I'm too sexy for my shirt, too sexy for my shirt, so sexy it hurts

Is Deus Ex: Human Revolution on your new games radar yet?  If it isn’t, then let me do you a favor and give you a heads up about it.

Deus Ex: Human Revolution is a first person role playing game being developed by Eidos Montreal for the Xbox 360, PC, and Playstation 3.  Human Revolution is a prequel to the popular PC game Deus Ex and the less popular Deus Ex: Invisible War.  Set in a cyberpunk future and featuring a globe hopping campaign, Deus Ex looks to be what  Alpha Protocol should have been.  Like Alpha Protocol this game promises options. Specifically, Deus Ex is promising that any Mahatma Gandhis out there can get through the game with a minimum of violence using stealth, social skills, and hacking.

Beyond all the boring talking, sneaking, and keyboard twiddling Deus Ex is a first person shooter.  It is promising a wide range of weapons and weapon upgrades.  Of course, upgrading weapons is nothing new but it looks like Eidos is making an effort to make the upgrades more interesting than hum drum damage and accuracy boosts.  The only upgrade that has been specifically mentioned is an upgrade that transforms a boring dumb fire rocket launcher into a heat seeking missile firing murder machine.  But the weapons are not the biggest draw for Deus Ex.  If you just want a bunch of weapons and AI targets the newest Call of Honor Zone game will scratch that itch.  The story Deus Ex promises to tell is the reason to check it out.

The story is promising to be a complex epic that involves evil mega corporations, conspiracies, and everything else you would expect from a cyberpunk world.  It centers around Alex Jensen, Mr. Too Sexy For His Shirt up there, and the nifty new mechanical arms he is kitted out with after an epic beat down. Big Sexy’s involuntary upgrade to stainless steel dick beaters adds a side story that focuses on trans humanist ideals and ethics.  This plays out in a sepia toned, near future dystopia in which Jensen is some kind of cross between Solid Snake and Dick Tracy that works for a, presumably evil, mega corporation that makes vibrating prosthetic hands for the ladies.  Well, presumably they make more than prosthetics with naughty features but a cyberpunk conspiracy story about the near future porn industry is something that I find oddly appealing.

Time to wrap this up before I get into theories about how porn will drive the cyberpunk technology of tomorrow.  Deus Ex: Human revolution looks like a promising first person shooter that will mix stealth, action, and smooth talking into an epic story that actually attempts to tackle trans humanist issues and ethics.  It does not have a release date beyond some time in 2011 but the news makes it sound like it will be out this summer.  If it waits too long to be released it will be up against the powerhouse noob stompin’ duo of Gears of War 3 and Mass Effect 3 that is slated to come out just in time for Christmas.

Natural Selection 2 is a new PC game being developed by Unknown Worlds that spices up the first person shooter genre with real time strategy elements.  Unknown Worlds is a brand new development studio that was founded by the creator of the original Natural Selection, Charlie ‘Flayra’ Cleveland.  The original Natural Selection is a custom game mod for the original Half Life.  At its core, Natural Selection 2 is a multi-player first person shooter that pits fairly generic space marines against only slightly less generic aliens.  The space marines are called the Frontiersmen and might as well be the Colonial Marines from James Cameron’s movie Aliens.  The aliens, called the Kharaa, are more original but bear a strong resemblance to Starcraft’s Zerg.  Despite how generic the premise of each race is, the game itself looks extremely promising.  Natural Selection 2 incorporates real time strategy into first person shooting in innovative ways and has an exclusively multi-player focus.  The two races are generic but well differentiated and Unknown Worlds is working hard to make them balanced and fun to play.  The most promising aspect of Natural Selection 2 is that Unknown Worlds is embracing their modder roots by making their game extremely modder friendly.

Natural Selection 2 mixes first person shooting with real time strategy elements seamlessly by allowing any player to assume the role of a real time strategy commander at any time.  Assuming the command role is as simple as hopping into a command center.  The command center switches the player’s view from the first person to a top down view.  Once in the top down command view the player is responsible for building up infrastructure and managing the economy for the team.  The economy in Natural Selection 2 revolves around building resource gathering structures on resource nodes Dawn of War style.  The use of Dawn of War style resourcing works very well in a first person shooter game because every room with a resource node strategically important.  The resource nodes provide a strong incentive to take and hold more of the map rather than just camping out in the spawn area.  This reinforces the run and gun, team death match style of play rather than conflicting with it.  The resourcing system is also used to promote teamwork.  Taking a resource node provides both the individual players and the commander with resources.  This gives every player a strong incentive to work together with each other and the commander because everyone benefits from taking a resource node.  Of course, the commander uses command resources for different things than the individual players use personal resources for.  Natural selection 2 also uses the tech tree to reinforce the teamwork that the resource system promotes.  Each team climbs the tech tree by capturing command points and placing new command centers on them.  As more command points are captured the commander can spend command resources to unlock new weapons and upgrades for the rest of the team.  The rest of the team, in turn, spends their personal resources purchasing the gear that the commander unlocks.  As the respective tech tree are unlocked the differences between the Frontiersmen and the Kharaa become more pronounced.

Game play video of Marines.

The Frontiersmen play much like you would expect generic space marines to play.  It seems like a deliberate design decision to make both factions fairly generic so that it is easy for anyone with first person shooter experience to pick up and play Natural selection 2.  The Frontiersmen, naturally, focus on superior ranged weapons and feature decentralized infrastructure.  Frontiersmen weapons are first person shooter staples like shotguns, grenade launchers, and flamethrowers.  Even though the weapons are first person shooter staples they are tailored to fill specific roles.  The grenade launcher is tailored to take out infrastructure at range while the flamethrower is tailored to take out advanced Kharaa creatures.  The Frontiersmen use armories and infantry spawning portals to decentralize their infrastructure.  Both the spawn portals and the armories can be built anywhere on the map by the Frontiersmen commander.  This allows the Frontiersmen to turn any area into a base.  The ability to create bases anywhere seems essential to Frontiersmen strategy.  Unlike the Kharaa, the Frontiersmen will run out of ammo and move relatively slow, so they need to be able to get to armories easily to resupply.  This makes using the real time strategy elements to make the spawn portals and armories close to the action key to winning as the Frontiersmen.  On the other side of the arena, the Kharaa feature a centralized infrastructure and focus more on individual speed and melee combat than the Frontiersmen.

The Kharaa resemble the Starcraft’s Zerg by having a more centralized infrastructure, melee focus, and faster movement.  The basic Kharaa creature that every player starts as is a smaller, dog-like ankle biter called a Skulk.  The Skulk can take shortcuts through air vents by running along walls and ceilings.  This allows the basic Kharaa Skulk to be a fast, versatile bushwhacker and harasser.  Each player can evolve from the basic Skulk into a different creature at any time, anywhere by entering a short chrysalis phase and spending personal resources.  Three other creatures revealed so far are the flying Lerk, the teleporting Fade, and the defense building Gorge.  The Lerk is a flying creature with a variety of ranged attacks that include a rapid fire spike, a sniper spike, and area denial gas bombs.  This makes the Lerk one of the few Kharaa creature with any kind of standoff firepower.  The Fade, on the other hand, forgoes ranged weapons for the ability to teleport over short distances and a powerful melee attack.  The Fade’s teleport allows it to, ideally, teleport in, pick a marine off, and get back out before the Frontiersmen can react.  The Gorge rounds out the faster, more offensive creatures by being able to place static defenses.  The static defenses the Gorge places are flower looking things that shoot any marines that come close to them.  The Kharaa also feature a more centralized infrastructure that revolves around Hive nodes.  Hive nodes act as both command centers and spawning portals.  The Hive nodes must be placed on command points and each additional hive node unlocks another level of Kharaa technology.  The Hive nodes also create eggs at regular intervals that the team respawns from.  Making the Hive nodes both the command center and spawning portal centralizes the Kharaa economy and sets them apart from the Frontiersmen.  Both of these races promise an innovative blend of first person shooter and real time strategy with simple to understand but well differentiated factions that only scratches the surface of what Natural Selection 2 could become.

Game play video of aliens.

Unknown Worlds is promising to embrace its roots as a Half Life 2 custom mod by releasing an extensive suite of modding tools with their game.  An extensive modding suite will allow players to do whatever they like with the game.  This means that any player could come up with new weapons for the Frontiersmen, new creatures for the Kharaa or even whole new games.  The Natural Selection 2 community is already talking about making mods that pit Frontiersmen against Frontiersmen and Kharaa against Kharaa.  The community is also planning to make a classic team death match game that strips out the innovative real time strategy elements.  Those mods are just the beginning of what Natural Selection 2′s modding community will come up with.  Unknown Worlds is promising to support their community in their modding endeavors.  Unknown Worlds is making a very smart decision by supporting their modding community because the modders will invariably add a lot of replay value to their game.  There are a lot of examples of how a mod has added a lot of replay value to a game.  Warcraft 3′s modding community, for example, created the Defense of the Ancients mod which was the inspiration and proof of concept for both League of Legends and Heroes of Newerth.   Other examples of popular mods that that added a replay value to there respective games are Team Fortress, Counter-Strike, and the original Natural Selection.  Unknown Worlds support for its modders is a virtual guarantee that Natural Selection 2 will end up being much more than just what the developer publishes.  The promise of extensive modding makes an extremely promising game even more promising even though Natural Selection 2 is only in beta testing.

Unknown Worlds has not yet set a release date for Natural Selection 2.  There seems to be  little chance that it will release this year, but don’t despair.  If anyone wants to play Natural Selection 2 right now they can zip over to the Unknown Worlds website and buy a beta copy.  Everyone that thinks Natural Selection 2 will be an awesome game should go buy a beta copy because Unknown Worlds is using the revenue from selling beta copies to finish their game.  There is also the promise that anyone that spends buys a beta copy will get the full game when it releases.  I encourage everyone who can afford it to go and buy a beta copy because Natural Selection 2 has a lot of promise and I would hate to see it fail for lack of funds.

You’re Invited!
What: The actual release of most famous vaporware game ever.
When: May 3, 2011

That video should have answered most of the questions about how Monday Night Combat will play.  The only big questions left are when will Monday Night Combat be released and how much is it going to cost?  The release date has not been officially announced but rumor has it that Monday Night Combat will be out within a few months.  The cost has not been officially announced, to my knowledge, but it is rumored that Monday Night Combat will cost $15.  With those questions answered there is one burning question that is up to you to answer.  Do you think you can get $15 worth of fun out of Monday Night Combat?

Epic Games decided to keep it in the family in Gears of War 2 by having Delta Squad reinforcements include Anthony’s brother, Benjamin Carmine. When I saw that in my initial play through of Gears of War 2 I thought Ben Carmine would be just the typical worthless soldier like his brother was and die fairly quickly. Fortunately I was mistaken on that count and Ben Carmine turned out to be one damn fine soldier. He was always rushing into battle, taking out more than his fair share of the Locust horde enemies. It took a building sized worm eating him and digesting him alive to take down Ben Carmine.

Sticking with tradition, Gears of War 3 will feature the 3rd Carmine brother, Clayton. And, following the trend as well, Clayton Carmine will be and even more bad-ass soldier than either Anthony or Benjamin was.

From Epic Games:

Fans to Decide the Fate of Carmine in Gears of War 3

Place your vote for the fate of the newest Carmine brother through the purchase of avatar gear on Xbox LIVE Marketplace, with benefits going to charity

The fate of Carmine lies in your hands! For the first time in franchise history, Epic Games and Microsoft are giving fans the chance to decide the fate of a character in Gears of War 3. By purchasing avatar gear on Xbox LIVE Marketplace, fans and gaming communities around the globe will decide the destiny of the newest Carmine brother set to appear in Gears of War 3, with all the proceeds going to the Child’s Play Charity.

Keeping with the series’ tradition, Clayton Carmine will be introduced in the trilogy’s final chapter, and like Anthony and Ben, the newest rookie brother runs the high risk of meeting an early death. However, unlike in the previous games, the Xbox community will choose whether Carmine lives or dies by purchasing special Gears of War 3 avatar gear on Xbox LIVE Marketplace. Starting July 29, two new avatar t-shirts will be available on the Avatar Marketplace on Xbox LIVE—one shirt reads “Save Carmine,” and the other reads “Carmine Must Die.” By purchasing the “Save Carmine” shirt, you’re casting your vote to let Carmine live in Gears of War 3. Conversely, purchasing the “Carmine Must Die” shirt means you want to see Clayton follow the fate of his brothers.

Child’s Play is a community-based games industry charity dedicated to improving the lives of children around the world. Through their network of more than 60 hospitals and through the generosity of their community of donors, Child’s Play raises millions of dollars each year to donate games, consoles, and toys to sick children. The proceeds from the sales of the “Save Carmine” and “Carmine Must Die” avatar gear and limited edition NECA t-shirts will go to Child’s Play, so cast your vote, donate to charity, and get cool Gears of War gear! Fans can get up-to-date information about the fate of Clayton Carmine by visiting www.gearsofwar.com.

Published by Microsoft Game Studios and developed by Epic Games, the Gears of War franchise has won over 30 “Game of the Year” awards, sold more than 12 million copies worldwide, and redefined the third-person shooter genre for this console generation. The Gears of War series is exclusive to Xbox 360, and its riveting multiplayer action makes it one of the most popular titles on Xbox LIVE. The trilogy finale, Gears of War 3, will release on April 5, 2011, only on Xbox 360.

http://www.bungie.net/projects/reach/vidaudio.aspx?c=58&i=27524

With that said, I’ve already pre-ordered my copy of H.A.W.X. 2.  Here’s the newest trailer for the game that just came out today.  Enjoy.

I have been a die-hard fan of the Halo fiction since Bungie unleashed its opus in November, 2001. Since then, I’ve bought every Halo game at midnight of launch day, played all the campaigns countless times, read every book (all seven including Halo: Evolutions) at least twice, and I own the graphic novel and the Art of Halo collection. Bungie has said that Halo: Reach would not follow the events of the novel “The Fall of Reach” and many people have mistook this to mean that they are ignoring the fiction contained therein. This is not the case, but simply their game follows a different story set on Reach, with a different set of characters.

WARNING: This article contains massive story spoilers for the Halo video games released thus far, the book Halo: The Fall of Reach, as well as minor spoilers for the book Halo: Ghosts of Onyx.

The story so far….

So it’s a prequel to Halo: Combat Evolved, and it takes place on a planet called Reach. This planet will get glassed by the Covenant, and many millions of people will die before the game ends. Simple right? Not so much. There’s many details you may or may not be aware of. We will start broad and then work our way down to the nitty gritty. You play the role of “Noble 6,” a replacement for a recently KIA member of Team Noble. You are not a Spartan II, like the Masterchief, but a Spartan III. Your job will be to follow orders and try to eliminate the Covenant threat on Reach along with the rest of your squad.

What’s the difference between a Spartan II and a Spartan III?

Many people are unaware that the Spartan program was started before the human/Covenant war even began. Originally, the Spartan program was created to help the UNSC fight “insurgents.” The first Spartan program, (of which Sgt. Avery Johnson was rumored to be a part of) was disbanded shortly after its inception and the soldiers were split up and put into different units. Later, in the year 2517, came the Spartan IIs, a class of 150 children kidnapped (with flash clones put in their place so as to anonymize their identities) around the age of 7 and taken to Reach. There, they endured extreme mental and physical training, and eventually a series of biologically augmenting surgeries that killed or crippled all but 33 of them. Later, they would be fused with the Mjolnir technology, which made up the armor that the Spartan IIs wear, which offers them enhanced battlefield awareness, speed, and rechargeable shields. In 2525, the Covenant attacked the planet Harvest in the outer colonies and the war began. 27 years later, the desperate UNSC, devised a plan that would use an up-and-coming Captain Keyes, on a ship called the Pillar of Autumn, stocked with one of the most advanced artificial intelligences created, Cortana, and a team of Spartan IIs. This operation would take the ship into Covenant territory, where the Spartans would kidnap a Prophet and use him as a ransom to force a treaty negotiation. The operation was to be launched from the planet Reach, where the Spartan program had started. However, just before The Pillar of Autumn left, a Covenant fleet arrived and the invasion of Reach began. The Spartan IIs went ground-side to defend the planet, and only Masterchief made it back onboard. As the planet was glassed, the Pillar of Autumn (in accordance with the Cole Protocol) made a blind jump into space to lead the Covenant away from Earth, and arrived at the first Halo. This is where Combat Evolved begins.

What happened to the rest of the Spartan IIs?

We’ll cover that later.

Who are the “insurgents?”

The insurgents are basically human revolutionists who wanted to live on their own planets/colonies throughout the galaxy free of the governmental regulations of the UNSC. In trying to gain their freedom, their protests would often get violent, and in many cases led to terrorism. Rather than sacrifice the lives of many to quell this terrorism and violence, the Spartan program was created in order to make an elite few soldiers who would be able to handle any situation as it arose. It’s important to know that this threat exists/existed for the UNSC, because at the beginning of the game (as detailed by Bungie for their Game Informer article) the Spartans of Team Noble think that the attacks are the work of insurgents, not the Covenant.

Okay, so get onto the Spartan IIIs, how are they different?

The Spartan II project was a massive undertaking, and each Spartan soldier cost millions of dollars worth of R&D for their tech and training. Whenever a Spartan was lost, it was a massive blow to the UNSC army. They needed a cheaper solution. That solution was the Spartan IIIs. They were trained faster, selected at an older age, the selection criteria for who would be kidnapped was wider than the Spartan IIs, and they were suited with cheaper technology. This is why your shields/armor in Halo: Reach are not as strong, and why the Spartan IIIs are shorter than Masterchief.

And Noble 6 is part of a team of Spartan IIIs?

Not entirely. While five of the characters, including the character you play as, are Spartan IIIs, one of the members of Team Noble, Jorge-052, is a Spartan II. He’s pretty easy to spot amongst the group, as he’s taller, bulkier, and is often seen carrying heavy weaponry. For the record, the other members of Team Noble are Carter (Commander of Team Noble), Kat (Lt. Commander), Emile (grenadier), Jun (sniper), Jorge (heavy weapon specialist of course), and an unidentified lone wolf Lt aka ‘Noble 6′ aka YOU.

Why Reach? What makes this planet so special that the game should be set there?

Reach is the military headquarters for the entire UNSC. It’s where the Spartan program was started, it’s the last human defensive stronghold before Earth, and, most importantly, the battle that occurs there directly lead to the events of Halo: Combat Evolved and the discovery of The Flood.

Speaking of which, The Flood won’t be in this game will they?

It’s impossible to know for sure but I’d be surprised, since in all of the fiction surrounding these events, there is never any mention of Flood. HOWEVER, it is possible. Of the Spartan IIs that remained on Reach when The Pillar of Autumn left and the Covenant began glassing the planet, some did survive, and they survived in a location where the Flood COULD be… under the surface of Reach inside a Forerunner structure. And of course anytime we’ve seen The Flood, they’ve come out of containment in Forerunner structures.

What? There are Forerunner structures on Reach?

Throughout the entire human/Covenant war, the main goal of the Covenant leaders was not to wipe out the humans. They were after the relics of the Forerunners, the long-extinct alien race that built the Halo rings. In several battles, Harvest and Sigma Octanus IV being just a couple, humans just happened to live on planets that housed Forerunner relics. The Covenant leaders waged war, with the primary goal of securing these relics, and finding the way to begin “The Great Journey.” Of course we know the Great Journey involves the firing of the rings, and wiping out all life. The Forerunners did this in an attempt to starve The Flood 100,000 years ago. The Covenant think they did this to transcend themselves into Godhood, and it is why they seek to light the rings as well. There are Forerunner relics and structures buried under CASTLE Base on Reach, and it is these artifacts that the Covenant are seemingly after when they arrive on Reach.

Where can I learn more about the history of the human/Covenant war and the Forerunners?

I’d highly recommend you read my favorite Halo novel “Contact Harvest” by Joe Staten. It covers the first encounters in the war told from the perspective of Sgt. Avery Johnson. It also gives you great insight into the Covenant hierarchy, why they want to kill humans in the first place, how Truth, Mercy, and Regret came to be the hierarchs, the back story of their treachery, and also gives you some details on the REAL main character of the entire Halo story, Mendicant Bias, the Forerunner AI that interacts with the player through the terminals on the Ark in Halo 3.

Wow, that’s a lot of information! Any other story/character info I need?

She may not be in Halo: Reach, but Dr. Catherine Halsey is the creator of the Spartan program, and the person whom Cortana’s mind and personality were emulated from. Also, Buck, everyone’s favorite Nathan Fillion-voiced marine from Halo 3: ODST, is almost guaranteed to at least make an appearance.

What about other details not related to story? Anything I should be aware of?

First off and most basic: your field of view has been increased. It may not be instantly apparent but you can see roughly 30% more as you are moving around throughout the game. As a result, to be comfortable, I recommend you turn up your look sensitivity at least one notch from what you had it set to in Halo 3. You will also notice a discernible difference between the size of your character and the Covenant Elites now. They will pose a formidable threat in Halo Reach. In fact, even Jackals and Grunt will seem to be much larger to you, because you are no longer the size of Masterchief.

In addition to this: you’re a Spartan III, like we covered, so you can’t jump as high as you could in Halo 2 or 3, and you will take fall damage. You also have a health bar in addition to your shields. Ala Halo: Combat Evolved and Halo 3: ODST, you will need to find health packs throughout the environment to replenish your health. Unlike these games, however, you can’t simply walk over these health packs, you need to press the “use” button to grab them.

Also, because you’re a Spartan III, you are shorter and run slower. You may not notice this just moving around the environment, because your point of view is closer to the ground, it feels like you are moving faster than you actually are. You are likely to notice once you get into battle with some Elites who can easily outrun you though, or when you realize that you no longer tower over some of the other Covenant forces.

Sounds like a lot of small changes? Any tips?

I don’t want this to become a strategy guide but I will drop some tidbits of knowledge that are essential to your enjoyment of the game. The first thing to understand is the difference in shield technology and melee combat. Now when you melee someone, you will only knock down their shields. Meleeing an enemy with no shields will net you a kill. If you unload with an assault rifle and you punch an enemy before their sheilds pop, you will not get a kill (unless it’s an assassination from behind). There is a very obvious yellow buildup and then “pop” of your opponents shields. Hold off on meleeing while in close quarters combat until you see that pop.
Next, grenades have received a bit of a buff. They do roughly the same amount of damage but the area of damage they can cover has been expanded. A grenade that wouldn’t have hurt you in Halo 3 may be close enough to knock your shields down in Halo: Reach.

There are more ways to use EMP than ever in Halo: Reach. EMP can be used to stall vehicles or drop an opponent’s shields. The charged plasma pistol shot still does this of course. The new grenade launcher has rounds that emit an EMP burst when detonated. Lastly, the new armor lock ability releases an EMP burst when you come out of it. This is particularly useful when dealing with sword/hammer enemies, or someone who has the drop on you and is coming in for a melee. By locking up just before an enemy strikes, you can block their punch and then unlock, releasing an EMP blast that can drop their shields leaving them vulnerable for you to finish off.

The pistol should be your best friend. It fires the same bullet as the DMR (essentially the new, single-shot Battle Rifle) meaning it does the same amount of damage: 4 shots anywhere to drop shields, followed by a single headshot for the kill. It can be zoomed in making it effective at range (though not quite as accurate at range as the DMR). In close quarters combat, you can pull the trigger fast enough to take down an opponent who is unloading on you with an AR before they kill you, and in most gametypes, you spawn with it as a Spartan. During the Reach beta, this thing was my baby.

I’ll leave you with one quick prediction: Bungie has said that they are building their multiplayer maps based on environments in the campaign and placing them into the single player maps that you will go through, as a way to further fuse the multiplayer locations into the fiction. You can see evidence of this on the map Powerhouse. Near the back of the map where blue team usually spawns, there is a road. On one end of the road is a gate that is locked. The other end takes you to a destroyed bridge, and that road continues on the other side of the crevice. You will probably be moving along this road in the single player, with bridge in tact and gate wide open, and it will probably be easy to drive right by Powerhouse and never know it was there.

Bungie also said that because of this there were lots of maps they couldn’t include in the beta because it would give away details on environments they would be taking the player to later in the game. If you watch the April Fool’s day video Bungie released showing Chess in the Halo: Reach engine, you may notice something about the environment they are playing in: it is clearly inside a forerunner structure. There is no mistaking the architecture. That this was even designed in the engine leads me to believe that the single player will take you to some underground Forerunner structures, possibly to a Flood research center, or even a portal similar to the one on Earth that sent you to The Ark. The possibilities are limitless. September 14th is fast approaching. The countdown until we become Noble 6 is underway, and this day cannot come soon enough. I’ll be there at midnight ready to get my copy, and cannot wait to join up with Carter, Kat, Jorge, Jun and Emile as soon as I can.

Alan Wake (release date: May 18th, 2010) – Xbox.com

This game really sneaked up on me.  This is an action-thriller game that seems like something out of the X-Files.   They even released a live action prequel series entitled ‘Bright Falls‘ for the game.   I’m not quite sure it’s worth buying yet, as I can’t tell how much replay value it will have, but it certainly looks worth taking a look at.  From what I’ve seen, the game really reminds me of the original Xbox title, Indigo Prophesy (Fahrenheit in Europe), and I really enjoyed that game.

Blur™ (release date: May 25th, 2010) – Xbox.com

Blur has to be one of the more exciting racing games I’ve seen in a long time.  Bizarre Creations has a hit on their hands with this game I think.  It’s got the great graphics on the new console system, coupled with the awesome multiplayer battles I haven’t seen in a racing game since Mario Kart. The multiplayer beta for this game ends this Monday morning, so get in what little more you can while it lasts.

Tranformers: War for Cybertron (release date: June 22nd, 2010) – Xbox.com

Yes, there have been two Transformers movies released in the last few years and some crappy movie related video games along with them.  This game stands out to me for two reasons.  First, it’s not based on the movies.  It’s based on the Generation 1, 1984 version Transformers storyline.  Secondly, it’s canonical.  This game sets down the official back story for the Transformers.  It looks to have some fun multiplayer action in it as well, giving players the ability to transform as often as you like.  Pre-orders from different stores get you different exclusive transformers to play as in the multiplayer game.   Ordering from Amazon will get you Demolisher, from Gamestop will get you Shockwave, and from Best Buy will get you Jazz.

Medal of Honor (release date: October 12th, 2010) – Xbox.com

EA just announced their next Medal of Honor game with this teaser trailer.  After all the chaos that has ensued at Infinity Ward over the Call of Duty series, this game looks to be the most anticipated realistic war/soldier game coming out in the near future.  Personally, I don’t think I’ll ever go back to the Call of Duty series.   I simply don’t trust Activision to make a good quality game.

Tom Clancy’s H.A.W.X. 2 (release date: Fall 2010) – Ubi.com

In some random chance,  I stumbled upon the announcement of the sequel to 2009′s hit fighter jet game, H.A.W.X., just minutes after Ubisoft released it.   As a kid growing up on military base and having a father work for the Air Force, I’ve always been a fan of fighter jet games.  I’m not too competitive with them, but just view them as really enjoyable to play.  H.A.W.X. was very fun to play, especially with them using GeoEye satellite images overlayed on the game’s landscape making it very realistic.  This is definitely a game I’ve pre-ordered already.