Notch Details Minecraft Update Logo

It's time to play catch-up on a few key games that are releasing this year and next, and share a few details you may have missed. LucasArts is no more, but the source code for two of the greatest Star Wars games lives on in the community. The next Killzone is further along than we first thought; Minecraft hit another two milestones; Battlefield 4 is going pro and there's hope for the Darksiders franchise to return. Suda51 has a new and unique game coming next year and The Elder Scrolls Online is baking on the franchise reputation to compete in the crowded fantasy MMO market.

Read on for the details.

Killzone: Shadow Fall

Possibly the best looking game we saw at Sony's PlayStation 4 unveiling in New York on February 20th was that of Killzone: Shadow Fall. Viewers at home streaming online didn't get a fair look at the graphical fidelity in high framerate, but it looked great. Trust us. What we didn't expect afterwards was to find out that its main campaign is already complete! Says game director Steven ter Heide a few weeks ago:

"Quiet Saturday morning in the office. Starting my [Killzone: Shadow Fall] campaign playthrough...Has been for a couple of months. Had [a] couple [of] playtests already. Getting better every time."

Now they must be working on polishing and the multiplayer features. Will it feature co-op like Killzone 3?

Source: Push Square

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Minecraft Still Selling Strong

The most basic in appearance, but most creative indie game ever is still earning big buck$. At the end of March 4J Studios, developer of the Xbox 360 version of Minecraft announced that their version had sold over 6 million units. The bigger, better PC version however, just crossed the 10 million mark last week. It sold 10,000 more in the last 24 hours. When they add mountable horses to the game - and they will - expect millions more to be sold! That will happen regardless.

Source: Minecraft Stats

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Battlefield 4 eSports

Call of Duty is one of the most popular games in pro gaming, celebrating its $1 million championship tournament for Black Ops 2 this week (congrats to Fariko Impact for the win!). That's not the case for Battelfield 3 however and developer DICE wants to change that for its successor. Says DICE general manager Karl-Magnus Troedsson:

"…yes, we're very interested in this area, and we’re definitely going to see what we can do there. I can’t talk about the specifics because we’re not announcing them, but I can say that e-sports is an area that we are very interested in."

For PC gamers, the ones playing the legit version of Battlefield 3 currently, AMD is promising to bundle their upcoming graphics cards with BF4. Says Roy Taylor, corporate vice president of global channel sales for AMD:

"[Partnership between AMD and EA DICE on the Battlefield 4] was presented at the Game Developer Conference, and the AMD Gaming Evolved logo already appeared online in the context of the game. You can expect that Battlefield 4 will be part of [future] Never Settle bundles."

Source: MP1st, Heise.de

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LucasArts Hiring New Star Wars Games

LucasArts Tribute

We're all still saddened by the news that Disney is closing LucasArts and canceling all of their in-development games and so are developers at Raven Software - who worked on the Jedi Knight games a decade ago - and so they've released the source codes for their Star Wars titles for the community.

“Raven is sad to hear about the closing of LucasArts today, we respected them and enjoyed working with them over the years,” said the studio, in a statement sent to Kotaku Australia. “We wish the best for all the talented people who were let go and hope they find good work in studios in the industry.

“We loved and appreciated the experience of getting to make Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast and Jedi Academy for LucasArts. As a gift to the persistently loyal fanbase for our Jedi games and in memory of LucasArts, we are releasing the source code for both games for people to enjoy and play with.

There is no official support for the source code and, according to Raven, it’ll most likely take some work to get it running with retail assets, but that’s for the modders to figure out!"

Modders and programmers can download  Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast source code here and the Jedi Academy source code here.

Source: Kotaku

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Darksiders Will Return!

Crytek CEO David Adams tweeted over a week ago that he was going to bid on one of the key remaining THQ assets after the company's bankruptcy, and fans of Darksiders hoping a third game in the series may just get it.

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The-Elder-Scrolls-Online-Logo

The Elder Scrolls Online

Have you signed up for the beta of the first multiplayer Elder Scrolls game? If you haven't, you should. Beta invites have already started to go out in waves. While we still await word on whether or not TESO will feature an oldschool paid subscription model or free-to-play one supported with microtransactions and premium services, the bigger question is how the title will compete with such a large amount of competitors. Says game director Matt Firor:

"It is a crowded space, but this is Elder Scrolls. One of things of having a huge IP like Elder Scrolls is it cuts through the noise. It's safe to say - looking at the lines for people to play - that everyone knows about it. That is the first step to getting a lot of people into the game. Part of the crowded landscape is it's hard to get your message out there. When you say 'Elder Scrolls', we don't have a problem getting the message out, which helps us immensely."

"Elder Scrolls is definitely a quality target, but everything it brings with it intrinsically is almost perfectly suited for an MMO. Giant open world, lots of cool classes, lots of history and depth, the cool combat system that you just experienced. That came from Elder Scrolls. That by far outweighs the expectations of the crowd who hear Elder Scrolls and want to come in. We want to make it meet their expectations."

Source: GamesIndustry International

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Suda51's Next Game

Goichi Suda's next game by Grasshopper Manufacture releasing in 2014 and it'll feature new, unique online features.

"This is going to be an action game obviously but the gameplay style is going to differ very much — it’ll be unique. This is a title that GungHo Japan and Grasshopper Manufacture is working on together collaboratively so there will be an online feature, because that’s their forte and what they specialise in. On the simplest level it will be social, but the word social is used and misinterpreted a lot these days. GungHo has over ten years of experience in providing online gaming services so that is their strength."

Will be available on current or next-gen platforms?

"We’re considering both. Naturally we are interested in developing games for the next-gen platforms. We are investigating the specs and all that right now."

Source: Edge

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