World of Warcraft turns eight on November 23, and we'd like to thank our amazing community for joining us in celebrating eight epic years of adventure. To celebrate, players who log in to World of Warcraft between November 18 and December 1 will receive a unique Feat of Strength achievement and Celebration Package item. Using your item will kick off the celebrations by shooting off fireworks*, applying a (cosmetic only) tabard to your character, and granting an 8% bonus to experience and reputation gains from any enemies defeated while active.
We look forward to another year of adventures ahead and many more to come! *Use fireworks responsibly. Harmful or fatal if swallowed. If fireworks get in eyes, rinse in muddy pond water for 20 minutes, /dance, and contact your nearest Mistweaver, Priest, Shaman, Druid, or Paladin.
The Halo 4 gameplay launch trailer is here! The Master Chief returns to battle an ancient evil bent on vengeance and annihilation. Shipwrecked on a mysterious world, Master Chief is faced with new enemies and a powerful new Forerunner menace.
What's new in Skylanders: Giants? Watch this new Developer Diary to find out!
Skylanders: Giants is the newest entry in the hotcake new sensation known as Skylanders, where players collect various physical toy figures that plug into any version of the videogame via an included "Portal of Power" Accessory. Stats that are built up in the games also save onto the toy itself via an RFID chip inside the toy (including gold, level and upgrades purchased and won through gameplay). The Portal of Power thus allows you to interchange your characters from say, the Xbox 360 version of Skylanders to the DS version. Allowing a kid to take it to his friends house and build up his character even if he owns a Wii and his friend only has the PC version. He can then take the toy with him and all that character progress will be translated back into his game on his home Wii system. This type of inter-console-platform connectivity is unheard of and has really never been done before to this extent. Add in the fact that kids love collecting, and that the game started with a whopping 32 collectable characters (not including various rare versions that are extremely limited) and you had a recipe for huge success that no one saw coming.
The game was a huge hit in late 2011 with toys selling out and becoming rare commodities, sold on ebay for big bucks by sellers who got their hands on limited-edition figures that have become impossible to find. Skylanders: Spyro's Adventure (the name of the first game, released for Xbox 360, PS3, Wii, 3DS, PC and Mac) became so successful that the game and figures have earned over $500 million for publisher Activision and developer Toys for Bob, with sales exceeding 30 million(!). The game has been the best-selling title of 2012 worldwide!
Skylanders: Giants is the first official sequel/expansion which greatly expands on the game with tons of new toys to collect, areas to explore, and characters to fall in love with. The game's main focus are on GIANT characters. These characters are extra large, and their toys are physically twice as large as the original line of Skylanders figures (it's worth noting that fans will NOT have to buy a new Portal of Power for use with the Giant toys, everything from the original game will work with Skylanders Giants). In addition to the new Giant characters who have extra special abilities in the game (such as being able to destroy certain objects, lift large boulders, or pull heavy objects to access new areas), two additional lines of new figures will also be on offer. In addition to the Giant characters, 8 new "Lightcore" figures will be available. These toys physically light up! Their in-game abilities include blast radius attacks that use light and radiate out to hit many enemies at once. On top of that, a new line called "Series 2" will re-introduce several of the old characters with all-new abilities (called "WOW Powers") and new figures to collect. All told, there will be a whopping 40 NEW TOYS to collect from Skylanders Giants among the "Giant, Lightcore and Series 2" figurines.
Other new features in Skylanders Giants include a level-cap raised from 10 to 15 and new difficulty modes that include Easy, Medium, Hard and "Nightmare" for those hardcore players. New "Toy Quests" have been added for each and every toy, giving them unique challenges to tackle. A new Arena mode has been added as well where you must fight off waves after wave of attackers, playable in either co-op or single-player.
Another huge addition is an all-new "Sky Stone" Collectable Card Game! This in-game card game (expect actual real versions of cards and the cardgame to hit at somepoint in the future if I had to wager a bet....) is playable throughout the adventure and will allow you to take new cards to add to your deck as you defeat opponents in the Card Game. Another new features is an in-game store where you can buy new cards, as well as other things like PVP Arenas, Lucky Charms and even new Challenges that you can only unlock by purchasing them in the store.
PHEW! That is a heck of a lot of new content!
Skylanders: Giants will hit stores everywhere on October 21, 2012, just ahead of the holiday rush! Be sure to buy those figures for your kids to put under the Christmas tree before its too late!
Skylanders Giants will also be the first game in the series to release for Wii U, with that version including online play on the Nintendo Network.
Darksiders II made a splash at Comic Con 2012 as one of THQ's biggest games of the year that releases in August 2012 for Xbox 360, PS3, PC, OnLive and Wii U (later this year).
GameSpot spent some quality time with the game for this Stage Demo which shows off all-new footage and gameplay of Darksiders II as players step into the shoes of Death and explore this Zelda-style action adventure sequel.
Tomb Raider 2013 the videogame features actress Camilla Luddington stepping into the shoes of Lara Croft, providing the voice work and animation via motion capture for this reboot of the iconic character and an all-new origin story for Lara Croft.
Tomb Raider 2013 will be released in March 2013 for Xbox 360, PS3 and PC.
See all-new gameplay footage of the title in these Comic Con 2012 videos, which will give you a new glimpse into Camilla's portrayal of Lara as well as where developer Crystal Dynamics take her in the game.
GameSpot Comic Con 2012 Lara Croft 2013 Camilla Luddington Interview Video
Comic Con 2012 Tomb Raider 2013 All Access GameSpot Video of New Gameplay footage.
Tomb Raider 2013 - The Final Hours, An Icon Reborn Documentary Diary and Introduction of Camilla Luddington as new Lara Croft.
Unjustice: Gods Among Us (er, Injustice) is the big new DC Comics fighting game from Ed Boon and his Netherrealm Studios (creator of Mortal Kombat 9). It will be released in 2013 for Xbox 360, PS3 and Wii U.
Injustice made a splash at Comic Con 2012 where they revealed two new playable characters: Nightwing and Cyborg. They join the previously revealed cast featuring: Superman, Batman, Flash, Wonder Woman, Harley Quinn, and Solomon Grundy.
Injustice is the first time that a DC Superhero fighting game has been seen in a LOOONG time, although Ed Boon also worked on Mortal Kombat vs DC Universe which featured DC characters going against Ed Boon's MK fighters. However, for a dedicated DC Fighting game, you may have to go all the way back to 1995's Justice League: Task Force for Super NES and Genesis!
Here is the Injustice: Gods Among Us Comic Con 2012 GameSpot Stage Demo Video With Ed Boon.
Sleeping Dogs from Square Enix (formerly True Crime: Hong Kong) made a big splash at Comic Con 2012 where it had a gigantic presence on the show floor with all kinds of new gameplay segments of this open-world Hong Kong Kung-Fu Action game shown off for the first time.
New gameplay segments shown in the videos below include Street Fight battles, Drag Racing, Drug Busts, a tour of your in-game apartment, riding shotgun and more action than you can swing Jackie Chan at!
Sleeping Dogs has a release date next month on August 14th 2012 for Xbox 360, PS3 and PC.
Sleeping Dogs Drug Bust Gameplay
Sleeping Dogs Street Fight Enemy Battles Gameplay
Sleeping Dogs Apartment Tour Character Customization Gameplay
