Guitar Hero / DJ Hero Dead?
Activision/Blizzard announced that they will be dropping development the Guitar Hero game scheduled for 2011 including any future DJ Hero games. They will also be disbanding the whole Guitar Hero division as stated by the company:
“Due to continued declines in the music genre, the company will disband Activision Publishing’s Guitar Hero business unit and discontinue development on its Guitar Hero game for 2011."
As for the future of the series, nothing is confirmed. Perhaps Guitar Hero will be back in 2012 or so but no music games will be coming out of Activision this 2011.
Development on True Crime: Hong Kong has also been stopped because it was "just not good enough" to compete in the open world genre. Which is probably why you haven't been hearing much about it for a while now.
Activision/Blizzard will instead focus on Call of Duty titles, the development of a "best-in-class digital community surrounding the Call of Duty franchise". A new Bungie IP and some new and "innovative universe with broad appeal" that will be revealed at Toy Fair later this week.
If you're all wondering about Guitar Hero DLC, that'll be done after the month of February too. All previously announced DLC will be released and that's it.
Source:
LG wants to ban PS3 sales in the US
Electronics firm LG has filed a patent infringement suit against Sony, demanding that the platform holder stop selling PlayStation 3 consoles and Bravia televisions. LG claims that TVs infringe four patents, while the PS3's Blu-ray player infringes a further four.
According to the suit, the problems stem from the way in which the PS3 handles multiple data streams and reproduces data from read-only sources.
Sony, for its part, isn't just the receiver in this legal buggery, having already gone after LG cellphones for seven patent violations, and filed a civil suit over LG Blu-ray players. Looking at the history, it seems as if LG is acting out and attempting to give as good as it gets.
This eye-for-an-eye way of using the legal system just strikes me as rather petulant, if anything. Likely nothing will come of this, and it's just two companies bitchslapping each other for nobody's gain. Both of 'em can shut up.
Via: DToid LG Fires Back at Sony in Patent Fight Over TVs, Phones [Bloomberg]
L.A. Noire Orientation video
Rockstar games released a video showing gameplay footage of L.A Noire. The video is similar to how they presented Red Dead Redemption's features last year which is a good touch if you ask me.
The video pretty much gives you the run down on what to expect from L.A Noire  and seems like a game that can't be missed. The core gameplay is investigating crimes like a real cop back in the 40's and the detective work in this game looks quite impressive. Take note on the facial expressions because that's what really caught my eye.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tO0W27D1TrY]
L.A Noire will be released May 20, 2011 on Xbox 360 and Playstation 3.
Battlefield 3 coming fall 2011
Is it just me or will 2011 be the biggest year in gaming ever. Well a huge title is again slated for a 2011 release and that title is Battlefield 3. Game informer was the first to spill the beans that Battlefield 3 is on the works with an official picture of the game as their front cover.
Website and trailer is up with the trailer being just a tease with no real gameplay footage or any information about the game but it's good to know it will be coming out this fall. EA failed completely with Medal of Honor to compete with Activision's Call of Duty series and their best bet to overthrown Call of Duty is Battlefield. Battlefield: Bad Company 2 was one of the best FPS games I've played in a long time and with DICE developing Battlefield 3, I'm positive this will compete or rather beat whatever Call of Duty title planned this 2011.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xP0Ij1_VTY0&feature=player_embedded]
Demon's Souls' "Sequel"/Spiritual Successor Revealed
An action RPG that blew our mind back in 2009 is officially getting a sequel. From Software, the developers of Demon's Soul first named it project dark but has retitled it as Dark Souls.
The game will retain everything that was Demon Soul's but with a bigger world to experience. instead of the first game's one portal area were u have access to all the game stages, there will be a world map to explore. The story will have no connection to the first and character customization is going deeper in the sequel.
Character classes though in the first game has been taken out as the devs mentioned they want your characters to start with nothing so you have more freedom to create your character in whatever play-style you prefer. The famous co-op feature were you can invade people's world to either help or mess them up, the ability to leave messages to warn players of danger ahead and being able to see how a player has died in that certain stage. All of this will return and will be adding a few improvements to the online feature but no details on how it will be improved.
Dark Soul's is currently in the works but it looks like it won't be a PS3 exclusive anymore. They are aiming for a worldwide release on the PS3 and the Xbox 360 at the end of the year. Namco bandai has mentioned that not only will they be taking care of the publishing for Dark Soul's on the US and UK release, they will also make Dark Soul's a PS3 exclusive in japan only. Why PS3 exclusive only in Japan? we have no idea. japan loves doing that for some reason.
Namco has also graced us with a trailer showing gameplay footage.
[Source: 4 Player Podcast, 1up]
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PsrNWNc2VCA&feature=player_embedded]