Puyo Puyo is now officially recognised by the Japan eSports Union, meaning Puyo players can now get a license required to compete in for-money tournaments in the country through this review for eSport acknowledgement statuses (due to gambling laws). This means it joins the ranks of Street Fighter V, Tekken 7, Call of Duty WW2, and several other titles in Japan’s eSports scene.
The first tournament will be held at SEGA FES 18, taking place on April 14 in Akihabara, Japan. There’ll be a 1 Million Yen prize for the winner (that’s around £6,750), with an overall prize pot of 1.65 Million yen (Around £11,150).
[ Source: SEGA, but the robust translation comes courtesy of GSK on Twitter. GSK regularly translates interesting video game information, so check them out! ]
When Tracker isn’t playing SEGA games, he’s talking about SEGA games. Or drawing about SEGA games. Or all of the above. You can also catch him over on Twitter.
Phantasy Star Online 2 is coming to Nintendo Switch, in the form of Phantasy Star Online 2: Cloud. The game’s been known about for a while now, but thanks to the recent Nintendo Direct we now know it’ll be landing on April 4th.
The game is, as ever, Japan-exclusive. It’s worth noting that the Switch is region-free, meaning those outside of Japan could technically get the game anyway – but as well as there being a huge language barrier that can be as easily circumvented as on PC, the game is actually streamed to the Switch, hence the “Cloud” moniker. As such there’s only a 40MB cloud-based application to download, but outside of Japan we can’t exactly imagine it’ll be a smooth experience, as all the servers the game will be streamed from are likely to be in Japan.
That being said, Phantasy Star Online 2’s Switch version does include a new set of items based on The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, which is a pretty wild thing to type. From the looks of things you’ll be able to get Link’s Champion duds, as well as the Master Sword and Hylian Shield. Also rather neat is that the game supports keyboard and mouse peripherals for the Switch, just in case you’ve got nostalgia for that one gigantic keyboard controller for Gamecube.
When Tracker isn’t playing SEGA games, he’s talking about SEGA games. Or drawing about SEGA games. Or all of the above. You can also catch him over on Twitter.
SEGA has announced that they are now prioritising native ports for SEGA Forever a la the ‘TaxStealth’ ports of Sonic 1 and 2, as opposed to emulated titles.
In a post on SEGA’s blog, they state that the native ports amongst the SEGA Forever lineup (Sonic 1,2 and CD, Crazy Taxi, and Virtua Tennis Challenge) are the most played – and as such, they intend to bring more of these sorts of titles to the service, rather than the emulated Mega Drive titles that make up a fair chunk of the current lineup. There’ll still be emulated titles added to the roster, but the focus of the initiative is now elsewhere.
As a result of this shift, the slew of releases for SEGA Forever is set to slow down a tad – however it appears the aim here is now “quality over quantity,” which will likely be music to the ears of many a SEGA fan. Also promised is “a surprise or two you weren’t expecting” amongst the upcoming emulated titles.
Speaking of which, the blog’s decor does tease another upcoming Mega Drive title for the service – it appears Treasure’s classic head-em-up Dynamite Headdy is coming to smart devices soon, as is… Super Monkey Ball?
When Tracker isn’t playing SEGA games, he’s talking about SEGA games. Or drawing about SEGA games. Or all of the above. You can also catch him over on Twitter.
The Yakuza 6 demo has been removed from the US Playstation store after some users found an exploit to allow them to play the full game.
The demo itself is 36.53gb in size and actually contains all the data for the full game, except the demo was designed to lock players into a small portion of the game with their progress being carried over to the full game on release day (17th of April 2018).
The full game exploit appears to be exclusive to the American version of the demo as the demo is currently still available on the UK and Australian Playstation store-fronts. If this changes then we will be sure to update this story.
Marking the end of the series’ over 10-year absence from Western shores, SEGA has announced Shining Resonance Refrain, a remaster of the PS3 title Shining Resonance. The remaster includes all previously released DLC, as well as a new ‘Refrain Mode’ that adds brand-new content. For those wondering, Shining had a bit of an image overhaul after Camelot broke ties with SEGA – so if you’re expecting something along the lines of the classic Mega Drive Shining series, this might not be what you’re after.
One slightly odd thing to note – while SEGA hasn’t localised any entries in the series for over 10 years, the fighting game spin off Blade Arcus from Shining: Battle Arena was localised, by Studio Saisenzen, and is available on Steam.
The game will also be getting a launch edition with a reversible metal slipcase – this will also be available in Europe, which is always nice to see. SEGA has also confirmed that the game will receive an English dub, with the option to use Japanese audio also being available.
When Tracker isn’t playing SEGA games, he’s talking about SEGA games. Or drawing about SEGA games. Or all of the above. You can also catch him over on Twitter.
The Hollywood Reporter have provided a fresh batch of details from Paramount regarding the upcoming Sonic the Hedgehog movie – perhaps most notably, the release date.
The film is currently slated for November 15th 2019. The crew attached to the project includes Neil Moritz as producer, with Tim Miller of Deadpool fame in an executive producer role. In addition, Toby Ascher will also executive produce, whilst Dmitri Johnson and Dan Jevons serve as co-producers.
In terms of the director’s chair, it falls to Jeff Fowler – Sonic will be his directorial debut. In the past, Fowler produced Gopher Broke, an Oscar nominated short film – so perhaps the film’s in good hands after all?
Currently there’s no information on current writers or how the film is going to take shape – it can be assumed it’s changed significantly since Sony held the project, but one thing that hasn’t changed is the intended mix of live action and CGI. There’s no information on whether Marza Animation Planet are still on board either – it may well end up that Miller decides to use his own studio, particularly since Blur Studios have actually worked on Sonic games in the past.
All eyes are now on SXSW in March – could that be our first glimpse at the film?
When Tracker isn’t playing SEGA games, he’s talking about SEGA games. Or drawing about SEGA games. Or all of the above. You can also catch him over on Twitter.
Tags: Paramount, Sonic Movie, sonic the hedgehog Posted in News | Comments Off on Sonic the Hedgehog Movie Planned for Release on November 15th 2019, Jeff Fowler to Direct
A new expansion for Total War: Rome II is due to drop on March 8th 2018. This new expansion is called Desert Kingdoms and it brings 4 new factions to the game and one of them is called Kush. Take a look at the announcement trailer below to see the word, “KUSH” appear very big on your screen:
Total War: Rome II originally launched for Windows back in 2013. It is also available for Mac.
Bandai Namco’s Pac-Man mobile will feature a special maze that’s themed around Sonic the Hedgehog. The maze is clearly inspired by Green Hill Zone with Sonic taking the place of Pac-Man and Motobugs taking the place of the ghosts. Click the embed below to see Sonic in action in the classic arcade maze game:
The Pac-Man mobile game is free-to-play on iOS and Android devices but also includes in-app purchases. This Sonic maze is currently not available in the latest update of the iOS game, so we can only assume it is coming in a future update. Go to LevelUp casino and play casino games while waiting for the updates.
UPDATE 21/2/2018
The update to the iOS version of the Pac-Man app is now live and includes the Sonic-themed mazes for free.
The original soundtracks for Panzer Dragoon, Panzer Dragoon II, Panzer Dragoon Saga, and Panzer Dragoon Orta are now available on iTunes in most territories, including Europe and the United States. In the UK, the soundtracks are priced at £10.99 each, with the exception of Saga (priced at £11.99). They’re also available in Japan (with Saga listed under its title in that region, Azel: Panzer Dragoon RPG).
SEGA Japan has mentioned ‘various distribution sites’, though as of right now iTunes appears to be the only site carrying them. However, Spotify users may be interested in Brave Wave Productions’ arranged release of Saga’s soundtrack, which is currently available on the platform.
When Tracker isn’t playing SEGA games, he’s talking about SEGA games. Or drawing about SEGA games. Or all of the above. You can also catch him over on Twitter.
SEGA and development company Grounding have announced Space Channel 5 VR: Arataka Dancing Show will be getting a digital release for the HTC Vive in Spring 2018. There’s currently no word of an international release or pricing, but we do know the game will be available for public demoing at the Makuhari Messe in Japan later this month. The digital release will seemingly be based on this demo, so it’ll probably be more geared towards showing a concept than being a fully fledged game.
The demo sees you dancing with Ulala to defeat the Morolians, much like the original Dreamcast title; but now in VR! This is a different project to “Space Channel 5: Ukiuki Viewing Show”, demonstrated at TGS a couple of years ago, as in that, you were more of a spectator than an active participant in the grooving.
It’s nice to see another SEGA franchise making a return, and in a rather interesting way – if an international release falls into place, we’ll let you know.
When Tracker isn’t playing SEGA games, he’s talking about SEGA games. Or drawing about SEGA games. Or all of the above. You can also catch him over on Twitter.
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Puyo Puyo is now officially recognised by the Japan eSports Union, meaning Puyo players can now get a license required to compete in for-money tournaments in the country through this review for eSport acknowledgement statuses (due to gambling laws). This means it joins the ranks of Street Fighter V, Tekken 7, Call of Duty WW2, and several other titles in Japan’s eSports scene.
