Hasta La Gadget!

Crytek is looking to reunite Darksiders with its original creators, Vigil. The company hired 35 of Vigil’s employees after the company failed to receive any bids back in THQ’s original auctions. Crytek launched a new studio in Austin, Texas called Crytek USA and housed all of the Vigil employees there. Crytek USA is currently headed by Vigil’s old co-founder, David Adams.

The bidding for Darksiders, as well as the other IPs in THQ’s back catalog auction, will begin on April 1st and will continue on through April 15th. THQ will then have to discuss the bids with the entities that it owes money to, and then it will decide on a primary bidder and back-up bidder for each of its IPs. THQ will then have to present the sales to the court, who will have to approve each sale. Everything is expected to finalize sometime in May.

David Adams tweeted, “Looking to buy @Darksiders IP back from #THQ. The IP belongs in the hands of its creators.” Ryan Stefanelli, the Principal Designer at Crytek USA, further confirmed that Crytek will be bidding for Darksiders’s IP, and that everyone is “excited at the prospect”. It’s still up in the air what Crytek plans on doing with the IP. It had already stated that it doesn’t plan on working on Darksiders 3, because it “doesn’t fit with our strategy”.

Nonetheless, fans, as well as the ex-Vigil staff, will be relieved that Darksiders will return home to its rightful owners. For those of you that are interested in playing Darksiders or Darksiders 2 for the PC, you can purchase the games for extremely cheap through this week’s Humble Bundle. You can pay $1 to get Darksiders, or a little over the average payment to get both games. You will also get Red Faction: Armageddon and Red Faction: Guerrilla.

[via Joystiq]

Crytek intends to take Darksiders off THQ’s hands is written by Brian Sin & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Today the next chapter in the Iron Man film saga has been revealed in mobile game form by the folks at Gameloft. This Iron Man 3 game is being targeted for a cross-platform release on the 25th of April, just days before the theater release of the film itself! You’ll be rolling out with an endless runner this time around – or endless shooter, if you prefer that version of the game concept genre.

What you’ll be doing here is blasting your way through a massive amount of metal mayhem with your newest-generation Iron Man suit, nearly all-gold and everything. Tony Stark won’t be stopping around for too much self-reflection in this presentation of the storyline, so don’t expect too much to be revealed about the inner workings of the movie – but there will be some hints and spoiler-like bits and pieces.

As it has been with past Gameloft releases, here we’re going to see a top-notch delivery of a film series translation – this set of developers doesn’t mess around. And by the looks of the gameplay trailer above, they’ve come back with no less than the healthiest dose of metal fist face-bashing action they’ve ever delivered.

Below you’ll see a bit more information about the Iron Man film series including trailers for Iron Man 3. Join us in the first week of May where we’ll be checking out the Iron Man 3 film ourselves – get pumped up to learn more if you don’t end up seeing it yourself on opening night! Also don’t forget to check out our entertainment tag portal for more movie action than you can handle!

[via Android Community]

Iron Man 3 mobile gameplay revealed by Gameloft for iOS and Android is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Executives from Facebook have revealed that game developers generated around $2.8 billion in revenue last year. Sean Ryan, Facebook’s Director of Game Partnerships, spoke at the Game Developers Conference trying to entice more developers to join Facebook’s gaming platform. Ryan stated, “Anywhere in the games business we are investing heavily.” Ryan rolled out a bunch of impressive statistics to get more developers on board.

The statistics showed that over 250 million people play games on Facebook each month, and that 20% of all Facebook desktop users play games daily on Facebook. In the last month alone, Facebook redirected 263 million clicks to Apple’s App Store and Android’s Google Play store. Since last year, game installations has increased by 75%. Over 200 games on Facebook now each have over 1 million monthly active users. Over 100 developers generated over $1 million last year. There has been a 24% increase of players who pay to play games on Facebook compared to last year.

Facebook is looking to draw even more players to its gaming platform. It’s launching a series of high-end games that it believes will attract even the hardcore gamers. These new games will feature higher-quality graphics, intensive gameplay, and more riveting storylines. They will be completely different than Facebook’s current offering of games like Farmville and Bejeweled.

Facebook is pursuing many routes in order to generate as much revenue as possible. Along with creating a more stronger gaming network, the company is also pursuing new marketing methods that may be able to help it generate more than the $4 million a day it already generates from sponsored stories. One of the new methods is targeted ads placed straight into your newsfeed. There will most likely be more changes coming down the line, so stay tuned.

[via Facebook]

Facebook game developers made $2.8B in 2012 is written by Brian Sin & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Hyperkin’s upcoming RetroN 5 gaming system will allow you to dust off those old, video game cartridges you have lying around and play them once again. The RetroN 5 improves upon the old RetroN 3 by adding support for more, old gaming consoles. Like the RetroN 3, you will be able to play game cartridges made for the original Nintendo, Super Nintendo, and Sega Genesis, but unlike the RetroN 3, you can also play games made for the Famicom, Super Famicom, Sega Mega Drive, Game Boy Advance, Game Boy Color, and original Game Boy.

The new RetroN gaming system also allows you to use your old gaming controllers with the system as well. There are 6 available controller ports. The Sega Genesis and Famicom controllers will use the same port, and the Super Nintendo controllers will be used to also control the Game Boy games. The retro gaming system will also feature Bluetooth wireless controllers that can be configured to work for any game.

The RetroN 5 is basically a hardware emulator for classic games. The system allows “Save States” for games, overclocking to speed games up, brightness adjustments, volume adjustments, and more. There is also an HDMI output that allows you to play your games at up to 720p resolution. Hyperkin has also fixed the “blurry” issue that most classic games have when being played on HD televisions. The RetroN 5 can also improve the audio of games, but that’s entirely up to the gamer. Some people like the original 8-bit music in their games.

Hyperkin is hoping to keep the price of the RetroN 5 low. It’s aiming for a $100 or less price-point, but the company isn’t able to promise anything. Considering that the RetroN 3 was $69.99, and Hyperkin’s SupaBoy (handheld Super Nintendo) was $79.99, we could be looking at a $90-$100 price tag for this system. Hyperkin is also hoping to launch this system during the summer, with a speculated release date being sometime in July.

[via SlashDot]

RetroN 5 revives classic video game cartridges is written by Brian Sin & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

One of Capcom’s most iconic classics, Mega Man, is turning 25 years old this year come December. The Mega Man franchise has seen a huge amount of success, with over 40 game variations of the series being created, over 30 million copies of its games being sold, and with several TV shows being created/based off of it. To celebrate its upcoming 25th anniversary, Capcom is looking to give back to the players that helped make the series so successful.

Unfortunately, Capcom didn’t announce a new game being developed for the series, but it did announce several collector’s items that are set to go on sale later this year. One of the collector’s items is a Mega Man USB statue. The statue is 10-inches tall and is powered through USB. The statue is based off the classic version of Mega Man, and will have light-up boosters. Unfortunately, the statue will only be available at the San Diego Comic Con.

Next up is a Mega Man art book. The art book, titled, MM25 Mega Man & Mega Man X Official Complete Works, is a 432-page art book published by Udon Entertainment. It will feature all the character art and designs from the entire Mega Man and Mega Man X series, and some concept art for Mega Man 9 & 10. There will also be developer interviews, and tribute art from Hitoshi Ariga, Toru Nakayam, and Shigeto Ikehara. The book will be released in the second-half of 2013.

Next up is Worlds Collide. Worlds Collide is a crossover comic series that’s a collaboration between Mega Man and Archie’s Sonic the Hedgehog comics. The series will start on April 10th, 2013, and will run for 12 issues and span over 3 story arcs. On May 4th, you will be able to grab a free primer of the comic book series from your local comic book store for “Free Comic Book Day”.

Last, but not least, Capcom will finally be releasing Mega Man Original Soundtracks. There will be 10 Mega Man OSTs released, for Mega Man 1 through 10. The OSTs were available in Japan, but they never found their way to the United States or Europe. The OSTs are set to be released sometime during the summer, but there is no word whether or not it will be sold separately, or in an entire collection.

Capcom has also stated that it has been listening to Mega Man fans all around and that they have been working on something new. They aren’t able to announce something yet because they want to have a product that’s deep into development first. But until then, Mega Man fans can quell their cravings by purchasing the Mega Man 4 remake for the Nintendo 3DS that’s set to come out April 25th. Following Mega Man 4′s re-release is Mega Man 5, which is set to be released on May 16th, and Mega Man 6, which is set to be released sometime around June.

[via Forbes]

Mega Man’s 25th anniversary brings goodies to die-hard fans is written by Brian Sin & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.