This year’s holiday season is beginning to look like last year’s, especially for the FPS genre. Last year, there was an influx of marquee shooters such as The Orange Box (which contained several high-quality games), Metroid Prime 3: Corruption, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, Bioshock, Crysis, and Unreal Tournament 3.

Far Cry 2 will be joining this year’s batch of top-tier games as it lands on store shelves this October 21 in North America and October 24 in Europe. The Ubisoft shooter will have versions for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC. Other high-profile games coming out in the latter half of 2008 include Resistance 2, Fallout 3, Mercenaries 2, Left 4 Dead, Gears of War 2, Saint’s Row 2, Dead Space, and Brothers in Arms: Hell’s Highway, to name a few.

Yes, Far Cry 2, a highly-anticipated shooter, has become a mere drop in the bucket. To lure more gamers to its fold, Ubisoft also announced that there will be a Far Cry 2 collectors’ edition that will include:

• Exclusive wooden box;
• The Far Cry 2 game;
• “Limited edition” Far Cry 2 shirt;
• “The Art of Far Cry 2” art book;
• Collector 50km² map;
• Making-of DVD.

I originally considered Far Cry 2 as rental, at least until I heard about its flamethrower and map editor. Now, I’m undecided between Fallout 3 and Far Cry 2. Among the games coming out, which are the ones you’re torn over?

Image for Far Cry 2 is courtesy of Ubisoft.

Post from: EveryJoe

Release date for Far Cry 2 revealed, causes purchasing headaches

Remember the thrill you felt when you first heard about Resident Evil 5? At that time, GameCube owners were the only people enjoying Resident Evil 4, though the promise of a PlayStation 2 version was imminent. RE4 was critically acclaimed and with good reason; it was a reimagining of the franchise that had relied too long on annoying camera angles.

The announcement of RE5 intrigued gamers everywhere. RE4 was already a visual masterpiece of the then-current generation. What would the end-result be if Capcom were to place the same harrowing action in high-definition?

This question would be answered in March 2009.

According to GameSpot, Capcom has shed some light on RE5’s release in a business strategies presentation. During Capcom’s projections for its fiscal 2008 (which is up to March 31, 2009), the publisher said:

“(It) aims to sustain solid growth by introducing Resident Evil 5 and titles in other core franchises.”

Capcom’s sales projection for RE5 is at 2.3 million copies worldwide. The publisher also expects to sell 1.5 million units for Bionic Commando and 610,000 for Lost Planet: Colonies.

Image of Resident Evil 5 is courtesy of Capcom.

Post from: EveryJoe

Capcom sheds light on Resident Evil 5 release date

We all know that PC gamers are getting Unreal Tournament 3 this very month, but the release date for the Playstation 3 version remains tentative. Mark Rein, vice president at Epic Games, told Eurogamer that the chances of getting the PS3 version this year is still pretty good.

“Right now we’re very close to a release candidate, and we should have it finished by the end of this week. Then we send it off and it’s just a matter of what happens from there.”

While Rein never said it explicitly, I think it’s very doable. Why? This Eurogamer quote was given roughly around November 8, Thursday, at an event in Birmingham. The end of that week would be the 10^th or 11^th. Production would take from two to three weeks (around the end of November), and delivery would probably be another two weeks (this would roughly fall in the first week of December).

There’s a catch.

UT3 won’t make it to Europe until 2008 because according to Rein, the region’s certification process takes longer. They’ll still be testing the game in different languages, so that will eat up some more time.

Post from: EveryJoe

UT3 for the PS3 might launch this year, but Europe gets no love

Yes, Dementium: The Ward is shipping for the Nintendo DS on October 31. If you haven’t been paying attention, Dementium is this seemingly very gory, very fluid, and very nice survival horror/FPS where you must escape a decrepit hospital while solving puzzles and shooting zombies.

Escaping decrepit hospitals has always been one of my life goals.

To many, the impending release date may be good news. After all, it’s always nice to hear when a game is shipping, and said date is reasonably close. But when release dates coincide, things start to get a little nasty.

Days ago, I posted news of Hellgate: London hitting store shelves on October 31. I happen to like Hellgate: London and Bill Roper, so a personal copy on launch day is very likely.

This means that my expense this Halloween won’t be limited to candy, a few sacrificial bats, and a nice new costume.

Yes, I know that this year’s Holiday Rush™ is going to be crazier than usual, but due to budget restraints than anything else, I’ve always considered myself not part of the bigger herd that jumps at the next overhyped game.

Two games in one day. It’s not even Christmas yet.

Post from: EveryJoe

Dementium to scare pants off this Halloween