games, review Jason England games, review Jason England

Bioshock Infinite Review

Bioshock Infinite has entered a world of extremely high expectations. 

Over the course of six years the first person shooter has grown stale, and Irrational Games are being looked to as the saviors, with a hope of reinvigorating the entire genre just like they did with the original Bioshock in 2007.

Developer ambitions and public aspirations, much like the in-game city of Columbia, are sky high.  This amount of hype would ultimately lead to disappointment, as expectations would transcend any ordinary game.

But this is no ordinary game.

Read More
tech Jason England tech Jason England

Microsoft To Introduce 'Xbox TV' To Take On Apple TV?

Citing “multiple sources familiar with Redmond’s plans”, The Verge has been tipped that Microsoft is planning to launch an Xbox-branded set-top box, similar to Apple TV, built to deliver movies and TV shows as found on the 360 marketplace, as well as more ‘casual games’ – most likely to be downloadable Xbox Live Arcade titles.

Read More
games, review Jason England games, review Jason England

The Walking Dead: Episode Five – No Time Left Review

The concluding part to Telltale Games' The Walking Dead presents not only an end; but a beginning. 

This may seem like the generic vague statement that; but its relevance is strong.  One of the best games this year has come to its explosive finale, and a revolution of in-game storytelling has been introduced with it.

Lee Everett's narrative in No Time Left is emotional, terrifying, exciting, and tense all at once, making for a fitting conclusion that will affect even the most hardened of players.

*EDITOR'S NOTE:* While the storyline of No Time Left will not be spoiled in this review, I do write about key plot points from the previous episodes.  If you have not played any of the series, you may want to refrain from reading, in order to keep it a surprise.

Read More
games, news Jason England games, news Jason England

New Skyrim DLC Revealed: Dragonborn

Xbox players of Skyrim will be receiving an early Christmas present from Bethesda: the third DLC will be coming out on the 4th of December, and it looks awesome. Sadly there is no release date yet for PC or PS3.

Read More
Science, games, news Jason England Science, games, news Jason England

University Researchers Use Xbox Kinect To Control Lasers

Researchers at the University of Dundee have used the Xbox 360 Kinect sensor to control optical tweezers, a set of laser beams used to manipulate particles.

Physicists control the particles through their body movements, which are read by a Kinect-based interface called "HoloHands."  While not completely perfect yet, with a latency issue and the occasional misinterpration of the user's movements, the interface has been quite successfully tested moving silica particles.  

Read More
games, news Jason England games, news Jason England

US Navy SEALs Punished Over Involvement With Medal Of Honor

 
In an attempt to make its latest Medal of Honor unrivalled in realism in the first-person shooter stakes, EA Games has purportedly landed seven US Navy SEALs who consulted on the game in hot water. The U.S. Navy’s principal spec-ops forces, the SEALs have most recently been famed for the finding and killing of Osama Bin Laden.
Read More
games, review Jason England games, review Jason England

The Walking Dead: Episode Four – Around Every Corner Review

 

The Walking Dead has been the epitome of Telltale's vision of episodic gaming, and Around Every Corner has the particularly difficult task of playing out the penultimate chapter to this: the first of (what we hope to be) many seasons to come.  Book of Eli writer Gary Witta leaves his dark signature upon the piece, tackling child endangerment, burying the dead, and a society where the idea of "survival of the fittest" is taken to inhumane lengths.  But the one question remains: does this setup make for an episode that lives up to the finely tuned creations of past?

Read More
games, news Jason England games, news Jason England

Microsoft Investigating Halo 4 Leak

He might be one of the most bad-ass, cybernetically-enhanced super-soldiers we've ever seen, but it seems even Master Chief himself isn't invulnerable to a spot of piracy. Reports are flooding in from numerous online forums from gamers claiming to already have their hands on the long-awaited fourth chapter in the Halo series, Halo 4.

Read More
games, review Jason England games, review Jason England

Game Review: Minecraft - Xbox 360 Edition

Notch's Minecraft truly is a phenomenon in gaming. In a couple of short years, the deviously-simple sandbox building game represents everything fundamentally great about indie game development. Going from a project created in the bedroom of the aforementioned Markus 'Notch' Persson and since riding on the back of nothing more than word alone (up until now, Minecraft has been entirely self-published), the game has now been played by millions and, along with it, earned its creator millions in the process.

Read More
games Jason England games Jason England

Xbox Live’s Sex Pests ‘Move In On Prey Within Two Minutes’, Reports Metro

How’s this for a sensationalist, videogame-bashing headline: ‘Xbox paedophile predators 'move in on prey within two minutes of contact’'? If there was ever a reason to cry fowl of the mainstream presses misunderstanding and vindication of gaming, it’s right here. London’s daily free-sheet Metro today brings alarmist reporting and misplaced fear-mongering to an all-new high, reporting ‘alarming findings’ that makes the paedophile population of Xbox Live sound like a feral pack of ferocious lions stalking their evening meal across the dusty plains of online lobbies, leaderboards and friends lists. An image used of the first-generation Xbox is the icing on the cake.

Read More
games Jason England games Jason England

Halo 4 Is “A More Cinematic Experience” Says 343

 

343 Industries quite rightly has an enormous amount of pressure riding over its head. Not only does Halo 4 herald the long-awaited return of Master Chief as lead protagonist (a very welcome return might we add), but this, the seventh game incorporating the Halo license – a franchise racking up revenue of over $2.8 billion might we add, as of January 2012 – is the studio's very first as lead developer. With Bungie relinquishing the reigns of the franchise, 343 has an incomprehensible weight placed on its shoulders to live up to what's expected both from its ever-faithful fan-base and Microsoft itself.

Read More
games, review Jason England games, review Jason England

Game Review: SSX

If you've ever plunged down a slope of death-defying proportions, listening to a certain Run DMC song, playing as a male individual with a giant afro, you probably have been watching this game very closely to see whether it is the renaissance of a genre that's been dead for too long, or a metaphorical final nail in the coffin of video-game brand rebirths.

Read More
Editorial: How A Dancing C-3PO Represents Everything Wrong With Kinect Development
editorial, games Jason England editorial, games Jason England

Editorial: How A Dancing C-3PO Represents Everything Wrong With Kinect Development

It happened when the Nintendo Wii was first announced, and then again when Microsoft unveiled the Kinect upon the world: gamers across our universe were filled with anticipation; imagining how motion control would finally bridge the gap between dream and reality, how simple gestures aimed at our TV screens would bring us one step closer to truly feeling like a Jedi. The force is strong in Kinect, after all.

Read More