In under two months, more than 427 million hours have been logged into Call of Duty: Black Ops II multiplayer and zombie modes. At this point, it is reasonable for players to be clamoring for some new content. Treyarch has responded with a resounding, “It’s coming!” with the the Revolution DLC pack (which had some tidbits leaked late last week). The Revloution DLC pack will be coming out first to XBox 360 on January 29.

The Revolution DLC pack will include four new multiplayer maps, a new zombie map, the first new zombie DLC mode and the first ever DLC weapon. Check out the level descriptions below as well as the full preview trailer after the jump.

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Epic franchises have been doing crossovers for years. It was only a matter of time before the team behind The Lord of the Rings movie franchise took notice of the success of other film blockbusters like Star Wars, Harry Potter and Indiana Jones and how well they all did when they met the LEGO world. Not only did the toys sell, but their video games were all certified hits. LEGO The Lord of the Rings promised to again do something never before done in a LEGO crossover.

The Long

Unlike LEGO Batman and its sequel which were original stories, LEGO The Lord of the Rings took the path of Star Wars and put the entire film trilogy and its most epic encounters into LEGO form. Unlike Star Wars though, LEGO The Lord of the Rings included actual voiceover taken directly from the film. That means the most iconic scenes, though given LEGO twists and humor in many cases, have the authentic audio from the movies. Hearing LEGO Gandalf utter, “You shall not pass” to the Balrog is unexpectedly still incredibly powerful even though, for all intensive purposes, it’s a toy saying it.

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The Call of Duty series is the gaming industry’s equivelent of a Michael Bay summer blockbuster film. While the story might be slightly convoluted, millions of people flock to it and spend their hard earned money on a explosion filled, high octane, testosterone laced good time. In addition to the campaign, Call of Duty: Black Ops II includes both the standard mutliplayer and the Zombie mode from Treyarch which has given the studio something for people to remember them by.

It’s no surprise that Black Ops II had huge midnight launches at over a thousand locations across the country but lines of people don’t necessarily ensure a game will live up to the hype. But, Treyarch continues to prove why they are trusted with such a franchise.

The Long

First and foremost, regardless of anything else in the game, Call of Duty: Black Ops II captures shooter gameplay and control on a console at its finest. Everything from movement to aiming and shooting to damage detection all feel perfect in Black Ops II. The default control scheme is perfect for the genre and everything really just fits perfectly into place (at least on the XBox 360 controller) for the FPS experience. If you stripped down the graphics and setting, the engine behind Call of Duty: Black Ops II would still be an ideal shooter.

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After three straight games following Ezio through the Renaissance, the Assassin’s Creed series moves on to a new and still somewhat unexpected timeframe of the American Revolution. Since the initial announcement of Assassin’s Creed III, the hype machine has turned out video preview after video preview to help bring back loyal assassins as well as recruit new ones to the franchise’s ranks. The result is one of the most anticipated titles of 2012 (coming out right before Halo 4 and Call of Duty: Black Ops II) which will most likely outsell its previous versions. But as we have seen in the past, just because a game has a triple A development budget and tons of marketing behind it, that doesn’t necessarily ensure it is going to live up to its potential.

The Long…

When I first stepped into Assassin’s Creed III, the first thing I noticed was how alive the world in front of me was. Being in a theater with hundreds of other guests made it feel like a real event going on around my character. It didn’t feel like just some instance created with a few background characters to fill up the space nor did it feel like the background of a sports game with a generic crowd with repetitive motions wallpapered in either. Instead it felt like my character was a part of a real and tactile world.

This feeling continues to hold true in many other areas of the game, especially the cities of Boston and New York. Constantly, you are surrounded by people all doing very different things. Some might be selling wares, others begging for coins and others just going about their daily business. What helps make this different though is the variety of animations and poses characters on screen go through as they go about their daily life. With a few exceptions (like the subway arrival in one of the game’s later present day scenes), you don’t often see two people on screen doing the same thing at the same time.

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If you have a Kinect, chances are that it isn’t the most used accessory of your XBox 360. Though tons have been sold, there hasn’t been great support of good games for it. In fact, many have been downright disappointing like Star Wars Kinect. The shining light for Kinect has been the Dance Central series.

With the first two titles, Dance Central has proven to be one of the best applications of the Kinect technology in terms of accurate recording of the player’s movements and giving a fun experience that actually utilizes the Kinect technology in a fun way. Now, for the third year in a row, the team at Harmonix brings back its dance craze inspired game with incredible results in the form of Dance Central 3.

The Long

If you’ve never played a Dance Central title before, the premise of the game is very simple. Players stand in front of the Kinect controller and mirror the movements they see of the characters on screen. The angle of their arms, legs and body are all monitored by the Kinect as a player follows the motions on screen. The accuracy of the player’s movements determines how well they score on each dance move. Higher scores mean more stars, which have been trend in Harmonix’s music games for some time now.

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Chances are even if you are a hardcore gamer, you probably haven’t heard about 10000000. And its understandable. With hundreds of apps getting put on the App Store daily, it’s easy to miss a game that isn’t an Angry Birds clone. But of any game recently released that should have mass appeal to gamers, 10000000 is it.

10000000 is the epitome of taking current trends, combining them and doing it right. First, the basic gameplay revolves around gem matching. Players drag rows and columns right and left or up and down to match either swords, magic staves, keys, chests, shields, wood and stone to accomplish various tasks. Swords and staves attack. Keys unlock doors and chests. Shields provide armor. Wood and stone provide resources for later. Chests grant gold and items.

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Younger players may not understand why there is so much love for the Tony Hawk series. Their most recent memories involve a “skateboard” that was “filled with technology” that didn’t actually work right with Tony Hawk: Shred. But at the turn of the millennium, Tony Hawk Pro Skater was one of the hottest games on any platform.

It was the height of the extreme sports phenomenon and Tony Hawk Pro Skater and its early sequels helped make Tony Hawk a household name, something completely unheard of for an athlete who wasn’t playing one of the big four sports. Now, almost thirteen years later, the team at Robomodo wants to give players the chance again to relive their favorite moments from Tony Hawk Pro Skater and Tony Hawk Pro Skater 2 for the first time in Tony Hawk Pro Skater HD.

Gameplay

The first thing old school players of Tony Hawk Pro Skater will notice is that the HD remix holds up and ages well. It is still just as fun as it was years ago to hop on a rail, do a kickflip into a manual and then grab some big air with a 720 Superman off a vert ramp. What they will also notice though is the XBox 360 controller’s sensitivity makes it a little difficult at first to get used to the game’s multiple instances where they must balance. Whether it’s a grind, manual or lip trick, the analogs on the 360 are almost too responsive and once a player gets a little bit off the rails, they are going to need to bail or take a nasty fall.

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The name itself is somewhat deceptive. LEGO Batman combined with the DC Super Heroes. Is it another entrant into the LEGO Batman franchise or the start of a new series focusing on more of the greater DC universe? And with trailers featuring members of the Justice League, why didn’t they go with LEGO Justice League or at least LEGO Batman 2: Justice League? LEGO Batman 2: DC Super Heroes gives a lot of what is expected as well as some interesting gameplay and story design choices as well.

Gameplay:

At its core, LEGO Batman 2: DC Super Heroes is a puzzle solving game with light combat elements. Players must figure out how to traverse from point A to point B in a room using the special techniques and powers of the game’s heroes. Both Batman and Robin have multiple suits, each with different power sets, to aid in this and are aided by Superman’s unique abilities later on. Superman can’t walk through electric fields, but Batman has a suit that can. Robin can’t melt gold beams but Superman can shoot his heat vision to accomplish the task. And for some reason, Robin has both a hazard suit to clean up toxic waste and a snow suit which lets him freeze stuff.

Interspersed between puzzles is light combat. Enemies can often be taken out in a single hit and multiple targets can go down quickly with a quick shot from the batarang. Combat is also one of the fundamentals that hurts the gameplay. During the levels where players can be both Superman and Batman or in a later level where players can be Wonder Woman, both characters are essentially invincible. There is no threat as they have steel health hearts and cannot take damage. And because both can fly as well, there is no fear of them falling during platforming sections. The second players realize this, the excitement of the combat sections is lost.

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When movie makers started taking toy lines from twenty years ago and made it into movies like Transformers or G.I. Joe, the concepts at least made sense. But when Battleship was announced that it was coming to the big screen, the only thing more frightening than what would appear on screen was the chance that a game adaptation of the film might be made as well. Traditionally movie tie-in games are quick cash ins to coincide with the film’s release, a few exceptions being the much beloved Spider-Man 2 or X-Men Origins: Wolverine games. Now, a strategy game that started on a table top using red and white peg and miniature ships has made its way to the world of movie tie-in first person shooters.

Gameplay

Battleship consists of two main gameplay aspects. Where players will spend most of their time is in a traditional military FPS. While traversing the tropical beaches of Hawaii, players’ choices are limited to three human weapons, a pistol, a shotgun and a carbine, two alien weapons, one resembling a turret gun and another similar to a sniper rifle, and grenades. The lack of variety of weapons or just the sheer lack of different weapons is disappointing as it doesn’t feel like the game really gives a player the opportunity to progress and earn better items. In terms of control, the game moves and shoots in a fairly standard manner, not doing much to try and set itself apart from other shooter combat scenarios but still at least getting the basics right.

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This past twelve months has been marked by the return of long awaited franchises. Whether critical and commercial flops like Duke Nukem Forever or sensations like Diablo III, nostalgia has played a big role in gaming recently. Also returning after a eight and a half year hiatus is Max Payne 3. Despite a terrible movie, the franchise has returned to PC and consoles with one of the most surprisingly violent games so far in 2012.

Gameplay

Max Payne 3 can best be described as an evolution of the series. Instead of just spouting off a sequel with refined graphics and new locales, there is an evolution to the gameplay of this third person shooter. In the early Payne games, Max’s actions revolved around ducking out from behind corners and going into his signature bullet time dives. While bullet time still exists, it isn’t the main focus as it once was. Most firefights play out in a coverbased shooter format now. Bullet time becomes a more varied and tactical resource than the main repetitive component it was in Max Payne and Max Payne 2.

The game also has specific set pieces revolving around bullet time like when Max dives off a roof or grabs on to a chain and gets pulled into the air, allowing him to clear out a room full of enemies in the extended BT sequence.

Melee has been improved in Max Payne 3. When up close, Max can grab and enemy and pull off a violent kill shot instead of a generic pistol whip animation that is seen in most other third person shooters. Also improved are the bullet cams. In the second Max Payne, the only time the bullet cam engaged was with a sniper rifle. Now, these go into effect as Max kills off the final enemy in an area. Players can slow down the shot by holding a button and even unload further ammunition into them, which is a great feeling after clearing out a room that has taken multiple attempts to complete.

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To say Minecraft: XBox 360 Edition is already a success is an understatement. The game literally became profitable within the first hour of sales and boasted 400,000 users in its first 24 hours, breaking all XBLA records including the one set by fellow Arcade Next member Trials Evolution with its quarter million first day sales. But does commercial success equal a great game? In the case of Minecraft: XBox 360 Edition, the two are one in the same.

Gameplay

For those who haven’t played Minecraft yet in either its PC or mobile incarnations yet, the game is an open world where players must mine resources around them in order to craft tools and build structures including buildings, mine cart pathways and increasingly complex machines. On the surface, Minecraft looks incredibly simple as players only need to hack away at or place objects in the world around them.

But there are tons of layers of depth. Players literally start in a world with nothing but their fists to punch out sections of a tree. Once they have some wood, they start constructing tools to make these tasks easier. They also can craft weapons and armor to help defend themselves from the world around them.

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Whether you call it MOBA or DOTA, the genre that best fits Awesomenauts didn’t exist even a decade ago. Spawning from the Defense of the Ancients mod for Warcraft III, MOBA games are traditionally controlled as a isometric RTS style game. Awesomenauts changes things up a bit with the first major 2D side-scrolling release to the genre.

Gameplay

Awesomenauts follows the traditional MOBA formula of a team of players making their way past set defense points to reach an opposing team’s base. Each team consists of three players (which can be filled in with bots if someone is playing during slower hours) and the constant stream of less powerful computer controlled minions. Different from most MOBA titles like the DOTA mod is the game’s classic style 2D environment.

While greatly detailed to fit in a next gen world, all the action occurs on a 2D plane. Action is still fast and frantic though with players running in to battle, having rapid exchanges before someone is killed or forced to flee and most matches are over in less than fifteen minutes.

There is a somewhat limited supply of characters with only six playable Awesomenauts to choose from, each with different combat roles. Some act as tanks, others as damage dealers and others as more stealthy assassins. Players start off with only three unlocked and must earn combat experience to level up and unlock more. Hopefully Ronimo adds more through DLC or updates since the matches are usually matching teams with players already trending towards a few core characters rather than a variety that could come from an expanded roster.

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Forget about it being AMC’s top rated series. Forget about Volume 1 being the number one selling graphic novel of April 2012 despite it being published more than eight years ago and seven other volumes filling up the top 10. And even forget about it being the title that made Robert Kirkman a superstar comic writer.

The Walking Dead is now a video game too. And yes, we were just as hesitant when we heard about it as anyone else. As much as we appreciate a studio like Telltale with a pedigree of former Lucasarts employees and titles like Monkey Island franchise and Sam & Max, we know the dangers of a licensed franchise being brought to the gaming world. Luckily, Telltale showed us once again that the right team working with the right property can bring magic on screen.

Gameplay:

The Walking Dead comes to players as a newer style of point and click adventure game. Traditionally, the genre revolved around players sorting through an environment with trial and error until they found the proper combination of items and persons needed to solve a puzzle. Now, The Walking Dead steps up the ante with a faster paced and more natural feeling action oriented adventure.

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While [Prototype] had an insane world with an incredibly selfish and callous anti-hero protagonist, the title was hindered with some gripping gameplay problems. Many times, the player wasn’t given a fair opportunity in the game world. Rockets would come from off-screen opponents or as a player fled from an unwinnable conflict, they’d find themselves being chased by an ever spawning flock of Hunters appearing from water towers littered throughout the city.

It is a game notorious for many people not finishing because of a unfairly difficult final boss fight. But there was something that kept the franchise alive despite the more well received Infamous coming out at the same time. Three years later and Infamous 2 being on shelves for a year already, Radical Entertainment brings Prototype 2 with some pleasant and unexpected results.

Gameplay

The gameplay of Prototype 2 takes the concepts from the original and makes some minor tweaks to make the game more approachable and enjoyable. The open world of NYZ starts off with just initial conflict with Blackwatch military personnel. Slowly, the infected are thrown into the mix which gives players a much easier learning curve for their powers instead of just being launched into the middle of a battle royal in Times Square.

Combat has been changed up some since [Prototype] as players can now assign two different powers at the same time. With one to the X button and one to the Y, players can combine strategies depending on the opponents in front of them.

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Almost two years since the first time we heard about Street Fighter X Tekken,  it has finally made its way home to consoles. Everyone wondered, how would the characters of Tekken mesh into the Street Fighter world and how the Tekken fanbase would feel about the gameplay mechanics they know and love so much for their favorite fighters being altered to match the fast paced, juggle and projectile based combat of Street Fighter. Because of the quality of the team working on the game, the answers didn’t come as a huge surprise but they were awesome to experience.

Gameplay:

Street Fighter X Tekken knew it needed to bring the best to the screen with this combination of two of the most beloved fighting franchises ever. The unique challenge of bringing the two worlds and not just their characters but their signature styles together was one of massive intrigue. Luckily, the Capcom team was able to piece together a unique tag system differing from past Capcom Vs. titles and using core Street Fighter mechanics to create a new but familiar fighting style.

While maintaining the basic three punches, three kicks and back to block control scheme, Capcom was able to put together new combinations using the tag and juggle system allowing players to not only swap characters on the fly but have multiple characters fighting at the same time on the same side. Signature special maneuver’s return in the form of Super Arts to allow for small cinematic beatdowns, giving Street Fighter’s cast their classic favorite moves while Tekken’s roster is introduced to them for the first time. In addition, the game introduces Pandora Mode, tying in to the game’s story, that allows players to sacrifice one of their characters to give their partner a limited boost (that will be fatal if they don’t win the match in time).

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