TMNT: Shredder’s revenge lands next week with 6-player co-op
TMNT: Shredder's Revenge finally got a release date and it's closer than we thought.
Dragon Quest Creator Yuji Horii Teases Future Franchise VR Support
Dragon Quest is one of the most renowned video game franchises on the planet and more or less invented the entire premise of the turn-based JRPG back in the mid-80s, back before even Final Fantasy. The series’ creator, Yuji Horii, spoke with Yahoo Japan about the legacy of Dragon Quest and its future.
Dragon Quest VR
The above video is a trailer for the arcade-exclusive Dragon Quest VR game from Japan. You can read our hands-on impressions of the experience here. What he’s alluding to in the interview though, is for an official entry in the series for actual consumer platforms at home.
In the interview referenced above, as translated by Google Translate, Horii says:
“I think it’s a question that everyone wants to ask, but what will happen to “Dragon Quest” in the future? It’s a secret (laughs). It also affects what happens to the game console, and in the future, the day may come when you can enjoy it in VR, such as the world of “Dragon Quest” is there while you are in the room.
Also, I think it would be interesting if AI systems could be used in the characters and conversations of fellow characters. It would be nice if the friends who ventured together grew up with AI and became people to talk to. We hope to continue to provide new and exciting play under the name Dragon Quest.”
The most recent main line entry in the Dragon Quest series is Dragon Quest XI: Echoes of an Elusive Age. It’s out on PS4, Switch, Xbox, and PC and is available as part of Game Pass on the latter two platforms.
Rather than simply numbering entries like Final Fantasy, the Dragon Quest series is well-known for its esoteric and fancy subtitles. Some of my favorite subtitles include Dragon Quest II: Luminaries of the Legendary Line (NES, 1987) and Dragon Quest IX: Sentinels of the Starry Skies because I’m a sucker for alliteration.
What exactly a Dragon Quest game could look like in VR is a big mystery. If the arcade adaptation is anything to go by it probably means adapting things to a more action-focused format, which could be a lot of fun. But it’s hard to know how they will adapt the heavy exposition, menu-heavy interface, and slower pace that the series is known for.
Let us know what you think down in the comments below!
1976 – Back to Midway erscheint am 10. Dezember
Mit 1976: Back to Midway möchte das Studio Ivanovich Games den Arcade-Klassiker 1943 in die Virtual Reality bringen.
1976 – Back to Midway erscheint am 10. Dezember
Wir schreiben das Jahr 1976. Wir befinden uns in einer dystopischen Realität, in der die Nazi-Armee am Ende gewonnen hat.
Dank des Quantum Air Combat Simulator, dem von Dr. Iwanowitsch entworfenen Virtual-Reality-Prototypen, habt ihr in 1976 die Möglichkeit, in der Zeit zurückzureisen und an den bedeutendsten Luftschlachten des Zweiten Weltkriegs teilzunehmen, um das Blatt zu wenden.
Wie der Trailer zeigt, werdet ihr hierbei unterschiedliche Ansichten nutzen können, was ein interessantes Gameplay verspricht.
Das Studio Ivanovich Games betritt mit 1976: Back to Midway kein Neuland. Die Entwickler und Entwicklerinnen können bereits mit Warcade ein innovatives VR-Spiel vorweisen. Das neue Spiel soll im kommenden Jahr auch für PlayStation VR, Oculus Quest und Oculus Quest 2 erscheinen.
Wir sind sehr gespannt auf das Spiel und werden euch natürlich unsere Eindrücke schildern, sofern wir es selbst ausprobieren konnten.
Hier könnt ihr euch das Spiel auf Steam vormerken.
Der Beitrag 1976 – Back to Midway erscheint am 10. Dezember zuerst gesehen auf VR∙Nerds. VR·Nerds am Werk!
Blasters of the Universe: Infinity Forever Is A New Free-Roam LBE VR Shooter
Secret Location revealed Blasters of the Universe: Infinity Forever today, a new free-roam location-based VR shooter for up to four players.
The original Blasters of the Universe was one of the first room-scale VR interpretations on the classic bullet hell wave shooter genre. Instead of controlling a spaceship, you’d move your body to dodge bullets while returning fire in a neon-soaked retro-futuristic landscape. It was a blast (pardon the pun) and is highly regarded as one of the best early VR shooters with lots of replay value that eventually left early access after a couple of years.
Now, Secret Location (also developers of the excellent time-bending VR puzzle game, Transpose) is back with Blasters of the Universe: Infinity Forever, a free-roam location-based entertainment take on the franchise. Designed for up to four people, it follows a linear story structure as players make their way through a series of levels at actual physical VR arcade locations powered by SynthesisVR.
The choice to focus on LBE VR rather than at-home VR is an interesting one given the current state of the industry. Top-billed attractions like The Void are struggling to retain leases for their locations and arcades around the world, but most especially in the United States, continue to struggle.
“We have remained optimistic about the state of our industry in the past months as we continued to make our games from home”, said Michael Masukawa, Director of Strategy and Business Development at Secret Location, in a prepared statement. “We know that now more than ever, families and friends are going to be craving meaningful shared experiences and so we’re happy to be able to offer them exactly what they need. As family entertainment centers start to reopen with safety in mind, we are thrilled to be partnering with Synthesis on the launch of our first location-based VR game.”
What do you think of the move? Risky considering the state of affairs, or forward-looking as the world slowly tries to return to normal? Let us know what you think down in the comment below!
Community Download: Will The Coronavirus Kill VR Arcades?
Community Download is a weekly discussion-focused articles series published (usually) every Monday in which we pose a single, core question to you all, our readers, in the spirit of fostering discussion and debate. For today’s Community Download, we want to hear what you think about the Coronavirus and its impact on VR, specifically VR arcades.
It’s way past time to take the Coronavirus (COVID-19) seriously. Here in the United States, governors across the nation are urging restaurants, bars, and any other in-person business to transition to delivery and remote work as much as possible, even going so far as shutting them down in some states. Many employees at companies across the country are working from home as well to limit social contact.
We’ve already started noting some impacted businesses. Locations like Two Bit Circus are closing down (temporarily) for now, while others like The VOID are not (yet) but we expect this to continue hitting industries such as VR arcades fast and hard. It’s unclear how large and far-reaching the impact will be at this time.
How much worse do you think this is going to get? Will the coronavirus (COVID-19) have a big enough impact to totally wipe out the location-based VR sub-market, or at least severely cripple it? If not in the US with big companies like The Void, what about in China, where most consumers don’t have the space or money for VR at home?
Beyond location-based markets, COVID-19 is already impacting VR as a whole too. The Quest is struggling to stay in stock due to production issues, the same goes for the Index, E3 2020 in June has been canceled, conferences are moving to in-VR events, GDC 2020 is postponed, F8 is canceled,
Let us know what you think about this in the comments down below!
The post Community Download: Will The Coronavirus Kill VR Arcades? appeared first on UploadVR.
VR Arcades Close Due To Coronavirus: ‘Never Have We Faced A Moment Quite Like This’ (Update)
Update: Since original publication, this story has been updated with new information regarding Dreamscape Interactive and The VOID.
Two Bit Circus in Los Angeles closed its location for the month, and a VR tournament cancelled the portion of its event to be held at VR arcades, as the response to the coronavirus shifts on a daily basis.
On March 13, before the closure, the Los Angeles entertainment venue sent an email saying Two Bit Circus installed a thermal camera at the park entrance and planned to check the temperatures of employees and guests, intending to turn away anyone deviating from normal temperatures. A fever is one of the primary symptoms associated with COVID-19 and Two Bit Circus is a Los Angeles-based entertainment venue featuring a number of VR-based attractions, like a Terminator Salvation VR ride, the Birdly flying experience and VR pod seated motion platforms running games like Battlezone VR.
By March 14, however, the location was closed through at least March 31.
Responses to the spread of COVID-19 are changing on a nearly daily basis with a series of social responses and new measures by governments worldwide. A national emergency was declared by the White House in the United States on March 13 while sporting events, like the NBA and MLB, have suspended or delayed their seasons. Television shows also paused production or stopped recording with live audiences as corporations institute work-from-home policies.
VR arcades and attractions are fairly new businesses facing some difficult realities even before the spread of COVID-19. Each headset can only transport one person at a time to a virtual world and physical locations are typically forced into high-rent areas to get the foot traffic arcades need to maintain a constant flow of new guests. Some arcades featuring off-the-shelf headsets also compete against new home experiences. The $400 Oculus Quest, for example, provides fully wireless VR and some incredibly popular games competing with roughly $25 for an hour with a tethered experience at an arcade. These tough realities led a number of VR arcades to close over the last few years, like the IMAX VR arcade effort.
And now the locations which survived face their toughest challenge yet — the spread of a virus.
On Friday March 13 the arcade portion of a tournament for Pistol Whip — one of VR’s best pick-up-and-play arcade games — was cancelled just as the Virtual Athletics League holding the event was nearing 200 arcades participating in the competition. An online portion of the event will continue.
“The impacts from the coronavirus are still unknown, but as arcade owners, we have traded private messages back and forth over the past few weeks. It’s been a nerve-wracking couple of weeks for us all,” reads a note from Ryan Burningham, CEO of the league and an arcade operator. “VR arcades, in general, are not huge businesses. Most are operated to support themselves and their owners’ and staff’s families. From one business owner to another, we are seeing corporate cancellations, some arcades (especially in Europe and all over Asia) having to close due to mandatory restrictions being put into effect. The VR arcade industry is quite young, but never have we faced a moment quite like this.”
I’ve reached out to Dreamscape Immersive, SandboxVR and The VOID which all feature backpack-powered untethered VR projects at locations worldwide. The companies feature attractions built around some internationally recognized properties, like Marvel’s Avengers, Star Wars, and Star Trek. I’ll update this post with more comments and updates.
The VOID responded quickly on Saturday March 14 to say they are welcoming guests “as usual” while they “implement additional preventative measures in order to ensure the health and safety of our communities.” I confirmed on Sunday March 15 the Downtown Disney location for The VOID remained open while nearby Disneyland closed for the month.
“We maintain a high level of cleanliness throughout our sites and are continuing our thorough cleaning and sanitation procedures for all equipment used by guests,” a statement reads sent by The VOID on March 14. “Additionally, we have increased the frequency of our cleaning and disinfection procedures in all common areas and are continuing to provide hand sanitizing stations in all of our venues. We have also imposed companywide travel restrictions and limitations for the sake of our employees and partners. As the situation continues to evolve, we are prepared to enact additional health and safety protocols.”
On Monday, March 16, Dreamscape contacted UploadVR to confirm the immediate temporary closure of its Westfield Century City location, in accordance with LA-based order. The venue hopes to reopen on March 31st, but will “reassess as needed.” In an Instagram post, Dreamscape encouraged customers who purchased advance tickets for the next few weeks to contact them directly for refunds.
On Tuesday, March 17, The VOID contacted UploadVR once again to update their stance. As of the evening of March 16, The VOID has made the decision to temporarily close all The VOID locations in North America, effective immediately as a precautionary measure. According to a company representative, The VOID “is working with guests to reschedule pre-booked tickets, as well as offering guests exclusive offers for future visits. Additionally, during this time The VOID will continue to compensate location team members. The official statement from The VOID will be viewable on thevoid.com, along with specifics on the closures and additional details on pre-booking refunds.”
The CDC on March 15 recommended ” that for the next 8 weeks, organizers (whether groups or individuals) cancel or postpone in-person events that consist of 50 people or more throughout the United States.”
This article was updated on March 16 to include Dreamscape closure information and again on March 17 to include The VOID closure information. Let us know what you think about all this in our latest Community Download discussion.
The post VR Arcades Close Due To Coronavirus: ‘Never Have We Faced A Moment Quite Like This’ (Update) appeared first on UploadVR.
Team Laserland gewinnen die Tower Tag DreamHack Masters
Die DreamHack 2020 in Leipzig ist vorbei und wir blicken zurück auf ein grandioses Wochenende. Zudem war Virtual Industries mit Tower Tag vor Ort und VR-Nerds haben ein schweißtreibendes Turnier am Stand in der Indie Arena Booth veranstaltet.
Laserland sind die neuen Tower Tag DreamHack Masters
Insgesamt traten beim Turnier 16 Teams an, welche sich zuvor über Toornament anmelden konnten. Ins Halbfinale zogen Team Technical Issues, Karl bitte zur Turnierleitung, Team Laserland und Team Laserland 2 ein. Technical Issues und Laserland konnten sich ins Finale kämpfen und letztendlich triumphierte Laserland und stellte seinen Titel als Tower Tag Weltmeister erneut unter Beweis.
Somit darf sich Team Laserland über eine HTC Vive Cosmos freuen und Team Technical issues erhält ein Paket mit Merchandise von Rocket Beans TV.
Wir bedanken und bei allen Teilnehmern, Sponsoren und Zuschauern für ein spannendes und erfolgreiches Turnier.
Der Beitrag Team Laserland gewinnen die Tower Tag DreamHack Masters zuerst gesehen auf VR∙Nerds. VR·Nerds am Werk!
Resident Evil 7 VR Arcade Review: Walkthrough The Fear Is A Disappointing Return To The Baker Mansion
Nearly three years on from its original release, Resident Evil 7 remains an enticing glimpse through the keyhole at AAA VR. Some of its more dated design decisions may creak louder than a floorboard in the Baker Mansion but, even in 2019, you’ll struggle to find a VR game as slickly produced, let alone as darkly and delightfully terrifying as this.
You’d hope, nay expect, that a location-based prequel, neatly hidden away behind a giddy haunted house-style set in Capcom’s impressive new Tokyo-based arcade, would live up those standards. Sadly this isn’t such a warm welcome back to the family.
Resident Evil: Walkthrough The Fear tries to capitalize on the uncompromising new brand of terror that 7 established for the series (whereas the Resident Evil 2-themed experience, Valiant Raid, plays to its shooter roots), but doesn’t demonstrate the same understanding of its new format that the original game did. It’s a 10 – 15 minute multiplayer adventure that initially teases potential escape room-style elements that would be well-suited for brave puzzle masochists, but ends up opting for rudimentary point-and-shoot action.
You find yourself trapped once more in the haunting confines of the Baker basement, following along with a desperate escape attempt turned game of cat-and-mouse. In its initial moments, when the menacing cackle of Jack Baker fills the room as he offs a non-playable character by typically unpleasant means, it’s easy to find the fear of RE7 gripping you once more, so much so you might consider ripping your headset off.
But, even for a self-confessed VR coward, the threat doesn’t linger. Walkthrough The Fear is played on an HTC Vive with a single controller. A guide instructed me to hold the kit with two hands, but I could never mirror my placement with the virtual hands grasping my gun. It’s a clumsy bit of on-boarding (I got the sense the staff didn’t have to do it much), made worse when myself and a partner (in this case a member of store staff, as no one else would play it with me) fail to kill the first monster we’re locked inside a room with using the bullets provided. Our NPC guide continued to tell me to grab non-existent ammo while I awkwardly side-stepped around the room. After about 5 minutes the monster conveniently died all on its own. Not the best start.
But things pick up, if never reaching the spectacular heights of the game this is based off of. You follow a tour of the basement, occasionally stopping to pick off more monsters with limited ammo. Your familiarity with the source material — and the sneaking suspicion you’re just witnessing a lot of recycled assets from it — does away with much of the mounting tension, but I still couldn’t stop my heart from racing when dodging a lumbering swipe from an enemy and quick-footing it to the other side of the room.
In fact there’s an ironic touch of Resident Evil-style tank controls given you’re told not to run (why wouldn’t you run!?) and you’re fitted with a heavy backpack PC. This is a strained experience, which does play to the slower pacing, but also robs you of a full sense of immersion. And yet, despite the given precautions, there was one moment I managed to walk into a wall with no in-VR warning. An unpleasant surprise in the middle of a horror game especially, but surely a far more ugly error for anyone that has this as their first VR experience.
More memorable touches include the use of external audio that add a nice sense of space. Walking over to one corner in a room with running water reveals a trickling sound effect that appears as if it could be right in front of you, while you’ll occasionally hear Baker taunt you while stomping around other rooms.
Resident Evil 7 VR Arcade Review Final Verdict
Again, its all a little haunted house, but this should have been more. As welcome as it was to return to the unwelcome world of Resident Evil 7, Walkthrough The Fear lacks many of the revelatory moments of unbridled horror that make the original an essential staple in any PSVR collection and doesn’t hold the same assured grasp on immersion throughout. There was a chance to do something truly terrifying here; perhaps a series of Saw-style games to save your friends lives or new monsters designed specifically to play to VR’s strengths. But Walkthrough The Fear just doesn’t take the invention that RE7 was built upon to heart.
There are plenty of people out there who’ve been hoping to see Resident Evil 7 on PC VR headsets but you’d be better off waiting for a proper home release of the full game, or buying a PSVR, rather than springing on a ticket to this watered-down version in Tokyo.
Final Score: 
2/5 Stars | Disappointing
Resident Evil 7: Walkthrough The Fear is available at the Ikebukuro Capcom Plaza in Tokyo. You can reserve a spot here. You can read our review guidelines here.
The post Resident Evil 7 VR Arcade Review: Walkthrough The Fear Is A Disappointing Return To The Baker Mansion appeared first on UploadVR.
Path of the Warrior Review: Brawling In The Streets Of Rage City
Surprise! Oculus have announced (and released) a brand new VR game today during The Game Awards 2019 called Path of the Warrior, developed by Twisted Pixel. And guess what? We’ve already played it. Here’s the full review!
Path of the Warrior is about as close as you can get to a VR adaption of a non-VR game without actually paying the licensing fee to use the IP itself. This is, for all intents and purposes, exactly like a Streets of Rage, Final Fight, or Double Dragon game, except it’s from a first-person VR perspective. If you’re looking for a quick and dirty synopsis, that’s it. You punch bad guys, pick up stuff, and beat up bosses. That’s the game.
Now, get this: Path of the Warrior takes place in a town called Rage City. And you often fight in the streets. So…my pun in the headline is pretty genius and original, right? Yeah, I don’t think anyone else will think of that.
I grew up on the Sega Genesis. All three Streets of Rage games were in constant rotation on my system as I plowed through them each ad nauseum with friends. I couldn’t get enough of the rocking soundtrack, amazing pixel art, and edgy style. All that being said, not enough was really done here to adapt Path of the Warrior for VR beyond the minimum.
You move around each level, wait for enemies to spawn, punch them a few times until they’re staggered or have fallen down, then either keep punching them to finish them off, grab them and toss them into a part of the environment, or use a finishing move of your own. Once a wave is defeated you save a civilian that has a bomb tied to their hands. After all the waves are gone, you fight the boss then you unlock a couple mini games for each area. That’s literally the entire game for five levels.
Mechanically it’s just about flailing your arms a bit for a little under two hours then rolling credits. No difficulty options and no multiplayer support (yet) although that’s reportedly coming soon without a date attached.
Reviewing a game like Path of the Warrior is difficult and conflicting because, at it’s core it’s certainly fun.
Twisted Pixel have done a good job of channeling that 90s-era arcade style into a VR game that’s fun to play in quick 20-minute bursts per level and it’s got a great deal of visual variety since all five levels are extremely distinct with different enemies, weapons to find, and a new special power-up to gain, but it’s just not enough.
The main issue at hand other than Path of the Warrior being a generally shallow game without a ton of content is that it’s not designed well from a VR perspective either. You press a button on your controller to make a disembodied leg quickly erupt from your invisible chest to do a kick, for example. It feels downright ridiculous. You can pick up and use items in the environment as weapons, but only some of them. Chairs? Yep! They’ll even break apart! Tables? No, of course not. You can throw enemies into walls with bottles on display causing them to shatter, but don’t try picking up the pieces or broken glass.
The combat is also devoid of any physics interactions at all, instead using canned animations. You don’t even really need to put any force behind punches for them to connect either, just squeeze the trigger to make a fist and poke away like a feather if you want. Even though all the enemies look different based on each level, their strategy is always the same: slowly walk towards you and take turns punching, very slowly, and without much intent to do you harm. I think I died once the entire game and that was only because I accidentally backed myself into a corner.
Honestly the best parts of the game for me ended up being the boss fights. Each level has thematically appropriate and wholly separate encounter with a named boss character that rumbles in with dedicated movement patterns you’ve got to memorize. One enemy has a mohawk of knives, for example, that he picks and throws at you so you need to punch them out of the air and throw the final one back. Another boss is a pair of roller-skating sci-fi women that do laps around you and throw goons your way that you need to punch back before getting trampled.
They do a great job of punctuating levels that are visually delightful to explore, but with only five 20-minute stages to get through it’s mostly too little too late.
Path of the Warrior Review Final Verdict:
Path of the Warrior is a conflicting game because it’s seeping with nostalgia and simple thrills like punching clowns in the face or shooting hoops at an arcade littered with unconscious thugs. Twisted Pixel have done a good job of replicating what it would feel like to go inside of a Streets of Rage-type video game and it mostly succeeds on that front. To be clear: Path of the Warrior isn’t a bad game, but with only five stages that take less than two hours to clear, repetitive combat, and not much depth at all, it’s nowhere near as impressive as it could be.
Final Score: 3/5 Stars | Pretty Good
You can read more about our five-star scoring policy here.
Path of the Warrior is now available as of December 12th for $19.99 on both Oculus Rift platform and Oculus Quest via the Oculus Home Store with cross-buy support. When multiplayer support releases next year, it will also be a cross-play title.
This review of Path of the Warrior is based on the Oculus Rift version of the game and was conducted using a Rift S with two Touch controllers.
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The best arcade cabinets for 2020
Brands like Arcade1Up let you turn your own home into an arcade without breaking the bank. These are our top 10 most-wanted home arcade cabinets, including Donkey Kong and Killer Instinct.