Mad Catz^® Ships Tekken™ Tag Tournament 2 Arcade FightStick^™ Tournament Edition On The Wii U™, Xbox 360^® and PlayStation^®3 Platforms

Mad Catz Interactive, Inc. (“Mad Catz”) (NYSE MKT: MCZ) announced today the Company has begun shipping the Tekken Tag Tournament 2 Arcade FightStick Tournament Edition S, the first fighting game controller released by Mad Catz for the new Wii U console from Nintendo^® and the similar Tournament Edition S+ FightStick for the Xbox 360^® video game and entertainment system and PlayStation^®3 computer entertainment system.  Licensed by NAMCO BANDAI Games Inc., the Tournament Edition fighting game controller has been designed for competitive play featuring genuine arcade components. 

“We’re pleased to extend our relationship with NAMCO BANDAI Games and particularly excited to introduce a Tournament Edition fighting game controller to the new Wii U console.” said Darren Richardson, the President and Chief Executive Officer of Mad Catz Interactive, Inc.  “We believe that the new FightStick will enable us to further grow our position as market leaders in this category.”

Both fighting game controllers use genuine Sanwa Denshi^™ arcade components and the new Tekken Tag Tournament 2 Arcade FightStick Tournament Edition S+ features underside foam padding for sustained comfort and interchangeable graphic decals.

Additional information available at: http://www.madcatz.com/ttt2    

Hi Gamers,

We’re pleased to share with you the DLC package details for Activision and Fox Consumer Products’ Family Guy: Back to the Multiverse (available exclusively in this universe). The exquisitely titled Peter Griffin’s Man Boob Mega Sweat Packcombines new costumes, weapons, and a bonus Challenge level all in one freakin’ sweet collection, including:

·         The Space Station Challenge, which throws Stewie and Chris into the middle of a war against malicious alien chickens – in space! Features single-player and co-op gameplay.

·         The Evil Pack unlocks the Evil Stewie and Evil Mayor West costumes, each equipped with unique melee weaponry. Machete-wielding Evil Stewie is available in all game modes, while Evil Mayor West and his petrified cat are usable in Multiplayer and Challenge Modes.

·         The Humiliation Pack adds two additional costumes across all game modes – a diaper-dressed Stewie and pink-furred Brian.

·         The Opening Number Pack adds some class to the Griffin family with the gold-colored tuxedos and top hats from the show’s opening theme song. These dapper outfits are available in Story Mode (Brian and Stewie only), as well as Multiplayer and Challenge Modes.

As an added treat, PlayStation®3 users will receive an exclusive Family Guy: Back to the Multiverse Theme with their purchase.

Peter Griffin’s Man Boob Mega Sweat Pack is available now in the UK on Xbox LIVE and on the PlayStation Network.

Family Guy: Back to the Multiverse is currently available for the Xbox 360®, PlayStation®3, and PC. It is rated PEGI & USK 16+. For more information on the game, visit http://www.facebook.com/Familyguythevideogame. For information on the television series, visit www.familyguy.com. 

PRODUCT INFORMATION

Family Guy: Back to the Multiverse

Formats:  PS3, X360 Out:  23/11/2012 Publisher:  Activision

 Guardians of Middle-earth Thorin Oakenshield and the Great Goblin DLC now available

Gamers will now be able to purchase new playable Guardians Thorin Oakenshield and the Great Goblin in  Guardians of Middle-earth! The DLC is currently live on PlayStation Network and on Xbox LIVE Arcade.

Thorin Oakenshield, who is based on the character in  The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, is the son of Thráin and led the company responsible for taking back the Lonely Mountain from the dragon Smaug. The Great Goblin rules over the denizens of Goblin-town, which is located deep within the Misty Mountains under High Pass.

The Thorin Oakenshield and Great Goblin trailer In  Guardians of Middle-earth, gamers team up as the most powerful heroes from the greatest fantasy epic of all time, bringing up to 10 players together in a competitive multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA) game.  Featuring select characters from the upcoming film,  The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, the game allows players to develop and master more than 20 iconic characters. Play as 

Gandalf, Gollum, Legolas, Sauron and more, forming memorable and unlikely alliances with and against friends. Gamers will have the ability to connect with other players via an in-game voice communication system, as well as access to a comprehensive online stat and leader board system where they can track friends’ victories and defeats, and more. Now available for the PlayStation®3 computer entertainment system at select retail stores and via download for Xbox LIVE Arcade for Xbox 360 and PlayStation Network. 

Bully, Midnight Club 3 and Red Dead Revolver Now Available on PSN

In addition to last week’s release of San Andreas in the PlayStation Network’s PS2 Classics Collection, a trio of Rockstar titles from the PS2 era are now available to download from the PlayStation store for £7.99each.

Bully (Canis Canem Edit in Europe and Australasia)

Set in the fictional New England town of Bullworth, Bully tells the tale of young Jimmy Hopkins as he experiences classic high school clichés and attempts to navigate through Bullworth Academy. Jimmy must work his way up the social ladder of this demented institution of supposed learning, standing up for what he thinks is right and taking on the liars, cheats and snobs who are the most popular members of the student body and faculty.

Midnight Club 3: DUB Edition REMIX 

Tear through the living city sprawls of Detroit, San Diego, Atlanta and Tokyo at breakneck speeds. REMIXfeatures the entire original Midnight Club 3: DUB Edition game plus all the content included in the special Remix update - over 20 additional vehicles added to the original roster spanning all car classes.

Red Dead Revolver

The precursor to Red Dead Redemption, this third person shooter is a classic tale of vengeance and the story of Red Harlow - a bounty hunter prowling the untamed frontier and bringing justice to wicked bandits, while desperate to unravel the identity of his family's killers. Many classic characters from the game, including Red, were featured as multiplayer avatars in Red Dead Redemption’s Legends & Killers Pack.

Assassins Creed 3

I have played all of the Assassins Creed games and to be fair was starting to lose interest in them because they seemed to be the same game with a few tweaks here and there. When this came along and had many promises alongside it, I was once again eager to play.    I’m pleased to say that I wasn’t disappointed; this is actually a great game.  It’s a little confusing at points and certainly at the end of the game once the initial credits roll then you realise you haven’t actually finished the game, and even more so when you’re not sure what to do at all and it really takes all those little white cells to work it out.

In this day and age you again play Desmond and there’s the odd mission here and there that you need to do to find more cells etc for the animus.

The main part of the game consists of you playing Connor, a Native American Indian whose father is a British soldier. With his mum dead and his village threatened you need to use all the sneaking and assassin skills possible to find out the truth behind who wants your local land and who is betraying who to get it.

It’s a bit confusing with who’s fighting who, who’s working for whom and exactly what you need to be doing as an assassin.  There’s Templars, Assassins, Colonists and some very aggressive, large wildlife out there. 

The first thing you will notice with this game is the difficulty of controlling your character, it’s actually so frustrating that I almost quit this game and threw my controller into the TV.  Luckily I decided to have a coffee, calm down a little and keep trying. Eventually I managed to get the hang of it – although the ugly controls do raise concerns with the game and can cause frustrations during crucial fight scenes.

This is much more than the regular Assassins Creed games, as there are just so many additional elements.  As Connor you have a homestead out in the forest, you can recruit people to help you in your sub-missions, grow the homestead into a business and buy and trade goods  - such as animal pelts in order to gain additional funds.

The map is immense you bounce all over the USA across cities; wilderness and you even take to the water with some sailing missions and battles.

You really have to believe that the completion of this game will give you such immense excitement and a feeling of success because it’s a bloody long game that uses all your brain matter to get through - even after 30 hours + of playing there’s still so much to do.

This is an amazing game and really does need to be purchased and played by anyone and everyone, whether an Assassins Creed fan or not this is a tough but enjoyable game!

Games Booth Rating 10/10

PRODUCT INFORMATION

Assassin's Creed III

Formats:  PS3, X360, PC, WiiU Out:  31/10/2012(PS3 X360)   23/11/2012 (PC)   TBA (WiiU) Publisher:  Ubisoft

Hi GAMERS!

We’re launching new entertainment apps on Xbox in the UK, as we continue to build our global catalogue of TV, movies, sports and music experiences across Xbox LIVE.

• Crunchyroll (Available now)

Watch your favorite Anime and Asian drama titles including “Bleach,” “Naruto Shippuden,” “Hunter x Hunter,” “Sword Art Online,” “Coffee Prince” and “Boys Over Flowers” in HD with Crunchyroll on Xbox. Instantly view over 20,000 episodes of professionally subtitled Anime, Korean drama, and live-action titles in HD. Enhance your Crunchyroll app experience with voice and gesture control via Kinect for Xbox 360.¹

·         Sports Picks (Available now)

Sports fans have a whole new way to connect with fellow fans and compete on Xbox LIVE with the new Sports Picks app. You can make picks, compete with your Xbox LIVE friends and fight for domination of the leaderboard. With the Sports Picks app, we’ve also added a new experience for Xbox SmartGlass, so you can do all of this on your tablet or phone without missing a beat of the game on your TV through Xbox. ¹ 

  

As we continue to grow and strengthen our portfolio of international offerings with partners including SkyDrive, Napster, and Karaoke, we’re also working to bring additional features to the experiences that you already use. Xbox SmartGlass integration¹ with NBA Game Time² gives you total control of the non-stop basketball action on your Xbox. Browse live NBA games with highlights and game recaps, select the videos you want, and send them to your Xbox for full-screen action.

In addition, Xbox LIVE Gold subscribers can watch the fascinating documentary “Minecraft: The Story of Mojang” for free this coming Saturday 22 December in the UK.

We will keep you updated as more of the world’s leading entertainment providers come to Xbox and additional entertainment apps launch.

For more information please visit Xbox.com

F1 Race Stars

Woo hoo – ever fancied racing round a track in an F1 car, but don’t want to buy the serious game – well in that case this is for you. I absolutely love this game and the whole family have enjoyed it too.

Imagine Mario Kart but with real F1 drivers, pit stops and more – well this is it.  Well when I say real F1 drivers, of course I actually mean cartoon versions with large bobble heads.

It has all the tracks of the modern F1 season as well as all the drivers to choose from – there are even some women driers in there (not being sexist in any way at all).  As you race around the tracks in Monte Carlo, Britain, Australia and more, you get to enjoy some local scenery and some very odd obstructions.

Hit too many of these obstructions, or generally drive badly your car begins to fail and you need to pull into the next pit stops for a quick tune up – just like the normal game.  Prior to each race you can change your car and race type, so you can drive a higher or lower powered car and an easier circuit.  

This game is great fun and really made me smile to play.  For those of you who don’t own a Nintendo, so haven’t tried Mario Kart, go get this game for your PS3 and have a great night in.

Games Booth Rating 9/10 

PRODUCT INFORMATION

F1 Race Stars

Formats:  PC, PS3, X360 Out:  16/11/2012 Publisher:  Codemasters Racing

Behind the Scenes in Grand Theft Auto: Vice City’s “The Lab” (Part 1: Animation)

Nearly ten years ago, Grand Theft Auto: Vice City was honored by London’s Design Museum as an annual design award nominee recognizing the ‘biggest contribution to design in 2002’ alongside such other newfangled technology as Apple’s iPod. Part of the award festivities included a special installation at the museum for which Rockstarproduced an exclusive set of interactive kiosks to give visitors a glimpse of how Vice City was created – specifically focused on the game’s Animation, Sound, and City Design architecture. In honor of Vice City's 10th anniversary andrelease for Android and iOS, the Rockstar Newswire will be publishing the entire three-part series of original files not seen since the original museum exhibition, starting with today’s Animation chapter, featuring:

• “Motion Capture”- a rare video showing a cutscene between Kent Paul and Tommy Vercetti going from motion-capture through to 3D model wireframe to finished product.
• “Sketch Book” - a progression of original character sketches through to final models and now-iconic illustrations of such folks as Lance Vance, Avery Carrington, Ken Rosenberg and more. 
• “Tommy Moves”- a set of clips showing the genesis of Tommy’s animations whether jumping into a Comet sportscar, dive-kicking a biker off his chopper or running with a chainsaw...

 You can find an embed link for "The Lab” (Part 1: Animation) below.

<iframe src=" http://www.rockstargames.com/vicecity/designmuseum/animation/" width="300" height="200" scrolling="no" frameborder="0"></iframe>

Forza Horizon Rally Expansion Pack Available Tuesday, 18^th December on Xbox LIVE

The year’s biggest racing game brings the thrill and danger of rally to Colorado with new cars, terrain, and off-road racing challenge

Microsoft, Playground Games, and Turn 10 Studios have announced that the “Forza Horizon” Rally Expansion Pack is available to download starting tomorrow, Tuesday 18^th December on Xbox LIVE. The Rally Expansion Pack brings a thrilling new automotive experience – with new cars, terrain, and off-road racing challenge – to this year’s biggest racing game. The “Forza Horizon” Rally Expansion Pack will be available to download for 1,600 Microsoft Points or as a free download for players who own the “Forza Horizon” Season Pass.

With the Rally Expansion Pack, the Horizon Festival is expanding to include epic rally racing and iconic rally cars that have been specifically tuned to handle the extreme terrain of Colorado’s most formidable off-road stages. Players will test their driving mettle with new multiplayer rally events, leaderboards, and Rivals challenges, as well as a new set of career events that take place on rally stages built across Colorado to push rally drivers and their cars to the limit. These stages feature severe and sudden elevation changes, massive jumps, and more surface variety than has ever been seen in “Forza Horizon,” providing an intense and varied off-road driving experience.

The Rally Expansion Pack will include five iconic rally cars, each with its own storied real-world rally history. Players will be able to upgrade these cars with new rally-specific upgrades including tires, suspensions, transmissions, and body kits specifically created to maximise each car’s potential on the varied terrain of the Expansion Pack’s rally stages. In addition, players will be able to create their own dirt-eating machines by applying rally upgrades to any car in their “Forza Horizon” garage for use in the rally stages and in the main game. 

The five cars in the Rally Expansion Pack include:

·         2005 Subaru Impreza WRX STi – The traditional blue and yellow Subaru is nearly synonymous with rally racing. The Subaru World Rally Team has been active since 1980 and has employed a “who’s who” list of rally-driving greats including Ari Vatanen, Colin McRae, and Petter Solberg. The 2005 WRX STi saw minor interior upgrades over the 2004 version. It is powered by the turbocharged and intercooled 2.5-liter flat-four that cranks out more than 300 horsepower. Subaru’s invincible all-wheel drive system provides grippy traction on any surface.

·         1982 Lancia 037 Stradale – The words “Group B” will send a chill of excitement down any rally lover’s spine. These cars were so fast they were eventually banned from rally competition. The Lancia 037 Stradale represents the last of the RWD cars to be competitive before AWD cars took over the sport. With a silhouette similar to its predecessor, the Lancia Stratos, the 037 is a mid-engine, tube frame beast with body panels made of Kevlar. The 200 road going versions built for homologation had an Abarth-developed 16-valve four-cylinder 2.0-liter engine with a Volumex supercharger. Power output of the street car is right around 200 horsepower, although the final evolution of the rally 037 had as much as 325 horsepower.

 

·         1992 Ford Escort RS Cosworth – Built with the intent of winning the World Rally Championship, the RS Cosworth was a successful stopgap model between the Sierra Cosworth and the later Focus. Although the Escort did not win the championship, it did win eight events between 1993 and 1996 and was extremely competitive as a Group A car. What makes the Escort RS truly special is the Cosworth YBT 1993cc turbocharged I4 engine. Its standard output of 224 horsepower has been tuned to as high as 1,000 horsepower in competition trim. Its full-time 34/66 front/rear split AWD system also give it excellent handling on any surface.

·         1992 Toyota Celica GT-Four RC ST185 – Driven by Carlos Sainz, the ST185 won the driver’s title in 1992. This was the pinnacle of Sainz’s rally career and the first time a Japanese car won trophies in an otherwise European manufacturer-dominated motorsport. The GT-Four RC is an AWD, turbocharged, 4-cylinder with a water-to-air intercooler and close-ratio transmission. A total of 232 horsepower give it plenty of juice and, when you upgrade to the rally body part components, the Celica is an obvious standout rally-racing icon.

·         2004 Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution VIII MR – The Lancer’s AWD performance is equal to supercars costing exponentially more. With 276 horsepower ready to be unleashed, the lightweight 3,109-pound Evo VIII MR is a formidable car on any surface. Lightning-quick turbocharged acceleration is put down to the surface through a six-speed transmission and helical limited-slip differential, making the Evo VIII a natural choice for any rally lover.

“Forza Horizon” Season Pass owners will be able to download the Rally Expansion Pack for free on 18^th December. In addition, Season Pass owners will have access to the December Season Pass bonus car—the 2003 Ford SVT Focus, which also comes with rally-inspired body upgrades—effectively giving Season Pass owners a sixth rally car to enjoy in the Rally Expansion Pack.

Season Pass owners will also receive five exclusive cars, with one car being released per month through March.

Where Cars Belong: “Forza Horizon” is available in a Standard Edition (£49.99 ERP) and Limited Collector’s Edition (£59.99 ERP) and is rated PEGI 12. The Limited Collector’s Edition offers exclusive content, including the “Month 1” Car Pack and “VIP” Car Pack, as well as additional downloadable content and VIP membership status.

PRODUCT INFORMATION

Forza Horizon

Format:  X360 Out:  26/10/2012 Publisher:  Microsoft Developer:  Turn 10 Playground Games