Need for Speed Shift Team Racing Pack

A free DLC is coming out for Need for Speed Shift on the 1st of December for the Xbox 360 and PC and December 3rd on the Playstation 3.

The Team Racing Pack downloadable content for Need for Speed SHIFT includes five new cars: 1998 Toyota Supra Mark IV, 1967 Chevrolet Corvette Stingray, 1967 Shelby GT500, 1969 Dodge Charger R/T and 1969 Dodge Challenger R/T, as well as the new Team Racing mode.

Grab your friends, create a team and take on the world in Team Racing. Using a combination of teamwork, skillful driving and the occasional slick maneuver to topple your opponents, you’ll be atop the podium in short order.

To go to the news announcement page, visit the link below.

Need for Speed Shift Team Racing Pack

AMD interviews DICE for use of DirectX11 in their next game

AMD interviewed DICE and asked some interesting questions about next-gen hardware and how they plan to implement it in their soon to be released Battlefield Bad Company 2 video game. Here is an exerpt from the interview,

(2) Can you share any details of how you plan to use DirectCompute 11 to implement deferred shading? What does that mean in terms of how your games would look or perform?  Can you think of other way you might use DirectCompute 11?

Our plan is to improve performance and at the same time be able to have many more dynamic light sources than we’ve been able to have previously — and by a wide margin even. This is possible as the culling & processing of large light sources can be done much more efficiently and directly in a compute shader compared to traditional deferred rendering techniques.

To red the full interview, head on to the following link,

AMD DICE Interview - 11 Days of DirectX 11

DiRT 2 PC System Requirements

Here are the system requirements for the upcoming PC title, DiRT 2. The game was recently released on the consoles and received excellent reviews. The small delay for the PC version was due to the added DirectX 11 support which will be well worth the wait.

Recommended (Enhanced for DirectX 11)

• OS: Microsoft Windows XP, Vista or Windows 7
• 
  Processor: Intel Core i7 or AMD Phenom II
• Memory: 3GB
• HD Space: 10GB
• Video Card: ATi Radeon HD 5700 Series

Minimum:

• OS: Microsoft Windows XP, Vista or Windows 7
• Processor: Intel Pentium 4 3.0Ghz, AMD Athlon 64 3400+
• Memory: 1GB (2Gb for Windows Vista)
• HD Space: 10GB
• Video Card: ATI Radeon X1500, NVIDIA GeForce 6800

Source

Please fill out this survey

I am running a survey these days for my Master thesis and researching on blogs and what motivates people to write them and how do they generate revenue and so on. Even though, I am a blogger myself, it is very interesting for me to try and understand how other bloggers do it. If you want to help me with my thesis and you are a blogger, you could contribute to my research by going to the following link where I have the survey set up. Please note that the survey is completely anonymous.

Blog Survey

Your help would be greatly appreciated. =)

Microsoft says, "Xbox console ban is permanent"

The recent banning of users who had modified their Xbox consoles to play pirated games may have been banned permanently from using their Xbox consoles and may have to buy a new console if they want to continue playing online. In an interview to the BBC, the firm said,

"Users of banned Xbox consoles can recover their profile to another, unmodified Xbox 360 console to resume their Live service"

"The banned console will be unable to connect to Xbox Live."

It was mentioned however that the banned consoles will still be able to work offline.

To read the full news story, head over to the link below.

Xbox console ban is 'permanent' - BBC News

Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 breaks sales record

It seems that COD MW2 has broken the sales record which was previously set by GTA IV. COD sold over 1.23 million units in its first day and it turned around profits of over 47 million British Pounds.

You can read more about it at the link below.

Modern Warfare 2 breaks UK record.

Microsoft cuts off thousands of gamers from Xbox Live

I came across a news story on BBC's website today that thousands of gamers may have lost their connection to Xbox live because of using modified Xbox consoles. These consoles are usually modified in order to play pirated versions of games available for the Xbox.

To read the full news story, click on the link below,

Microsoft Disconnects Xbox gamers

Dragon Age: Origins

Another game which got released recently and has been getting great reviews is Dragon Age: Origins. The game was released on all major platforms including the PC, Xbox 360 and PS3. Out of all the three versions, the PC version is supposed to have the best graphics while out of the consoles, the PS3 version seems to have better graphics. I own a 360 right now and I might purchase a new gaming PC in the near future so I might wanna hold out on this one until I have a good enough rig for it as I think the experience on a PC would be so much worthwhile for this game. Actiontrip.com reviewed this game today and you can check out the full review from the link below.

Actiontrip.com Dragon Age: Origins Review

More Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 Reviews

The game is finally out and the two websites I trust the most when it comes to gaming reviews have given their final verdict on the blockbuster. Both Gametrailers.com and IGN.com have given the game an astounding 9.5 out of 10. The thing that surprised me about the reviews was that IGN reported the single player campaign to be around 5 hours in length while the Gametrailers review mentioned that the campaign was around 7 hours long. I guess I will find out for myself how long the campaign is once I buy the game. They both praised the significant amount of improvements to graphics done for the game as well as the multiplayer enhancements. The added perks have been quite welcome and the new Spec-Ops mode also seems to be a very welcome addition to the game.

However, both the reviews mentioned that the way the story unfolds in the game could have been shown in a better view instead of static mission briefing scenes which appear while the single player maps are loading. At the same time, they said that the number of cinematic scenes have been increased much further as compared to the previous Modern Warfare game. Also the locational variety is much better than the previous game as the player is taken from locations like Afghanistan all the way to Rio de Janeiro and beyond.

You can check out both the reviews from the links below.

• IGN.com COD 4 Review (Xbox 360)
• Gametrailers COD 4 Review
  

Two new multiplayer modes for Battlefield Bad Company

Two new modes for the highly anticipated upcoming FPS, Battlefield Bad Company 2 have been revealed in an interview they gave to the folks at IncGamers.com. They have not given too much details on it except the fact that the squads will play out more like they did in the awesome Battlefield 1943 game (launched a few months earlier this year as a DLC). The players will no longer be forced into a squad like Battlefield Bad Company 1 but will play more similarly to the way squads worked in BF1943. You can read the details from the following link,

IncGamers - Two new multiplayer modes for Bad Company 2

You can also check out the awesome footage from the African harbour map from the game below. The sound effects are some of the best I have heard in a video game and the graphics effects and lighting effects are simply superb. I can't wait to get my hands on this when it gets released early next year for all major platforms.

Battlefield: Bad Company 2 - Africa Harbour MP Gameplay

Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 Reviewed by GamingBolt

One of the first reviews to hit the internet about the next FPS phenomenon is out. GamingBold.com reviewed the game calling it an

"Action packed story that keeps you on the edge of your seat the whole time. Multiplayer and Spec-Ops will leave you with endless hours of fun while still keeping the core gameplay of COD 4 but adding tons of more features".

On the downside, they reported that the campaign of the game was fairly short. Also note that the review of the game was done for the Xbox 360 version of the game. I cannot wait to get my hands on this puppy myself as I have been looking forward to it for quite a long time. These days I am having a lot of fun with Operation Flashpoint Dragon Rising. Of course it may not be everyone's cup of tea, but I enjoyed it a lot. Perhaps I may decide to write about it pretty soon.

You can read the full review of Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 from the following link...

GamingBolt: Call of Dtury Modern Warfare 2 Review