Publisher THQ has made a big move in order to preserve one of their most popular franchises. THQ has purchased the rights to the UFC license putting a submission hold on the competition until the end of 2018. Similar to EA’s acquisition of the NFL license some years ago, THQ is now the sole publisher of Ultimate Fighting Championship games on all consoles, web apps and platforms.
New owners of EA’s Medal of Honor can look forward to free DLC. On November 3rd , players who have activated EA’s Online Pass will get a new multiplayer elimination mode called “Clean Sweep”. The new mode will come with two new maps entitled Bagram Hangar and Khyber Caves as well as two older maps, Diwagal Camp and Kabul City Ruins, redesigned in order to fit the new mode. Despite poor reviews,
Double Fine Productions is home to some of the best creative minds working in the game industry today. But while their first two releases Psychonauts and Brutal Legend were praised for their inventive worlds, good sense of humor, and entertaining stories, they also had some issues with their game design and failed to make a big impact financially. That resulted in a new strategy for Tim Schafer and his team. Instead of pouring all their energies into large projects that the whole company’s future hinged on the success of, they abandoned the retail market in favor of splitting into smaller groups to work on cheaper downloadable titles to limit the risk and boost their output. Costume Quest is the first release using this strategy, and while we don’t know how much this strategy will help the company, it could result in a lot of really fun projects.
Both Parasite Eve and its sequel are said to be headed for PSN. Tetsuya Nomura has confirmed, using Twitter, that both the PSOne classics by Square Enix should be arriving at some point, although no date has yet been given.
Space Channel 5 Part 2 will be one of two new Dreamcast games that will be arriving on PSN and Xbox Live.
For those who never experienced it, Space Channel 5 is a rhythm music game developed by United Game Artists. The player has to copy sequences of dance steps given by an on screen character.
Sony seems to have been storing games up somewhere because it is a huge week for new releases, especially in the stores. The game likely to get most attention this week is Fallout: New Vegas. But Vanquish, an intense third-person shooter has been getting some fairly decent reviews, so might also be work a look
Assassins Creed 2 was an impressive single player experience that came close to winning many writers’ game of the year awards in 2009. Since the game lacked a multiplayer component, it was hard to rationalize a GOTY title when you consider the continued enjoyment associated with the replay value of multiplayer. Ubisoft hopes to cover all their bases with the release of Assassins Creed: Brotherhood.
