As many hardcore gamers will be aware E3 (Electronic Entertainment
Expo), the annual video game conference and show at the Los Angeles
Convention center is being held this week.
E3 was kicked off earlier this morning with the Microsoft Press
Conference. The press conference began with a live action short for Halo 4. They unveiled
the brand new Splinter Cell game, and gave us a sneak peek at a new
Gears of War game and a number of upcoming titles including FIFA
13, Fable: The Journey, Forza Horizon, South Park: The Stick of Truth, Call of
Duty: Black Ops II, and more.
Got a spare hour or two? You can check out the full press conference below
(note: the real action begins about five minutes into the video).
Hitman
Absolution, the fifth instalment of the Hitman games series, is
coming to PC, PS3, and Xbox 360 in November. IO Interactive premiered
“Attack of the Saints” today, the new epic new trailer to promote
Agent 47's extensive appearance at this year's Electronic Entertainment Expo
in Los Angeles.
A Mighty Ape-exclusive pre-order offer has been announced for Sniper:
Ghost Warrior 2. Pre-order and receive an exclusive Sniper:
Ghost Warrior 2 T-Shirt free with your order!
We've also just confirmed the Collector's Edition
which comes packed with:
- Steelbook copy of Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2
- Sniper Tactics and History hardback book
- Artbook
- Official soundtrack CD
- DSR-1 in-game sniper rifle for multiplayer modes
- Vintorez in-game sniper rifle – AKA the “Thread cutter”
- Four exclusive multiplayer playable characters (Diaz, Medox, Marinov and
Marine Team Leader)
Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 is coming to PC, PS3, and Xbox 360 on August 21st.
Stock of the pre-order offer is limited, get
your pre-orders in quick!
Continue reading...
COMPETITION CLOSED: The winner of the kick ass Duke Nukem prize pack
is Simon B. from New Plymouth. His original Duke Nukem one-liner was
“Always blow on the pie, they can be thermo-nukem-lear!” Enjoy your
prize pack Simon. Safer communities together.
Duke is back to kick ass and chew bubble gum… and he's still all
outta gum. After a fourteen year wait Duke
Nukem Forever is almost here. The almost mythical game is being
released in just over a week on June 10th!
Our games gorilla was lucky enough to play Duke Nukem Forever last week. He
said that you'll be laughing your pants off for the entire time that you play
it. It has all the great humour, aliens and babes that you'll remember from the
previous Duke Nukem games. If you want to play a first-person shooter that
doesn't take itself too seriously, then Duke Nukem Forever is for you.
To celebrate the release of the game 2K have given us a kick ass Duke Nukem
Forever prize pack which includes the following items:
Continue reading...
I caught up with Andrew, the other Dragon Age II
competition winner, upon his return from Canada to get his thoughts on the
experience. He sent me a lengthy report on the trip and a link to a huge gallery of
photos. It's a great read and an easy blog post for me; copy and paste FTW!
Take it away Andrew…
Andrew: I just want to thank everyone at BioWare, EA and
Mighty Ape first of all for the chance to visit the BioWare offices in Edmonton,
and especially for the opportunity to play DA2 before its release. I would also
like to extend a special thanks to Randall Bishop, Mat Goldman, Mike Laidlaw and
Mark Darrah, as well as all the great people at BioWare. Mark the executive
producer and Mike the lead designer for DA2 joined us for lunch and shared some
interesting and entertaining anecdotes.
Mat gave an awesome presentation on the art concept for DA2, and Randal was
our official tour guide through the BioWare labyrinth, spending all day with us
during what must be an especially busy time with the release only
6 weeks away!
The first thing you notice about the BioWare offices, aside from the many
many awards, is that they have a real appreciation for their fans. In every area
of the offices there is fan art on display, sharing space with the awards and
their own concept art. I got the impression that they really care about what
the fans think and are thrilled when they go to the trouble of making and
sending something to them.
Continue reading...
As we
announced last week the winners of the Dragon Age II pre-order competition
were Nigel and Andrew. I caught up with Nigel this week to see how his trip to
Canada and BioWare studio was.
How was the weather in Canada? Was it cold?
Canada was amazing. It was my first time in that part of the world and I got to
experience cold like I’ve never felt before; the temperature was lowest
at –32°C.
What was BioWare Studio like? Was it how you imagined a big game
developer would be?
Everyone at BioWare was really friendly and cool, pretty much exactly how
you’d expect a big developer to be. Pretty much everyone had a console of some
sort near their desk. It seemed like an ideal place to work (if you can deal
with the cold).
How was Dragon Age II?
I’m so very excited for Dragon Age II now; they’ve made some really cool
changes that improve the gameplay on the console (particularly in combat), and
being a BioWare game the story is really good.
Continue reading...
As you will recall we
recently ran a competition with EA to give two Mighty Ape customers the
chance to win a trip to Edmonton, Canada when they pre-ordered the upcoming Dragon
Age II game. The purpose of the trip is to visit BioWare's Canadian studio
to play Dragon Age II early.
The lucky monkeys who have won the trip are:
- Nigel D. (Auckland)
- Andrew W. (Cambridge)
Nigel and Andrew flew out to Canada a few days ago, and are no doubt having a
great time up there. I will catch up with them when they arrive back in New
Zealand for a post-trip report so that they can share their thoughts and photos
from the trip.
Dragon
Age II is coming to PC, Xbox 360 and PS3 on March 11th. Pre-order
now and receive and receive a bonus in-game code for Fadeshear sword and
Lion of Orlais shield!
Would you like to play Dragon
Age II before it is released? Want to travel overseas and visit
BioWare's studio? Well here is your chance to do just that.
EA and Mighty Ape are giving two people the opportunity to travel to
BioWare's studio in Edmonton, Canada in February. You'll get to meet the
producers of the game as well as play Dragon
Age II before it releases in New Zealand in March.
So you want to know how to enter right? All you need to do to enter the
competition is pre-order
Dragon Age II from Mighty Ape by January 11th. Yup, it's that easy. Not
only will you go into the draw for the trip to BioWare in Canada by pre-ordering
by January 11th you will also be automatically upgraded to the BioWare Signature
Edition of Dragon Age II. Sweet!
If you are one of those organised types who have already pre-ordered Dragon
Age II don't worry you wont miss out, you are also eligible to enter the
competition. We will send an email to all existing pre-order customers which
will explain how to enter – you've probably already received it.
Continue reading...
Look what showed up in the Mighty Ape warehouse today. That's right, Call
of Duty: Black Ops, one of the most anticipated games of 2010. It is being
stocked in and prepared by our warehouse monkeys to be shipped out to all of our
pre-order
customers on Monday.
We've been bombarded with messages about Black Ops from excited customers all
week so we're glad to say that the wait is almost over. Those of you who have
pre-ordered will receive your copies on Tuesday, release day.
In the photo you can see the standard edition, Hardened Edition, and the big
daddy Prestige Edition. You can still pre-order the standard edition and the
Prestige Edition here.
If you want the Prestige Edition, I suggest pre-ordering as soon as possible.
We don't have many left and once they are gone, the are gone for good!
Have a safe Guy Fawkes night, don't do anything we wouldn't do. Bring on
Tuesday!
Fallout:
New Vegas is shipping today, so to mark the occassion I called on
the biggest Fallout fanboy that I know to discuss his experiences with the
Fallout franchise (his IM status at work has been “Hurry up Fallout: New
Vegas!” for the past few months). Introducing todays guest blogger, Ben from
customer service aka VEGAN SHINIGAMI!
The games of the Fallout series have always been among my favourites, right
from the original Fallout, which blew my 17 year mind with its
extremely raw and violent take on a post-apocalyptic wasteland. A year later,
Fallout 2 improved on every aspect of the first, giving us
more fantastic perks and an even bigger wasteland to explore, full of memorable
characters and locations.
Ten years later and Bethesda emerged with Fallout 3. There
was a lot riding on Fallout 3 for the Fallout franchise, as it was somewhat of
a series reboot with a change of developer, and the change from the isometric
view to 3D. I personally had huge expectations, and had anticipated it since
the first day it was announced. When it did release in 2008, not only did it
meet my expectations, it exploded them into a bloody mess! The moment when
I initially emerged from that first vault in Fallout 3, and cast my eyes across
the vast, desolate and dangerous wasteland before me will always be etched in my
mind as a defining gaming moment. Since then I have logged over 120 hours in
the world of Fallout 3, and I am still hungry for more.
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