It appears Activision had forgot some songs when it issued the February release schedule of downloadable content for Guitar Hero World Tour, as developer Neversoft just announced a Southern Rock three-pack due for release today.
The songs are “Commotion” by Credence Clearwater Revival, “Gimme All Your Lovin’” by ZZ Top and “Black Betty”. The latter two are covers.
It can be noted that they did not name the artist who has performed “Black Betty”, as the song has been performed by a number of artists over the years.
Though no price point was mentioned, previous three-packs have sold for 440 Microsoft points ($5.50) and individual tracks for 160 points ($2).
Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment today announced that it is acquiring Snowblind Studios, the developer behind such games as Justice League Heroes and Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance.
The studio is the third to become part of Warner Bros.’ portfolio, joining Monlith (FEAR 2) and TT Games (LEGO).
“We look forward to working as a part of Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment on creating several distinctive games with wide appeal,” said Snowblind Studios head Ryan Geithman. “Our team is committed at every level to making the best gaming experience possible for our audiences.”
They are currently working on Xbox Live Arcade game Death Tank.
There’s a whole lot of news coming out of EA today, including confirmation of a Mass Effect sequel. The scifi shooter/RPG hybrid was a huge success for the Xbox 360 and PC, so the existence of Mass Effect 2 isn’t a huge surprise. Currently it’s expected to release in the Q4, which means January-March 2010 in real world terms. He also said it will be launching for ‘multiple platforms’, but failed to specify which ones.
The Xbox 360 and PC are shoes-in, given that the first Mass Effect was a success on both platforms. What’s questionable are the other two current-gen consoles. The PS3 is of course fully capable of matching the technological requirements for running the game, but will EA chance putting the game out on Sony’s console? The sequel isn’t being published by Microsoft, so it’s certainly possible. Given that EA is planning to focus more on the Wii, we could be seeing a version of the game created for that console as well.
Continuing the onslaught of EA news today, company CEO John Riccitiello has revealed that sequels to Mass Effect and Battlefield: Bad Company are in the works for release during the first quarter of 2010.
The CEO noted that Mass Effect 2 will arrive on multiple platforms, meaning it could hit PS3, PC and Xbox 360 at launch. The first was exclusive to Xbox 360 before being ported to PC a few months later.
BF: Bad Company 2 will likely follow its predecessor, being released for PS3 and Xbox 360 simultaneously.
No details on either game were given.
In today’s first bit of unsurprising news, EA CFO Eric Brown disclosed at the company’s conference call that Dead Space and Mirror’s Edge have sold over one million copies each in 2008.
The figure includes all versions of the games released last year. Both titles were released on PC, PS3 and Xbox 360, though the PC version of Mirror’s Edge hit earlier this year. Thus, the PC sales of the game were not reflected in the total 2008 sales.
Brown did not talk about the planned sequels for either game.
At its conference call, EA announced that Valve’s cooperative zombie shooter Left 4 Dead has sold over 1.8 million copies at retailers in 2008. The figure accounts for retail sales of the game’s PC and Xbox 360 versions; it does not include copies sold via Valve’s digital download platform Steam.
The figure is also limited to sales in North America and Europe and does not take into account total worldwide retail sales.
L4D is an awesome game and really fun to play with a bunch of friends over a LAN. Total strangers – not as much fun, but quite unpredictable.
Previously slated to arrive before its console brethren, the PC version of Dragon Age: Origins has been delayed to the second half of 2009. It will now launch alongside the console versions.
“I’m really proud of our team, who are working very hard to make Dragon Age: Origins the biggest and most exciting BioWare game yet, and we will work to ensure it not only meets, but exceeds the expectations of our loyal audience,” said BioWare CEO Ray Muzyka.
Electronic Arts CEO John Riccitiello said that the delay was due to marketing, and that BioWare will continue to polish the PC release.
Six more tracks from the vast Rock Band DLC library are available for the Wii as of yesterday. Five of the songs are from classic rock bands and one is from more recent years. Four tracks are from Boston, including “Hitch a Ride”, “Peace of Mind”, “Smokin’” and “Something About You”. The other two tracks are “Hanging On The Telephone” by Blondie and “Dirty Little Secret” by All-American Rejects.
All six tracks are the originally master recordings and will set you back 200 Wii points ($2) per track. They were available starting yesterday so boot up your Wii and get rocking!
Of all the game genres out there the Wii has always had the most exciting potential for shooting games. The pointer capabilities of the controller make it very easy to mimic the addictive light-gun style action of arcade titles, so it’s no surprise that shooters are being created and ported to the Wii quite often. The success of the Resident Evil IV port guaranteed that.
EA in the face of some staggering losses has announced that they’re bringing scifi survival horror game Dead Space to the Wii. There aren’t any details yet beyond the fact that IGN reports the game will “make full use of the Wii remote”. EA’s CEO John Riccitiello has said that the company is going to be shifting its focus in light of the Wii’s incredible success: “Wii is the market leader — they’re getting half of our emphasis in terms of title count.” The Wii version will undoubtedly have to scale back on the graphics
Finally, we can report a Sims game that isn’t an add-on, expansion or anything else. It seems EA has finally pryed their hands off of The Sims 2 and onto getting The Sims 3 in stores.
The game was recently announced to be shipping on June 9th. This is a bummer for hardcore fans of the series who were hoping for an end of Feburary release date as originally thought.
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