GTA V sets 7 world records

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Before GTA V was released everyone knew it was going to be a massive hit. So far every game in the series since GTA III has been a big deal on consoles and PC. But GTA V really was a massive success, and has already set not one, but seven world records.

Confirmation of the world records comes from the only source that really counts: the Guinness World Records. Six of those records relate to sales, the seventh is related to the game’s trailer being viewed. Here’s the full list of which records GTA V now holds:

Best-selling action-adventure video game in 24 hours

Best-selling video game in 24 hours

Fastest entertainment property to gross $1 billion

Fastest video game to gross $1 billion

Highest grossing video game in 24 hours

Highest revenue generated by an entertainment product in 24 hours

Most viewed trailer for an action-adventure video game

Those records were achieved by managing to sell 11.21 million copies of the game in the first 24 hours. That equates to revenue of over $815 million in the first day, increasing to over $1 billion by day three. Such massive sales and revenue hasn’t just knocked games off the world record list, it’s also affected movies.GTA V has surpassed Call of Duty, Avatar, and The Avengers in its quick rise to the top spot.

Will GTA V retain those records for a long time? Well, there’s a new multi-format Call of Duty game on the horizon, but I doubt that will achieve the same highs of previous titles. Avatar 2 isn’t arriving until 2016, and The Avengers: Age of Ultron won’t release until 2015. Is there any other movies or games that could potentially beat GTA V’s figures? Gran Turismo 6 is going to be popular, but then it’s limited to a PS3 release.

Five great games like Minecraft

Minecraft may be the most popular game to have ever come from the voxel-based genre that it invented, but it is far from the only game out there offering block-building fun. Whether you’ve grown tired of running red stone throughout your house for lighting or you’ve decided you’ll never be as creative as the people who replicated Game of Thrones on their Minecraft server, there are plenty of options available to you if you’re looking for a change of pace.

We took a look at some of the lesser known but still incredibly fun games like Minecraft, and broke it down for you to check out for yourself.

Synthetic World

The open world feel to Minecraft is part of what makes it so much fun to play. Knowing that you could wander for days and create an entire world if you had the time is what keeps skilled creators playing day after day. Voxel games like Synthetic Worldby StaudSoft, which add an whole new layer of realism to this style of game was bound to happen eventually.

Synthetic World is an open environment game with build rules that are vaguely similar to Minecraft. You have a base inventory on the bottom of the screen, and you use that in constructing objects all around you. Just like Minecraft, you can cut down trees and change the landscape to suit your needs. Where the big difference comes in for first time players will be the look of the game itself. Unlike the blocky Minecraft, Synthetic World has rather realistic textures and landscapes. On top of this, the shadows and lighting are all incredibly realistic compared to the more popular Minecraft.

You can find Synthetic World on IndieDB on for Windows and Linux, as well as a forum for users to submit bug reports and feature requests. Synthetic World is described by the creator as a0.1 release currently, but the game is already very interesting and visually appealing.

FortressCraft

FortressCraft may look a lot like Minecraft, but it’s only available on the Xbox 360, and supports multiplayer via Xbox Live. It ditches the 8-bit pixelated textures for smooth surfaces, and while the objects, blocks, and buildings still have that familiar blocky appeal, they’re more detailed when you’re close to them.

FortressCraft was built by ProjectorGames, and has many of the same elements that Minecraft does: you can build anything, harvest resources from a huge, open world, set up a home for yourself, deck it out in items that you’ve created or objects you’ve encountered, and of course, battle enemies bent on taking your resources.

FortressCraft is available for 80 Microsoft Points, or the equivalent of $1. Though MineCraft is now available on the Xbox 360, FortressCraft provides a cheaper alternative.

First eight Dragon Quest games being ported to Android, iOS

Square Enix has surprised gamers today by announcing that it is set to port and re-release the first eight games in the mainDragon Quest series for mobile devices. So Dragon Quest, Dragon Quest II, Dragon Quest III, Dragon Quest IV, Dragon Quest V,Dragon Quest VI, Dragon Quest VII, and Dragon Quest VIII will all be getting a mobile outing for both Android and iOS devices.

So far the ports are only confirmed as heading to Japan, but it seems likely Square Enix will release English versions of the games in other territories. Why wouldn’t they? A lot of the translation work has already been done from previous releases of the games.

It’s not just the main Dragon Quest series that is heading to mobile devices, though. Square Enix has also announced Dragon Quest Monsters: Super Light is in development for iOS andAndroid. Monsters is a spin off series of Dragon Quest, which sees the focus put on capturing and breeding monsters that are then used by the player to fight.

This decision by Square Enix to port so many of the games from a key series demonstrates the growing importance of mobile to game developers/publishers. Where as before we’d expect Dragon Quest releases on dedicated games consoles and handheld devices, now the focus is switching to smartphones and tablets. Sure, these are old games, but Square Enix wouldn’t spend the time re-releasing them if it didn’t think there was a healthy profit to be made.

The latest title in the Dragon Quest series–Dragon Quest X hasn’t seen a release outside of Japan on either of its launch platforms: the Wii and Wii U. And that seems unlikely to happen now as Square Enix has turned its focus to getting the game running on a tablet instead. That combined with the publisher’s new focus on free-to-play could mean the next new game developed in theDragon Quest series may end up appearing on mobile devices first.

GTA V’s beautiful in-game world captured in time-lapse

The scale and beauty of modern video games is staggering when you look at the state of things just a few years ago. There is more to see in these virtual worlds than ever before, and this video from YouTube’s The Despicable Channel illustrates that fact perfectly. It’s a time-lapse montage created from photos of various landscapes and streets, but none of it is real — it was all captured in Grand Theft Auto V.

It took a full day to assemble from raw footage of the game, but it looks remarkably realistic. Rockstar should probably take as much credit for that as The Despicable Channel — you would think a time-lapse of a video game would expose some repetitiveness or flaws in the engine, but it looks remarkably normal. You might even think for a moment that the video is real as it starts.

There are so many little details that Rockstar got right in this game,that you might never take note of watching it play out at normal speed. Look at the way people walk around, for example. They don’t follow the same paths or stop in the same places. The waves are also believable and non-repetitive as the tides ebb and flow. The wind even vibrates the power lines in GTA V.

The hardware running GTA V is nearly a decade old right now. If a dedicated developer can make a huge game that looks this real now, what’s going to happen with next generation gaming hardware in the PS4 and Xbox One?

Nintendo so angry about Pokemon X leaking they flew someone out to get it back

On October 12 Nintendo is set to release Pokemon X andPokemon Y for the 3DS worldwide. The reason for the worldwide launch is to stop any game spoiling leaks happening, imports from being necessary, and the inevitable slew of images and videos appearing on the web before everyone can play it.

A worldwide launch certainly helps, but the game still managed to leak last week. One gamer in particular, known only by his Instagram name of kosthedin, has been sharing images and videos of Pokemon X regularly. However, that all stopped yesterday as Nintendo took action.

They figured out where the copy of the game had been leaked from–it turns out a game shop had received stock of the title and someone who worked there had sold it to a friend. That friend being kosthedin. Nintendo was clearly angry over this leak, so they flew someone out to the store to reclaim the game. Kosthedin found out about this and decided to hand the game back so his friend could keep his job. It’s unclear whether that was enough to save his job, though.

To have Nintendo fly someone out to a local game store to recover a game shows you how serious they are about this worldwide launch. Kosthedin also states that “heads were rolling” internally at Nintendo, which he heard directly from the Nintendo rep. I’d imagine that’s because someone shipped the games out too early, and I can’t believe this is the only copy of the game that has slipped through the cracks.

Watch Dogs on PC requires a quad-core CPU, 4GB RAM, 64-bit Windows

One of the key launch games for the next-gen consoles this November is the open world shooter Watch Dogs. But Ubisoft isn’t just bringing the game to consoles. PC gamers get the chance to experience it too.

As ever, PC hardware isn’t a set platform, so Ubisoft had to figure out what the minimum spec would be to run the game. And you won’t be surprised to find it’s relatively high compared to some other games we’ve seen announcing specs recently.

At a minimum you are going to need a quad core processor, 4GB of RAM, a DirectX 11 compatible graphics card with at least 1GB of video RAM, and 20GB of hard drive space. If you’re running a 32-bit operating system then you will need to upgrade as Watch Dogs only “officially” supports 64-bit versions  of Windows.

As an example of a minimum spec, Ubisoft gives the following example:

• Intel Core 2 Quad Q660 or AMD Phenom X4 9750
• Nvidia GeForce GTX 460 or AMD Radeon HD 5770
• 4GB RAM
• 20GB hard drive space
• 64-bit Windows Vista (SP2), Windows 7 (SP1), or Windows 8

That’s the minimum spec taken care of, but if you want to run this with all the settings turned up to maximum you’re going to need some better-performing components. Ubisoft recommends the following to play the game as they intended:

• Intel Core i7-3990K or AMD FX-9370 8-core
• Nvidia GeForce GTX 670 or AMD Radeon HD 7990
• 8GB RAM or more

Watch Dogs is set for release for PC on November 19, giving you about six weeks to get your rig up to spec. If you’re thinking about upgrading your PC anyway, and money isn’t really a concern, maybe consider buying yourself a Nvidia GeForce GTX Battlebox to play the game on.

Nvidia awards top gaming PCs with GeForce GTX Battlebox seal of approval

If you’re looking to invest in a new gaming rig in time for the holidays, Nvidia has decided to make sure you can select a PC that has its seal of approval by branding select systems as GeForce GTX Battleboxes.

That’s right, GeForce GTX Battlebox is now a thing manufacturers will be vying to get added to their top-of-the-line PCs. Nvidia saysit has decided to implement this program because of all the great games that are coming to PC in the near future that benefit from having all their settings turned up to 11.

Key titles mentioned include Watch Dogs, Batman: Arkham Origins,Call of Duty: Ghosts, Splinter Cel: Blacklist, and Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag.

So far four system builder brands have managed to achieve GeForce GTX Battlebox status. They are: Digital Storm, Falcon Northwest, Maingear, and Origin PCs. Others will surely follow.

In order to qualify, a PC has to use either a GeForce GTX 780 or Titan graphics cards in 2- or 3-way SLI configurations. The processor has to be an overclocked Intel Haswell Core i5 or i7 chip, DDR3 memory (16GB or 32GB) and a fast SSD storage solution must also be in use. Not only does this ensure you can play the games as the developers intended, but both Nvidia and the system builders can claim GeForce GTX Battleboxes are “4K ready.”

As you’d expect, these systems will not be cheap (think $2,000 to $3,000), but then again if you are looking to purchase the ultimate gaming rig the Battlebox seal of approval is guaranteeing you a seriously powerful machine. It just comes at a premium price, probably with part of that premium being applied because it is a Battlebox.

Valve has 47 people working on Half-Life 3

Last week saw Valve release three official bits of news relating to the future of where it saw gaming on the PC. They includedSteam OS, Steam Machines, and a Steam Controller. Such news may excite some, but it’s the unofficial news coming out of Valve this week that’s really grabbing people’s attention.

Yesterday it was revealed that Valve had filed for the Half-Life 3trademark–you know, that game just about every gamer has wanted to exist since they finished playing the second game in the series launched back in 2004. However, a trademark on its own doesn’t mean much, but an internal software leak at Valve has confirmed Half-Life 3 is most definitely in development.

There’s a piece of software Valve uses internally called the Valve User Picker. It is used for project management and bug tracking, and splits employees into their active teams. It is not publicly accessible, but someone managed to gain access to it yesterday and revealed not one, but two Half-Life 3 teams.

The first of those is called Half Life 3 Core and consists of 10 people. The second is simply called Half-Life 3 and has 46 people listed. So in total, Valve has 56 people 47 people counting overlaps working on the game right now. It seems likely the Core team is focusing more on actually getting the game up and running as well as finalizing the (core) gameplay and story line. Interestingly, the first name listed on both team’s pages is Adam Foster, who produced the Minerva mod for Half-Life 2. As for what the other team is doing, I’d guess most of them are on content creation duties . So level modeling, character modeling, texturing, and scripting the levels in their basic form.

There’s no clues given as to how far along the project is, and I’d suggest 47 people is still a pretty small team. Valve is either taking its time with a small team, or has yet to ramp up to full production on the project just yet.

How to play Grand Theft Auto Online today

Today is the day that Rockstar flips the switch, turns all the servers on, and allows GTA V players to start enjoying Grand Theft Auto Online. But how exactly do you gain access to the online world?

Rockstar says that access to GTA Online will be decided based on where you are in the world. But for simplicity, GTA Online became available to play at 7am EST this morning, so if you are in the US and reading this, it’s already available. Logging in, however, requires you first download and install a software update (about 60MB).

Both PS3 and Xbox 360 owners should see this software update appear for download. Once installed, GTA Online will appear as a menu option in GTA V. Selecting that, and then selecting the bottom slot on your GTA V character wheel, will connect you to the online world.

Of course, how successful you are at managing to connect depends on how well Rockstar’s servers are coping with demand. The developer has already warned players they expect teething problems initially as they have never done this before. So if your connection fails, or the game is unplayable due to lag, it’s going to be best if you log out and try again later. Frustrating, yes, but there’s not much you can do about it.

As for what to expect once you are playing the game, we’ll start with the story. It’s actually set a few months before the storyline followed in the core GTA V single player experience. So there won’t be any overlap, at least initially. Content updates may change that in the future.

Rockstar has also come up with solutions on how to manage millions of potential players and all that violence in a finite-sized world. For example, you may end up owning the exact same property as another player. But that’s a planned feature. You will just see a different instance of the property and it will remain just yours.

GTA Online is also aimed at up to 16 players working together, so it seems likely you will want to invite friends over to your house. In order to avoid any possessions being stolen or violence happening, accepting an invite to visit a property blocks any stealing or violence while you are there. So all parties know they and their possessions are safe.

A big area of concern for players is the use of real money in the game. Rockstar announced last week that you will be able topurchase cash cards containing GTA$ using real-world money in stores. However, Rockstar has limited the usefulness of such quick cash by ensuring access to goods goes hand-in-hand with Reputation Points. If you have a low reputation, you will only be able to purchase a small subset of the available products the game offers. And to up your reputation you need to play the game, not spend a lot of cash. You can’t cheat the system if you’re rich.

Finally, there’s jobs. The gameplay and fun comes from carrying out jobs, and therefore Rockstar has included a lot of them to keep you busy. However, it has also been revealed that they intend to add the ability for content creation by players, meaning in the near future you will be able to create your own jobs. For example, custom races and deathmatches.

As this is day one, the main tasks for players are going to be installing the software update, managing to connect to Rockstar’s servers, and creating your character. If you get that far then I think you’re doing well, and hopefully by the weekend millions of players will be keeping the servers humming and teaming up to carry out jobs.

Star Fox mod fits perfectly into Team Fortress 2

If there has ever been a character known for being extremely annoying and unlovable, it’s Slippy Toad from Star Fox. If there has ever been a cast of characters more beloved than the lovable goofballs from Team Fortress 2, then we haven’t seen it. While Slippy Toad may ever join the ranks of cartoon-smooth men, Star Fox and Team Fortress 2 have met in an unlikely mod available on Steam.

The mod, created by Steam user NarryGewman, is currently in a pre-alpha stage, so as you can see by the video below, it’s missing a lot of little nuances that really make a mod soar, such as an environment and details.

So far, it appears as though the mod simply allows you to fly and shoot in a sparsely populated map, though the players do seem to have individualized jet streams. Similar to the PS3′s Starhawk, this mod puts the Arwing and TF2 character models on the same map, allowing the ships to speed by the humans.

If you think the pre-alpha stage looks a little rough, don’t worry, as NarryGewman noted that the mod “will be optimized and stuff.” As for a Star Fortress release timetable, Gewman notes it’s “coming whenever it’s finished,” so you can expect a swift release, and full of optimizations at that.

Though there isn’t much detail on the mod, the version does look fun, and if the human characters get anti-air weapons, the mod could take off. Maybe we’ll even get Slippy Toad wielding the Heavy’s minigun at some point.

Rockstar confirms Grand Theft Auto Online lets you buy cash for instant gratification

Rockstar has posted an update regarding the upcoming launch ofGrand Theft Auto Online and what players can expect to experience from day one. There will be plenty of content to keep you busy, but also a warning about overloaded servers and the inherent issues and bugs that come with the launch of any online game.

Rockstar has also confirmed a feature that was hinted at earlier this week in an XML document related to the game. Grand Theft Auto Online will contain microtransactions and the ability to use real-world money to buy in-game cash.

The suggestion that Rockstar was going to do this didn’t exactly get a positive response from the gaming community. However, Rockstar has been quick to point out that you do not need to purchase GTA$ in order to enjoy the game. It is balanced in terms of the economy and gameplay design to never require you to purchase cash. You can make all you need from doing jobs, winning races, and stealing to name but a few ways to generate GTA$.

If that’s the case then why include the ability to purchase cash at all? Rockstar says the microtransactions are there to allow players to “attain the cars, guns, clothes, flash and style of a high-roller in Los Santos” all the more quickly. It’s a shortcut. They also point out that generating cash in GTA Online will happen much more quickly than it currently does in GTA V.

I don’t think it matters how much reassurance Rockstar offers that you don’t need to buy cash to enjoy the game. It is there to generate more real-world cash for the company, and therefore it is expected to be used by at least a subset of the people playing the game. There’s surely also going to be a certain amount of pressure to spend if you are working in a team with other players and could really do with a better gun, car, or whatever else in order to be more useful during missions.

GTA hack reveals Google Glass’ true gaming potential

If you could take the HUD from your favorite game and move it to just inside your peripheral vision on Google Glass, would you do it?

Google has been spending a lot of time recently working on explaining how Glass could be useful to the average user. Sure, you can check your email and social networks, and you’ve got an OK camera at eye level that could be capable of taking a photo faster than you could pull your phone out of your pocket, but for many that’s not enough. We know that native Glassware apps are on the way, which will help a great deal with these explanations of value. It seems likely that the biggest untapped market for Glass is to behave as a second screen for the things going on when watching TV or playing games. One Glass developer took matters into his own hands — he fired up a copy of Grand Theft Auto 3, and decided to try something new with his wearable tech.

Mike DiGiovanni is no stranger to writing native apps for Glass. Mike is the developer who first figured out how to let Glass users take a photo with a blink, and has been working hard on other apps ever since. This latest concept pulls the map from GTA 3and places it on Glass as a head-up display. It’s not ready forGTA V just yet, but the concept is incredibly cool.

Right now the app keeps the display on the whole time you play, so Glass’ battery life becomes a concern. DiGiovanni explained that if the app were to behave more like the current GPS system, where it wakes the display when something important happens, battery life would be significantly longer.

So, how about it? Would you slide Glass on when sitting down to a gaming session? If you could use Glass as the motion tracker inHalo, or even as just the ammo counter in your FPS of choice, it’d be a whole new level of interaction for most users.

EA will shut down Warhammer Online on December 18

World of Warcraft continues to be the most popular MMO on the market, and that’s despite losing over a million players this year. Other games have appeared carrying popular names includingStar Wars, Lord of the Rings, and Warhammer Online. They didn’t do so great as subscription MMOs, so made the switch to a free-to-play model. That may still be working for some high-profile online games, but for Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning the end is now in sight.

On December 18 the servers for Warhammer Online will beturned off after five years of service. At its peak the game counted 800,000 subscribers and 1.2 million copies sold, but less than a year after launch that number had dwindled below 300,000 subscribers and continued to fall. Switching to F2P gave the game a lifeline, but clearly only short term.

The decision to shut down the MMO came when it was time to sign a new agreement between Mythic and Games Workshop. Both companies decided not to continue the relationship, and therefore the game can no longer be offered to players. EA has already started taking action by turning off subscription auto renewals and removing three-month subscription codes. Hopefully some kind of world event will be held in December for the remaining players to experience before everything goes dark.

There won’t exactly be a lot for EA and Mythic to actually shut down on December 18. The initial 76 servers the game had at launch in 2008 were reduced to just 13 in 2009, with that total continuing to fall to just 3 by December 2011.

Three men face year in jail after posing as cops to cut in line for GTA V

If you happened to be out around midnight on Monday evening/Tuesday morning you may have noticed long lines of people outside game retailers. It was of course GTA V launch day, and while many gamers went home happy with the game in hand, one got stabbed, and now three more are going to be prosecuted due to their initially successful attempt to cut the lines completely.

Frank Santanastaso, Matthew Kirsheh, and Kirolos Abdel Sayed came up with what they thought was a brilliant plan to purchaseGTA V as early as possible. They dressed up as cops and turned up at the Staten Island Mall in an exact replica unmarked police vehicle they had apparently acquired at a police auction. It was even outfitted with flashing lights and a siren for good measure.

The trio proceeded to bypass the long line of gamers that had formed outside the mall’s GameStop outlet and spoke with the store’s manager. Flashing badges and proclaiming they were NYPD, the manager agreed to let them purchase copies of the game and saw them on their way. Until that point the ruse had worked, but they didn’t count on a real copy being in the area.

As the trio pulled away happy in their unmarked car, they passed a real officer in an unmarked car who got suspicious and followed them. He eventually pulled them over outside Kirsheh’s house and the true story was revealed. Now all three are facing counts of second-degree criminal impersonation and could face up to a year in jail. Santanastaso is also going to have a hard time at home as his father is a retired cop, and Abdel Sayed is an auxiliary NYPD officer, so this is going to have serious repercussions for him.

Waiting in line for a few hours to buy the game probably sounds like a great idea right now to all three of them I’d bet.