PS3 Features

To get the Doctorate Achievement and Trophy in Deus Ex: Human Revolution, you will need to scour each and every location in the game to find the 29 eBooks that will give you a Scholar Bonus of 200 XP when picked up. Note that these eBooks are different from all the other, numerous, eBooks scattered about the game, which offer no such rewards.

What defines a character? It’s the kind of question we tend to ask more with novels and movies than games – but when it comes to BioShock, it’s a valid query. We’ve got two exclusive videos that dig into the evolution of character in BioShock Infinite.

You know, I was really enjoying Dead Space 2. Really, really enjoying it. When I started playing it a few months ago I hadn’t yet found a game of 2011 that had really clicked with me, but Dead Space 2’s improved narrative, nigh-perfect pacing, and beautifully judged, cranked-up set-pieces struck one hell of a chord. It was a big, ominous, bassy chord, like the kind that plays when something looms up out of the darkness behind an unsuspecting soon-to-be-meat-pile in a horror film. And I loved it. But I’ll probably never finish it.

The reason? A game-killing glitch that turned up at the start of chapter 12, a few hours from the end. An unfixable, go-back-to-the-start glitch that vetoed my last ten hours of gameplay, and which I know has been documented all over the internet but never patched out. And that got me thinking about the issue of glitches. Which are acceptable? Which aren't? Do they really matter? And who's fault are they anyway? And I actually surprised myself a bit. So I wrote something about it.

Sometimes we’re let down by big, blockbuster games failing to live up to their potential. In fact, it happens at least a few times a year, and we’re sure to see a few of 2011’s big holiday releases fall flat on their faces.

Other times, however, the exact opposite occurs; that rarest of occasions where a game that looks absolutely, positively dreadful ends up being good… or great. It’s less frequent, that’s to be sure, but it’s exciting when we go in with low hopes and leave with a smile on our faces. In 2007 we took a list of games with strange, seemingly uninteresting concepts and got together a list that succeeded our wildest dreams, and now we’re taking another look—this time at a different list of games that rose above the rest and proved us all wrong...

Can’t be in LA for the biggest multiplayer party ever thrown? Well there’s still time, man! Okay, assuming you can’t hop on a plane on a moment’s notice, we’ve got you covered. In our exclusive little photo gallery we'll show you the whole shebang from end to end. From the recreated IRL Burgertown and Scrapyard paintball course, to the FOUR HUNDRED or so Xbox 360s running one of the most anticipated games of the decade, your chance to see everything Call of Duty XP has on display is only a click away…

Goodbyes are never easy, but at least we made it funny...

So what’s the real story behind the recently announced delay of Twisted Metal? It’s actually got nothing do with adding additional features or modes. It’s all about polish and playtesting – key components in a game that’ll live or die based on how perfectly tuned it is. 

Jesus Christ, you guys. This isn't even the holiday season, and look at how many games are coming out. This is unreasonable. Publishers can't realistically expect to make money in September, can they? Ah, hell, who are we kidding? We're gonna buy almost every friggin' one of these releases before claiming bankruptcy. Just in time for October's similarly unfair set of releases to overwhelm us all over again. Well, until then…

I could harp on about the original Deus Ex, how great it was, its legacy and all that, but I already did that in my review. Instead I’ll focus on what makes Deus Ex: Human Revolution this month’s winner. DX:HR lets you figure out how you want to play the game, a huge departure from the endless hand-holding corridor slogs that compose a frighteningly large portion of the current gaming landscape. There’s a lot of stuff in DX:HR you won’t see on your first time through, and the way the story shifts and secrets get revealed according to how you play will bring you back again and again.