Most of us are still stuck indoors for this long winter, and Sega is putting together some amusing videos in the style of a college lecture that teach you the history behind the former console giant. In the first talk, Sega producer Hiroyuki Miyazaki showed a prototype for the handheld Sega Nomad for the first time publicly.As Miyazaki reveals in his lengthy lesson, Sega referred to many of its hardware projects by planet codenames, a trend that was first established by the release of the Sega Saturn in 1994. When Sega was working on the Nomad--which is a portable version of the Sega Genesis/Mega Drive that you could take on the go--it was called the Sega Venus, and its prototype looked a bit different than the final product. This video series is promoting the Sega Test, an event that celebrates the 60th anniversary of Sega, which will challenge fans on their knowledge of the long-running gaming company.The Sega Nomad was arguably one of the best portable systems of its day thanks to the fantasy library of games on the Genesis, though it did have one fatal flaw: It required six AA batteries to play, and the console would eat them up in two to three hours. That's a lot of juice for not a lot of game. (The Nomad did have a rechargeable battery pack that you could purchase, and some intrepid fans have even modded their Nomads to install more modern battery cells.)Continue Reading at GameSpotInfo from Gamespot.com

Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War marked a return to the incredibly popular Zombies mode after it wasn't included in Modern Warfare. The mode, which is a big part of the Treyarch-developed Call of Duty games, is the reason many players purchase every edition of the yearly franchise.The new Zombies mode only has one map, though. Treyarch has said that more maps and other additions to the mode are coming, but players already want more. If it's just more content they want, they'll find a wealth of options--and a very active community--in the five-year-old Call of Duty: Black Ops 3, which now features hundreds of player-made maps, skins, and other content.Treyarch offers official modding tools to Black Ops 3 via the Steam Workshop, so players can create their ideal fight-til-you-die experience. Maps and other new additions include everything from My Little Pony skins to neon-lined diner levels. There are even recreations of movie locations like Shaun of the Dead's Winchester bar and levels from other games like the Skeld in Among Us.Continue Reading at GameSpotInfo from Gamespot.com

The game industry's version of the Emmys are almost here. The Game Awards will be broadcasted from Hollywood, California on December 10, with other segments happening in different locations. The annual show will take place entirely online due to the pandemic.Game of the Year nominees include Naughty Dog's The Last of Us Part II, Animal Crossing: New Horizons, Doom Eternal, Final Fantasy VII Remake, Ghost of Tsushima, and Hades. Other notable nominees include 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim, Half Life: Alyx, Ori and the Will of the Wisps, and many others. You can check out the full list of Game Awards nominees to see what was nominated in each category.Host Geoff Keighley has said that announcements surrounding the show will be coming all week. Last year's show had plenty of surprises including an appearance by The Muppets and a number of musical performances. We could see something similar this year. We'll keep you updated with what the show will include right here as announcements are revealed.Continue Reading at GameSpotInfo from Gamespot.com

Activision's Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War is finally here, and one part of the military FPS that people are particularly enjoying is the campaign and its story. The Black Ops brand has always had a special flavor to it. It is less serious--remember this?!--and more narratively open-minded than the ripped-from-the-headlines storylines in the other historical and modern Call of Duty games.With Black Ops Cold War, the game's story plays with history and covers real historical events, but with a healthy amount of conspiracy theories and deniable operations baked in.With that in mind, we connected with former Australian Security Intelligence Organisation operative David Callan (who has since become a comedian, but more on that later), who told us about his experience as a counterintelligence officer. Callan worked for the ASIO in the '80s and '90s, which was a stormy time for international politics and clandestine operations. Callan shared stories and insight from his time in the service, and he also discussed what he thinks Black Ops Cold War, which is set in early 1980s, gets right about its depiction of the era.Continue Reading at GameSpotInfo from Gamespot.com

During the pandemic, people have turned to video games to pass the time, connect with friends, and just enjoy themselves. New data from The NPD Group has provided a new level of detail on just how popular gaming has become in recent months.In short, it's up across the board. The number of people in the US who play video games has risen to 79%, total time spent gaming jumped by 26%, and the total amount of money spent on games has increased by 33%. According to the NPD's numbers, four out of every five US consumer has played a video game in the past six months.This general trend of growth is reflected across platforms, but mobile is a special bright spot, the report said, thanks to its nature as an accessible platform. The popularity of console gaming has also increased, as families look for ways to play together, while others are seeking out consoles to play together with others online.Continue Reading at GameSpotInfo from Gamespot.com

Pokemon Go's big Go Beyond update is now live, which means a new generation of Pokemon are soon making their debut in the mobile game. Niantic is introducing the first wave of Gen 6 Pokemon to Go this week as part of the new Kalos Celebration event, which kicks off tomorrow, December 2, at 8 AM local time.Throughout the week-long event, a handful of Pokemon originally from the Kalos region will appear in the wild and hatch from eggs, including the Gen 6 starters Chespin, Fennekin, and Froakie. On top of that, players will be able to encounter some Kalos Pokemon in Raids. Among them will be the Psychic type Espurr, which will be appearing throughout the event in one-star Raids.Gear up and get ready! We’ve just gotten word that a mysterious Pokémon is appearing in raids! Good luck, Trainers! Open #PokemonGO to discover what this surprise Raid Boss is. pic.twitter.com/E8Q0PrsrBb — Pokémon GO (@PokemonGoApp) November 30, 2020In addition to increased Pokemon spawns, there will be event-exclusive Field Research and Timed Research tasks to complete during the event. The Kalos Celebration runs until 10 PM local time on December 8. You can read more about the event on the official Pokemon Go website.Continue Reading at GameSpotInfo from Gamespot.com

HBO recently greenlit the Last of Us TV show, meaning it might enter production relatively soon. An official release date for the program has not been announced yet, but people are guessing that it may debut around the time that another show with zombies--The Walking Dead--airs its 11th and final season in 2022.Scott Gimple, the head of content for The Walking Dead at AMC, said in a new interview with Insider that he's not worried about potentially competing with The Last of Us. "I think there's room for all of us, with zombies and the different ways of telling zombie tales," Gimple said of the two shows. "I'm going to be watching both. I hope a lot of people will be watching."Continue Reading at GameSpotInfo from Gamespot.com

The Queen's Gambit, a recent Netflix miniseries about the rise of fictional chess prodigy Beth Harmon (played by Anna Taylor-Joy), has been a huge success for the streaming giant, scoring the biggest debut ever for a scripted limited series. The ripples of this success spread much further, though--chess itself has greatly benefited.A recent report from NPD states that chess-related sales have spiked since the show debuted in October. In the 21 days following the show's release, chess set sales increased by 87% in the US, and sales of chess books leapt up an incredible 603%.NPD Group also reports that across its first nine days on Netflix, US homes spent a total of 40.8 million hours watching the series. To put this into perspective, finishing the whole series takes under seven hours.Continue Reading at GameSpotInfo from Gamespot.com

The newest patch for Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War has arrived, and the big-ticket change is a tweak to how fast you'll earn weapon XP.Across multiplayer and Zombies, Treyarch has increased the earn rates for weapon XP. With the update applied, players should now level up their weapons faster than before, allowing them to unlock new gear and attachments at a quicker pace.The update also fixes an XP-related problem with the Zombies mode that caused the game to not pay out enough XP in solo matches and later in rounds.Continue Reading at GameSpotInfo from Gamespot.com

Halo Infinite has been delayed to 2021, but Microsoft is still rolling ahead with news and previews of the sci-fi FPS. The latest special look at the game comes in the form of an "audio field recordings" video that shows off how the audio team went about capturing various sounds.Most of the sequences in this video were released earlier, but this is a "supercut" video that puts them all together in one place. In the video, you'll see how the team used everything from an original Xbox to a staffer's little dog and even a wolverine to record sounds for Halo Infinite. It's an impressive video that showcases the creative ways in which the team went about creating unique sounds for Halo Infinite--check it out below.If you like this video, you might also enjoy this other video showing off how the team captured the weapon and vehicle sounds in Halo Infinite. Continue Reading at GameSpotInfo from Gamespot.com

The Good Life, the next game from Deadly Premonition director Hidetaka "Swery65" Suehiro, has picked up a publisher. The game, about New York photographer Naomi Hayward and her move to the mysterious town of Rainy Woods, is due to release in Summer 2021.The Good Life will be published by The Irregular Corporation, the publisher of Murder by Numbers and PC Building Simulator. The game is being developer by Suehiro's White Owls Inc. team, and is the result of a successful Kickstarter campaign.The new trailer shows off some of the game's major mechanics, including photography and animal transformation--Naomi can turn into a cat or a dog during the adventure. This is, ultimately, a detective adventure, with Naomi digging into the town's secrets. Hopefully she'll uncover some interesting truths. It looks just a little janky in the trailer, but that's part of the charm of Swery65's work. The game is coming to Switch, PS4, Xbox One, and PC. It'll also be playable on PS5 and Xbox Series X/S thanks to backwards compatibility. Deadly Premonition 2 released exclusively on the Switch earlier this year. It received a 5/10 in GameSpot's review, which criticized the "jarringly inconsistent frame rate of the open world." A later patch improved things somewhat. Continue Reading at GameSpotInfo from Gamespot.com

Nintendo Switch update 11.0.0 is here, and the latest numbered update makes some big additions. The main one is the addition of a Nintendo Switch Online hub on the main page, but there's plenty of other stuff to dig into.The new "Nintendo Switch Online" hub button appears on the home screen next to News, and it collects together all of Online's functions and services into one place. This includes a list of smartphone apps, online games, current tournaments, an archive of NES and SNES titles arranged by year, your save data in the cloud, and member offers.Cloud data will now be automatically downloaded on multiple systems attached to the same account, too. This could be a blessing for anyone using a regular Switch and a Switch Lite in conjunction, as once it's activated save data will jump between the two systems automatically. A new "Trending With Friends" option is now available on your user page, below "Friend List". It shows what your friends have been playing recently, telling you exactly how many of the folks on your friend list are still regularly playing Animal Crossing: New Horizons and other titles. It tracks who has played over the last ten days, and will tell you the total playtime of the friends listed.12 new user icons are also added. They're focused on Mario's 35th anniversary, with icons based on Mario's classic appearance right through to Odyssey. You can even use Mario with FLUDD as your icon, if you're a huge fan of Super Mario Sunshine.Perhaps most useful of all for those who like to share screenshots, it's now much easier to transfer screens and videos from the Switch to other devices. You can copy to a computer via USB, or to a smart device via a QR code. There are a few other changes introduced here, including download prioritization, the ability to name button remaps, and support for Brazilian Portuguese. You can read the full update notes below.Nintendo Switch Ver. 11.0.0Nintendo Switch Online was added to the HOME Menu.Access all Nintendo Switch Online services, from getting the latest information to checking your membership status.*This feature is not available in some countries/regions.A new feature that automatically downloads backed up save data was added to the Save Data Cloud.When using software with the same Nintendo Account linked to multiple systems, save data backed up from one console will automatically be downloaded to your other system(s).*To use this feature, it must be enabled under System Settings > Data Management > Save Data Cloud.*Save data will not be downloaded automatically unless save data for that software exists on the console. The first time only, users must download the save data manually.*A Nintendo Switch Online membership is required to use the Save Data Cloud service.A new Trending feature was added to the User Page.Users can check what software their friends are playing or have started playing recently.Information will not be displayed for friends who have their online status set to display to no one.Users can now transfer screenshots and videos from Album to their smart devices.Users can wirelessly connect their smart devices to Nintendo Switch to transfer the screenshots and videos saved within their Album.For screenshots, users can transfer a maximum of 10 screenshots and 1 video capture at once.*To connect, users must use their smart device to scan the QR Code displayed on the Nintendo Switch screen.A new Copy to a Computer via USB Connection feature was added under System Settings > Data Management > Manage Screenshots and Videos.Users can use a USB cable to connect Nintendo Switch to their computers to copy the screenshots and videos saved under Album.* A USB charging cable [model HAC-010] or a USB-IF certified USB cable that supports data transfer is required to connect to a computer.Users can now select what download to prioritize when there are multiple downloads in progress.When there are multiple software, update data, or downloadable content downloads in progress, users can now select which they want to download first.You can set this under Download Options by selecting the icon for the software you want to download first on the HOME Menu.User icons were added.12 user icons that commemorate the 35th anniversary of the Super Mario Bros. series were added.Users can now name preset button mappings with the Change Button Mapping feature.Brazilian Portuguese was added as a supported language.When users set their region to the Americas and their language to Português, the language used on the HOME Menu and in certain software will be displayed in Brazilian Portuguese.Several issues were fixed, and usability and stability were improved.Info from Gamespot.com

Immortals Fenyx Rising knows perfect is the enemy of good. Typhon, its big bad, is obsessed with perfection; as he overthrows the gods of Mount Olympus and strands them on the Golden Isle, he strips them of their essences, and with those essences, the flaws that made them legend. Aphrodite loses her passion, pettiness, and jealousy; Ares his rage; Hephaistos his suffering; Athena her self-righteousness. In their quest to reclaim those essences, Fenyx, a lowly soldier in search of their brother Ligryon, argues those flaws should be celebrated, not forgotten. Their tale doesn't always impart that lesson, but it's able to deftly take its own flaws in stride and, while not reaching the highs of the gods it worships, earn its own praise.Fenyx Rising sets the bar high for itself by borrowing heavily from The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. You can climb your way up just about any solid surface if you have enough stamina; one of your four major abilities lets you magically float objects above your head and move them around to solve puzzles; the Golden Isle is littered with vaults, one-off puzzles that take place in self-contained parts of Tartaros. The list runs deep.Despite all the borrowed elements, Fenyx Rising hews closely to Ubisoft's flavor of open world. At first, it was hard not to treat every similarity I spotted as a point of comparison. Fenyx Rising, for example, lacks a real sense of exploration. You're rarely lost, since the first thing you do in every region is head to the nearest vantage point, scout the area to reveal it on your map, then mark a bevy of collectibles and activities to chase. I never got the sense I was "exploring" the Golden Isle so much as I was beelining it to all the icons I'd already marked, which told me exactly what I would find when I reached them. I wasn't paying much attention to the world around me because nothing is really "hidden," which is disappointing only because in its early hours, Fenyx Rising did remind me of the spacious Hyrule of Breath of the Wild, where every rock formation or tree stump hinted at some surprise worth telling someone else about.Continue Reading at GameSpotInfo from Gamespot.com

In 2018, Tetris Effect's mesmerizing sounds and sights heightened the classic game's aesthetically pleasing properties and its ability to consume our attention to almost therapeutic levels, reinvigorating our appreciation for one of gaming's oldest obsessions. But even as former GameSpot editor Peter Brown proclaimed Tetris "better than ever" in Tetris Effect, he noted it "sadly" did not apply its wondrous approach to multiplayer. Two years later, Tetris Effect: Connected--an updated re-release for Xbox consoles and PC--fills that gap. Just as the original did for the classic version of the game, Connected reimagines Tetris multiplayer with flair and vision. It also loses a major component, VR support, which delivers the most intense version of the experience. While I'm of two minds on that tradeoff, the soothing intensity of Tetris Effect hasn't lost any potency. On the contrary, it feels more vital than ever in 2020.Though it adds and removes modes whole cloth, the core of Tetris Effect remains unchanged. Despite the fact that Journey mode hasn't been touched, its shifting, syncopated themes enraptured me level by level, even on my second time through. Tetris Effect is a significant challenge to average Tetris players like myself. Each level revs the speed up to push you just up to the edge of what you can handle. Even as you improve--and you are getting better, whether you see it or not--the levels scale to demand your full focus. It sounds unapproachable, but there's something about the combination of the way your brain looks for patterns, combined with the rhythmic sensory elements and this challenge, that lets you give yourself over to the game, almost trance-like, without even trying.You'll need that focus in multiplayer. Whether you're playing cooperatively with other players or competing against them, the multiplayer modes in Connected ratchet up the intensity found in the original. Connected features four multiplayer modes--three competitive, one co-op. As in most games, other players will push you in ways a single-player campaign will not.Continue Reading at GameSpotInfo from Gamespot.com

One amateur game developer has decided to give two of the most notoriously terrible Legend of Zelda games a second chance, remaking Link: The Faces of Evil and Zelda: The Wand of Gamelon for a new audience, as reported by Eurogamer.Originally developed by Animation Magic and released on the CD-i console in 1993, Faces of Evil and Wand of Gamelon are considered to be the worst Legend of Zelda games in the entire series thanks to the frustrating gameplay and unintentionally terrifying animated cutscenes which eventually became bizarre memes."I wanted to prove to myself that I could make a game," the remake's developer Dopply said in an FAQ. "It started as a joke between friends, but then I wanted to see if I could actually pull it off. I've flirted with game making for a while but never finished something. This was my chance to do that (well, over the course of four years, I guess). Over time, remastered versions of these notorious titles was something I wanted for myself as well."Continue Reading at GameSpotInfo from Gamespot.com