If the rumors are true, buying something on Xbox Live could get a lot simpler. According to Inside Mobile Apps, by the end of this year, Microsoft Points will be ditched and replaced with real money. Along with Xbox Live, the change would also apply to Windows Phone and Zune marketplaces. Any outstanding balances a user might have would be converted into real money.
According to anonymous sources speaking to Kotaku, the next Xbox will support Blu-ray discs, and Kinect 2 will be introduced. But perhaps the biggest, and scariest, bit of information from the sources is the Xbox 720 will block gamers from playing used games. How the next Xbox will block games was not shared, but Kotaku theorizes that a game could be linked to a specific Xbox Live account, although even that could easily be bypassed by playing offline.
Asura’s Wrath has an impressive amount of gumption behind it judging by the the demo that hit XBLA recently. Comprised of two chapters from the full game, the demo for Asura’s Wrath is just as noisy and frenetic as one would should hope. What appears to be a gleeful celebration of soul-boiling cataclysmic rage is hiding a certain amount of depth from the player in numerous ways.
The game is coming out in a few days, and you probably already know whether or not “More Final Fantasy” is something you want. If you’re still firmly perched on that fence, Square Enix just released a new bit of gameplay footage of Final Fantasy XIII-2 to temp the undecided, and get fans to salivating.
The upcoming Kinect Game, Kinect Star Wars has released a trailer that shows they know exactly who their audience is. While this trailer doesn’t have a second of actual gameplay footage, it does give us a taste of what sort of fun might be had by hardcore Star Wars fans.
As the XBLA season begins we have our first game that can be considered well executed. Scarygirl is a 2D side scrolling platformer, although many of the levels are structured to have branching paths that give off more of a 3D winding view and feel. Based on Nathan Jurevicius’s graphic novel the game finds Scarygirl making her way from level to level fighting enemies that range from axe-chucking lunatics in a brightly colored forest, to giant neon orange rats in the sewer of the Bad City. All of these levels bring you to a finally face-to-eye patched face with the notorious Dr. Maybee. The premise of Scarygirl is nothing impressive but all of the elements that bring you to that final showdown are executed in at least a fairly well done fashion.
Fighting game fans are more than likely already aware that the PS3 and the PSVita will be receiving 3 extra characters for Street Fighter X Tekken, Toro and Kuro, the Sony Playstation mascots and, of course, Cole McGrath from the infamous… uh, Infamous series. However, just like what happened with Mortal Kombat in 2011, it appears that the Xbox 360 version of the game will not be receiving any exclusives. According to Yoshinori Ono at Capcom, they were pushing for Xbox 360 exclusive characters.
