After 10 Years, Sony Discontinues PSP

Lifetime sales totaled more than 76 million units.

The PSP's days are numbered.

Sony announced today that the portable gaming device, originally launched ten years ago, will be discontinued worldwide by the end of 2014. The Associated Press reports that PSP shipments ended in North America in January, are scheduled to end in Japan this month, and will come to a close later this year in Europe. Sony is now, of course, pushing the platform's successor, the PlayStation Vita.

Sony has sold more than 76 million PSP units, though that figure is accurate as of the latest officially tally, which came two years ago. The actual lifetime sales figure is likely somewhat higher. The PSP debuted in Japan in December 2004, before coming to the West in early 2005.

The PSP enjoyed a significantly longer lifespan than the digital-only PSP Go, which Sony launched in 2009 and discontinued just two years later. Meanwhile, Sony launched the PS Vita in March 2012, and just recently released a slimmer, lighter version of the device worldwide.

http://www.gamespot.com/

Assasin΄s Creed Unity DLC Revealed by poster

Assassin's Creed Unity will be getting a bonus mission as pre-order DLC, according to a new GameStop poster.

The below image was posted on Twitter by CriptAssassini, and shows a retailer-specific pre-order offer called Chemical Revolution. Alongside giving us a glimpse at the face of our new protagonist, the poster also includes a man many are speculating is Antoine Lavoisier, the father of modern chemistry.

Assassin's Creed Unity was leaked last month (along with Assassin's Creed Comet), and Ubisoft confirmed the PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One title days later. Assassin's Creed Unity appears to be set in Paris and will reportedly come out later this year, with rumours also surfacing that four-player co-op may be on the cards.

With E3 kicking off next week, hopefully we'll get a chance to see much more of the title in action very soon indeed.

http://www.ign.com/

Resident Evil 2 remake project shown off with promising videos

Resident Evil 2 remade to play like Resident Evil 4. What's not to like?

Resident Evil 2 Remake - UDK - Resident Evil 4 gameplay style.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5fm8z5RqG0

One devout Resident Evil fan has produced a proof-of-concept video showing Capcom's iconic survival horror title Resident Evil 2 remastered with a modern engine.

Built in the Unreal Engine and spotted by Game Informer, Rob Lima has plucked areas out of the Resident Evil 2 section of Wii shooter Resident Evil: The Darkside Chronicles for the project, and mixed in original effects and cutscenes from the PlayStation original. The budding developer has also given his project a feel very reminiscent of Resident Evil 4.

Resident Evil 2, one of the high points of the long-running series, has been re-released in various incarnations but never actually remade by Capcom. The publisher remade the original Resident Evil for the Gamecube, however.

Resident Evil 2 Remake - UDK - part 2

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=62rptEGgPLc

Lima has also previously experimented with recreating the iconic opening of Resident Evil 2 in a over-the-shoulder style similar to Resident Evil 4, but the impressive and intriguing videos are more of an attempt to learn coding rather than recreate the whole game.

"I'm not planning on do a Resident Evil 2 remake, (there's already other groups taking it serious) I made this, only to see some codes actually working, not only in theory. And as the result was good, I decided to do a video. Just that."

Lima adds that it's "fun to walk around on Raccoon City on RE4 style."

I wonder what Capcom thinks of these videos? Producer Yoshiaki Hirabayashi told GameSpot in September 2012 that it would consider remaking Resident Evil 2 if there was enough fan support behind the project.

http://www.gamespot.com/

Mortal Kombat X will be "the most brutal Kombat experience yet"

Scheduled for 2015, it'll introduce new modes and new characters

As Ed might have mentioned yesterday, the official announcement of a new Mortal Kombat game has left me rather excited. So excited that I've only just calmed down enough to piece together a few details on what the new game will actually entail. Mmm, delicious Earth-realm entrails.

"Mortal Kombat has always been about over-the-top, visceral fighting and with Mortal Kombat X we wanted to utilise the power of new-gen consoles to give players our most intense game yet," said NetherRealm's Creative Director Ed Boon in a press release announcing the game. "The team has worked hard to make sure Mortal Kombat X delivers everything fans expect along with new characters, new game modes and an all new graphics engine"

New characters, you say? Hopefully they'll be more Skarlett and less like, er, Freddy Krueger.

Elsewhere in the press release, Warner Bros states that "Mortal Kombat X combines cinematic presentation with all new gameplay to deliver the most brutal Kombat experience ever, offering a new fully-connected experience that launches players into a persistent online contest where every fight matters in a global battle for supremacy." Calling it now, it's going to get competitive up in here.

And, in a move similar to Ultra Street Fighter 4's Edition Select Mode, you'll be able to choose from multiple variations of each character, which is sure to shake up strategies and freshen up a few fighting styles.

Perhaps most promising (for me at least) is the assurance that players will "step into an original story showcasing some of the game's most prolific characters including Scorpion and Sub-Zero, while introducing new challengers that represent the forces of good and evil and tie the tale together." MK9's story mode was exceptionally well done, so here's to more of that. And more Kitana too. Less Quan Chi though, no-one likes that guy.

http://www.totalxbox.com/

Plants Vs Zombies: Garden Warfare hits Ps4 in August

Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare launches on PS3 and PS4 on August 19 in North America, August 21 in Europe and August 22 in the UK, with two DLC packs bundled in.

Developer Popcap announced the news, and also revealed that both the Garden Variety and Zomboss Down content expansions will be included from day one. It also confirmed the PS4 version will run at native 1080p and 60fps, along with supporting Vita Remote Play and split screen co-op. The PS App can also be used to experience Boss Mode.

http://www.ign.com/

This is the First purported footage of playstation 4's project beast

BY COLIN MORIARTYEarlier this month, an interesting rumor emerged. Screenshots from something called Project Beast leaked on the Internet. The screens showed a shotgun-wielding man roaming around various environments -- like a temple and a cemetery -- and the game looked distinctly like a From Software experience, the developer behind PlayStation 3's Demon's Souls and both Dark Souls games for PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and PC.

Today, fuel has officially been added to the fire, as a video posted on NeoGAF -- seen below -- purportedly shows this rumored game in action. Take a look (via this YouTube link):

The footage, which comes in at only 19 seconds long, shows a man who appears to be the same shotgun-toting character seen in the screenshots that leaked earlier this month, as well as a small variety of scenes showing off some environments, enemies, and combat situations. It sure looks like a From Software game in the same vein as Demon's Souls, Dark Souls, and Dark Souls 2.

The "Souls" franchise began in early 2009, when From Software released Demon's Souls in Japan, exclusively on PlayStation 3. Demon's Souls was funded by Sony -- and the IP is owned by Sony -- but the company declined to publish it in the west. Niche Japanese developer and publisher Atlus brought it to North America later in 2009, while Namco Bandai (now Bandai Namco) brought it to Europe and other western territories in 2010. We absolutely loved it.

Namco Bandai continued its relationship with From Software following Demon's Souls' surprise success, funding and publishing Demon's Souls' unofficial sequel -- Dark Souls -- which came to PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 in 2011 (and to PC in 2012). We loved that game, too. And finally, just a couple of months ago, Dark Souls 2 came to those same three platforms by way of the same developer/publisher combination, and -- you guessed it -- we loved that one as well.

It was clear that Sony didn't anticipate Demon's Souls' success, especially in the west, allowing Namco Bandai to seize control of the series under a different name. Still, with the Demon's Souls name owned by Sony -- and with Sony's long-running relationship with From Software intact (the company has been making PlayStation games since PSone launched in Japan in 1994) -- it was long assumed that Sony would try to get From Software to make another PlayStation-exclusive Souls game. This might just be it.

Now, it's important to note that this footage is unsubstantiated. This footage, as well as the screenshots that leaked earlier, could be real, but we just don't know for sure. So file this as a compelling rumor for the time being. We reached out to Sony for official confirmation. However, the company declined to comment.

http://www.ign.com/

All signs point to a new Mortal Kombat being announced before E3

Ed Boon trolls fans, says it's done "out of love"


A poster of a spine with the words 'Who's Next?' and a familiar-looking dragon logo at the bottom has appeared, and Mortal Kombat creator (sorry, kreator) Ed Boon has been teasing people for the last few days with cryptic (gah, kryptic) clues (I'll stop now) through his Twitter account.


Boon's been teasing people for a few days with his numbers-based countdown. For a while we suspected it was an Injustice 2, but here's the poster from Reddit that emphatically points towards the tenth Mortal Kombat game: