THE RUMOR: Diablo III is coming to consoles
THE SOURCE: 1UP
MY TAKE: If recent job postings from Blizzard are any indication, we could be seeing some dungeon crawling Monk action coming to a home console near you. Blizzard;s own careers directory has listings under Diablo III for lead designer, lead programmer and senior producer jobs for consoles in particular. These listings also have a red “!” indicating they are important roles that need to be filled. This evidence should clearly show Diablo III is heading to consoles…right? Well, Blizzard released a statement stating “this is not an announcement of a console title,” and all they are doing is “currently exploring a Diablo-related concept for consoles.” So are they just testing to see how Diablo translates on a console for research purposes? Are they just keeping this project tight lipped until they are officially ready to announce it? Could Blizzard really be entering the console market since their days making SNES games like Justice League Task Force and The Lost Vikings?
THE VERDICT: SPARE IT!!!
As much as this looks like an experiment for future Blizzard projects it may be too early to completely dismiss a console port of Diablo III. Activision has not had the greatest year aside from their obvious juggernauts Call of Duty: Black Ops, Starcraft II and the millions they pull per month from Warcraft subscriptions…well okay so they are in no means close to bankruptcy but consider this, Tony Hawk: Shred only sold 3,000 first week units which pretty much signals the end of that franchise. Guitar Hero: Warriors of Rock met with mediocre reviews, seemingly signaling the end of the music peripheral games. The list goes on and on, but he bottom line is Bobby Kotick and company are struggling to produce sales outside of the Call of Duty franchise and even though those sales could support certain COUNTRIES…they have to know the COD train is going to run out of steam at some point. What’s a possible solution? Bring some Blizzard content over to consoles. I guarantee that if a game like Diablo III sells 5 million units on PC that it will sell AT LEAST 10 million more if it were released on the PS3 and Xbox 360. Plus of the big Blizzard franchises Diablo is probably the easiest to replicate onto consoles since the game is more action based and has an action bar that would be easier to translate onto a controller. This is getting long so I’ll wrap it up by stating that although it seems unlikely a console version of Diablo III is not beyond the realm of possibility.
THE RUMOR: Gears of War for Kinect to be announced at Spike VGAs
THE SOURCE: IGN
MY TAKE: When Kinect was announced way back when it was still called Project Natal one of the first big rumors to come out was that Halo: Reach was going to have some sort of motion control integration. Obviously we know that didn’t come to pass but now that the motion control wars are in full swing Microsoft may be turning to its other big shooter franchise to begin a hardcore Kinect movement. According to a tip, Microsoft is going to use the VGAs to introduce some big action games and Kinect games and the one that will headline it all will be Gears of War for Kinect developed by Epic Games. Will it be Gears of War 3 with the option for Kinect controls or will it be a spin off game designed specifically for Kinect a la Link’s Crossbow Training? No one really knows and with Microsoft taking their oh so useful “we can’t comment on rumor or speculation” stance we aren’t going to get clarification that way. So since Microsoft won’t serve up the goods I guess we just have to listen to my best hypothesis on the rumor at hand.
THE VERDICT: KILL IT!!!
Sorry folks, but this rumor just got curbed stomped by the one and only Cliffy B. Via his twitter account Epic Games designer Cliff Bleszinski tweeted simply “No Kinect in Gears of War 3.” To be honest this is probably for the better. Gears of War would probably be one of the hardest shooters to translate onto Kinect since it’s so cover based. Unless you want to be slamming into the back of your couch for your entire gameplay experience or wrecking your knees from having to crouch half the time I highly doubt Gears of War for Kinect would be up your alley. If Microsoft really wants to use one of its franchises to promote a more ‘hardcore’ Kinect experience then I suggest they start with Alan Wake. Think about it, bring the perspective to first person, have one hand controls the flashlight while the other is your gun. The game already has fantastic atmosphere and I think bringing that experience to Kinect would be a great use of the controller. Back on topic although it, while it appears Gears of War won’t be supporting Kinect, it’s not impossible for an original game created by Epic to find its way onto Kinect that will debut on the VGAs.
THE SOURCE: VG247
MY TAKE: Okay, so we’ve pretty much confirmed that PSP2 is actually in existence. We don’t have to cover rumors about it any more because if I do I may have to check myself into the funny farm. Thankfully this rumor has nothing to do with existence but with photographic evidence, such evidence that VG247 is claiming to be the “world’s first images of a PSP2 dev kit.” The two images show the front and back of the unit which contain pretty much all the rumored features that have been piling up this past year or so. HD screen, check! Bizarrely placed rear touchpad, check! DUAL JOYSTICKS, double check!! These features along with front and rear facing cameras and a built in microphone seem to come together to create a slick slide model that looks pretty much like a PSP GO. Now apparently, VG247 has found out this dev kit is the older dev kit and the new one is more like the PSP-1000 due to overheating issues with the slide model. So here is the question, are these images of the legit PSP2 or has the internet pulled the wool over our eyes again?
THE VERDICT: BELIEVE IT!!!
With all the developers claiming to have worked with the PSP2 dev kit it was just a matter of time before some images or videos leaked on to the internet and I think this one is the real deal. It has all the components that have been rumored for months, the model doesn’t look like it’s been photoshoped at all and that “Not For Sale” print on the back of the unit is just icing on the cake. Now keep in mind that the final version of the PSP2 will probably look very little like this model since we already know they’re scrapping the slide mechanism which may throw off a lot of the design on this pictured model. As a first impression though, I have to say that while the dual joysticks are a long time coming, I still don’t know about this whole rear touchpad business. Right now I see no use for it whatsoever and can already see control complications if it does make the final design. Still, since I obviously haven’t had any hands on with it nor have I seen it in action it’s too early to know how it’ll work. All I know is that with the 3DS on its way and the competitive mobile gaming scene being what it is, Sony better really bring something special to make us gamers care about it.
THE RUMOR: BioWare’s VGA reveal will be Mass Effect 3
THE SOURCE: VideoGameHenchmen
MY TAKE: With BioWare’s cruelly brief teaser for its reveal at the Spike VGAs, I’ll probably be doing a rumor about this image till December 14th. So let’s start off with the general consensus this week of what this game could be. With Mass Effect 2 a sure-fire nominee if not winner of the Game of the Year award it seems like the perfect time for BioWare to reveal their final piece of the Mass Effect trilogy. Various clues have come to light courtesy of the video game community that seem to point to Mass Effect 3:
1) It’s noted that the gun the guy in the photo is using could be a version of the M-29 Incisor Sniper Rifle.
2) Certain pieces of Mass Effect armor have similar circular patterns on the fabric as the armor in the picture and since the image is clearly CG and not gameplay that could account for the pattern being more distinguished.
3) BioWare posed two QR codes on Twitter, one translates to -128.5°F which is the lowest temperature recorded on Earth in Vostok, Antarctica. Vostok is a galaxy in the Mass Effect universe
4) The other one reads 55.845 which is the mass of iron, possibly referring to a piece of fan fiction called Mass Effect: Iron Rebirth
We could be stretching the references a little thin at this point since the latest QR code BioWare posted actually is a link to Britain’s Secret Intelligence Service homepage so god knows what that’s referring to. It is possible though that the teaser is for a whole new IP or even an update of a really old BioWare franchise (Shattered Steel perhaps) so really it’s all up in the air right now.
THE VERDICT: BELIEVE IT!!!
Here’s one more tidbit of information that could have blown this thing wide open. Twitter is at it again with PlayStation Russia posting a tweet which when translated reads “Company #BioWare Award for #VideoGameAwards showed a teaser, in which we can see the first footage #MassEffect 3.” Normally I would file this under the hogwash of the internet but I find it hard to believe PlayStation’s official twitter feed, no matter which countrym would post something like that without knowing 100% for sure it was true. If this does turn out to be true (which with that tweet is looking very likely) I’m actually kind of disappointed. Don’t get me wrong, I’m a huge Mass Effect fan and all but I just feel that if Mass Effect 3 is going to be the big final end to the trilogy where thousands of decisions from my Shepard are going to come together I would like it if they take their time and tweak it more. Update the engine to get rid of some of the bugs and maybe put three years between the two games to support Mass Effect 2 with DLC for the next year or so. That’s just my opinion though so feel free to sound off below and agree or disagree if you so choose.
THE FINAL SAY:
My final say this week is about a serious topic that is becoming a big problem in our industry, over saturation. I want you to stop for a second and count all the franchises that have had yearly releases, sports games included. That’s a lot and it’s definitely a lot more then there should be. Remember the days when there could be upwards to 15 years between sequels? Okay that’s probably too long but basically all I’m saying is we don’t need Call of Duty, or Assassins Creed, or Left 4 Dead or any game really to come out annually. That gives no time for the franchise to grow or expand and redefine the genre like they use to. All these games can do is add minor gameplay changes and ultimately only take a step sideways instead of forward. Developers and publishers please, I’m begging you, take an extra year or two and make meaningful expansions to your game instead of popping off annual releases like machines. Trust me, the innovations and improvements you can make could not only create a better title but show your fans that you actually give a crap about the franchise.
omg i hope diablo III gets a console release. im planning on building a rig just to play this and Witcher 2, so maybe i could save that money and just get that ps3 i been wanting.
What I really liked about that Bioware teaser was the immediate conclusions a lot of people came to. First, it was definitely ME3, and second it was definitely a FPS.
I need my Mass Effect fix soon so I’m very willing to believe it is Mass Effect related (not 100% sure though). What I don’t get is how people can draw a conclusion like ‘Mass Effect 3 is a FPS’ from a couple of seconds of video. The character is holding a rifle, so it must be a first person shooter, right?
For all we know we could be talking about a spin-off, a new IP, and the genre could be anything from a RPG (it’s bioware) to an action-adventure game, or even a Turnbased Strategy game, anything’s possible.
Please dont do it Blizzard. Come on…how could you such a thing to happen. You are the PC community supporter. So stay in that route. Consoles already have to many exclusives, why you want this masterpiece develop on consoles? Leave this title to PC gamers for god sake.
Diablo 1 was on the Playstation so I don't see why it's a PC "exclusive"