Entertainment Electronics Blog

Bethesda has announced the Dawnguard expansion for Skyrim, with more details of the DLC incoming at E3.

Skyrim’s first DLC will named Dawnguard as rumoured, with the expansion hitting Xbox 360 this summer, Bethesda has announced.

Skyrim DLC’s Xbox exclusivity was confirmed last month with Bethesda admitting it had “been hard at work on creating the first set of game add-ons that will be exclusive to the Xbox 360. This additional content will add new quests, locations, features, and much more to the world of Skyrim. Stay tuned for more details.”

More details will be revealed at E3, the developer has confirmed.

Check out the Dawnguard art below:

More Skyrim DLC on NowGamer:

• Skyrim Kinect: Full List Of 200 Voice Commands
• Skyrim DLC: ‘Dawnguard’ Bethesda Trademark Hints At Elder Scrolls Content
• Skyrim Kinect Launches For Xbox 360, DLC ‘Tidbit’ Incoming
• Skyrim DLC: Evidence Points Towards Snow Elf Prince, Crossbows
• Skyrim: World Secrets You Have To See – Video Guide

The hugely-anticipated DLC for Bethesda’s Skyrim could feature Snow Elves, Crossbows and more according to lines of code in the latest update.

Skyrim DLC could feature Snow Elves and Crossbows according to lines of code found in the update that patches the game to version 1.5.26.

A user on the Bethesda forums found code that references animations for both the Snow Elf Prince and Crossbow weapon.

Snow Elves were a race that usd to dwell in Skyrim before the Nords drove them away, with some taken in – then ultimately betrayed – by the Dwemer, resulting in Skyrim’s Falmer.

Meanwhile, Ripten notes that a book in Skyrim details a Snow Elf Prince as follows:

A Nord warrior sees much in a life of bloodshed and battle, and is rarely surprised by anything armed combat may bring. But few among us that day could have imagined the awe and uncertainty of a raging battlefield that all at once went motionless and silent. Such is the effect the Snow Prince had on us all.  The glorious Snow Prince, an Elf unlike any other, did come that day to bring death to our kind. And death he so brought. May our gods honor him in death, and may we never meet his kind again in life.

We’re quaking in our boots. Hopefully, Bethesda will reveal more about Crossbows and Snow Elves next week.

More Skyrim on NowGamer:

• Skyrim DLC: Evidence Points Towards Snow Elf Prince, Crossbows
• Skyrim DLC: Dragon Mounts & Spell Combos – What Could It Be?
• Skyrim DLC: Xbox 360 Exclusivity Confirmed, New Quests, Locations, Features Incoming
• Skyrim: Bethesda Reveals Incoming Kinect Support For Xbox 360
  

Rockstar set to ’steal thunder’ from E3 with a GTA 5 announcement ahead of the show thinks analyst.

GTA 5 could be revealed further the day before E3 begins as Rockstar likes  “stealing the thunder from everything else,” according to Wedbush Securities’ Michael Pachter.

“They’ve outgrown the show. I think they’re way too cool to go,” he said on GTTV (skip to 5.31). “My read on those guys is they like stealing the thunder from everything else. So if I had to bet, I’d say you’d get an announcement on GTA 5 the day before E3 starts, that’d be Monday, June 4. They don’t show up and that’s all anybody can do is talk about GTA 5 at the show.”

Rockstar last attended E3 to reveal Agent at Sony’s press conference in 2009.

Pachter added that he expects GTA 5’s release date to fall on 23 October – shortly after BioShock Infinite, which the analyst says is of no concern to Rockstar. With both games falling under the Take Two Interactive umbrella however, you might want to take that with a pinch of salt.

More GTA 5 on NowGamer:

• GTA 5: Characters, Multiplayer, Plot – Rumours & Facts Round Up
• Xbox 360 At E3 2012: What To Expect
  
• GTA 5 ‘Delayed’ To December 2012 – Release Date Rumour
  

BT Games follows its God of War 4 listing with more unannounced sequels – Dead Space 3 and Need For Speed: Most Wanted 2.

Dead Space 3 and Need For Speed: Most Wanted 2 – both yet to be announced by EA – have appeared for pre-order on South African retail site BT Games.

The site recently mentioned God of War 4 too, which could be revealed as soon as this week.

Dead Space 3 would be the third, and pretty much expected title in Visceral Games’ third-person sci-fi survival horror franchise, while Need For Speed: Most Wanted 2 would be a sequel to EA Canada’s 2005 urban street racer, which hit PS2, PC, PS3, Xbox, 360, DS, Gamecube and PSP.

NFS: Hot Pursuit studio Criterion is thought to be working on a new Need For Speed game, with speculation suggesting it could be Hot Pursuit 2. Could it actually be Need For Speed: Most Wanted 2 instead?

PC is the format mentioned for Dead Space 3, but no platform information is given for NFS: Most Wanted 2 – instead the description just reads: “Latest Release in the Need For Speed Franchise”.

With E3 coming up in the next few weeks, it seems there are still plenty of game announcements set for 2012.

More Dead Space 3 and Need For Speed on NowGamer:

• Dead Space 3 Powered By Frostbite 2.0 – Rumour
• Dead Space Studio Working On ‘Bold New Action Franchise’
• Need For Speed Studio Criterion Teasing Something ‘Big’
• Burnout Studio Gearing Up For New AAA Racing Game
  

The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings is out next week – but just how good is it?

The Witcher 2 finally launches for Xbox 360 on Tuesday 17 April, but the verdicts are in today and reveal an RPG of note, with review scores indicating that CD Projekt’s epic is just as good – if not better – than the PC original.

NowGamer’s 9.2/10 The Witcher 2 review called the game an “atmospheric and demanding RPG that you should play right now,” which the rest of th internet appears to agree with – check out the other review scores below:

Beefjack – 8.5
CVG – 9.2
Eurogamer – 9
GamesRadar – 9
GameReactor – 9.2
GameTrailers – 9.4
OXM UK – 9
OXM US – 8.5
Strategy Informer – 9
Videogamer – 9

More The Witcher 2 on NowGamer:

• The Witcher 2 Headed To PS3? Dev Teases ‘Something Extraordinary’
• The Witcher 2: Enhanced Edition – New Elements Trailer
• Witcher 2: The Assassins Of Kings Hits Xbox 360 In April – Epic Trailer

Max Payne 3’s trophy/achievement list reveals plenty of kill-based challenges.

Rockstar has revealed the full list of trophies and achievements for Max Payne 3, which confirms he return of the series’ kills=seconds time-based New York Minute mode.

There’s plenty of other tough sounding rewards too.

Max Payne 3 hits PS3 and Xbox 360 on 15 May and follows on PC two weeks later.

Max Payne 3 Achievements & Trophies

Feel the Payne
Story Complete MEDIUM

Want more on Max Payne 3?

• GTA 5: Rockstar Confirms Max Payne 3 Multiplayer Crew Imports
• Max Payne 3 Single Player Hands On: Gameplay, Awesome Tech & Bullet Time

Minecraft’s creator has only just revealed his Elite-style flight simulation game and already he’s detailing features of the game.

If you’re at all keen on Minecraft then you’re already aware of Notch, his latest game in development 0×10c and the fact that he likes to use Twitter. A lot.

Since the recent announcement of 0×10c, Notch has been fielding questions over Twitter to answer the intrigued masses. Piece the answers together and you’ll discover plenty of details on the next big indie game.

The visuals, for example, will be something of a step-up as Notch claims 0×10c will be in a new “prototype engine”, which the logo has been rendered in.

That said, the visuals will still have “Simple graphics. Very simple.” while it will be first-person, at least when inside the ship.

As for gameplay, it’ll be possible to build your own spaceships while your friends can jump on board a single ship and control it together. Which might be necessary, since there will be a number of necessary engineering repairs required during play.

Duct tape, however, is a fix-all regardless of malfunction for a temporary period of time.

There will be planet gameplay too with seamless travel between space and planets, though details on what the gameplay will involve is unknown. Let’s hope it’s an explore and settle style, with an ever-expanding multiverse.

As for the on-board, programmable DCPU-16, Notch is considering three computers per ship with a 100KHz speed and will take 1.44MB floppy discs for different programs and software.

It’ll even be able to play Doom, providing someone recreates it for the DCPU.

Most interesting is the communication capabilites of the CPU, enabling peer-to-peer communication, distributed processing, remote spaceship control and even cyber warfare.

Notch mentions other technical details surrounding the DCPU-16 or just how hard his hard science game will be, the rest of which you can find at an unofficial website tracking Notch’s Twitter feeds for details on 0×10c.

Related links:

• 0×10c: Notch’s Space Game Named, Has Trading, Looting, Combat – Details
• Minecraft: Xbox 360 Edition Gets May Release Date, High Price
• Portal 2, Batman: Arkham City Winners At The 2012 Videogame BAFTAs

Exciting Xbox Live Arcade platformer is inspired from an unlikely source.

Tequila Works, the minds behind survival horror platformer Deadlight, reveals some of the inspirations for its gritty art style.

“We grew up in the Eighties,” says creative director Raúl Rubio Munárriz in an interview with NowGamer, “We tried to capture the unique visual appealings of the Eighties, not the stereotypes.”

“It may sound silly, but one of the initial visual references for Deadlight was The Goonies!” reveals Munárriz, adding “First Blood was also a major influence.”

Inspirations from other games, however, aren’t what you might expect. Despite the survival horror themes, Munárriz claims “classic cinematic platformers like Prince Of Persia, Another World or Flashback” as major inspirations, focusing on “worlds where one misstep can mean death.”

Continuing to discuss the survival horror elements in a platform game, however, Munárriz said “We chose to make Deadlight that way, as we felt it was a great way to mix fast-paced gameplay with a deep horror atmosphere.

“The surprise element is working even better by making this association. We wanted the player to feel vulnerable, isolated.”

More Deadlight links:

• Minecraft: Xbox 360 Edition Gets May Release Date, High Price
• Gears Of War 3: Forces Of Nature DLC Hits Xbox Live With New Maps 
• Jet Set Radio HD Making Summer Brighter On PS3, Xbox 360 – Screens

Next-gen console release dates likely unknown says veteran analyst Michael Pachter.

Xbox 720 and PlayStation 4 release dates are probably unknown by any developers with knowledge of the next-gen consoles according to Wedbush Securities analyst Michael Pachter despite rumours to the contrary which suggest a 2013 launch for both.

“I suppose that there are dev kits out there, but nobody has firm knowledge about launch dates,” he told NowGamer.

“I love that the Xbox 720 has gone from no disc drive to a Blu-ray drive in the span of a week, and love that there is no mention about the PS4 blocking used games,” Pachter said of the latest reports. “If there are disparate rumors about the Xbox 720 and PS4, one of them must be wrong.”

The rumoured specs for both consoles are believable as “dev kits would have the correct configuration,” the analyst reasoned, adding that while features such as a perpetual internet connection or built-in Kinect may be true, are not essential information for developers at this stage.

“The noise about who will launch first is just noise. Neither Sony nor Microsoft knows what the other is doing, so it’s not particularly important which one launches first. They may both go at holiday 2013, although spring 2014 makes more sense so that they can keep up with demand,” Pachter concluded.

More Next-Gen on NowGamer:

• Sony Wants PS4 To Beat Microsoft’s Xbox 720 To Launch – Report
• Durango: Next-Gen Xbox Has 2013 Release Date, Blu-ray – Rumour

Rental chain Blockbuster offering deals and midnight openings for Star War Kinect and themed Xbox 360 bundle respectively.

Kinect Star Wars will be available for just 99p at Blockbuster when gamers trade-in one of eight recent game releases.

If you’re already fed-up with one of the games listed below, you too can be a motion-controlled Jedi (or Rancor) for next to nothing.

•    Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City
•    FIFA Street 4
•    Streetfighter X Tekken
•    Twisted Metal
•    Ninja Gaiden 3
•    Asura’s Wrath
•    Ridge Racer Unbounded
•    Tiger Woods PGA Tour 13   

Elsewhere, Blockbuster will have a midnight event for the upcoming Star Wars-themed Xbox 360, as well as the game, at its Clapham store on Monday – the first five customers in the queue will each be given the £339.99 console for free.