Hasta La Gadget!

Those of you who play Hammerpoint’s The War Z may want to change your passwords. Hackers have breached databases in The War Z that held personal player info. Players’ email addresses, passwords, in-game names, IP addresses, and game log-in credentials have all been compromised. Hammerpoint has temporarily shut down its servers for The War Z and for its forums to address the issue and find out the scope of the damage.

Hammerpoint assures The War Z players, however, that their payment credentials have not been compromised since it uses a 3rd party to handle all of its transactions. It also says that its players’ real names and addresses should not be compromised, unless the players themselves posted the information on the forums. Hammerpoint also says that player passwords and the email addresses that they use to log into the game are encrypted, so hackers should not be view them without using a “brute force” attack. Nonetheless, change your passwords.

Hammerpoint is currently working with external investigators and security experts in order to determine just how wide-spread the breach was. It has enhanced its security systems to better protect its players’ personal information. It has notified all of its players of the security breach, and is taking the steps necessary to ensure that an incident like this will not happen again in the future.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with The War Z, it’s a zombie survival MMO that many gamers say is a rip off of Arma II’s DayZ mod. It has also received bad press for falsely advertising its game. It launched the game on Steam with misinformation. It lied about how the game has a skill tree system and private servers, and it also over-exaggerated its offerings. This outraged many players who purchased the game but realized that they had no access to many of the promised features. The game was removed from Steam, and was reinstated 2 months later after it amended its description.

Hammerpoint didn’t release an ETA on when the investigation and security updates will be finished, so we’ll update you when we find out. Security breaches seem to be going around a lot recently. Earlier last month, Evernote suffered from a similar breach where user emails and passwords were compromised. It had to initiate a mandatory password reset for all users in order to protect their data.

[via The War Z]

The War Z player data compromised after security breach is written by Brian Sin & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

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.

Fans of the Mass Effect franchise will be very happy to hear that Bioware is currently getting ready to develop the next Mass Effect game. Casey Hudson, the Executive Producer at Bioware, stated that the game developer is planning on bringing a “fresh and new” experience to the series. He says that the game will still have the same, core aspects that made the franchise so successful, but that there will be some major new changes, perhaps revamped game play.

BioWare Montreal and Hudson will be taking point on the development of the new game. The game will be released on the PC, as well as the next-gen consoles, like the PlayStation 4 and the Xbox 720. The game may not be called Mass Effect 4, because according to Chris Priestly, Bioware’s Community Coordinator, the Commander Shepard trilogy is over, so calling the next game Mass Effect 4 would be a “disservice”.

Speaking of Commander Shepard, Bioware revealed some interesting statistics that showed that 82% of all Mass Effect 3 players preferred to play as male Commander Shepard. The statistics also showed that 48.7% of players chose to play as the soldier class in single-player. 64.5% of players chose to play Paragon while the other 36.5% chose to play Renegade.

Hudson also stated that the Mass Effect movie is still a work-in-progress, but there is no speculated release date. Aside from the Mass Effect news, Bioware is working on an all-new game. Hudson didn’t release any details about the project, but he says that he hopes the game matches the success of the Mass Effect series. He says, “We’re focusing on delivering something new, the way we did at the very beginning of Mass Effect.”

[via GameSpot]

Next Mass Effect to offer a fresh experience is written by Brian Sin & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Valve has just announced a new program in Steam called “Early Access”. This allows gamers to purchase and play games that are still in development. It’s like a beta mode where you test drive the game in its current state, and report bugs and give feedback to the game’s developers. Valve believes this program will help developers form bonds with gamers as well as help them make better games.

Currently, there are only 12 games being offered in the Steam Early Access program. They are: Arma 3 Alpha, Kerbal Space Porgram, StarForge, Kenshi, Prison Architect, Kinetic Void, Gnomoria, Under the Ocean, Patterns, Gear Up: Premium, Drunken Robot Pornography, and 1…2…3… Kick It! etc. None of the games are free-to-play, however in the future, Steam plans on bringing f2p games into the mix.

Developers will offer their games at a discounted price in the Early Access program, so there’s a chance that you can get the game for a much lower-price point than if you purchased it on its official launch date. There may be developers, however, who may charge you a bit extra for the game later on during development, so be warned. Some of these games are only in Alpha mode, while others are more farther along. You have to view the screen shots of the game to see whether or not you’ll find it “playable”.

The Early Access program is a great way for developers to continuously make money for the games while they’re still in the development stages. The feedback from gamers will be helpful in creating the best end-product upon the game’s official release. Developers will be able to see what game features generate positive responses from players, and which features deter them. All in all, we should be seeing an influx of new, great games coming soon.

[via Steam]

Steam offers “Early Access” to developing games is written by Brian Sin & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

After making themselves clear back in January about their intentions to not exit the PC peripheral business, Logitech is back to prove that point. They’ve ended up rebranding their “G” lineup of PC gaming peripherals and accessories by announcing a slew of new toys, including new mice, keyboards, and headsets.

Logitech is calling their line of new gaming peripherals “Logitech G,” marking the first time that the company’s “G” products have actually gotten their very own branding. In total there are eight new products, including four mice, two keyboards, and two headsets. The mice include Delta Zero sensor technology for extreme cursor control accuracy, and what Logitech calls “advanced surface materials” for a comfortable precision grip on the keyboards.

Both headsets also include a noise-canceling microphone and removable ear cups to wash every now and then. Headlining the new G series of products is the Logitech G700s mouse, claiming to be “the zenith of all wireless gaming mice.” Logitech says that the mouse “communicates with the computer at up to 1,000 times per second, making it up to eight times faster than a standard USB mouse.” The G700s is priced at $99.

The Logitech G line of products is expected to launch in North America sometime next month, while Europe will receive them in May. As for pricing, the mice start at $39, while the keyboards are $119 and $199. The two headsets are priced at $59 and $79. Overall, it’s your typical pricing scheme from Logitech, but these new peripherals should be quite the advancement from past G-series products.

Logitech announces new line of PC peripherals with new “G” brand is written by Craig Lloyd & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.