Level Orange

Hot on the heels of last year’s big release of Battlefield: Bad Company, DICE has announced the release of Battlefield: Bad Company 2 this winter. Once again, gamers will ride or die with B Company and fight their way through more of the intense, totally destructive environments that only the Frostbite engine can deliver. Also announced is the new Battlefield 1943 title, following in the footsteps of the wildly successful Battlefield 1942 WWII setting and gameplay. Bad Company 2 will be available for Xbox 360, PS3 and PC, while Battlefield 1943 will find its way to gamers online through Xbox Live Marketplace, Playstation Store and PC.

I played a fair share of Bad Company and even though some of the weapons frustrated me to no end, it was endlessly amusing to see what can happen when you take all manner of weapons to any given structure. So while the promise of more vehicles, more team play and more mayhem in Bad Company 2 is a no-brainer, I’m more curious to see how Battlefield 1943 will fare, both in terms of being yet another WWII game and with online distribution for such a massive game.

As someone who’s played video games regularly for years, watching this video by photographer Robbie Cooper of young gamers and the emotion on their faces is both amusing and interesting.

LINK

OK, so this might not be the most accurate depiction of me, but then again, I did try to make it as accurate as possible. I’ve played around with the new Avatars with the new Xbox 360 dashboard (wisely being marketed as the New Xbox Experience, or NXE, for anyone not into gaming), and I have to say, it’s kinda neat.

I’m not particularly a fan of the plans to capitalize on things like clothes and accessories and whatnot for the Avatars by game publishers and licensors, but I can understand the business sense of it. And after personally tinkering around with the system, I can see where it’s starting to come up short, assumedly so that third parties can come in and add even greater value to it.

I’ll be interested to see just how much a Halo or Rock Band t-shirt costs for an Avatar. One can only hope that a whole new outfit wouldn’t be much more than say, a set of gamerpics (roughly a buck or two), but with some publishers eager to nickel-and-dime gamers for every little item, I wouldn’t be surprised to see purchases like this broken down even further. “Want a new bracelet? How about a new baseball cap? That’ll be $1 each, please.”

Yeah, let’s hope not.

Today comes news of the first downloadable content to hit Xbox Live since the April release of Grand Theft Auto IV. The new episodic content, titled Grand Theft Auto IV: The Lost and Damned, will hit XBL on February 17, 2009 and is the first of two new episodes to come to the platform. No other details, such as plot or price point, have been revealed, but stay tuned!

“Making these episodes has enabled us to expand the narrative and the experience of interacting with a game world in really innovative ways,” said Sam Houser, Founder of Rockstar Games. “We hope fans of the game enjoy the new way of experiencing life in Liberty City contained in this first episode.”

LINK

Now in the iTunes App Store: The Iconfactory’s Frenzic! Looks like fun and at a good price point, especially with the quality that Iconfactory brings to their work.

Wolfgang Ante, the game’s creator and lead engineer explained, “The iPhone’s revolutionary touch-screen interface combined with a simple premise that takes only minutes to learn, makes Frenzic a compelling game for players of all ages.”

LINK