After the critical and commercial success of Resident Evil 5, it is no surprise that a sixth proper Resident Evil title is coming out. Selling over 5 million copies and garnering a Metacritic score in the mid 80s, it is only common sense that Capcom would continue the story of their top tier franchise. After several viral teasers, no pun intended, on NoHopeLeft.com, Capcom finally revealed to the world Resident Evil 6.

This Resident Evil will feature series headliners Leon Kennedy and Chris Redfield along a new unknown male character, this one who seemingly has an unknown immunity to the T-virus. This new character appears as a mercenary for hire and is seen in the trailer below constantly being given injections, whether these are used to revive him or help him fight a T-virus infection are still unknown. This new character also has a female sidekick much like Sheva from Resident Evil 5.

Take a peek below at the new trailer and the first image reveal for the game. Stick to The Flickcast for more on Resident Evil 6 coming out for the XBox 360, PlayStation 3 and PC on November 20th, 2012.

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The first Thor film was pretty well received. As an introduction to magical and mystical elements into a universe defined by more down to earth realism, Thor was a great success. So the sequel is going to be very anticipated, especially after The Avengers hits cinemas this summer.

The film has already played the director carousel, and is just now landing on a new writer to get things in order on the script. Deadline is reporting that Robert Rodat, whose credits include The Patriot and Saving Private Ryan,  has been brought on to do a re-write of the script currently in hand.

Rodat is reworking a draft by Don Payne. Disney will put the film into production later this year for release in 2013 with Chris Hemsworth returning as the title character.

With much of the principle cast returning, and a director with ability firmly in place, Thor 2 is fast becoming one of the most anticipate projects of the year. Normally in instances like this we would have some sort of idea what the sequel could be about, but with Thor and Loki playing primary roles in the upcoming Avengers film, we really don’t know what state our hero will be in come late 2013.

I find it funny that even with everything happening at CES in Las Vegas this week one announcement from Apple about an event next week and the entire tech news world shifts forces to them. Sorry CES, nobody seems to care all that much about you.

To what event am I referring? Well, as I mentioned last week, Apple was rumored to be planning an education-related event for sometime in January. As you can see from the pic above, they’ve now sent out invitations to said event and it’s definitely scheduled for the 19th of this month.

Now that we know the event is education-related does that mean Apple is announcing a new textbook initiative with major publishers to bring school books to the iPad? I think it might. I also think we might see a bit more during this event such as new publishers added to the magazines available in the Newsstand app as well as some new publishers added to iBooks.

Sadly, I would doubt Apple will also announces a new iPad next week. I think they will wait on that one for another month or two. Of course, whatever happens we will find it all out come January 19. Should be interesting.

At an event held this morning at Apple’s Cupertino campus, newly minted Apple CEO Tim Cook unveiled what many were expecting: a brand new iPhone. Dubbed the iPhone 4S, the device is cosmetically very similar to the current iPhone 4 but features a host of internal improvements which may appease fans eagerly awaiting an iPhone refresh.

In addition, Cook announced the release data for iOS 5, the software that powers Apple’s lineup of devices including the iPhone and iPad, as well as updated iPods with price cuts and an intelligent assistant, dubbed Siri, which enables user to verbally interact with their iOS devices.

Here’s the highlights of today’s event:

• Apple made the iPhone 4S official. It features the same Retina Display but features Apple’s dual-core A5 processor and a dual-core graphics chip.

• The iPhone 4S battery can provide 8 hours of 3G talk time, 6 hours of browsing time on 3G and 9 on Wi-Fi, 10 hours of video playback or 40 hours of music playback.

• Apple has redesigned the iPhone 4S antenna to switch between two antenna to send and receive. Hopefully how you hold the device won’t matter now.

• The iPhone 4S features HSPA+ 14.4 support, though Apple isn’t branding it as “4G.” It’s also a world phone, so one device will support CDMA and GSM/WCDMA networks around the globe. That means it will work on AT&T, Verizon and Sprint networks in the U.S.

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Now that we know Apple will be announcing something next week on October 4th, the speculation can continue as to what that will be. And here’s one for today.

Mac Rumors reports that a China Unicom executive apparently confirmed during a presentation at this week’s Macworld Asia that the “iPhone 5″ set to be announced next week will support HSPA+, which is sometimes called “4G.” This technology  offers a maximum theoretical data speed of 21 Mbps.

They’ve even got a photo of a slide presented during the talk that seems to support the assertion. According to the report, research vice president of China Unicom, Huan Wenliang, said the iPhone 5 “will support W-CDMA based high-speed data transfer standard HSPA Evolution” (aka HSPA+) during a keynote speech at the event.

T-Mobile and AT&T both offer 21Mbps HSPA+ in the United States and market the networks as “4G,” although it really should be thought of as more “3.5G” if anything, based on the speed. Apple is reportedly testing a true 4G LTE iPhone but we probably won’t see that being announced next week.

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It looks like Amazon has thrown down the tablet gauntlet to Apple (and others) in a big way today. During a press event in New York City, the company unveiled its $200 Kindle Fire tablet.

And before you get too skeptical and lump the device in with the recent offerings from Blackberry or HP, let’s check out the specs. The Kindle Fire has a 7-inch display and will give users access to all of Amazon’s services including: AmazonMP3, Amazon Prime, Amazon Kindle Bookstore, Amazon Instant Video and the Amazon AppStore.

It’s powered by a dual-core processor and weighs 14.6 ounces. Customers can pre-order the Kindle Fire today and it will ship in November. Not bad Amazon, not bad.

Also unveiled was a brand new version of the company’s eReader called the Kindle touch. It is $99.00 for the base model or $149 for the 3G one and has an infrared layer on top of the E-Ink display to help avoid with any interference while reading.

It also has Amazon’s EasyReach technology for turning pages by tapping the screen in specific areas. In addition, an X-Ray feature allows users to view where and when certain characters and more take place in a book. Pre-orders for the Kindle touch eReader begin today and will ship by November 21st.

Finally, Bezos announced a new non-touch Kindle for $79. It is available for shipping today.

Well, that’s a lot of info. It will be interesting to see how the Kindle Fire and it’s reasonable price competes with the iPad and its not so reasonable price. The Christmas season just got a lot more interesting.

Check out the full press release from Amazon after the jump.

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Up until now, we have seen some pretty outrageous characters, insane levels and some astounding levels of violence associated with Anarchy Reigns. But there was really no context behind it. Now, SEGA reveals to us, along with three new characters, just why this group of horrific mercenary psychopaths have come to clash.

In a futuristic city, a group of bounty hunters is on a man hunt. The trailer is however pretty confusing though since it is hard to tell really who are the good guys and bad guys. It seems like assuming Jack would be the hero of the game since he was revealed first both as a playable character and in the story trailer.

At the same time, Leonhardt looks to be a good guy as well even though he is seen standing aside the villainous Nikolai. It will be interesting to see how everything players out once Anarchy Reigns is actually released.

Check out the full story trailer after the jump.

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Nintendo has sent out official word that in two weeks, their latest gaming platform, the Nintendo 3DS will be having its first price drop. Usually price drops happen once a system has been available for an extended period of time and the initial sales spike begins to falter. Unfortunately for Nintendo, their 3DS never had an initial spike.

A few years ago, the Nintendo DS was the chart topping selling system, even overtaking the next-gen XBox 360 and PlayStation 3, many times beating the Nintendo Wii and completely crushing the PlayStation Portable. Since its March release however, the 3DS hasn’t even hit the 1,000,000 seller mark and it has not been for lack of systems available to consumers.

Now in what looks to be a desperation move to entice consumers to purchase the new portable, Nintendo is dropping the MSRP a full $80 from $249.99 to $169.99. Never before has a Nintendo console had such a massive price drop, especially in such a short time since its release. The lack of software available to consumers is most likely the reason for the system’s subpar sales. Even with the price drop, it will be the software that ultimately will drive sales to the system.

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Now that just about every new device, be it a TV, computer, game console, or Blu-Ray player, comes with Instant Netflix programmed into the device itself, the rules have to change to accommodate just about everyone on the planet watching Netflix either through streaming or the original DVD plan. That means the company is making changes in the way you use the service, and exactly how much you spend monthly.

Now, instead of having that fancy DVD and streaming plan together, the company is making you choose or pay for both at double the price. Here’s the breakdown from the horse’s mouth.

First, we are launching new DVD only plans. These plans offer our lowest prices ever for unlimited DVDs – only $7.99 a month for our 1 DVD out at-a-time plan and $11.99 a month for our 2 DVDs out at-a-time plan. By offering our lowest prices ever, we hope to provide great value to our current and future DVDs by mail members. New members can sign up for these plans by going to DVD.netflix.com.

Second, we are separating unlimited DVDs by mail and unlimited streaming into separate plans to better reflect the costs of each and to give our members a choice: a streaming only plan, a DVD only plan or the option to subscribe to both. With this change, we will no longer offer a plan that includes both unlimited streaming and DVDs by mail.

So if you have the current $9.99 unlimited streaming/DVD plan, you’ll have to pick between paying for JUST unlimited DVD’s at $7.99 or unlimited streaming for $7.99. Or both if you’re so ambitious. Unfortunate, but it was bound to happen with this service becoming more and more popular.

Once the initial rush of new players began to slow down, Blizzard in their infinite wisdom allowed new players the chance to experience World of Warcraft for 14 days, free of charge. Though Blizzard hadn’t released the actual number of players who ended up becoming full subscribers, they stuck to this method for a number of years.

Now, with players at the 11,000,000 range, Blizzard has decided to switch things up a bit in a further effort to bring new players in to the World of Warcraft machine. Under this new structure, players will be given an unlimited amount of free play time on their account until their character reaches level 20.

Part of the reason behind this new strategy may lie in the fact that things come up out of no where in people’s lives unexpectedly and such a freak occurrence happening during a limited 14 day time frame may completely shut out the chance for this new player to experience what World of Warcraft has to offer. Instead, players are given the chance to experience Azeroth at their leisure, much like they are allowed to in a full version of the game.

There is no pressure to try and experience as much as you can in a short time span with this new system. There are, as expected, some restrictions to this Free-to-Play system though.

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Darksiders was a game that many people expected to fall by the wayside between lack of promotion and an interesting choice in release dates, January 1st 2010. But as was seen in our review of the game, giving it an 8 out of 10, Darksiders proved it had the potential to be something special and for the most part lived up to it.

Not entirely what gamers were expecting, Darksiders ended up playing out much like a dark, demon filled version of Ocarina of Time where players were challenged to solve puzzles along with a constantly improving repertoire of weapons, skills and magic at their disposal under the guise of the horseman of the apocalypse War.

Now, Darksiders II brings a new horseman to the player’s control, probably the most infamous of them all. Death. And with Death comes a whole new list of possibilities. War’s power were all about destruction. It would only make sense that Death’s powers were all about… well, death. Instead of just ripping enemies apart, Death can bring about the primordial forces to end the lives of any who oppose him, be they angel or demon. At least, that’s what we are hoping to see happen.

Darksiders II is coming in 2012 to XBox 360, PlayStation 3 and PC. Make sure to take a peek at the trailer below to see Death in action. Stick to the Flickcast for more information on Darksiders II as it becomes available.

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As expected, Activision made a strong showing at this year’s E3. Of course, they headlined with their premiere franchise Call of Duty with Modern Warfare 3. But they didn’t forget about the rest of their games.

One of the games right now being most closely followed by us is Spider-Man: Edge of Time.  The followup from Beenox from Spider-Man: Shattered Dimensions, Edge of Time tells a story about time being ravaged by the untimely death of the modern day Peter Parker and the ripples it sends in to the future.

In the latest trailer and screen shots below, one of the game’s first major villains is revealed with Anti-Venom. Anyone reading the current Amazing Spider-Man arc will be familiar with Anti-Venom who fancies himself as a cure on society’s cancers. Much like Eddie Brock’s former lethal protector mentality as Venom, Eddie’s personal delusions get in the way of his motives and inevitably put Spider-Man in the sites as one of his targets.

How this will play out in the game remains to be seen but it is refreshing to see Beenox putting newer characters in to their game instead of just rehashing the most famous of Spider-Man’s rouges over and over again.

Take a peek below at Spider-Man: Edge of Time featuring Anti-Venom, Spider-Man 2099 and of course everyone’s favorite modern day Spidey. Stick to The Flickcast for more on Spider-Man: Edge of Time as it becomes available.

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