Kingdom Hearts HD 1.5 Remix Pre-Order Artbook Bonus

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Square Enix has announced that it is offering a limited edition artbook for those that pre-order Kingdom Hearts HD 1.5 Remix. The game includes HD remastered versions of Kingdom Hearts 1 Final Mix, Kingdom Hearts Re:Chain of Memories and HD cinematics from Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days and will be available exclusively on PS3 for $39.99 on September 10.

“Now, this isn’t your traditional video game artbook. First off, the artwork will feature your favorite characters in the history of anything — Sora, Riku, Donald Duck, Goofy, other iconic Disney characters, and much more,” wrote Mathew Kishimoto, Marketing Coordinator for Square Enix. “This book has everything you could want — from early sketches, to character renders, to final pieces of artwork that never made its way to North America (from famed Director Nomura Tetsuya).”

Source: Blog.US.PlayStation.com

Defense Grid 2 Gets Angel Investment From Steven Dengler

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Hidden Path Entertainment has announced that Steven Dengler will help fund the final parts of developing Defense Grid 2. This angel investment was done via his company Dracogen and is the latest game project he’s helped out with, which has included Torment: Tides of Numenera, Project Eternity, and Super Pixel Brothers.

“I don’t have rights, and I am not a publisher,” said Dengler. “I did smaller financings for fun. But I see that the thing that is broken in the industry is that publishers want your soul. Self-publishing has to become a better option. Jeff [Pobst, chief executive of Hidden Path] didn’t have to twist my arm. I’m not in this to make my fortune. This gets a game out there that people want to play. I don’t want to own part of the company. I want to help make a game.”

“We are going to change this industry, one awesome game at a time. Developers are going to make most of the money from their own games,” he later tweeted.

Source: GamesBeat

Twitter’s ‘Game of Thrones’ Favorites Are Coming

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Earlier this week BuzzFeed analyzed 200,000 tweets relating to HBO’s Game of Thrones to determine viewers’ demographics and positive and negative sentiments to different characters. Using what they call “ninja machine learning techniques,” the website discovered that there are more male viewers than female, more New Yorkers than Californians, and that everyone — male or female — is in love with the captivating Khaleesi.

The website also found Twitter users’ favorite and least favorite members of the Game of Thrones universe, measured by the percentage of positive and negative tweets.

Not a major shocker, the social study deemed Jon Snow the bronze recipient of the top favorites. Barely edged out by his brother.

 

Robb Stark, besides his militant struggles in the show, made runner-up to the top fan favorite.

The Queen of Twitter is the lovely Daenerys Targaryen, the Mother of Dragons.

Sitting in the loser throne is Joffrey Baratheon with the highest number of negative reactions on Twitter.

Which GOT character is your favorite Let us know in the comments below! 

Source: BuzzFeed

Come Home To The Simpsons

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Making the rounds recently has been this live action recreation of the opening to The Simpsons. Originally done to support the airing of the perpetually popular show on Sky One, it’s interesting to see the differences that come from the filming location being the U.K.

Sony Gets Angry Birds Film Rights

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Sony Pictures Entertainment has announced that it has signed a deal with Rovio Entertainment to make an Angry Birds film. The film has a planned release date of July 1, 2016 and has John Cohen as a producer (Despicable Me) and executive producer David Maisel (Iron Man).

“Sony impressed us with their great attitude, determination and professionalism. They convinced us that we have found the right partners and team to help us market and distribute our first motion picture.” said Mikael Hed, CEO of Rovio Entertainment. “(Their) teams will be the best possible collaborators as we get set to take our franchise to the next level.”

Among The Sleep Gets Funded On Kickstarter

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Killbite’s Kickstarter for Among the Sleep has reached its initial goal of $200,000. With only hours remaining, the project already has reached its stretch goals for Oculus Rift support and a commentary track, and is close to its other stretch goal of added DLC.

“Among the Sleep is now past 100% funded! You have no idea how much this means to us, we’re soooo grateful for all your generosity, your inspiring enthusiasm, and your tireless dedication for the last month!” posted Killbite. “Now it’s our turn to deliver. We’re back to intensive work on Among the Sleep, and we can’t wait to show you everything we have in store for the project, in due time.”

Source: Kickstarter.com

Machinima App Tops On Xbox 360 In Past Year

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Machinima has announced that its Xbox 360 app is one of the fastest downloaded Xbox apps in the last 12 months. The app features full access to all Machinima programming and content exclusive to the Xbox 360.

“We worked with Machinima in the past to launch the digital series Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn, and knew that they would be an ideal partner for the release of our first global app,” said Microsoft’s director of Xbox programming Larry Hryb. “The sheer volume of downloads is a great milestone that demonstrates the popularity of Machinima among Xbox owners.”

“We are excited to be the first global app on Xbox 360. The overwhelmingly positive response from the consumers validates the true worldwide power of the Machinima audience and brand,” said Machinima CEO Allen DeBevoise. “We know our audience watches video on Xbox. Developing the Machinima app makes it easier for them to watch, engage with, and share our content.”

Valve Launches Steam Trading Cards

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Valve has announced that they are launching Steam Trading Cards. This new service is designed to reward gamers for gaming on Steam.

“Released in beta today, Steam Trading Cards allows customers to earn Steam rewards for playing the games they love. Those who participate will receive game-specific trading cards that can be collected to earn rewards such as game badges, profile backgrounds, emoticons, coupons, and more,” reads the release by Valve. “The group of titles participating in the Steam Trading Cards beta includes Don’t Starve, Dota 2, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, Team Fortress 2, Portal 2 and Half-Life 2. The service will expand over the coming months to include many more titles on Steam.”

For more information on Steam Trading Cards visit SteamCommunity.com/TradingCards.

Mobile Gamer Revenue Per User Above $12: SuperData

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SuperData released their April report for the digital games market in the U.S. They stated that while overall spending on mobile games declined slightly, the average revenue per paying user had increased and is above the $12 barrier for the first time.

The top mobile titles during this time are Mobage’s Marvel: War of Heroes, King’s Candy Crush Saga, and Supercell’s Clash of Clans. These games fed a great deal into the total spend in the digital game market at $832 million, down 5 percent month-over-month.

Free-to-play MMOs saw their audience grow to over 45 million in the U.S. While average revenue per paying user did decline slightly, it is expected that Infinite Crisis and Gundog: Animal World War will spark more growth of the free-to-play market very soon.

Social games and pay-to-play MMOs both saw declines. 2.7 million monthly active users departed social games and subscription MMOs lost roughly 896,000 U.S. subscribers in the past three months.

“As we reach the end of the console cycle, and the various next-gen contenders are made public, overall games sales are slowing down,” said SuperData. “Much less affected by the console life cycle, downloadable content on the PC was this month’s exception, and grew almost 9 percent to $136 million month-over-month.”