Happy Holidays to all you fine folks out there in video game land. This week will likely see many of you traveling, chilling with family and friends and just generally doling out the peace on earth and goodwill towards men. As we prepare for our own long winter’s nap, here’s the last weekend news roundup before the new year. I’ll see you all in 2011, assuming the Mayans weren’t off by a year and we all end up dead/in a time warp/turned to pudding.
Witcher 2 Will Kill You for Good – So it seems that if you play Witcher 2 on “Insane” difficulty once you die, that’s it; you’re dead. No reloading your save file, no picking up from a checkpoint, it’s over. I’ve wondered a few times in the past why games don’t sometimes impose a harsher death penalty, but one this severe is just no fun. Sure, there will be a small number of super-hardcore masochists out there who will claim this is the greatest thing ever, but they’re wrong. In any case, I now know for a fact that I will not be playing Witcher 2 on Insane.
Black Ops First DLC Pack Detailed – What do you know, it’s multiplayer maps and it’ll cost $15. At least this time all the content is new, and they’re not “remastering” old maps and screwing players over. Then again, the only reason they aren’t is likely because this is the first CoD game set in the Cold War so they couldn’t really trot out a bunch of World War II stages or Modern Warfare retreads. No point in me railing against this any further, the DLC will sell 5 million copies and I’ll just die a little more inside.
This Study Says Games DON’T Cause Violence – Each of these studies are beyond meaningless since scientists can manipulate the parameters to get about any result they want, but at least gamers can shove this in the face of someone next time they try and say that games make you violent. That is, at least until the next survey that says games DO cause violence comes out, and then we’re right back to square one.
Tomb Raider Trilogy May be Coming to PS3 – The source site of this rumor is written in German, so we’re not totally sure if it’s advertising for video games or annexation and genocide, but it seems there’s a Tomb Raider collection (Legend, Anniversary and Underworld) coming to PS3. Sony’s loving these anthologies lately, with God of War and Sly Cooper already getting the bundled treatment, and Team Ico slated to be next. If it happens with Tomb Raider it’ll be a first for non-Sony exclusive franchises, so that’s pretty cool. Lara Croft’s had a good run lately, first she gets a gritty reboot a la Batman and now she’s getting a re-release of some older titles.
Buy a Windows 7 Phone, Get a Free Game – In case you’re doing some last-minute holiday shopping you may want to check this deal out. Microsoft is offering a free Xbox 360 game (Kinectimals, Kinect Joy Ride, Fable III or Halo: Reach) for anyone who buys and activates a Windows 7 phone. Not a bad deal at all, and a nice incentive when considering which smartphone you want. We now expect Apple to counter by offering a free MacBook with every iPhone purchase just to further kill off any competition in the market they currently dominate.
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