Ever since Bioware announced that Mass Effect 3 will be the first game among their intergalactic hit RPG franchise to receive the multiplayer treatment, I admittedly was not pleased with the news since I believed Mass Effect was perfectly fine without it. I know multiplayer these days is practically the backbone of every game that is released today but there are some games that manage to thrive quite well without it.

Yesterday we received a video that was very special for a lot of different reasons. While I may not have made a news post for said video, I did opt to make a brief post on the Shogun Gamer Facebook page. Our loyal readers may know what I’m talking about as I’m referring to the live-action promo video for Kinect Star Wars. 

Announced out of the blue and with little to no initial demand, Dirt: Showdown from Codemasters is a game that could be a nice title to play over the long days of Summer or it could merely be a product of  a company and generation that is keen on making a constant profit.

Fighting games aren’t exactly my forte, or at least fighting games that are devoid of color-coded ninjas and an abundance of over-the-top violence.  Casey White is Shogun Gamer’s fighting game master but I felt a bit compelled to do a quick snippet on the latest reveal for Street Fighter X Tekken.  Now I’ve somewhat followed SF X Tekken since it was first announced but I haven’t been looking forward to it as much as the still to be revealed Tekken x Street Fighter, which I think could be amazing if everything comes together.

After doing the unexpected in the form of producing Top Spin 4, developer 2K Czech could be going back to their roots with another installment in the Mafia series.  Best known to gamers who adore old-fashioned mafia action set in the 1940s/early 1950s, Mafia II proved to be an unexpected open-world game as it wasn’t GTA: Mafia Edition but instead was an experience that had a great deal of substance and some nice action, which ultimately saved the game from a rather piss-poor ending.

Guild Wars 2 fans were treated to some delightful news Monday morning when Mike O’Brien, President and ArenaNet Founder, ushered in the Chinese New Year with details regarding its upcoming beta test. Current plans are to open the beta to select press in February and hold beta test events for the general public come March and April. 

A rare moment of utter excitement has washed over me as Quantic Dream founder/co-CEO David Cage will be making a presentation at GDC 2012 showcasing the new technology powering the next project the studio is producing.  Best known for making the cinematic experiences that were Indigo Prophecy and Heavy Rain, Quantic Dream reportedly has two projects in the works, both of which are PlayStation exclusives due to the commercial and critical success Heavy Rain achieved in 2010.

This may be sad news for some PS3 gamers, but Insomniac Games is officially done with the Resistance franchise. After releasing Resistance 3 last September it was unknown if Insomniac would continue with the series some point down the road given the ending of the game and the new 3rd party focus of Insomniac.

The near constant stumbling by Netflix has continued as company CEO Reed Hastings has announced that the company will forgo their plans to offer video game rentals.  Initially announced last September when Netflix was ready to actually call a part of the company Qwikster, the exact plans for video game rental distribution were never laid out but nonetheless it excited those who were looking for an alternative to Gamefly.

Details may have been scarce since the game was unveiled and shown behind closed doors at E3 last year, but things are progressing well with the new Tomb Raider reboot. In fact things at Crystal Dynamics have been going so smoothly that it has been revealed that Tomb Raider has now reached the all-important Alpha stage which could mean we’ll see Lara Croft return sooner rather than later.

2012 hasn’t exactly started off the best way for THQ as rumors swirled that the company had not only scrapped their entire 2014 software line-up, but they were also on the verge of shutting their doors or at the very least begin selling IPs to stay afloat.  The claims concerning THQ’s future were refuted in an extremely vague press release which didn’t really address the main problem: THQ isn’t a financially secure company.

We’ve waited patiently for a Doctor Who: The Eternity Clock premier trailer and now such a thing has finally been released with some major surprises.  Up until now much wasn’t known about The Eternity Clock other than that the UK based Supermassive Games were developing it and it was supposed to be a full-on cinematic Doctor Who game as opposed to the Wii and 3DS based abominations we previously saw.