The first person shooter genre is a huge one with franchies like Call of Duty and the like leading the pack. However, EA has been looking to secure their own respective share of the market with their Battlefield series.

While the series has been around for quite some time, it’s Battlefield 3 that many feel will take a hefty chunk of the market aware from Activision’s Call of Duty. Set to drop sometime later this year we’ve already seen a whole slew of media focusing on the game but more information will be known leading up to its release. In fact, DICE CEO Patrick Söderlund recently came forth to speak player limits for the game’s multiplayer and has come up with some pretty promising information.

Apparantly, DICE has tested 256 player gamers but unfortunately will not utilize them – instead focusing on offering 64 player matches as a maximum.

Depending on which game we’re talking about, the developers will more often that not regard their title as a work of art. However, once in a while it takes longer than scheduled to get a game out and with the developers having to rush to get the game out on time. It seems that something along these lines happened to Team Ninja – the folks behind the Ninja Gaiden series.

According to Team Ninja’s Yosuke Hayashi, following the release of Ninja Gaiden 2 the team immediately got to work on the sequel (Ninja Gaiden 3) due to them being dispelled unsatisfied with the second title. These words came about when Hayashi was asked if he’d ever been given the opportunity to cease work on the Ninja Gaiden series to which he replied that him and his team was heavily motivated to begin work on the third title due to them being so unsatisfied with the second.

Unfortunately, there’s no release date for Ninja Gaiden 3 but when it does hit the market, let’s hope it’s something all of Team Ninja is satisfied with.

As we’ve told you many times in the past Crytek’s Crysis has long been regarded as one of the most graphically advanced games on the market. Unfortunately, due to the fact that it required such a high end machine to run coupled with the fact that it was exclusive to the PC it never reached the critical mass it deserved. Luckily, Crytek will be taking their next generation game to the Xbox 360 and PS3 as well giving console gamers a taste of what the Crysis world is all about. However, many console gamers have wondered how much worse (if at all) Crysis 2 will look on their console as opposed to the PC version.

Well, right on cue, a video has appeared on YouTube comparing the Crysis 2 PC demo to the Crysis 2 Xbox 360 demo. The video doesn’t touch on gameplay or anything of the sort instead serving as a comparison between the two platforms. Check it out and let us know what you think – which platform will you be getting Crysis 2 for?

If you’ve been trying to hop on the PlayStation Network to grab some frags in Black Ops you may have noticed that the entire network is down. Don’t worry, this isn’t your home Internet connection going down the drain. Instead, it’s Sony taking the PlayStation Network down for some maintenance which was set to last for 11 hours. Luckily, it seems that the network has since gone back up as the maintenance as said to have ended at 7:00PM PST.

So folks, what did you do when the PlayStation Network was done? Whip out the Gameboy, hop on Xbox Live or, dare I say it, go outside?

We honestly didn’t believe the Kinect would ever do this well, but apparently the motion sensor has sold a whopping 10 million units since its launch back in November, according to Microsoft’s Adam Greenberg, who tweeted the news. On top of that, Greenberg says the Kinect is the fastest selling consumer device ever, a record which has been indicted into the Guniess Book of World Records. We’re not so sure about that record, since a little device called the iPad, released by a little company called Apple, sold quite a lot more than the Kinect. Either way, 10 million units is certainly a great feat, and is likely to have sold quite a bit more than Sony’s PlayStation Move motion controller.

Sony has announced a brand new feature for its PlayStation Plus subscription service, where owners of the $50 a year service will be able to save their games in the cloud as opposed to locally on their console (which is still possible even if you use the cloud).

The new feature will launch on March 10 and will offer each Plus subscriber 1,000 savegame files, or 150 MB. Which honestly doesn’t sound like much, but it’s still better than nothing. And 150 MB should be more than enough for most folks. So far the feature will only be available as a back up service, meaning you have to manually back up your savegames to the cloud. However, Sony states that future titles will be able to save directly to the cloud.

The first piece of evidence suggesting the next generation of consoles has just been revealed by Microsoft, as they’re now looking to hire designers to work on the Xbox 360 successor, codenamed Xbox 720. Microsoft posted a job posting looking for people to help them “defining and delivering next generation console architectures from conception through implementation.”. Which means the console is in very early stages of development.

While nothing has yet been announced, it’s safe to say that all three major console makers are looking into the next generation of game consoles, although it might take a few years before we see any of them on the market, considering the great success the Wii, Xbox 360 and PS3 are having these days.

Dragon Age came out just over two years ago, and took the RPG world by storm, showing just how well BioWare built RPGs and how good they are at storytelling. As expected, two years down the line, it’s sequel time, and Dragon Age 2 is set to deliver a bigger, better and feature filled game than its predecessor. On some areas, it succeeds, on others, it fails.

Dragon Age 2 is a story driven RPG where your decision have a big impact on how the game plays, it’s the exact opposite of the very linear games we see (like Call of Duty). In Dragon Age 2, your character moves through the world and through the story the way you want it, based on your decisions, meaning there’s always a reason to go back and play it over again, choosing a different path and getting a different outcome. There are numerous quests throughout the game, where you’ll do different jobs, meet different people, and so on, good ol RPG style. You can chose between three classes, Mage, Warrior and Rogue, which are pretty straightforward if you’re an RPG fan.

Dragon Age 2 takes the inventory and skill-set management and greatly simplifies it, which is never a bad thing. But this time, it’s been simplified a bit too much, which might disappoint hardcore RPG fans. On the upside, the simplified management and combat means that you’ll be spending less time tweaking things and pausing the game to manage stuff, and more time actually playing it. Remember in Dragon Age 1, where you had to pause the game before every big battle and navigate through your spells to get the upper hand on your enemy? In the sequel, it’s a bit easier.

One thing we didn’t like a lot is all the talking that’s going on. There’s a lot of dialogue — but good dialogue — which sometimes gets in the way of actually playing the game. This time, your character is fully voiced, meaning there’s a lot of back and forth discussions with other characters, like Mass Effect, another BioWare series. On top of that, the story is kinda bleak, certainly not up to par with Dragon Age 1 and the two Mass Effect games. You character is homeless and his job is essentially to rise out of poverty. Why? No real reason. No real motivation. Meaning the quests aren’t really connected, but they are quite good, in and of themselves.

Overall, Dragon Age 2 simplifies some of the combat and inventory management, and the game plays a lot faster as well. Visually, it also looks better, but still looks kinda dated, with low res textures and a washed out look. Story wise, it’s not as good as the previous game, and the dialogue cut scenes tend to go on for longer than necessary. Dragon Age 2 might not be the best RPG to recommend for veterans of the original game, especially if they’re hardcore RPG fans who like a challenge. In many ways, Dragon Age 2 is a lot easier and simpler to play than the original. For better or worse.

The Good:
More streamlined combat
Great quests
Interesting characters
Great soundtrack

The Bad:
Visually, still looks a bit dated
Story is weak
Atrocious loading times on consoles (PC version loads quickly)
Too much reliance on dialogue and cut scenes

Overall score: 8/10

I’m sure you, much like me, are a video game addict. While fulfilling this craving with the latest titles is a very satisfying one, it can also be quite expensive. First you’ve got the $200+ console, then the $50+ games and then, if you’re looking to get fancy you’ve got the motion control peripherals like the PlayStation Move and Xbox 360 Kinect which will both run you a pretty penny. Luckily, some online retailers like Amazon.com have been known to cut us gamers a deal and today seems to be no different.

Amazon.com has just announced today that  they will be giving those who purchase a PlayStation 3 video game console from them before March 12th will receive a $50 Amazon gift certificate. While some may prefer cold hard cash, Amazon sells virtually everything (including video games, quite obviously) so you shouldn’t have a hard time finding something to spend that 50 bucks on.

Check out the listing here.

As we’ve told you many times in the past, Blizzard is one of the most influential and successful development studios on the market. Some of their more popular titles on the market today including World of Warcraft, StarCraft II and the forthcoming Diablo III. However, Blizzard is also working on another MMO that is currently codenamed Titan and, like much of Blizzard’s doings, is shrouded in mystery.

Luckily, Blizzard’s Paul Sams has recently sat down with Gamasutra to talk Titan. According to Sams, the game is “the most ambitios thing [Blizzard] has ever attempted” going on to say that many of the most talented World of Warcraft engineers are working on the game. He also says that Titan will be Blizzard’s “next big thing” following the release of Diablo III. Of course, while we would like to say that gives us a more solid release date  it doesn’t as Diablo III still does not have a date.

Unfortunately, Sams didn’t give us much information as to the gameplay only closing out by saying that the company is very confident in the project and that they are have already begun playing in. Any guesses as to what Blizzard’s next MMO will be?