Hasta La Gadget!

If you have a gamer on your holiday shopping list and they like shooters with a little RPG mixed in on the side, EA and BioWare have the perfect gift. On November 6, BioWare is launching the Mass Effect Trilogy compilation. The compilation will have all three Mass Effect games in one package.

The bundle pack will cost just $59.99(USD) and will provide many hours of epic gaming action. Mass Effect is one of the best video game franchises out there in my opinion. The franchise will take you from our first introduction to Commander Shepherd all the way to the point where he (SPOILER ALERT) sacrifices himself to save humanity.

The trilogy pack will be available for the Xbox 360 and PC on November 6. In a kick to the groin for PS3 gamers, there is no launch date offer for the PlayStation version of the Mass Effect Trilogy. I hope that the PS3 version will come in time for holiday gift-giving, but since the original Mass Effect was never released on the PS3, it’s likely to result in some delays for that console.

If you’ve somehow managed to miss out on BioWare’s three Mass Effect games, then good news: BioWare and Electronic Arts announced a new Mass Effect Trilogy bundle today. The compilation naturally features all three games in the Mass Effect series, so it should be perfect for those who have yet to jump aboard the Mass Effect bandwagon.

What’s surprising about this announcement is that the Mass Effect Trilogy will be coming to Xbox 360, PC, and PS3, meaning that PS3 players will finally get to enjoy the first Mass Effect title. It was looking bleak for a long time there since Microsoft acted as publisher on the first game, leading many gamers to believe that Mass Effect would never come to PS3. Not only is Mass Effect launching on PS3 in the Mass Effect Trilogy, but it will also be available as a standalone download on PSN.

Unfortunately, PS3 players are going to have to wait a bit longer than Xbox 360 and PC players. While the Xbox 360 and PC versions of the Mass Effect Trilogy will be launching on November 6, PS3 owners won’t be getting it until “a later date.” The announcement from Electronic Arts doesn’t get any more specific than that, so PS3 players might have a while yet before the Mass Effect Trilogy launches on their console of choice.

The Trilogy will only cost $59.99 when its released, which is surprising considering that it features three full games and Mass Effect 3 isn’t that old. BioWare will be celebrating the release of the Mass Effect Trilogy with the first “N7 day,” which is slated for – surprise! – November 7. Details on N7 Day are still pretty slim, but we’re told that there will be a number of in-game and online events to celebrate the new gaming holiday. More information on both the Mass Effect Trilogy and N7 Day should be coming soon, so stay tuned.

Mass Effect Trilogy announced for 360, PS3, PC is written by Eric Abent & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Microsoft is beginning to pare back its Zune offerings to make way for Xbox Music, a brand new service that is still a mystery for the most part. Today, however, we’re getting some details on Xbox Music’s pricing and an ever-so-brief glimpse at the user interface it will sport on Xbox 360. The pricing information comes courtesy of the Windows 8 Music app, while the look at the UI is the doing of some Xbox dashboard beta testers, who spilled Microsoft‘s secrets in sharing a screenshot with The Verge.

The Windows 8 Music app shows us that a one-month subscription to the incoming music streaming service will run £8.99, while a one-year subscription will cost £89.90. Zune users living in the UK will immediately recognize those prices, as they’re the same rates Microsoft charged for access to the dying service. Pricing details for the US are still missing, but it seems safe to assume that Xbox Music will follow the same payment structure as Zune here in the States as well.

Of course, in order to use Xbox Music, you’ll need to sign up for a subscription to Xbox Live Gold, which runs $59.99 per year in the United States. This means that you’ll be paying more than the advertised price to use the music streaming service, but obviously the expectation is that you’ll use your Gold subscription for more than just access to Xbox Music. Good news for those of you who hate paying monthly fees (don’t we all?), as some keen-eyed gamers on NeoGAF are also saying that an ad-supported free version of Xbox Music will be offered, so it appears that Microsoft is taking a page out of Spotify‘s book with this one.

The screenshot that was sent to The Verge doesn’t show much, but it does indicate that users will be able to sync their playlists across multiple devices. If that’s an actual feature of Xbox Music, then that will be a big bonus for users, so let’s keep our fingers crossed. The service is still obviously in its early stages though, so right now, we’ll just have to wait until Microsoft spills some official details. Stay tuned.

Xbox Music pricing details outed in Windows 8 app is written by Eric Abent & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Borderlands 2 arrived last week, and most are saying that its better than the original. Early adopters are adventuring through Pandora, collecting guns and killing Bullywongs as you read this, but for some of those Vault Hunters, the adventure is not without headaches. No, we’re not talking about Borderlands 2‘s increased difficulty, but rather about a bad rank reset bug that is affecting users on all platforms.

For the uninitiated, Borderlands 2 features a ranking system that is separate from the game’s leveling system. Players have the ability to increase their “badass rank” by completing a series of challenges, and increasing your badass rank gives you coins to spend on improvements that apply to all of your characters. Users can improve a variety of stats, including reload speed, maximum health, and elemental effect chance (there are many, many more aside from those three), and the best part is that challenge completion doesn’t carry over between characters, meaning that players could potentially get their badass rank ridiculously high by completing challenges with all four characters.

It’s a really cool aspect of the game, but there’s one problem: some users are reporting that their badass rank is being randomly reset, taking all of the unlocked stat bonuses with it. This wouldn’t be much of a problem for someone who is planning to play a lot of Borderlands 2, but the completed challenges aren’t being reset with the badass rank, meaning that players will have a really difficult time getting their badass rank up to where it was. To make matters worse, skins and items that have been unlocked with tokens have disappeared as well.

This problem is present on the Xbox 360, PS3, and PC versions of the game, and users have speculated on the Gearbox forums that it has something to do with save file corruption. Gearbox’s Chris Faylor chimed in on the thread, saying that the studio is working on a fix and reassuring players that this seems to be a rare issue. Even if it is, it’s still a major annoyance for those who are affected, so here’s hoping that Gearbox gets a fix out the quickly. Have your badass ranks and unlocks in Borderlands 2 been reset, or are your save files still solid in that respect?

[via Kotaku]

Borderlands 2 rank reset bug making the rounds is written by Eric Abent & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Microsoft did not make any official announcement concerning new Xbox 360 Holiday Bundles that should be coming our way at the end of this year, but it seems that retailers who have inside information (or perhaps, one of the more interesting crystal balls around) have already been showing off the new Holiday Bundles for a couple of days already. The pricing details did not change which means you will not save an extra dollar compared to the year before (purists will argue otherwise, saying that inflation and the dollar’s depreciation means this year’s Xbox 360 is more affordable even at the same price point), but at least the games have been updated to deliver gaming goodness in the form of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, Forza 4 and Kinect Disneyland Adventure.

Forum members at Slickdeals.net and Cheap Ass Gamer did check out the new Xbox 360 Bundles in-store at both Best Buy and Wal-Mart. Expect the same basic hardware such as the 250GB Xbox 360 in the $299.99 Holiday Bundle that will be accompanied by Forza Motorsport 4 (Disc format), a downloadable copy of Skyrim, and a 1 month Xbox Live subscription. There is also the $299.99 4GB Kinect Xbox 360 Holiday Bundle to choose from. So what will it be this Christmas – Xbox 360 or the slimmer PS3?

By Ubergizmo. Related articles: Microsoft’s Xbox 360 is the no. 1 selling console in the US for the 20th consecutive month, 2012 Xbox LIVE Update public beta now available,