRottGL (Birger got a new web address for this site by the way. It used to be something else).

----

Sources: Twitter – 7outof10

Metro 2033: Behind the ESRB’s Mature Rating

Another little nugget on twitter was that Metro 2033 has a mature rating, due to Violence, Sex, Nudity, Strong Language, Drugs, etc.

Apparently in the game, there will be prostitutes who will obviously have their little way of speaking to potential clients. And the player can choose to follow her in to her room, and give her the money, but that this will be interrupted by an event in the game.

I don’t quite get what they mean. I think it’s like just as they're about to get it on, there’s some spectacular happening that means the player’s undivided attention. I hope he got his money back. So from this, they say that he encounters a prostitute (as in one), so it may not actually be like GTA where they’re all over the place, and you can beat them to death afterwards (to get your money back).

As for the violence, there will be blood, and it can stain floors and walls and the player’s visor (the characters tend to wear gas masks and that sort of thing).

The characters also swear in the course of the game.

There’s even a sequence in the game where the player can take drugs. He’s able to use a hookah, and then experience the effects of the drug.

This sounds even more authentic than S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Oh, on that note, the developers would like you to know that this game is nothing like S.T.A.L.K.E.R., seeing as it’s not an open world romp, but a “tight, cinematic, scripted experience”. It’s been compared to games like Call of Duty or BioShock as far as play-style and gameplay are concerned, just with a little bit of trading involved. They would also like you to know that the game does not use the same engine as S.T.A.L.K.E.R. (X-ray), but possibly a derivative of it. (No, it doesn’t! Damn it! – 4A Games)

In any case, the game is based on the cult novel by Russian author Dmitry Glukhovsky, also titled Metro 2033 (which has a sequel in Metro 2034). Apparently Metro 2033, the novel, is getting an English translation soon.

Metro 2033, the game, should be out next month, on PC and Xbox 360 (no PS3), on the 16th or March in North America, and the 19th in the United Kingdom.

----

Source: Connected Consoles