Tidbits: The State of Gaming on Oct. 24
Things You May Have Missed
“Civilization: Beyond Earth” Release!
Firaxis is releasing the newest installment of their Sid Meier’s Civilization franchise to the masses on Friday, Oct. 24! I am beyond excited for it because, along with “Myst” and “MS Rogue,” the early “Civilization” games were some of the first ones I ever played. The pre-release reception has been mixed, spanning from “Its just ‘Civ 5’ minus the history and in space” to “Where ‘Civ 5’ only really demanded your time, ‘Beyond Earth’ demands your attention because now choices tend to matter.” If “Beyond Earth” is indeed just a transplanted “Civilization 5,” I think I’ll be OK with that, but I do understand how others may end up disappointed. This game will see a lot of scrutiny with the inevitable comparisons to “Alpha Centauri.” Hopefully it will measure up or find its own footing.
“Civilization: Beyond Earth” is available on Steam for PC and Mac and retails for $49.99. If you were able to pre-order, you also received the "Exoplanets Map Pack" for free.
“Hearthstone” Goes Mobile ... Again!
Blizzard’s digital Warcraft card game, Heartstone, will be available on Android tablet by the end of the year, and there is talk of it moving to iOS and Android phones next year.
As a side note, if you didn’t already know, there is an in-game "World of Warcraft" achievement link to the Hearthstone game called “Mount Up!”. If you win three games of Hearthstone against another player, either in the arena or one-on-one, you will be rewarded with the Hearthsteed mount for your World of Warcraft characters.
Hearthstone is free-to-play.
Super-Selling "Smash Bros.!"
"Super Smash Bros." for the 3DS sold 705k copies in the first two days. Even for a game with just a dedicated following, that is an enormous amount of product, and with the new announcements for the Wii-U version, Player Theory will not be surprised to see numbers like this from Nintendo again.
“Titanfall” Update
EA announced what they called the “biggest update ever” for “Titanfall.” Additions include new gameplay options such as horde mode and sudden death CTF, as well as a ranked play system for players level 32 and up, and of course, improvements to the UI. The complete list of changes and additions is extensive and can be read about in much more detail in Player Theory's writeup on the update.
The Deadly Ground update will be released Nov. 5, and Marked for Death Pro will go live Nov. 26.
Have you seen anything cool this week? Tell us in the comments below and find us on Facebook and Twitter!
