With the impending release of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim — Legendary Edition, which bundles all three downloadable content packs along with the original core game, GamesBeat thought this might be a good time to highlight some of our favorite PC mods.

If you like what you see or have some awesome mods of your own to suggest, leave a comment below and you’ll automatically be entered to win one of 10 golden Skyrim NES carts made exclusively for GamesBeat by 72pins. U.S. entries only. The winner will be randomly chosen on May 25, so make sure to check back then.

The lands of Skyrim are peppered with ancient Dwemer ruins overrun by aggressive mechanical enemies, but thanks to another mod by gg77, you can now add a little steampunk to your arsenal. The self-explanatory Summon Dwemer Mechanical Mounts and Followers mod changes Skyrim so you can call a Dwarven Horse, Spider, Centurion, or Sphere to your side.

Make sure to check the mod page for installation directions, known issues and compatibility conflicts, and so on.

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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With the impending release of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim — Legendary Edition, which bundles all three downloadable content packs along with the original core game, GamesBeat thought this might be a good time to highlight some of our favorite PC mods.

If you like what you see or have some awesome mods of your own to suggest, leave a comment below and you’ll automatically be entered to win one of 10 golden Skyrim NES carts made exclusively for GamesBeat by 72pins. U.S. entries only. The winner will be randomly chosen on May 25, so make sure to check back then.

SiTWulf’s Razas de Noche mod adds two new playable races to Skyrim: skeletons and Draugr. The mod is still in beta, so it has plenty of bugs and compatibility issues with other mods. But if you’re just looking to spice up your vanilla game and bring your own brand of terror to the world of Skyrim, look no further.

Racial Skeletons

Prometheus’s Beast Skeletons mod adds race-appropriate skeletons for Argonians, Khajits, Orcs, and Elves. The new skeleton types have been added to lore-friendly areas (where previously there had only been human remains), and after completing a new quest, players can even conjure a skeleton thrall with the same race as their own.

Make sure to check the mod pages for installation directions, known issues and compatibility conflicts, and so on.

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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BioShock Infinite is this year’s Skyrim: Flawed in just about all design but completely forgivable due to its overwhelming atmosphere.

BioShock Infinite is exactly what Spec Ops: The Line would’ve been if its game elements worked. Instagram filters and the chained shooting galleries of a bland shooter that relies mostly on a storyline with an immense twist.

BioShock Infinite is like the Twilight series minus the scruples: Its third act becomes as convoluted and incredible as Bella becoming impregnated by a vampire baby who wants to eat her from the womb.

BioShock Infinite is what Proteus would’ve been if the developer had forced in traditional gameplay elements: Simply being present in its universe is more consequential than any other, lesser element of the game.

BioShock Infinite is Far Cry 3 with opposite priorities: a gorgeous shooter with unnecessary ultra-violence that we accept because of the overall product’s excellence.

There are bound to be a few more succinct comparisons to be made in a snappy one-liner. If you have one, feel free to leave a comment!

This was originally posted on gg3.be.

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

---

With the impending release of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim — Legendary Edition, which bundles all three downloadable content packs along with the original core game, GamesBeat thought this might be a good time to highlight some of our favorite PC mods.

If you like what you see or have some awesome mods of your own to suggest, leave a comment below and you’ll automatically be entered to win one of 10 golden Skyrim NES carts made exclusively for GamesBeat by 72pins. U.S. entries only. The winner will be randomly chosen on May 25, so make sure to check back then.

Fans of The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion will admire this cheeky nod to one of the first (and worst) pieces of downloadable content for a console game. Dartani’s Horse Armor mod replaces each major city’s buyable player horse with a unique armored option. Frost and Shadowmere also get custom armor (for those who have found them).

Additional mods recommended by the modder:

• Heroic Dwarven Armor Retexture
• Divine Aegis With A Custom Horse Armor by Sader 325
• Mstik Elven Armor With A Custom Horse Armor by Sader 325
• Better Horses
• Horses for followers
• Vicious Weapon Pack
• Plants+Herbs HD Retex

Make sure to check the mod page for installation directions, known issues and compatibility conflicts, and so on.

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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This sponsored post is produced by Dealzon.

Here’s the thing about post-apocalyptic shooter games: most people just can’t get enough of them. Need to make a FPS title but can’t think of a compelling setting? What about…Asia as a nuclear wasteland after fallout from a North Korean saber-rattling mishap? You travel from country to country, battling different post-apocalyptic Asian tribes composed of mutant ninjas and five-handed kung fu masters. Bam.

Wait a sec…maybe we should trademark that IP…

Until Fallout: Asia is released, next week’s Metro: Last Light might just hold you over, especially if you’re a fan of Metro 2033 or novels by Dmitry Glukhovsky (which the games are based on).

You can get the Steam activated version of Metro: Last Light for only $37.50. The current preorder deal includes the bonus Ranger Mode DLC plus The Gospel According to Artyom, a digital comic from Dmitry Glukhovsky and Dark Horse Comics.

Other hot deals this week include Skyrim and Dishonored for only $15 each during GamersGate’s Bethesda Weekend sale. You already know about Skyrim and Dishonored, so we won’t spin additional details here.

Hot deals

May 14: Metro: Last Light (PC Download) — $37.50 at Green Man Gaming after coupon. All other legitimate retailers have it at full price. Steam activated.
 

GamersGate Sale: Bethesda Weekend Fifteen excellent Bethesda titles are on sale at GamersGate, with previous triple-A titles such as Skyrim and Dishonored down to $15. All titles are Steam activated.

• Dishonored — $14.99
• Doom 3: BFG Edition — $14.99
• Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim — $14.95
• Brink Complete Pack — $12.49
• Fallout: New Vegas Ultimate Edition — $9.95

June 4: Remember Me (PC Download) — $37.50 at Green Man Gaming after coupon. Considering its impending release, coverage of Remember Me (previously ‘Adrift’) is fairly light so far, but the amnesiac ‘memory hunter’ premise seems interesting.
 

The Humble “Double Fine” Bundle — Pay What You Want. Minimum is $1. Paying $7.94 or more gets you Brutal Legend. Bundle includes Costume Quest, Psychonauts, and Stacking.
 

Upcoming PC games

May 24: Resident Evil: Revelations (PC Download) — $37.50 at Green Man Gaming after coupon. Originally released on 3DS, this survival horror port is finally coming to other platforms.
 

May 30: Grid 2 (PC Download) — $33.75 at Green Man Gaming after coupon. Next best is $45 at GameFly. If you liked Race Driver: Grid or any of Codemasters racing games, you’ll enjoy Grid 2.
 

June 14: Dark (PC Download) — $25.50 at Green Man Gaming after coupon. Next best is $34 at GameFly. This upcoming stealth action vampire-centric RPG is now at the lowest price we’ve seen. Details are sparse beyond the few released trailers.
 

June 21: MotoGP 13 (PC Download) — $22.50 at Green Man Gaming after coupon. Next best is $27 at Amazon. If you follow the sport, this title might be worth checking out. Developed by Italian dev Milestone.
 

PC download deals

BioShock Infinite (PC Download) — $40 at Green Man Gaming after coupon. A new low price for the excellent third installment to the BioShock series. Essentially a must-own for most gamers.
 

Sniper Ghost Warrior 2 (PC Download) — $18 at Green Man Gaming after coupon. The first game was “okay”, but if you enjoy tactical shooters, this is the best deal we’ve seen for the game.
 

Alpha Protocol and Binary Domain Bundle (PC Download) — $6.39 at GameFly after coupon. Both decent (read: not great) shooters, but they’re bundled together at a great price.
 

Xbox 360 and PS3

Aliens: Colonial Marines (Pre-owned: Xbox 360) — $9.99 at GameFly. While reception for Colonial Marines wasn’t all that impressive, at $10 you’re not giving up too much to give the game a try.  

NCAA Football 13 (PS3, Xbox 360) — $19.99 at Amazon. It’s NCAA Football 12, but with a few new additions that earn it a 76/100 Metacritic score. “Heisman mode” seems a bit silly but could appeal to diehard fans.
 

Naruto Shippuden Ultimate Storm Generations (Pre-owned: Xbox 360) — $12.99 at GameFly. A new low on this year-old well-received entry in the Naruto Ultimate Ninja line that features a new battle system for faster fights.
 

Gaming hardware

Nintendo 3DS XL is $179.99 and the regular Nintendo 3DS is $149.99 at Best Buy. Both are $20 off their usual prices.
 

AMD Never Settle Reloaded Sale: Radeon HD 7850 & 7870 Video Cards + 3 Free Games — at TigerDirect. Never Settle Reloaded returns again! Buy a GPU and get Far Cry 3 Blood Dragon, Bioshock Infinite, and Tomb Raider for free. If you bought each game separately at their best online prices, you’d pay $90.
 

Lenovo IdeaPad Y500 1080p Gaming Laptop — $849 at Lenovo after coupon. Specs: Core i7-3630QM, 1TB HDD + 16GB SSD, and GeForce GT 750M 2GB. List is $1,349.
 

HP Envy dv6t-7300 Quad Edition Core i7-3630QM — $624.99 at HP after coupon. $9.99 shipping. List is $800. Cheapest we’ve seen the base configured HP dv6t Quad Edition laptop in months. Last week you’d pay $650 + $10 shipping. Add discrete graphics for $75 more and you’ve got yourself a gaming rig.
 

Lenovo IdeaCentre K430 Gaming Laptop — $999 at Lenovo after coupon. Specs: Core i7-3770, 16GB RAM, and GeForce GT 630 2GB. List is $1,269.
 

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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With the impending release of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim — Legendary Edition, which bundles all three downloadable content packs along with the original core game, GamesBeat thought this might be a good time to highlight some of our favorite PC mods.

If you like what you see or have some awesome mods of your own to suggest, leave a comment below and you’ll automatically be entered to win one of 10 golden Skyrim NES carts made exclusively for GamesBeat by 72pins. U.S. entries only. The winner will be randomly chosen on May 25, so make sure to check back then.

Midas Magic by xilverbulet and Midas Magic Evolved by DaRealSlenderMan combined add over 130 new spells to Skyrim. They have plenty of devastating elemental spells, such as Mass Lightning Storm, Molten Spray, and Call Meteor Rain, but it’s the weird and unusual that really makes the Midas collection worth owning. Want to freeze time or summon an unlimited number of conjured followers? Done. Been running through the forest for several hours with no end in sight? Why not summon a player house and take a little nap?

If you’ve used these mods or plan to download them, let us know which spell’s your favorite in the comments!

Make sure to check the mod page for installation directions, known issues and compatibility conflicts, and so on.

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

---

This sponsored post is produced by Dealzon.

Last week’s release of Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon brings back plenty of 80′s action-flick nostalgia and was well received by critics and gamers alike. Happily there’s a Gamefly coupon which takes 20% off the game, making the PC digital version only $11.99.

Fans of Valve Software will also want to check out some additional deals from Gamefly this week, with classic Valve titles on sale at up to 80% off (after coupon). They’re all Steam activated titles, so you can add to your steam library of 1,450 games (which you’ll totally start playing through this summer).

Note: We update our GamesBeat weekly deal post every Tuesday with the latest deals. For last week’s deals, check below the “Last Thursday” headline.

Tuesday New Deals

Last Wednesday’s release: Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon (PC Download) — $11.99 at GameFly after coupon. You’ll need a UPlay account to play but thats the DRM price we pay these days.
 

May 14: Metro: Last Light (PC Download) — $37.50 at Green Man Gaming after coupon. Everywhere else is basically full price. Steam activated.
 

Gamefly Sale: Valve Classic PC Titles — Up to 80% off at GameFly after coupon. Some top picks from this sale:

• Left 4 Dead 1 & 2 – $3.99 each
• The Orange Box – $3.99
• Counter-Strike: Source – $3.99

Last Thursday

Love them or hate them, Origin is having a “six days of action games” sale, with recently released titles discounted as much as 50% off. To add some much-needed irony to the mix, some of the titles in the sale are actually activated on Steam. So if you like to save money but don’t want to deal with having Origin as a DRM platform, you’re in luck.

Patient gamers will be happy to know that last month’s release of Tomb Raider for PC download is now only $20 at Green Man Gaming, and happily the title activates on Steam. (Update: we’ve previously listed this for $25 at Origin’s sale, but GMG’s new price decisively steamrolls the Origin deal). For a game rated as “???” by Conan O’Brien, this is an excellent deal.

For more Steam-activated deals, you’ll find a few other Square Enix titles such as Hitman Absolution and Sleeping Dogs (though both have hit lower prices in the past). If you don’t mind Origin or already have it installed anyway due to Battlefield, big EA titles like Crysis 3, Dead Space 3, and Assassin’s Creed 3 are all on sale (yep – all the ‘3’s).

Origin Action Sale

Origin Sale: Six Days of Action Games — up to 50% off at Origin. Tons of action/shooter PC and console games on sale. PC games tend to be 50% off while console prices are about 33% off. Sale ends Monday at 10am Pacific. Our top picks below:

• Assassin’s Creed 3 (PC Download) — $24.99
• Tomb Raider (PC Download) — $24.99 (activates on Steam).
• The Walking Dead Game – All Episodes (PC Download) — $10
• Dead Space 3 (PC Download) — $29.99
• Full list of games activating on Steam from this sale can be found here.

360, PS3, and Wii U deals

Grid 2 (Xbox 360, PS3) — $49.99 at NewEgg. List is $60. Sequel to the well-reviewed motorsport sim Grid, which was characterized by IGN as “automobile erotica”…hmm. Releases May 28th.
 
Bioshock Infinite (Xbox 360, PS3) — $49.99 at Best Buy. Next best is $58 at Overstock.com. Best discount yet about a month after its release. Lowest price we’ve seen on the console versions by $2.
 
Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm 3 (Xbox 360) — $39.99 at NewEgg. Fans of Naruto? You’ll be buying the game regardless of the reviews (which weren’t half bad, by the way).
 

Resident Evil: Revelations (Xbox 360, PS3) — $37.99 at NewEgg. The hit 2012 3DS game is getting its own console release. Release date is May 21st. Elsewhere $50.
 

Playstation All Stars Battle Royale (PS3) — $29.99 at Amazon, which ties lowest ever. Fight as everyone from Sly Cooper to PaRappa the Rapper. Next best is $40 at Best Buy.
 

Assassin’s Creed 3 (Wii U, Xbox 360, PS3) — $29.99 at GameStop. This is the lowest price we’ve seen on the PS3 and Wii U versions of the popular sandbox-style action-adventure game. Next best is $53 at Overstock.com.

Hardware

Alienware M14x r2 Laptop — $969.99 at Groupon. Yep, Groupon does more than sell spa packages now. Specs: Core i5-3210M, 8GB RAM, and GeForce GT 650M. List is $1,260.

Lenovo IdeaPad Y400 59371958 Laptop — $719 at Lenovo after coupon. Specs: Core i5-3230M and the new Kepler-based GeForce GT 750M 2GB. For $700, you’ll have a portable machine that runs most modern games without a problem.

Logitech G9X Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 Edition Gaming Mouse — $37.99 at Amazon. It’s a Logitech mouse with CoD printed on it – now it’s $20 more than usual. We’re half joking, of course. (It’s actually cheaper than the unadorned G9X.)

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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With the impending release of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim — Legendary Edition, which bundles all three downloadable content packs along with the original core game, GamesBeat thought this might be a good time to highlight some of our favorite PC mods.

If you like what you see or have some awesome mods of your own to suggest, leave a comment below and you’ll automatically be entered to win one of 10 golden Skyrim NES carts made exclusively for GamesBeat by 72pins. U.S. entries only. The winner will be randomly chosen on May 25, so make sure to check back then.

PC players probably felt the ridable horses in Skyrim were pretty tame compared to all of the crazy shit you can take for a spin in most massively multiplayer role-playing games. gg77’s Monster Mounts mod adds a massive 87 new ridable beasties, including sharks, dinosaurs, giant bunnies, and even humanoids such as Dragon Priests and Atronachs. Your new friends will even enter battle by your side as long as you dismount them first.

Make sure to check the mod page for installation directions, known issues and compatibility conflicts, and so on.

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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I hate it when a Deadric Prince has evil plans for my soul. Thankfully, I’ll get a chance to put a stop to that nonsense in the upcoming massively multiplayer online role-playing game from Bethesda.

The Elder Scrolls Online, from developer Bethesda, is due out later this year. In anticipation of that release, Bethesda is dripping out details of the MMO’s mechanics and story. Earlier today, the studio released a video that reveals information about the title’s plot.

Check out the video below:

Basically, Molag Bal, the God of Schemes, has some crazy plan to enslave the souls of all mortals. This forces the player to track down the Daedric Prince in Coldharbour, one of the evil parallel planes of Oblivion.

Once there, players will discover that Molag Bal has special plans for their soul in particular.

The Elder Scrolls Online is Bethesda’s first time taking the popular franchise online. Most recently, the company had a major hit with The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim on PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and PC. Online takes place 1,000 years before the events of that game. Spoiler warning: Molag Bal is still around in Skyrim, so I’d be careful with your soul in The Elder Scrolls Online.

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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With the impending release of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim — Legendary Edition, which bundles all three downloadable content packs along with the original core game, GamesBeat thought this might be a good time to highlight some of our favorite PC mods.

If you like what you see or have some awesome mods of your own to suggest, leave a comment below and you’ll automatically be entered to win one of 10 golden Skyrim NES carts made exclusively for GamesBeat by 72pins. U.S. entries only. The winner will be randomly chosen on May 25, so make sure to check back then.

Skyrim has dozens of graphical mods at this point, but only one turns Tamriel into a tropical paradise. For fans of Far Cry 3 or Dead Island, Soolie’s Tropical Skyrim mod replaces the vanilla settings with lush jungles, sandy beaches, bamboo forests, and volcanic areas. It also subs in different wild animals, so now you’ll encounter pandas instead of bears, tigers instead of sabre cats, seals instead of horkers, and so on.

Before

After

Additional mods recommended by the modder:

• SkyBirds
• Fantasy Music Overhaul
• Waves
• Tame The Beasts of Skyrim,
• Pride’s of Skyrim

Make sure to check the mod page for installation directions, known issues and compatibility conflicts, and so on.

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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If you waited to pick up The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim until all the downloadable content debuted, then the time to act is soon approaching.

Publisher Bethesda revealed today that it will launch The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim Legendary Edition for Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC on June 7 at a suggested price of $59.99. The special packaging will include the original game along with the Dawnguard, Hearthfire, and Dragonborn expansions.

On April 15, Bethesda announced that it halted further production of Skyrim content. It will still release patches to improve performance, but it doesn’t have any additional expansions in the works. That makes the Legendary Edition the definitive Skyrim release.

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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I have some bad news for players of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, Final Fantasy, or anything based on Dungeons & Dragons: They destroy lives — at least according to Christian television personality Pat Robertson.

On a recent episode of The 700 Club (a Christian news program), Robertson answered a viewer’s letter about whether it is “safe for a Christian to enjoy video games that have magic in them.” Robertson doesn’t think it is, according to news site Raw Story.

“I think the idea is not how close can I get to danger, but how far away can I stay from it?” Robertson said about games. “I don’t know what game you’re talking about. I know there’s one called Dungeons & Dragons that literally destroyed people’s lives. I mean they got into this thing and it was almost like demonic.”

Dungeons & Dragons gained notoriety in 1980 when a player named James Dallas Egbert disappeared into the steam tunnels of Michigan State University. Many first claimed that his disappearance was due to his inability to tell reality from the fantasy world of the pen-and-paper role-playing game. Such claims were later proven false.

Still, some Christians believe that magic, the occult, and witchcraft are equivalent to worshiping Satan and oppose any fiction that includes magic on that ground.

“I dont’ know what game you’re talking about, but if it’s based on magic — the occult and that sort of thing — stay away from it,” said Robertson. “There are other games you can play, but don’t get into that. You say, is it wrong or not wrong? I just think we should flee from evil. Period.”

While Dungeons & Dragons was first a physical RPG, it spawned many video game titles. We’ve contacted The 700 Club to ask Robertson which cases he was referring to in his claim that D&D destroyed lives.

Photo credit: Oliver Douliery/WUPR

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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Forget your local Renaissance faire — the best way to live in a medieval world full of magic is by sitting at your computer and wearing a virtual-reality helmet.

Software developer Chris Gallizzi did the footwork to get Bethesda’s beloved first-person role-playing game The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim working on the Oculus Rift headset, according to Joystiq. The Rift is a special helmet that creates a full 3D wrap-around display of in-game worlds. It provides a real sensation of walking through a digital setting — which is ideal for Skyrim.

“It’s amazing,” Gallizzi wrote on his YouTube page. “Skyrim is the perfect game for VR. No online connection required and a massive world to explore. You can stand up and do a full 360-degree turn-around or look in other directions.”

Gallizzi’s solution isn’t official, so it will require some work for others to get working. The developer used the Vireio Perception Driver, open source software that brings Rift support to multiple games, and he had to play around with Skyrim’s settings to improve the experience.

Also, Skyrim could cause a lot of disorientation, even over short play sessions, due to the in-game menus, text, and heads-up display that are not optimized for the Rift.

“It takes some adjusting depending on your sight,” Gallizzi wrote. “I’m nearsighted, so I had to adjust the field-of-view from 100 degrees to 110 degrees to make everything seem correct.”

Check out Skyrim on the Rift in the video below:

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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If you follow VentureBeat but don’t regularly check our GamesBeat site, here’s a list of the best video game stories we ran over the last seven days that you may have missed.

This week, Clash of Clans developer Supercell is now valued at $770 million and raised $130 million in February, Bethesda wraps up major Skyrim updates, and Disney fully embraces transmedia integration in Disney Infinity.

You’ll also find reviews for ShootMania, Cut the Rope: Time Travel, and a Threeview for BioShock Infinite, as well as our early impressions for Defiance.

News

• The DeanBeat: Defiance is inescapable transmedia that you’ll want to escape
• The Evil Within is the new survival-horror title from Resident Evil creator Mikami
• Nintendo finally releases the Circle Pad Pro for the 3DS XL in North America
• Angry Birds maker Rovio hires new exec to lead game development
• OnLive improves game-streaming performance with new optimization options
• Microsoft determined to make Xbox 360 more popular in Japan
• TimeGate loses appeal: Court orders Section 8 developer to pay $7.3M in damages
• Valued at $770M, Clash of Clans game studio Supercell raises $130M
• How Digital Chocolate teamed with Betable to launch a real-money gambling game in the U.K.
• Ex-Call of Duty team at Respawn Entertainment files for new trademark
• 2K Games is removing evidence of the XCOM shooter from the Internet
• Bethesda says farewell to more major Skyrim updates
• EA pulls the plug on 3 Facebook games

Mobile news

• Chinese ‘app store’ lets you install pirated iPhone apps — without jailbreaking
• PopCap releases Bookworm Heroes for iOS
• Hold on, mobile gaming monetization ain’t as easy as it looks
• Former Unity execs reveal cyberpunk tactics game for tablets
• With $11.3M to back it, Music Mastermind’s Zya app will turn consumers into music creators
• Papaya’s AppFlood helps developers monetize games in lucrative Chinese market
• Pocket Gems evolves from a successful developer into a mobile game publisher

Tech news

• Benchmark reveals Ouya’s aging Tegra 3 can’t keep up with newest Android phones

NPDs and future plans

• March 2013 NPD: Industry slumps another 10 percent as BioShock Infinite tops the charts
• Xbox division up big for Microsoft in Q3; Xbox Live has 46M members
• Japan’s Capcom slashes forecast and cancels games
• U.S. digital game revenues were stable in March, Superdata says

Exciting announcements

• Bethesda revealing Shinji Mikami’s horror game tomorrow: Here are the clues
• Breaking down what’s old and new in the 3DS’s upcoming lineup
• 3DS Nintendo Direct trailer roundup: Earthbound, new Link to the Past, and more
• Here’s a quick look at Yoshi’s Island for the 3DS
• Nintendo is making a new Zelda set in the A Link to the Past universe for 3DS
• The Legend of Zelda: Oracle games heading to 3DS eShop
• EarthBound coming to the Wii U Virtual Console this year
• Winged Pikmin take to the sky in the Wii U release this August
• Mario Party coming to Nintendo 3DS this winter
• Nintendo explains how it made Donkey Kong Country Returns 3D easier
• Mario & Luigi: Dream Team due out August 11

Interviews

• ‘Terminator’ actor Michael Biehn talks voicing Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon’s hero
• Signia Venture Partners’ Rick Thompson delivers the über-investor’s take on mobile gaming investments (interview)

Reviews

• Cut the Rope: Time Travel is a charmingly addictive puzzler with a few new tricks (review)
• Defiance is not your normal massively multiplayer online game (first impressions)
• Threeview: BioShock Infinite reviewed by a critic, an analyst, and an academic
• ShootMania Storm excels at shooter simplicity and customization (review)

Previews

• Disney Infinity takes shape as a huge investment in transmedia (hands-on preview)

Pieces of flair

• The uncanny similarities between the original BioShock and Infinite (gallery)
• Read+Watch+Listen: Bonus material for BioShock Infinite fans
• 10 better-than-Hollywood video game cosplayers
• Camp Minecraft: How educators use the block-building game to inspire kids to code
• Racing with friends: PS4′s DriveClub vs. PC’s Auto Club Revolution

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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Put on your guessing cap because Bethesda Softworks has something new it wants to show off.

The developer responsible for The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim and Fallout 3 is teasing its next game on Vine. The Twitter video app enables users to post video clips of up to six seconds in length. Bethesda posted a short clip of barbed wire followed by records spinning on a turntable.

Bethesda senior producer Jason Bergman retweeted the Vine with the message: “Consider yourself teased.”

The records featured in the clip include “Planned program service. Program no. 416″ by the Moonbeam Trio and “Air on the G-string,” an arrangement based on Johann Sebastian Bach’s Orchestral Suite No. 3 in D major. Bach composed that piece in the 18th century. The Moonbeam Trio album is apparently rare, but the U.S. Library of Congress has a copy. It includes songs like “I cannot sing the old songs,” which was originally composed in 1868.

Check out the Vine for yourself and hazard your guess in the comments:

Despite the allusions to old-timey music, the clip is not teasing a new Fallout game. The Fallout series is known for its use of classic tunes to set up its atmosphere, but Bethesda producer Pete Hines confirmed the Vine is not Fallout related.

@aegies You talking about the Vine thing? Guess again

— Pete Hines (@DCDeacon) April 16, 2013

We’ve reached out to Bethesda to ask them to explain their madness. We’ll update with any new information.

Yesterday, Bethesda announced that it is done with development on Skyrim. It will still support the title, but it is moving the bulk of its workforce to its next project.

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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Bethesda Softworks announced today it is finished with making new downloadable content (DLC) for The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, one of the most successful fantasy role-playing games of all time.

The developer’s moving on to its next major game, which now requires the attention of the entire studio. The Bethesda Game Studios team in Hunt Valley, Md., has been working on Skyrim since 2006.

For the past 18 months or so, the company has been working on new content for Skyrim, including game updates, the Creation Kit, Steam Workshop, Kinect Support, and DLC.

“Even though we’re moving on, we’ll still have minor updates to Skyrim as needed,” the team said in a post. “We’ve invested so much of ourselves into Skyrim and will never truly say goodbye to it.”

The post was a thank you to fans who have made Skyrim the most successful Bethesda title ever.

“We loved hearing your stories, your in-game triumphs, and your suggestions,” the post said. “One thing stuck out to us through those emails, letters, and postings. And that is – video games matter. They’re as important to you as they are to us. It’s not just about entertainment, it’s about your time. And you chose to spend it with our game. … Games are the world’s best entertainment because they can do what other forms cannot – fill you with the wonder of exploration and the pride of accomplishment.”

The company hasn’t disclosed anything about the new project yet.

Recently, Bethesda updated its open-world role-playing game Skyrim to version 1.9 on PC, Xbox 360, and PlayStation 3.

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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The patch foretold in legend is finally coming to Microsoft’s and Sony’s systems.

Last month, Bethesda updated its open-world role-playing game The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim to version 1.9 on PC. Now, the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 are finally catching up as Bethesda releases the patch to those consoles.

Skyrim 1.9 is already available for download on Xbox 360. The PS3 update should go live later today.

Skyrim 1.9 title update is live on Xbox LIVE

— The Elder Scrolls (@ElderScrolls) April 8, 2013

Update 1.9 introduces a new Legendary difficulty for players looking to challenge their high-level characters. The patch also expands the skill system by allowing any maxed out skill to roll back to level 15. This effectively removes the overall level cap as players can keep earning experience points without end.

Bethesda also addressed a few dozen game bugs, including issues with bad collision detection and quest errors.

For a full log of all the changes, visit Bethesda’s blog for the detailed patch notes.

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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Bethesda owns some of the coolest fantasy and sci-fi franchises in gaming. The publisher is taking advantage of its properties in a new online store that deals exclusively in merchandised based on games such as The Elder Scrolls.

The Bethesda Store is open now. It includes art, glassware, and apparel all decked out in popular Bethesda games like Fallout 3, The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, and Doom.

Currently, the big-ticket item is a $300 statue of the Dragonborn from Skyrim. It currently isn’t available for purchase, but fans will have to plop down a $100 deposit to reserve one of 16-inch sculptures.

Other, less expensive items include a $48 Dishonored-themed Dunwall Whiskey hoodie, an $18 Doom T-shirt, and some dope Fallout-themed Vault 101 sneakers for $85.

Check out some of the cooler items in our gallery below:

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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This sponsored post is produced by Dealzon.

Welcome to the first installment of GamesBeat weekly top gaming deals, where we trot around the web and find you the best gaming deals out there. Deals are curated from a giant list of 100+ game deals that includes everything from the latest AAA titles to small-time indie games.

This week we see the release of two big titles: SimCity (in all its glorious server-connection error issues), and the well-received Tomb Raider. If you haven’t bought SimCity and you’re still planning to play after the server snafu, happily there’s a 20% promo code at GameFly, making the game $48 vs. the full retail price of $60. On the Square Enix front, Tomb Raider is available for $40 at Green Man Gaming for the Steam activated version. This isn’t the lowest price we’ve seen for Tomb Raider, but it is the cheapest since release date.

Recent Releases

March 5th release: SimCity (PC Download) — $48 at GameFly after coupon. List price is $60. Interestingly enough, Amazon even halted sales on SimCity temporarily, given all the server issues the game has been experiencing.
 

March 5th release: Tomb Raider (PC Download) — $40 at Green Man Gaming after coupon. List price is $50. Steam activated version. GameFly also has it for $40 after coupon, in case that’s your preferred retailer.
 

March 5th release: The Sims 3: University Life (PC Download) — $32 at Green Man Gaming after coupon. List price is $40. Yep, another expansion to The Sims 3. Activates on Origin.
 

Upcoming Releases

March 12 release: Sniper: Ghost Warrior 2 (PC Download) — $24 at Green Man Gaming after coupon. List price for is $30. If you didn’t like the first installment of Sniper: Ghost Warrior, you probably should pass on this one.
 

March 26 release: Battlefield 3: End Game (PC DLC) — $12 at Green Man Gaming. List price is $15. The DLC includes four new maps, along with a Capture the Flag gameplay mode. Activates on Origin.
 

June 25 release: Company of Heroes 2 (PC Download) — $47.99 at GameFly. List price is $60. After THQ folded, Sega picked up Company of Heroes 2 developer Relic. Release date was recently announced, with a closed beta in the near future (yay).
 

Multiple Platforms

Crysis 3 (PC Download, Xbox 360, PS3) — $39.99 at GameStop. Amazon is price matching the console versions. Next best is $42 at Origin. A little bit wild that a triple-A game is discounted so much only a month after release.
 

Red Faction Armageddon (Xbox 360, PS3) — $5.99 plus $3.49 shipping at GameStop. Next best is $14 at Amazon. Released back in 2011, with a Metacritic score of about 75/100. Published by now defunct THQ (sniff).
 

Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim (Xbox 360 Download Card) — $23.99 at Amazon. Skyrim is one of those titles that rarely gets discounted, especially for the 360 and PS3 versions. If you have slow net connection, you may want to skip on this deal.
 

Mobile and Classic Games

The Humble Bundle with Android 5 — Pay What you Want! The 5th installment to Humble Bundle for Android is out! If you pay at least $1, you’ll get Beat Hazard Ultra, Solar 2 and NightSky HD. Pay above the average of $6.65 (at time of writing) and you’ll also get Dungeon Defenders with DLCs and Legend of Super Hexagon.
 

Super Strategy Weekend — 50% Off at GOG. Eleven strategy titles on sale from GOG (aka Good Old Games) for $3 or $5. All DRM-free. Our picks would be the Heroes of Might and Magic series along with Age of Wonders.

Want a bigger list? Smaller list? Ditch the box art images? Feel free to leave feedback in the comments, and we’ll incorporate your suggestions as best as we can in future weekly gaming deal roundups.

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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If you follow VentureBeat but don’t regularly check our GamesBeat site, here’s a list of the best video game stories we ran over the last seven days that you may have missed.

This week, SimCity launches but suffers catastrophic sever issues, PETA claims Ubisoft is glorifying whaling in Assassin’s Creed IV, and Boy Scouts can now earn badges for game design.

You’ll also find reviews for SimCity, God of War: Ascension, Castlevania: Lords of Shadow — Mirror of Fate, and Dollar Dash, as well as previews for Dead Space 3 Awakened and Gears of War: Judgment.

News

• The DeanBeat: The revenge of the old farts who outlast evil and survive in the games business
• Maxis: It’s ‘fair’ that reviewers ‘punished’ SimCity for server issues
• Lord British returns with his first new role-playing game in 15 years
• SyFy’s Defiance television show and Trion World’s online game are in the home stretch after five years
• Free-to-play online gaming company Bigpoint gets a new CEO
• SimCity producer addresses fan outrage over server issues
• Videogamer: The Film explores gaming innovation from all perspectives
• Researcher uses Xbox 360′s Kinect game sensor to measure your breathing
• Amazon stops selling digital copies of SimCity as EA shuts off in-game features (update)
• SimCity not working for you? 5 alternative city-building games
• Boy Scouts can now earn a badge for game design
• You’ll either love or hate this new Deadpool trailer — first good look at gameplay
• Bunchball launches Nitro 5.0 with focus on enterprise gamification
• Core-gamer spending slows as industry prepares to transition to the next generation
• EA closes SimCity servers for maintenance, and even the alert message is broken
• Torment: Tides of Numenera Kickstarter blazes to $900k goal in six hours
• Xbox Kinect’s upcoming midair multitouch is gunning for you, Leap Motion
• Ubisoft to PETA: ‘We do not condone whaling, just as we don’t condone a pirate lifestyle’
• From Flash to Steam — how Adult Swim is building a publishing empire
• EA: Rumor that we’re killing Dead Space is ‘patently false’
• With a magic puff of smoke: Snoop is back in Way of the Dogg rhythm game
• Wizard of Oz social game hits a million players on Facebook (exclusive)
• Journey’s art director starts his own studio
• EA shuts down BioWare San Francisco
• Can’t download SimCity? You’re not alone (update)
• Aliens: Colonial Marines co-developer TimeGate Studios lays off some staff
• SimCity’s always-online functionality trips up the review process
• PETA: It’s ‘disgraceful’ for Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag to ‘glorify’ whaling
• Dota 2 surpasses Skyrim’s record for most concurrent players on Steam
• Skyrim 1.9 update: New difficulty setting and ‘Legendary Skills’
• You are the new Desmond in Assassin’s Creed IV
• Ubisoft: 40 percent of Assassin’s Creed IV is naval missions
• Assassins’ Creed IV: Black Flag is pirates vs. ninja
• Call of Duty co-creator Jason West leaves startup Respawn Entertainment

Mobile News

• AdColony sees huge growth for video ads in mobile apps, with 1 billion views to date
• Happy birthday to you: Free stuff from Google for your Android phone
• Subway Surfers creator explains why co-development is key in mobile games
• Chasing Temple Run, Zynga launches Running With Friends mobile game
• Humble Android Bundle 5 live: Super Hexagon and more
• Proletariat releases iPhone game LetterRush from the ashes of Zynga Boston
• How Green Throttle’s Arena will surpass Microsoft, Sony, and Nintendo
• iPadocalypse: ‘iPad shipments collapse’ 50% in January (but there may be a very good reason)
• With Temple Run: Oz, Disney will test how far a hit franchise can run
• Guitar Hero creator’s Green Throttle Arena turns Android gaming into a hardcore experience (exclusive video)

Reviews

• Kratos’s softer side still kicks plenty of ass in God of War: Ascension (review)
• Dollar Dash is not worth your dimes (review)
• Castlevania: Lords of Shadow — Mirror of Fate can’t quite translate 3D gameplay into 2D (review)
• A ‘big data’ experience revives the glory of SimCity (review)

Previews

• Psychological horror returns to Dead Space with Dead Space 3 Awakened (preview)
• Gears of War: Judgment makes some refreshing tweaks to an old formula (preview)
• Underneath Fuse’s brilliant combat system is a steep learning curve (preview)

Interviews

• Gears of War: Judgment writers debunk the series’ dude-bro reputation (interview)
• Crytek chief puts on his Warface and says why Crysis 3 for Wii U ‘had to die’ (interview)

Pieces of Flair

• SimCity server errors inspire a wave of memes (gallery)
• Electronic Arts’ digital revenue will surpass physical game sales this year (infographic)
• New Thief in the works at Eidos Montréal — here’s a bunch of confirmed screenshots

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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Traditional console gamers are vehemently resisting a major change in the business: the increasing influence of online integration and microtransactions. The closer we get to the next hardware cycle, the more game developers and publishers seem to defend this vision of the future. Like all advances forward, the industry is probably going to stumble a lot before it, as a whole, really figures this out.

For a little while now, it seems like we’ve been looking at an all-out assault on the very idea of a video game as a singular piece of content or as a creative work for that matter. The latest stated intentions come from companies like publisher Electronic Arts and developer Crytek, which are basically saying they’re doing away entirely with the old notion in an attempt to get people to stop trading in their games, with seemingly no room for coexistence.

EA wants all of their future games to include microtransactions. Forward-looking statements like this rarely end up being 100 percent true, but I also don’t like the idea of EA moving on with a blanket approach to every game they publish. I could only imagine what Need For Speed, all EA’s sports games, and Battlefield will look like laden with microtransactions, but I believe Dead Space 3 (pictured top) was the most egregious example because of its history as an atmospheric, isolated experience with the series’ game elements focused on a narrative instead of profit in and of themselves.

Crytek’s statement that single-player games are going to disappear is just as much of a speculative blanket proclamation as EA’s. That says that the developer isn’t really going to think about whether free-to-play is really a good thing for this particular game or that particular game. I have no idea how it’d implement microtransactions into a single-player Crysis game.

Former Epic Games designer Cliffy Bleszinski recently tried to defend companies like EA, and he’s right in regard to how varied the free-to-play and microtransaction-based business models are. But very few developers have really figured out good ways to implement them. He also makes a point that, apparently, people do buy these microtransactions. The market has generally accepted them, which brings forth the point that core gamers so vehemently against these new business models are a minority. It’s actually kind of scary when you think about how only a small portion of gamers actually care about the idea of a game being a singular creative work rather than a service with which to generate revenue.

One game that a lot of people (including Bleszinski) seem to bring up as a great example of melding single-player and multiplayer is Dark Souls (pictured below). But I actually see Dark Souls as a great example of not ceaselessly pushing forward with online-connected gaming in every single product a company makes.

Maybe a reason I’ve gravitated back towards Japanese games a little bit is because Japanese developers don’t seem to feel the need to cram online into each and every one of their games. When From Software made Demon’s Souls and later Dark Souls, the company didn’t just slam token multiplayer or microtransactions into the games in order to keep people from trading them in. From Software actually thought up a genuinely unique idea for a game that happened to require an Internet connection. People have probably given Nintendo crap for not making enough online-focused games for the Wii U already, but I applaud them for simply sticking to what makes their games fun whether they be connected or not.

Maybe, however, this is because online gaming isn’t as big in the Japanese market. What is big over there is local multiplayer for handheld games as well as passive communication between devices. That’s why so many handheld games have tried out Monster Hunter-style local multiplayer features and why Nintendo implemented Streetpass as a system-wide feature in the 3DS.

Still, I think market differences like that — as well as the continuing demand for wholly single-player experiences — will result in a landscape in the next-gen consoles that’ll be a hodgepodge mix of such games alongside the fully connected ones. We already have publishers like Nintnedo, Bethesda, and Rockstar that still primarily make single-player games.

Nintendo and Rockstar can do this because their games sell well enough already. You never seem to find used copies of Nintendo games, and their prices never seem to go down at retail — even five or six years after launch. With a game that sells as much as Grand Theft Auto, you don’t really see Rockstar complaining as much about the second-hand market, either.

Bethesda is the kind of company that can put out Skyrim – a game with no online features whatsoever outside of a few rather large pieces of downloadable content — and sell over 10 million copies. You never see Bethesda complaining about the used market — likely because it made a game that people can spend 100 hours playing. Plus, you’re also probably still going to have a lot of indies releasing games of all kinds, including those strictly based around single-player.

The appearance of microtransactions and free-to-play on consoles next gen is inevitable, but what’s also inevitable is that we’ll see a greater variance of business models and price points for console games.

Originally Posted on MultiPlatform.

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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The Dragonborn is no longer the most popular kid on the block. All the cool kids are into defending the ancients.

Valve’s Dota 2 strategy game just broke The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim’s record for the most concurrent players on the Steam gaming network. Dota 2 reached 297,010 simultaneous gamers on March 2. That beats Skyrim’s 287,411 players on the game’s launch day in November 2011.

Dota 2 is Valve’s entry in the popular multiplayer online battle arena genre. Other popular examples include League of Legends, Heroes of Newerth, and Guardians of Middle-earth. These games continue to grow in popularity largely due to huge presence in the competitive gaming scene.

In August, Valve held a Dota 2 tournament with a $1.6 million prize pool. Events like these are clearly replacing traditional marketing budgets, and it’s obviously working. You can see in the above chart that Dota 2 is growing rapidly.

Via Reddit

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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Bethesda just released the Barney Stinson version of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. That is to say that the game is now now legen — wait for it — dary. Legendary.

The developer introduced a beta update to Skyrim that takes it to version 1.9. The patch introduces a new Legendary difficulty setting, which is specifically designed to challenge players who hit the level cap or those who just want more of a struggle. Skyrim 1.9 also has Legendary Skills, which gives you the option to reset your maxed-out skills to level 15. This essentially removes the overall level cap, according to Bethesda.

This update is only available in beta on Steam right now. If you want to download it, follow these instructions:

1. Open your Steam Library.
2. Right-click on The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim.
3. Select “Properties.”
4. Select the “Beta” tab.
5. Use the drop box to opt in to the beta.

Naturally, this patch also addresses numerous in-game bugs. Head to the BethBlog for an extensive list of all the changes.

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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Video game publishers have bastardized and stretched to its limits the original concept of downloadable content (DLC).

DLC has become a staple of the video games industry within the last generation, and nowadays, it would be difficult to name a major release that is without at least one add-on. This extra content gave developers a way to continue to create reasonably priced supplemental material for their titles after launch and give players a reason to return months after completing the game.

It’s a shame to look at the state of things as they are now. DLC has been a subject of controversy for the gaming industry and its community for the past couple of years.

Too many times, players have found such content on the retail disc locked away until they pay an additional fee — not to download the content per se but to allow access to it on top of the $60 they already paid. On countless more occasions, publishers have released DLC on the same day as the game, which has led to speculation that it was developed alongside the base game and simply set aside to bring in more sales (and it’s a reasonable theory). Needless to say, the community has been in a state of outrage due to these methods of abuse, and now DLC is more commonly scoffed at than greeted with excitement.

Capcom has earned a rightful amount of infamy for including a staggering amount of disc-locked DLC in its recent titles.

I won’t go into too much detail on the shady practices of publishers regarding DLC, for that is a subject that would be better discussed separately. What I would like to do with this article is remind the guilty parties of what players are really expecting from their downloadable content and what the practice of releasing it is supposed to be.

As stated earlier, downloadable content was originally meant to revive players’ interest in a game after its release. Players expect to have a reasonable window of time to move on from these titles and then come back upon hearing word of an expansion. Downloadable content released on the same day as the retail launch is generally looked down upon not only because the content has already been developed and should have been included on the disc but also because players now have to pay an additional fee on top on a steep $60 price. How should things work in contrast to this?

Look at Bethesda, for example. Many of the studio’s open-world role-playing games, such as the The Elder Scrolls and Fallout series, have been fortunate enough to been given an exceptional amount of DLC, with each expansion released a month or two apart. These often come with new and original stories and an abundance of side content, all taking place in a new location along with new weapons and gear available for the player. Bethesda, among a few other companies, has provided us with some quality content on a reasonable timeline of launch dates. This is an example of what the community sees as what DLC is truly intended to be. You don’t hear complaints about DLC of this nature, do you?

Fallout: New Vegas offers a substantial amount of quality content with its DLC expansions, such as Honest Hearts (pictured above).

Other titles — usually action-based shooters — are applauded for releasing loads of additional multiplayer content, which continue for almost a year after the retail game’s release. This includes map packs, weapons, and new player classes, among other additions. This method has successfully kept players attached to the content’s base title and supported its multiplayer community for long periods of time — even after the next entry in the series is released.

In instances on PC, where an exclusively multiplayer title is free to play (such as on Steam), new content is constantly being made available, and in turn, the servers for these games never fail to fill to their limits. Such is the case with Team Fortress 2. Released back in 2007, this title’s multiplayer community remains alive and well to this day thanks to the developer’s constant effort to put out new content at a reasonable date and for a fair price.

The recent Mann vs. Machine expansion for Team Fortress 2 is a prime example of content that keeps a title’s multiplayer community alive years after release.

On certain occasions, DLC is offered to players at a free price, such as with Tekken Tag Tournament 2, released in late 2012. As favorable as this method may be (honestly, who doesn’t like free stuff?), we can understand the fact that free content comes at the cost of the publisher and can only be available on occasion.

Downloadable content is currently a far cry from what it originated as, and unfortunately, gamers are rarely treated to proper DLC. If the gaming community wishes for the state of DLC to improve, a good way to facilitate this would be to simply refrain from purchasing any sort of content that it sees as unfair or out of line. That may be easier said than done for some, but if publishers realize that sales are decreasing for their disc-locked and day-one content, they may see no point in continuing the practice.

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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Dragonborn is the third and most substantial add-on for the role-playing game The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim — a new limb grafted onto a comatose patient by an optimistic doctor who, to everyone’s surprise, not only wakes up the patient but then proves all those situations where having an extra limb would be useful. What that tortured metaphor means is it’s the first downloadable content worth returning for. Dragonborn doesn’t just add a new island to visit and new quests to do when you get there; it also adds something surprising — answers to our prayers. It feels like a response to criticisms of vanilla Skyrim, and you get the sense that the gods have been listening, or at least looking at a few blog posts and comment threads.

Tomorrow and to-Morrowind

One of the most common complaints that players whoremember the older Elder Scrolls games have of Skyrim and of Oblivion before it is that it’s not Morrowind. The fondly remembered third game in the series, Morrowind had its share of flaws. But what sticks in the mind was its strength: the deep oddness of its setting. It was a land where houses were grown from fungus or carved out of the shells of giant insects — where oversized fleas called Silt Striders were used as transport. It was distinctively surreal.

Dragonborn takes you back to Solstheim, an island first visited in one of Morrowind’s expansions. The unusual architecture, plants, and monsters return, a couple of characters have managed to survive the hundreds of years between games, and there’s a single Silt Strider (unrideable, sadly) there to prod at your memories with the stick of nostalgia. The thing most likely to inspire nostalgia is the music, much of it directly borrowed from Morrowind. Thankfully, the Cliff Racers — squawking pterodactyls that were Morrowind’s biggest annoyance — don’t return. But if you’re the kind of joyless soul who shows up in every Elder Scrolls comment thread saying, “Well, it’s still not Morrowind,” then Dragonborn is a cake that developer Bethesda has baked just for you.

Variety is the spice of dungeoneering

The first time you solve a puzzle in one of Skyrim’s dungeons by matching some symbols of animals, you might feel pretty clever. By the seventh time, you’re probably over it. Although Solstheim’s dungeons were designed with the same tile sets and some of the same obstacles (undead Draugr and steam-powered machinery), each one has something unique about it. In one dungeon, you leap across spinning gears while fighting robotic spiders; in another, there’s a magic sword that opens a door by carving patterns into it. And in a submerged dungeon, you alter water levels to access lower areas like something out of a Zelda game, only less annoying. That goes a long way toward reducing the tedium you used to feel when realizing a quest is building up to another familiar dungeon crawl.

They’ll make great pets

Finding a pet dog in Skyrim wasn’t easy, but as every Fallout game proves, we love owning pets in RPGs. The first plug-in, Dawnguard, added some new ones, including trolls, but Dragonborn improves on that. Now you can have a steam-powered dwarven automaton tagging along on adventures or one of the goblinoids called Rieklings. These jibber-jabbering, spear-waving creatures are normally enemies, but it’s possible to befriend a tribe of them who will then swear allegiance to you. In addition to the one you adopt as your mascot and drag around the island, showing him off like he’s your new poodle-cross, others are so devoted they’ll randomly leap out from behind rocks when you get into fights and charge into battle, fearlessly poking their tiny spears into ancient dragons. This is obviously the very best thing.

Unburdening Lydia

Lydia, the housecarl of your first home in Whiterun, was the companion of choice for many players. But she had very little to say, and her dialogue options were even shallower than those of characters who seemed less important. That sarcastic sigh of “I am sworn to carry your burdens” whenever you opened her inventory to give her a better piece of armor got on everybody’s nerves almost as much as the “arrow to the knee” line or the thing about the sweetroll.

Well, not anymore. Take Lydia to the island of Solstheim, and she has things to say about the new locations and creatures, as well as a new battle cry — and, thank Christ, new lines when you open her inventory. No other follower I’ve dragged to Solstheim has been given additional dialogue love, but admittedly, none of them needed it as desperately. Lydia still walks into the same traps over and over, but at least now she has a variety of complaints to make when she does.

Harden up

You may need to bring Lydia with you because Dragonborn’s fights are tougher. A lot depends on your character build and level, but I found the battles in Dragonborn significantly more challenging, especially when the story separates you from your follower and pet and forces you to rely on your own abilities. Dragon Shouts change from being an optional way to liven up fights to essential abilities you need to use wisely. Potions run out quickly, magic weapons need to be kept charged, and abilities you forgot you had suddenly become useful again. I found myself falling back on skills I’d already maxed out instead of using the ones I was trying to improve — simply to survive.

Of course, it’s entirely possible that I’m just terrible at playing games. Please tell me so in the comments.

My first wish is … .

During Skyrim’s main quest, you summon the dragon Odahviing and convince him to take you for a ride. It’s a one-time thing, but it’s built up by the game as a pretty big deal. Then you climb on his back and ascend on powerful wing-strokes — into a loading screen. Afterward, you immediately climb down, having arrived at your destination. It’s a great honking tease is what it is. So when word got out that you’d be able to ride the dragons in Dragonborn, that was also a pretty big deal. Don’t get your hopes up, though. How low are they right now? No, you’ll have to lower them a bit further than that.

Riding dragons is rubbish. You can’t steer them and instead simply hang on as they circle, picking out targets for them to attack, which they do halfheartedly before backing off for another round of pointless circling. You feel like a backseat driver — and you are. You can fling spells at enemies when you’re close enough to them, but otherwise, you’re redundant. There’s also the option to fast-travel on a dragon, which has no advantage over fast-traveling not on a dragon.

Presumably, the reason for this lack of control is so that you can’t fly over city walls and realize that if you don’t go through the loading screen at the gates, the settlements are empty. That’s necessary to keep your processor from melting, but I would happily trade learning that there’s a man behind the curtain for the ability to steer a dragon anywhere I want. I’m glad they tried to add another feature we all wanted, but the implementation doesn’t cut it.

With any luck, the PC version will be improved by mods. There’s already one that at least lets you watch while fast-traveling. Obviously, that’s no consolation for console players, though.

Apocrypha now

Pointing out all of the ways Dragonborn seems designed to fix Skyrim — or at least to chip away at some of its flaws — may make it seem like the whole expansion is nothing more than a sap designed to shut up the complainers. But there’s more to it than that. The best thing Dragonborn adds is something nobody asked for — something I didn’t know I wanted until I had it.

Read one of certain cursed books across Solstheim, and you’ll be sucked into it like Gumby, appearing alone in a magical otherworld called Apocrypha that’s a sort of interdimensional library. Books are everywhere, even seeming to grow out of the walls, and storms of torn pages whirl around you. There’s a sickly greenish tinge to everything, slime and tentacles are all over the place, and tunnels suddenly and dramatically stretch or shrink while you’re walking down them — removing an exit from your reach or bringing a dead end right up to your nose. It’s creepy in a way that Skyrim never usually is, with proper H.P. Lovecraft eeriness.

The most promising thing about Dragonborn isn’t that it proves Bethesda is listening to us but rather that the developer is still having ideas of its own.

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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Just because Xbox 360 ownsers get The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim downloadable content first doesn’t mean developer Bethesda doesn’t care about its PC players.

As proof of this, the publisher updated the high-definition texture pack for its open-world role-playing game on Valve’s Steam service today, according to Bethesda’s blog. The update improves the overall look of the main game. It also adds the improved texturing to the Dawnguard, Hearthfire, and Dragonborn expansions.

The HD add-on is particularly taxing, so the developer suggests players thinking about installing the pack should use a PC that exceeds Skyrim’s recommended settings. If you already installed the HD textures, Steam should automatically update, but beware: The file is 4.7 GBs.

Just as a reminder of what the game can look like with the HD texture pack, here’s a video that compares the standard game with the high-res DLC:

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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If you follow VentureBeat but don’t regularly check our GamesBeat site, here’s a list of the best video game stories we ran over the last seven days that you may have missed.

This week, Bethesda finally announces The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim expansions for the PlayStation 3, Disney shuts down Epic Mickey developer Junction Point Studios, and Rock Star pushes the Grand Theft Auto V release date to Sept. 17.

You’ll also find reviews for Antichamber, Omerta: City of Gangsters, Fire Emblem: Awakening, and Skulls of the Shogun as well as previews for Tearaway, Splinter Cell: Blacklist, Injustice: Gods Among Us, and Serious Sam Double D XXL.

News:

• The DeanBeat: Does it make sense for game developers to publish on the doomed BlackBerry?
• Former chief game designer Brian Reynolds: On Zynga, games, and the future
• Bethesda announces dates for PlayStation 3 Skyrim expansions
• Ubisoft creative director discusses hooking fans again with Splinter Cell: Blacklist (video)
• Sony invites the world to see the future of PlayStation on Feb. 20
• Drone pilots stationed in Afghanistan talk video games in a Reddit AMA
• Splinter Cell’s creative director has the best Minecraft story ever
• Chartboost invites international developers to experience Silicon Valley
• This week in the Nintendo Download: Fire Emblem, Puddle, and The Cave
• Brain-training service Lumosity hits 35M users and is now adding 100K users a day
• Grand Theft Auto V release date delayed to Sept. 17
• Nintendo president: No price cut for Wii U
• EA’s top executives paint the game industry’s grim picture — and how new consoles will change it
• EA’s CEO makes a passionate response on game violence controversy question
• Dishonorable discharge? EA removing Medal of Honor from release rotation
• Electronic Arts delays Insomniac’s Fuse beyond April
• Origin has 39 million users (and 4 other surprising numbers about EA)
• U.S. senator: ‘I think video games [are] a bigger problem than guns’ — and other out-of-touch old dudes
• EA narrowly beats expectations for holiday game sales
• Anti-censorship group: Massachusetts removing games from rest stops is ‘constitutionally problematic’
• Splinter Cell: Blacklist has side missions and may ship without a main menu
• Black Ops II’s in-game live-streaming feature adds support for Twitch
• FanDuel raises $11M for daily fantasy sports contests
• Nintendo reports a thin third-fiscal-quarter profit and sells 3M Wii U consoles in first season
• Zynga’s chief game designer, Brian Reynolds, resigns
• Sony harnesses the power of the Internet to promote Planetside 2
• Aksys Games to release HD version of Muramasa: The Demon Blade for PlayStation Vita
• EA DICE is porting Frostbite engine to Mac (Update)
• League of Legends Season 3: Taking the ‘e’ out of e-sports
• Disney closes Epic Mickey developer Junction Point Studios (updated with comments from Warren Spector)
• Crytek picks up some former Darksiders developers for a new Austin-based studio
• Experience earned in Gears of War: Judgment demo carries over to final game
• DICE Summit to open with J.J. Abrams and Gabe Newell

Mobile News:

• Open-source social-mobile games platform OpenKit goes into closed-beta test
• Temple Run 2 hits 50 million downloads in 2 weeks
• Memorabilia company Steiner Sports partners with SportsPicker to gamify its marketing
• PlayPhone signs up more developers for its mobile social gaming network
• Layoffs at Disney-owned studios could signal increased focus on mobile and social
• Mobile game monetization startup PlayHaven’s new COO: ‘There is life after Google’
• Google Play revenue growing 10X faster than Apple’s iOS app store
• Google Play and Apple app store sales increasingly dominated by Japan, Korea, and China
• Epic Games finally releases Epic Citadel on Android

Interviews:

• How Ubisoft’s designers transformed Sam Fisher into a ‘panther’ and a leader in Splinter Cell: Blacklist (interview)
• The Final Fantasy franchise’s future hinges on Lightning Returns (interview)
• Why developer teamPixel is making a bid for the Homeworld series (interview)
• Gearbox CEO: ‘Invoking the legacy’ for Aliens: Colonial Marines
• From the ashes of THQ: Left 4 Dead developer ‘super excited’ to work with 2K Games (exclusive interview)
• Life after Epic: Getting to know Cliff Bleszinski (exclusive interview, part three: his opinions on shooters)
• Former KingsIsle VP and creative director Todd Coleman on what’s next for him (exclusive interview)

Previews:

• Tearaway is a digital love letter to physical paper (hands-on preview)
• Splinter Cell: Blacklist lets you play like a ghost, a gunman, or a panther (preview)
• Injustice: Gods Among Us is not a reskinned Mortal Kombat (hands-on preview)
• Serious Sam Double D XXL’s multiplayer is like insane sour cream on crazy-ass nachos (hands-on preview)

Reviews:

• Calling all game developers: You need to play and learn from Antichamber (review)
• Omerta: City of Gangsters brings an authentic yet rough mobster experience (review)
• Fire Emblem: Awakening is one of the deepest and best 3DS games (review)
• Skulls of the Shogun is a balanced turn-based tactics game with clever writing (review)

Community Spotlight:

• Cubicle culture and the potential of indie games to tell stories differently
• Developer responsibility: What’s missing from video game violence
• Should Wii U owners demand more GamePad-friendly ports?
• The extremes people go to when hunting down Achievement points

Pieces of Flair:

• Required listening: Ni no Kuni, Anarchy Reigns, and an interview with Aliens: Colonial Marines composer Kevin Riepl
• Evoland shows how action-adventure games have matured, without the boring history lesson
• Dude blasts through Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3 in about 4 minutes
• Surgeon Simulator 2013 shows the frightening real-world discrepancy between knowledge and experience
• This is what a 2,800-strong space battle in Eve Online looks like (gallery)

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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The coming of the dragonborn is imminent. Bethesda is finally releasing The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim downloadable content on PlayStation 3 this month.

Dragonborn, Hearthfire, and Dawnguard will hit on three separate weeks in February in the reverse order that the developer released them on Xbox 360, according to Bethesda’s official blog.

Here are the dates:

• Dragonborn: Feb. 12
• Hearthfire: Feb. 19
• Dawnguard: Feb. 26

As we reported previously, Bethesda will cut the price of each add-on pack by 50 percent for the first week of its release on the PlayStation Network. That means Dragonborn and Dawguard will go for $9.98, and Hearthfire will cost $2.48.

Bethesda Game Studios struggled to port these expansions to the PlayStation 3. Dawnguard, the first DLC released on Xbox 360, hit the Xbox Live Marketplace in June. It later came to Windows in August.

Via Twitter: @Bethblog

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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Game music isn’t all chirpy chip tunes or sweeping symphonic movements. Just like film scores, soundtracks inspire us, scare us, and can even bring us to tears with a well-placed melody or a jarring action cue.

Because of this, I decided it was time we start paying attention to music as well as the people lovingly creating it. Try playing through Final Fantasy VII, Borderlands, or The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim with the sound turned off. None of these are even half as good without their scores subtly shifting tone and setting scenes around us.

Each month, I’ll take you on a guided tour through some of the notable albums released in the last few weeks and interview a composer on an upcoming project.

This month, we’ll take a look at Ni No Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch, DmC: Devil May Cry, and Anarchy Reigns. We’ve also got an in-depth interview with Aliens: Colonial Marines composer Kevin Riepl.

January albums

Ni no Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch
Composer: Joe Hisaishi

It’s a bit disheartening that many Japanese role-playing games these days are moving away from jaunty adventuring tunes. Long-time Studio Ghibli composer Joe Hisaishi’s score for Ni No Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch delightfully combines the orchestral bombast found in older Final Fantasys and Dragon Quests with his own playful melodies.

Hisaishi’s music enhances the overall Ghibli quality to Ni No Kuni. You could use the studio’s art style and even the same story with any other composer’s work but it wouldn’t retain that feeling that you’re diving into a Miyazaki film. With Hisaishi’s help, Ni No Kuni gets a little extra sprinkle of magic in an already fantastic adventure.

DmC: Devil May Cry
Composers: Noisia and Tom Colvin

This is probably the least comfortable soundtrack I’ve listened to in many years. DmC: Devil May Cry leans heavily on pulsating and grating dissonance with an occasional burst of tinny orchestral melody.

Dutch electronic group Noisia took a step away from their signature drum ‘n’ bass for most of Devil May Cry and focused instead on a grungy and oppressively synthetic wall of noise.

Fans of dubstep insisting on “dirty” bass drops will likely enjoy the soul-vibrating nastiness to the bass lines in “Mundus Theme” and “Lilith’s Club.” Dubstep is already an overplayed addition to most games, but Noisia’s attempts fit it into Devil May Cry’s overall tone and maintains a feeling that the world is constantly shifting between reality and Limbo.

Anarchy Reigns
Composers: Compilation

I dare you to not want to kick some ass after listening to Anarchy Reigns. Every song drips with that “hardcore” sound Sega established in Jet Set Radio and Crazy Taxi in the late ’90s, but here it updates it for a more hip-hop-aware world. Fat beats and heavily repetitive lyrics deliver a perfect one-two punch for tireless combos and horrible acts of digital violence.

Nothing about Anarchy Reigns is particularly classy or subtle, so it stands to reason that the music glorifies vengeance and thuggish braggadocio. Spending a few minutes with “Kill ‘Em All” and “Laughing at U” will almost certainly make you put on some gloves and destroy a punching bag.

Unlike Ni No Kuni and Devil May Cry, Anarchy Reigns’ music is always in your face like an overzealous hype man urging you to feel the beat.

Well, it worked. Excuse me while I go to the gym.

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The Xbox 360 has three pieces of downloadable content for The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. The PC currently has two. The PlayStation 3 has zero — but that will finally all even out in February.

The Dawnguard, Hearthfire, and Dragonborn add-on packs for Skyrim will hit Sony’s home console next month. Publisher/developer Bethesda will release an update to Skyrim just before the DLC goes live.

Dragonborn out Feb. 5 for PC. Also out for PS3 in Feb (date TBA), followed by Hearthfire and Dawnguard (also Feb.) Each 50% off first week.—
Pete Hines (@DCDeacon) January 18, 2013

As a special deal for PS3 users, Bethesda will sell all three add-on packs at half price for the first week of their release. That means, instead of $20 each for Dawnguard and Dragonborn and $5 for Hearthfire, players will get them for $10 and $2.50, respectively.

The PC version of the Dragonborn expansion will hit on Feb. 5, Bethesda’s vice president of marketing Pete Hines said today on Twitter.

Dawnguard first debuted on the Xbox 360 in June. Bethesda released it on PC two months later. The developer struggled to get the add-ons to work the PlayStation 3′s limited RAM, which caused the extraordinary delay.

Bethesda is probably one studio that is ready for some next-gen hardware to help avoid headaches like these in the future.

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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