“The additional time will also allow us to carry out even more quality beta testing, and soon we will also be announcing several public beta events where hundreds of thousands of gamers will get to test the game prior to launch.”

The Secret World is set in the modern day and is based upon conspiracy theories, featuring three distinct factions: The Illuminati, The Dragon and The Templars. Read more about it and register for the beta on the official The Secret World website.

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The Game Boy Era

1989: Game Boy

Shortcomings: The Game Boy was almost laughable from a hardware standpoint. Its puny processor was more than a decade old at launch, and its screen felt like a throwback to the ’70s, too, offering no color support but rather a paltry four shades of grey on a cheap LCD so prone to ghosting and blur that it rendered many action games nearly unplayable. Atari’s impressive Lynx arrived almost simultaneously with Game Boy, rendering Nintendo’s handheld practically obsolete from day one.

Why they didn’t matter: Nintendo’s design philosophy rendered many of the Game Boy’s perceived flaws into strengths. That weakling of a processor and mess of a screen allowed Nintendo to sell the system for about half of what the Lynx cost, and its battery life was extraordinary. On top of that, Nintendo was at the pinnacle of its NES-era popularity in 1989, and the mere opportunity to play games like Mario, Castlevania, and Mega Man on the go was profoundly motivating. Plus, Game Boy had a killer app in the form of Tetris. Game Boy games weren’t often truly great — but they were certainly good enough.

1989: Lynx

Strengths: Atari’s Lynx arrived mere days after the Game Boy and, technologically speaking, blew it away. It boasted a vivid full-color screen with proper backlighting, beside which Nintendo’s pukey-looking graphics paled. Behind that screen was an impressive array of hardware, including a beefy processor and a fast 16-bit graphics chip, putting it nearly on par with the TurboGrafx-16. On top of that, Lynx featured an innovative ambidextrous design so that both lefties and righties could play it comfortably.

Why they didn’t matter: With great power comes great responsibilities, and Lynx failed at living up to its demands. It cost nearly twice as much as Game Boy, and the hidden cost of batteries was even more significant: It required six AA batteries to run for four hours, where the Game Boy could run five times as long on fewer batteries. The system itself was massive and cumbersome thanks to some ill-advised focus testing. And perhaps most crushingly of all, Lynx wasn’t made by Nintendo, which meant its software library was filled with obscure games and dated arcade conversions. The sad thing is that Lynx probably would have done much better for itself had it been launched in a more timely fashion: Epyx developed it in 1986, but Atari sat on it for two years only to debut it head-to-head with Game Boy.

1990: TurboExpress

Strengths: The TurboExpress was nothing less than amazing. A compact and comfortable system, it was capable of playing TurboGrafx-16 games. Not ports, not repackagings; TG16 HuCard chips slotted directly into the system and played with few compromises aside from some difficulty with saves and the different resolution of its beautiful color screen.

Why they didn’t matter: Like Lynx, the TurboExpress was an incredible power hog, requiring as many batteries as Lynx for even less play time… and that was on top of its hefty $249 price tag (almost $390 in today’s money). The TurboExpress also had the misfortune to be tied to the TurboGrafx-16, a console that achieved very little success in the U.S. — and outside the U.S., its popularity was largely tied to the TurboCD add-on, which wasn’t compatible with the handheld.

1990: Game Gear

Strengths: Game Gear definitely offered the strongest competition to Nintendo’s handheld hegemony until the PSP arrived. Compact and comfortable with a slick color screen and a solid library, Game Gear featured all the strengths of its fellow competitors but also backed it with the Sega name — a true boon, especially in the U.S., where Genesis was eating Super NES’s lunch at the time. Another advantage: Gear Gear was essentially a scaled down Sega Master System, meaning existing games could easily be tweaked to run on the hardware and resold. It even had an optional TV tuner!

Why they didn’t matter: Unfortunately, as with Lynx and TurboExpress, Game Gear was hoist by its own petard: Its power and screen devoured batteries. While it never managed to overcome its thirst for power, by the time the system was retired it had moved more than 10 million units and boasted a library of nearly 400 games: A modest success.

1992: Watara Supervision

Strengths: Rather than trying to outdo Game Boy, this device by Asian manufacturer Watara took the opposite tack by trying to undercut Nintendo’s design. It was half the price and featured similarly low-power, low-cost components.

Why they didn’t matter: Supervision was too little, too late. With a paltry software library and even worse visual prowess than its competition, Watara’s effort appealed only to cheapskates and, these days, to aficionados of the obscure.

1997: Game.com

Strengths: In the twilight days of the Game Boy, Tiger Electronics launched the Game.com, which offered enhanced black-and-white graphics and far more power than Nintendo’s aging machine. It sported a touch screen (a first!), and Tiger pursued aggressive licensing (presumably carried over from its simple LCD games) to bring PlayStation hits like Castlevania: Symphony of the Night and Resident Evil to the system.

Why they didn’t matter: Game.com looked good on paper, but it was either a giant train wreck or too far ahead of its time, depending on how kindly disposed you are to it. The hardware proved to be grossly underpowered for the games it aspired to run; Sonic and Resident Evil were downright disastrous. The system felt flimsy and insubstantial, and its touch screen was strictly used in conjunction with its PDA elements, which were ill-conceived and not particularly useful.

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[Game website] A number of months after the Korean server got the version 3.0 update for Aion (link), the North American players are finally getting something to cheer about. Aion will be going Free to Play (F2P) like its European counterpart (link) and will boot the new version 3.0 update into the package as well.

New features such as player housing, more character customizations, gliding mounts and a new expanded storyline is nothing but welcoming for Aion, which a couple of players I spoke to have been complaining about it getting “stale”. Some of the new features can be seen in the Korean launch trailer below.

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Publisher: Alaplaya
Playerbase: Medium
Graphics: High Quality
Type: MMORPG
EXP Rate: Medium
PvP: Battlegrounds / Duels
Filesize: ~3.4 GB

Website: http://argo.en.alaplaya.net/

Pros: +Eight classes per faction. +Varied PvP modes. +Raid instances. +Unique setting, fight with guns, swords, and spells. +Class, adventure, and nation skill trees. +Great character customization. +Plenty of quests. +Pet system.

Cons: -Gameplay feels very similar to other MMORPGs. -Shop item selection limited. -Lots of grinding necessary. -Generic names for enemies. -Lack of auto movement.

 ARGO Online is set in the future, a future where the world lies in ruins in the aftermath of World War 4. The two races that emerged from the ashes, the Noblians and the Floressia, have been in constant warfare ever since. Their struggle is over a rare mineral called Earthdium. The game world of ARGO mixes standard fantasy elements with a Steampunk feel. This means players will be armed with swords, spells, and plasma guns. Mounts include wild beasts, and motorcycles. The game is developed by the Korean company MGame and is already live in Korea. Argo Online is a full fledged MMORPG with instanced raids for groups and guilds to tackle, varied PvP modes including battlegrounds where hundreds of players can participate, and a back-story that will help keep gamers immersed. The game has a solid character customization options, plenty of classes, and varied skills.

Factions: Floresslahs (mystical) or Noblians (steampunk)

Classes: Cavalier, Bounty Hunter, Alchemist, Medic, Assassin, Guardian, Animist, Mage

Taurus and Warrior – Equipped with a long spear as primary weapon to quickly defeat enemies. Their wide variety of offensive skills can slow down their effectiveness at times.

Defender and Protector – This class is good in defensive battles with the ability to protect their party when under attack. They are usually armed with a sword.

Elementarist and Scholar – Uses a pistol to deal high levels of damage despite its below average defense attributes.

Warlock and Bombers – Considered as the long ranged class toting heavy artillery to take out multiple opponents.

Sagittarius and Explorer – Also part of the long range class armed with a rifle.

Rogue and Chaser – Associated with the melee class. These soldiers execute swift blows using a Double Sword.

Shaman and Paladin – Possesses a variety of command and support skills to destroy foes. As a hybrid class it also has the ability to summon monsters for assistance.

Druid and Priest – This class has strong recovery and aura skills. They possess the ability to summon monsters as well.

ARGO Online Requirements

Minimum Requirements:
OS: Windows XP (32bit) / Vista (32bit) / 7 (32/64bit)
CPU: Intel Core2 Duo (Core i5)
RAM:  512 MB
HDD: 5 GB Free
Graphics Card: Nvidia GeForce 8 series / ATI(AMD) Radeon HD 2xxx series

Recommended Specification:
OS: Windows XP (32bit) / Vista (32bit) / 7 (32/64bit)
CPU: Intel Core2 Duo or higher (Core i7/ AMD Athlon II (Phenom II) X4)
RAM: 1 GB or more
HDD: 6 GB Free or more
Graphics Card: Nvidia GeForce 9 (GeForce 200) series or higher / ATI (AMD) Radeon HD 3xxx seriesor higher

A series of Nintendo Direct events are set to take place tomorrow, as creatively announced today through Swapnote messages sent out to 3DS owners. This is the third time Nintendo Direct is taking place and as Nintendo of America and Europe will each be hosting their own videos, as opposed to a broadcast only in Japanese, we should be getting much more information that is of interest to those outside of Japan.

The trend seems to be for Nintendo to showcase content through Nintendo Direct every two months. The first one took place in October, and although it did not bring with it any earth-shattering revelations, there were some newsworthy announcements. We received details on the 3DS system update adding 3D movie recordings and new StreetPass content, specifics on Mario Kart 7‘s online functionality, and new games were announced for Japan.

December’s Nintendo Direct was far less interesting to the non-Japanese crowd. It spent a great deal of time on Kiki Trick for Wii, announced release dates for a bunch of 3DS games in Japan, and coincided with the release of several 3DS game demos on the eShop (also only in Japan). Numerous game trailers were shown and the upcoming Fire Emblem game for 3DS was described as an original title and given the subtitle Fire Emblem: Kakusei, which translates to Fire Emblem: Awakening.

In both cases, the events were announced only a few days in advance, so the short notice for tomorrow’s broadcast is insignificant. What is hard to ignore is tomorrow is the proper launch of PlayStation Vita in North America and Europe, with Australia following one day later. That means Nintendo has a perfect opportunity to steal some of Sony’s thunder by making a big announcement of some sort. It’s not what Nintendo Direct has been used for the previous two times, but this seems like as good a time as any for that to change. If that is what Nintendo has in mind, what could Nintendo be planning to announce?

Among the most popular theories is Nintendo will finally announce the redesigned 3DS that has been rumored since last August. It was late that month when a report emerged suggesting an accessory would be released adding a second analog stick to the current system; just a few weeks later we were going hands-on with it. The same report also suggested a rebranded 3DS was to be released in 2012 with less emphasis placed on the 3D effect (and presumably an integrated second analog stick). Having seen how many people decline to use 3D (in an attempt to avoid headaches or simply for lack of interest), Nintendo has not focused on that feature as much post-launch. It has even said it may create games that do not feature 3D.

Even with this in mind, it seems very unlikely a redesigned 3DS is to be announced tomorrow. According to what Nintendo president Satoru Iwata had to say to investors and analysts late last month, 3DS hardware will finally become profitable again by the end of September. Dropping the price of the system last year caused the company to go from making a profit on each system sold to losing money on each one, a position the company was unaccustomed to and one which is contributing to its first annual loss in 30 years. Besides the fact that 3DS in its current form and price is selling quite well, a redesigned system could cost Nintendo more to produce. That means profitability on new hardware isn’t a guarantee, and there is no reason to sacrifice that with 3DS now being (in the eyes of many) a desirable system, something it was not last summer at $250 with very few games worth playing.

Not only that, but announcing a 3DS Lite-esque system less than a year after the original system’s launch would undoubtedly anger early adopters. Getting burned in such a way is one of the risks of buying hardware early, but those people have already had their patience tested when a significant price drop was announced just a few months after the system’s release. Now revealing their device is soon to be outdated would only further frustrate them further. I know I personally wouldn’t be pleased with the news.

There is also the matter of what a redesigned system would really accomplish beyond integrating a second analog stick. The Circle Pad Pro is not so bad and certainly makes Resident Evil: Revelations more pleasant to play. However, between the insubstantial support it is receiving — it’s sold only through GameStop in the U.S. and only a small handful of games are using it — and the question of where the CPP’s second set of triggers would be located, a redesigned system this early in the 3DS’ life cycle seems unlikely.

So where does that leave us as far as announcements tomorrow? Leaving aside the possibility that there simply won’t be anything big, the Nintendo Network could be fleshed out and there are plenty of games that could be unveiled to convince potential Vita buyers to instead pick up a 3DS. A new Pokemon RPG would be big news, as would an Ocarina of Time-style remake of The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask. (The latter will probably come later, unfortunately, as Nintendo does not want to do back-to-back remakes.) Luigi’s Mansion 2, Animal Crossing, Mario Tennis, Theatrhythm Final Fantasy, Paper Mario, and Fire Emblem are all without release dates in the west and represent possible announcements. In the west Monster Hunter is not the sensation it is in Japan, though we could still hear about a release of Monster Hunter 3G (released in Japan in December), while Japan’s Nintendo Direct could provide news on Monster Hunter 4.

Keep in mind those are only possibilities for 3DS. Wii U news isn’t expected until E3 comes along in June, but Wii does have some life in it yet. Plenty of details on Dragon Quest X, which enters beta this week, remain unknown, and Nintendo of America may follow the lead of NoE and decide to publish another Operation Rainfall game, Pandora’s Tower or (more likely) The Last Story. Either way that would be welcome news tomorrow.

Luckily we don’t have long to wait to find out what Nintendo has in store. Feel free to share your predictions in the comments below and set your alarm clock for tomorrow morning, February 22, if you want to take in the Nintendo Direct events. Nintendo of Japan’s is set for 8:00 PM JST (6:00 AM Eastern, 3:00 AM Pacific), Nintendo of Europe’s will follow at 1:00 PM CET (7:00 AM Eastern, 4:00 AM Pacific), and Nintendo of America’s will take place at 9:00 AM Eastern, 6:00 AM Pacific.

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Steam codes have been emailed out to those who were accepted today, and although the client can be downloaded now, the beta itself won’t begin until next week — and even then, it will only be available at select times.

The beta will be playable nightly beginning Wednesday, October 5. It’ll last only until October 9, and is playable from 7PM – 12AM Eastern for those five days. As it’s a closed beta, testers won’t be free to share information about the game.

Once the beta has officially begun, testers will need to open the game to get a CD key that will then need to be redeemed after logging into Games for Windows Live.

Gotham City Impostors is a downloadable, multiplayer first-person shooter set in the Batman universe. It was first announced in May and is being developed by Monolith Productions, the developer of the first two FEAR games, No One Lives Forever 1 and 2, and both Condemned games. It’s not expected out until early next year.

As the beta is only on PC, you’ll need to make sure your computer is up to snuff. Below are the minimum and recommended system specifications.

Minimum specs:

• Dual Core CPU 2.5GHz or higher (Intel Core 2 Duo or AMD equivalent)
• 1.5GB RAM
• 6GB HDD
• 256MB DX9 SM3+ Video Card (GeForce 8600 or ATI X1800 or better)
• DX9 compatible Sound Controller
• Windows XP, Vista, 7 with latest updates
• Broadband 64KB/s

Recommended specs:

• Quad Core CPU 2GHz or higher (Intel Core 2 Quad or AMD equivalent)
• 2GB RAM
• 6GB HDD
• 512MB DX9 High-Performance SM3+ Video Card (GeForce 8800 or ATI X1900 or better)
• DX9 compatible Sound Controller
• Windows XP, Vista, 7 with latest updates
• Broadband 1MB/s

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[Game website] I am guessing most of you have forgotten about this MMO, and luckily a new trailer released today helped refreshed mine as well. Royal Quest is developed by Katauri Interactive, the company behind the King’s Bounty game franchise, including King’s Bounty: The Legend (link) and King’s Bounty: Armored Princess (link). This new trailer shows more combat footage and some talk about alchemy’s role in the game.

Below is a list of the game’s features as listed on the game website if you are too lazy to visit (I know, I have such days as well). There are some PvP footage floating around from early test phases, in Russian though as both the developer and publisher are from the Land of Vodka.

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“Some say I’ve been lazy,” admits the King of All Cosmos in the opening sequence of Touch My Katamari. “Phoning it in.” This is meant to be hilarious — that crazy King, always so pompous, yet vain enough to be stung by criticism! — but the wittiness of the whole thing is badly undermined by the fact that Touch My Katamari is lazy. Namco is, in fact, phoning it in.

Of course, the best parody is that which rings of the truth. In that sense, sure, this game is pretty parodic. Damningly so, I’d say. The problem is that I don’t think it was meant to be self-satire; certainly it’s not an exercise in self-reflection. All this talk of apathy and flabbiness are meant to be loving, tongue-in-cheek pokes at the character, not a frank assessment of the software itself. So, it’s either a joke that reflects a jarring lack of self-awareness by the developers, or else it’s a snide middle finger to the player: Yeah, this game is warmed-over, recycled content, but we’re gonna fix that! By… making you do the exact same things you did in the last five Katamari games. Thanks for the 30 bones, suckers.

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Though it took longer than expected, the first downloadable content pack for Portal 2 will soon be here on all three of the game’s platforms.

Portal 2: Peer Review, as it’s been officially titled, was announced shortly after the game’s release in April. It was scheduled for a summer release, and when it began to look like Valve wouldn’t meet that date, it reassured fans it would be out by mid-September. That date, too, came and went, but we now have an actual, hard date, and one that’s far too close for it to slip once again.

Peer Review will be released on Tuesday, October 4 on Steam, Xbox 360, and PlayStation 3. Or rather, its global rollout will begin then, so depending upon where in the world you live, there may be a bit of an additional wait.

The DLC is free on all three platforms and includes content for fans of both the solo and co-op campaigns. The story of P-Body and Atlas — the two co-op robots — continues in Peer Review “as you puzzle your way through a mysterious new co-op test track and once again match wits with GLaDOS.” A new Challenge mode is introduced for both single-player and co-op, and accompanying leaderboards will let you compare your scores with other players.

Coinciding with the announcement, the last of three soundtrack volumes has been released as a free download today. You can grab all 64 songs comprising the three volumes (and a number of ringtones for iPhone and Android devices) here.

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In what can only be described as a remarkable turnaround, the 3DS has gone from struggling badly enough that it necessitated a steep price drop to breaking a record by reaching 5 million units sold in Japan faster than any other platform. It took 52 weeks to reach that milestone, compared with 56 weeks for the original DS and 58 weeks for the Game Boy Advance before it.

It wasn’t all that long ago that much of the talk about 3DS centered about how it was a doomed platform, one destined for failure because it was designed for a market that no longer exists in the size it once did. There were legitimate concerns to be voiced, as platforms like the iPhone and iPad have arguably taken a bite out of the handheld gaming market, but pronouncements of the platform’s death before it could even reach the holiday shopping season or see the release of its first big games (Super Mario 3D Land, Mario Kart 7, and Monster Hunter 3G) were clearly premature. Reaching 5 million units sold in Japan is no guarantee the system will continue to sell this well moving forward; it is, however, an encouraging sign for Nintendo, Sony, and third-party developers to see there is demand for portable gaming systems provided the price is right and desirable software is available.

Additionally, Japanese publication Nikkei (as translated by Andriasang) is reporting Seaman is to be revived for release on 3DS. As random as that may sound to you, a release of the Dreamcast classic was hinted at in 2010 when designer Yoot Saito tweeted about his interest in seeing a 3DS version released. The game saw players interacting with a virtual pet — a fish with a human head being the most common form — through the use of a microphone. The Seaman would need to be fed and spoken to on a regular basis, and if it wasn’t attended to daily it could die. Suffice it to say, it was a weird, unique game that doesn’t exactly hold the potential to sell as well as Mario or Call of Duty.

Seaman could fall in the category of what you might call mid-range or mid-tier games, a rapidly disappearing market losing ground to massive, AAA games (like the aforementioned Call of Duty) and smaller, indie titles (VVVVVV, for example). It was around this time last year when Epic’s Cliff Bleszinski suggested “the middle class game is dead,” comparing games to the film industry where it’s the blockbusters and indie films that do well in theaters, not the stuff in between.

While they are certainly in decline, I don’t think the market for mid-tier games is dead. In fact, as long as 3DS sales don’t begin to peter out (in addition to the 5 million sold in Japan, 3DS sales are over 4 million in the U.S.) Nintendo’s latest handheld seems to present the perfect opportunity for these titles to succeed. Nintendo seems to realize this, as Nikkei reports the company is looking to revive other publisher’s games on 3DS, with Seaman being just one example.

Pricing is one key element when it comes to selling mid-tier games. Publishers typically can’t sell them for $10, and pricing them at $60 against the Skyrims or Modern Warfare 3s is a death sentence. Yet discounting such a game to, say, $40 on consoles can bring with it a negative connotation that the game simply isn’t any good. This isn’t always the case (Deadly Premonition was good, cheap, and sold quite well, whereas MX vs. ATV Alive was mediocre and sold accordingly), although in the portable market it’s less of a problem: a new 3DS game being priced at $20 or $30 is less likely to make people question its quality than a $40 Xbox 360 or PlayStation 3 game.

There is also a much different expectation when it comes to the visual quality of a 3DS game. Graphics are not everything, but there is a certain level of expectation about how good a retail game will look on an HD console. An ugly 360/PS3 game that wouldn’t look out of place on the PS2 generation of hardware is off-putting. 3DS, on the other hand, is capable of powering good-looking games — just look at Resident Evil: Revelations — but overall the bar is not as high as on consoles or even Vita. That makes it easier to create a game on a more limited budget, as is often the case when developing mid-range titles.

Many publishers may decide to follow the lead of companies like Activision and continue to focus on higher-margin games at the expense of the mid-tier stuff. But with 3DS thriving right now and console development sure to become even more expensive as the next generation of hardware approaches, the opportunity is there to embrace the middle space in a way it has not been in recent years.

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