NEWS: Saturday Roundup

Hey guys, coming at you with a fat dosage of ‘new regular feature’ is the Saturday Roundup. The reason for this feature is twofold, one, so that I can bring more content to you guys on a regular basis and two, so that I can improve and broaden my writing by utilizing the different writing styles that news writing demands.

Welcome to the Saturday Roundup, a (bi)weekly roundup of all the important news going on in the gaming world.If you’re sick of gaming websites' content turning more and more casual, or trying to pass off a single sentence and a link to a cool picture they saw on deviant art as ‘news,’ you’ve come to the right place. I aim to consolidate and summarize only the stuff that’s most important to gaming enthusiasts. It’s a mix of hard news, interesting features, and other titbits that I feel like you guys would enjoy. Let’s see what’s been going on this week:

Cliff Bleszinski

• Gaming great Cliff ‘CliffyB’ Bleszinski, the man responsible for multiple iconic gaming classics such as the Unreal and Gears of War series has announced his sudden departure from EPIC games studios.
  ‘I’ve been doing this since I was a teenager, and outside of my sabbatical last year, I have been going non-stop. I literally grew up in this business, as Mike likes to say. And now that I’m grown up, it’s time for a much needed break.’
  Cliff was a much loved gaming personality who constantly pushed the boundaries of game development and will be missed by many. Hopefully he’s back on the scene sooner, rather than later!

• Resident Evil 6 released this week, and is already being slammed by user reviews on Metacritic. Many fans felt that the series had strayed too far from its survival horror roots, instead providing us with a generic cover-based ‘Gears of War but with zombies’. This feeling seems to be confirmed with comments by game director Hiroyuki Kobayashi that Resident Evil 6’s survival horror elements were indeed toned down to get that mass-market appeal.
  
  ‘We’re making games and we need to have mass-market appeal in order to survive. How far do we go into horror before we lose the support of the average player?'
• Done with Borderlands 2 already and craving more? Gearbox has you covered. As well as the four planned DLC packs, 2 of which are already in development, brainstorming has already started on Borderlands 3, which if released will give Gearbox an opportunity to gloat over their previous employers, Valve Software, by actually releasing a game with a ‘3’ in it.

Borderlands 2

• Speaking of Valve, they are one of the most secretive companies when it comes to what they are planning next, and Chet Faliszek is one of their most famous employees, providing the writing for many of Valve’s biggest blockbusters, including Half-life 2: Episode 2, Portal and Left 4 Dead. VG24/7 racks his brains to try and decipher what goes on behind Valve’s tightly closed doors.
• Distraught that there wasn't enough of The Sims in Skyrim? Fret no more, Hearthfire has appeared on the steam store! Hearthfire is the second peice of official DLC for Skyirm, and for just $4.99 will allow you to design and built your own house, as well as raise a family by adopting a child with your wife.
• Digital download services like Steam and Origin, as well as the major console platforms now offering digital downloads of much of their catalogue have us asking the question, ‘when will we forgo physical media entirely?’ TheGameJar’s Chris Jacobs seems to think the answer is ‘soon’, and discusses the possible implications of living in a digital world.



King Washington

• Assassin’s Creed III has been pretty low on my radar, but a little bit of interesting news has cropped up concerning its first DLC pack. It assumes an alternate reality where George Washington, upon freeing America from the British, rose to become a tyrannical king. The DLC will have you do what every hot-blooded colonialist has always dreamed of – kill George Washington
• SimCity is shaping up to be a great game, and while it won't be released until some time next year, lead designer Stone Librande takes us through a ten minute gameplay walktrhough. SimCity is the latest reboot of the titular 'SimCity' franchise, and is due out in 2013, with a promise to return to what made the city building sim that spawned dozens of offshoots (including the immensely popular The Sims) so popular in the first place.

So that’s the news for this week. Be sure to subscribe to my twitter for up-to-date news and blog updates, and check back here every Wednesday and Saturday for more content!