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One of the hoary old jokes we lazy gaming hacks like to do is dismissively refer to “ManShooter VIII” or “Gears Of Duty MCVIIXI”, sneering at the homogenisation of the mainstream industry. But really, the sarcasm is going to be undetectable if games keep calling themselves Warface and Warfighter. The latter is, of course, the moniker of the second Medal Of Honor game in the rebooted series. And there’s another trailer of its single player (sort of) below.

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#starwarstheoldrepublic Star Wars: The Old Republic currently has less than a million subscribers, publisher Electronic Arts said in an investors call today. More »

Well, that took all of about a fortnight. Pretty much everyone called this one, given the age of the expensive monthly subscription game seems to be over, bar a few very particular exceptions. So it is that the struggling juggernaut that is EA/Bioware’s MMO Star Wars: The Old Republic is to join the rapidly-swelling ranks of free to play. They’ve just announced that play up to level 50 will be gratis and open to all as of this Fall Autumn. That’s no moon – it’s a fully-armed and operational new business model.*(more…)

Battlefield 3's "Aftermath" DLC pack, leaked way back when and then finally confirmed but a day ago, will find itself in the hands of capable soldiers the world over come December, according to this Battlefield Premium hype page.

The site's calendar also officially acknowledges and dates BF3's "End Game" DLC pack for March of 2013. Both packs are said to contain four new maps, new unspecified weapons, equally new and equally unspecified vehicles, and "more." While Battlefield Premium subscribers gain access to DLC content two weeks earlier than regular folk, we expect the December and March launch windows to apply to both categories of people, provided the Premium launches aren't near the tail end of either month.

A major part of Facebook's business, in addition to keeping an accurate and exceedingly detailed log of the horrible web of lies you spin during your daily social activities, is as an advertising platform. As it turns out, advertising on Facebook can be pretty helpful, at least if the product you're shilling is something globally recognized like Battlefield 3.

"Electronic Arts recently spent $2.75 million promoting Battlefield 3 on Facebook," said Facebook COO Sheryl K. Sandberg during the company's first investor call since going public. "They attributed $12.1 million of their sales to these ads, translating to a 4.4x return on their Facebook marketing spend." Sandberg didn't elaborate on how EA extrapolated that figure.

An independent study performed on 60 different Facebook advertising campaigns showed that 70 percent of campaigns analyzed saw a 300 percent return on investment at minimum, according to Sandberg, while 49 percent of campaigns enjoyed 500 percent returns. It's difficult to determine how well that figure scales up, considering its small sample size, but we're sure that the simple act of typing "500 percent returns" has caused several dozen advertising executives to salivate uncontrollably.

Battlefield 4 is coming, with a beta scheduled to begin next fall, but DICE assures fans that doesn't mean a premature end to support for Battlefield 3.

Following up on earlier pledges to the same effect, the developer said on the official Battlefield blog that it intends to continue with BF3 support past the beta, continuing even after BF4 is released. "We are committed to providing an excellent Battlefield 3 experience well into the future , past the releases of Aftermath, End Game, and Battlefield 4," a representative said on the blog. "DICE is continuing its work on Battlefield 3 alongside Battlefield 4."

Of course, there's no way of telling what that "work" will entail following the release of Battlefield 4. It's certainly an impressive claim nonetheless, one that we hope isn't equivalent to pre-selling us some exclusive bridge DLC.

When I heard that there would be a free to play Ultima game, my knee jerked so hard that I fractured my leg in four places. To learn more I spoke with lead designer Kate Flack and found that Ultima Forever could be a virtuous project, emphasising character development over looting, moral quandaries over monster-bashing and more interested in tracking player behaviour than spending patterns. I also managed to peek at a trailer showing the similarities between Forever and IV with transitions into the new visuals, an example of which is below. Beta signups are open now and I might be eating my words and going back to Britannia after all.

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The original Dead Space introduced us to Isaac Clarke: a masked, silent engineer doing his best to survive an extremely lonely and hostile environment. His weapons were that of an engineer, though they served Isaac well enough in strategically dismembering the ghouls that came creeping at him. The events of Dead Space 2 took Isaac on a similar mission, albeit through an enormous space colony known as "The Sprawl." Isaac once again battled creepy necromorphs, all in the name of survival.

Despite what you've seen of Dead Space 3 thus far - the action-heavy, co-op sequences from E3, for example - Isaac is as much "the reluctant participant" as ever. Visceral Games executive producer Steve Papoutsis explained as much to us in a recent interview. "He by no means is a vigilante for hire or any nonsense like that," Papoutsis said. "That's not what's going on with Isaac. And I don't want to get into the details too much 'cause that would kinda spoil the fun for folks, but let's just say after the events of The Sprawl - which was, as you may or may know if you played it, a massive disaster - he's kind of laying low. And he kind of wants to be left alone."

Papoutsis didn't speak to specifics of the game's intro - which, according to previous precedent, should be insane - but he was quick to stifle any idea that Isaac is on the offensive in Dead Space 3. "The events that kind of thrust him into action in Dead Space 3 will reveal themselves when people play the game, but by no means is he a willing participant in the story that's gonna unfold." It's unclear if Clarke's co-op buddy, Carver, plays into that "thrust," but the fact that he's a gun-toting government official can't hurt.

As for whether this is Isaac's last spin as a starring character in a Dead Space game, Papoutsis was less specific. "We didn't set out to make a trilogy," he said. "We would love to create many more Dead Space games, there's a lot of stories to tell of the Dead Space universe." He allowed one teensy nugget to slip through. "With Dead Space 3, it's definitely Isaac's story and we're trying to bring answers to this story. There's a lot of questions that have come in Dead Space 1 and 2, and with Dead Space 3 we really wanna answer a lot of questions."

Sitting in a brightly lit office above Times Square in the middle of the day made it easy not to be scared by Dead Space 3, even with bodies reanimating, spawning grotesque appendages, and chasing me down. Which isn't to say it isn't scary, just that my surroundings - not to mention two other human beings - rounded off the scary, sharp edges.

I didn't play co-op, and I wasn't outside on an ice planet. I piloted returning protagonist Isaac Clarke through much of what you'd expect from a Dead Space game: creepy, atmospheric spaceship corridors pocked with vile mutant humanoid creatures trying to eat my flesh. My mission was an optional side quest in Dead Space 3's flotilla section - a mess of once operational ships now relegated to graveyard duty. But despite the level's original Dead Space feel, executive producer Steve Papoutsis tells me the demo wasn't intended as a response to the mixed fan reaction garnered from the third entry's action-focused E3 2012 reveal.

"Every time we show something new, we understand that when it isn't what we've done in the past, people are gonna have questions and wanna know what the meaning of it is or how it all fits together," he says. At E3, Dead Space 3's co-op was revealed in an action-heavy scene that some fans felt wasn't representative of the series' past entries. Papoutsis directly addresses that concern.

Electronic Arts is smooshing its two Aussie mobile developers together to form one studio known as Firemonkeys. IronMonkey (Mass Effect Infiltrator, Dead Space) and Firemint (Flight Control, SPY mouse) combined now form "Australia's largest game development studio." Awkward.

Firemonkey will continue working on separate projects, along with "collaborating on new ones out of the EA Melbourne office."

It should also be noted that shortly before it was acquired by EA, Firemint purchased Puzzle Quest developer Infinite Interactive. Now, the only thing more dangerous than Firemonkeys would be Infinite Firemonkeys.

Outernauts, the adventure RPG from developer Insomniac (Ratchet and Clank, Resistance series) and publisher EA, launched today on the solar system's most used social networking site. The game sounds like Facebook Pokemon, as players "capture and train exotic alien beasts for battle"

"By bringing the breadth and elements of console gaming to a social game, we hope to give our fans-both old and new-a unique gaming experience on Facebook," said Insomniac founder Ted Price.

Go ahead and try out the game now while your teacher or boss isn't looking.

If PC gaming had actually died on the numerous occasions when somebody has fumbled for and failed to find a pulse in its mechanical innards, I wouldn’t even be here to tell you that it’s alive again. Thankfully, as is clear by the amount of time and money it’s possible to spend in these imagined realms, the mighty PC is not only in rude health, it has a cocksure spring in its step as well. Even EA Chief Executive John Riccitiello has noticed the swagger, telling CNBC: “The fastest growing platform for video games today is the PC”. Thanks, Mr Riccitiello! “…but it’s growing through subscriptions, through micro transactions and through downloads.” Oh criminy, this isn’t just a pat on the back, is it?

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EA altered the tone of Dead Space 3 from solo chills to co-op thrills based on market research, a company executive stated in a recent interview. EA Games' marketing exec Laura Miele told MCV the company was really proud of the work on the first two games, but wanted to see how the franchise could reach more consumers.

"We were hearing feedback that they love the thriller game, but it was pretty scary, and the obvious next step was that they wanted to play with someone. So we introduced co-op into the game," said Miele.

Miele added Dead Space 3 was "no less scary" and "true to its roots," but that research found people were more comfortable playing the game with someone else. She said the implementation of co-op to share the scares was to "reach out to consumers that perhaps were not open to Dead Space 1 and 2."

Battlefield 3's "Armored Kill" expansion coming this September finally gives fans of the franchise the expansion they've been waiting for: vehicular mayhem.

#madden Attorneys in the class-action lawsuit alleging that EA Sports' exclusive publication of NFL football games constitutes an illegal monopoly last week told a judge that they have finalized settlement terms alluded to back in May, and that no later than a week from today, will file them with the court and a motion for the judge's approval of them. More »

Oskar Burman, general manager of Battlefield Play4Free and Battlefield Heroes developer Easy Studios, has departed from Easy and its parent EA. He's the second GM to leave the position, after Ben Cousins, who left to join ngmoco's Sweden-based studio.

Burman has yet to reveal his next destination, though he does have a plan. "New thing is exciting," he noted on Twitter. "More info soon." Whatever the new thing is, it is still in Stockholm.

Let me begin this by noting that, in actuality, EA’s at least been paying solid attention to Origin lately. Lending a helping hand to crowd-funded games taking their wobbly first steps was a smart idea, and putting out a big call for input from users is a much appreciated gesture – assuming, of course, that EA actually takes resulting criticisms to heart. That said, Origin 9.0 – a self-described “landmark update” – isn’t exactly encouraging. Once it rolls out, you’ll gain access to a free-floating friends list, re-sizable game icons, and, er, a clock.

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And it’ll be terribly awkward for you, because it’s not who you think it is. You’ll be like, “Hey, HK-47, how’s it going?” And HK-51 will be like… well, I don’t know what he’ll be like, because he’s a new character. He and his exceedingly murderous brethren are, however, something of a throwback to cut content from KOTOR 2, so you might not end up totally out of your depth. For now, though, BioWare’s prepared a lavish CG trailer, because – and I guess this should’ve been the headline for the story – gameplay doesn’t exist anymore. It disappeared forever while you were asleep. Games are now cobbled together from CG, live-action footage, and meticulously photoshopped still images. You can’t actually play them, but you can hit the pause button whenever you want, which offers a truly unprecedented level of choice in how you approach every situation.

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American McGee's Spicy Horse studio is shrugging off the madness of console development to create free-to-play, browser- and cloud-based games such as Kongregate's Big Head Bash. This move follows Spicy Horse's partnership with EA to launch Alice: Madness Returns last year as a mainstream, boxed and digital title. Alice was Spicy Horse's last foray into the physical space, McGee tells Game Informer.

"Our studio wouldn't consider going back to traditional console development, but I do think we'll end up being in the right place when consoles come back to us," he says. "By that I mean we fully expect the definition of 'console' to shift radically over the next two years. Our consoles will become our mobile devices (Or if you prefer: Our mobile devices will become our consoles)."

Spicy Horse has already seen a larger return on investment from its free-to-play games than Alice ever produced, or likely ever will. This is the future, McGee says, and static games locked to specific physical media will be unable to compete with always-updating, fluid titles in the free-to-play universe.

Are you sad? Tired? Angry? Upset because you spilled some milk and, contrary to popular opinion, it was in fact the end of the world after all? Well, don’t be. Today is a happy day, because criminally underrated first-person runner (with some shooty bits that should’ve leaped off a building and never looked back) Mirror’s Edge is on the comeback trail. For a while, it’s mostly been wishful thinking from folks at DICE, but now the people with the money are talking, and they’re saying wonderful, joyous things.

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I’d pay a substantial sum to visit Britannia again in a new adventure worthy of Ultima VII, which is, without a doubt, one of the games that made me. I probably wouldn’t play Ultima Forever even if it was free though and that’s at least partly because it’s free. EA/Bioware’s newly announced title is a “cross-platform action RPG” launching under the same Play4Free label as Battlefield Heroes. What price virtue, I wonder, and I mean it quite literally. How many tiny coins will I have to collect or purchase to redeem the virtues of Britannia. Scant details below.

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Star Wars: The Old Republic now has a free trial, hooray! Anyone is eligible, which is a good thing, and the main limiting factor is that it caps you to level 15 (the level cap is 50 for subscribers, so this will get you off the starting world to Coruscant, but not much further.) PvP and flashpoints are also available in the trial. There’s a bunch more information in the FAQ, but overall this seems like a good move for the game. Allowing folks to try it out before they plunge into the depths of their wallets is always a good idea.

After a long, bone-density-ruining day in space doing space things, it’s only natural that you’d want to come back to Earth, kick back, and put your feet up on something familiar – say, a footrest, Big Ben, or the city of Vancouver. But, in Mass Effect 3′s Earth DLC, you’ll return home to find the place ransacked, with Reaper forces making a mess of everything and totally wrecking your perfectly organized Mt Rushmore collection. So it’s time to fight back – with a handful of new classes, guns, modifications, and whatnot, of course. Such is the way of these things.

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#humor I really enjoyed these comics, published today by the hilarious folks over at Dorkly. No matter how you feel about video game publisher Electronic Arts these days, hopefully you can appreciate the ribbing. More »

Battlefield 3's new multiplayer customization feature, Matches, is live today. Matches mode allows players on Xbox 360, PS3 and PC to create custom matches with specific friends and squad members, allocating team sizes, game settings, maps and unlocks for competitive multiplayer rounds.

To establish a custom match, players must be actively renting a dedicated server. Too bad it's illegal to host massive firefights in other things you rent, like cars, apartments, houses and U-Hauls. Then again, renter's insurance on Battlefield 3 Matches would be pretty insane, so it's probably a good thing "renting" rules aren't all-encompassing after all.

Black Ops 2 may have a villain with all of the weapons and most of the beards, but that doesn’t mean we can just forget about the game’s real-life nemesis – who also has all of the weapons and most of the beards. I speak, of course, about Medal of Honor: Warfighter, which would also like to show you its fanciest new war-waging wares. This time, though, story’s taking a backseat in favor of multiplayer, and somewhere, a koala version of Smokey Bear weeps as these nationalism-powered soldier types welcome each other to the jungle by blowing it up. Witness the environmentally-unfriendly carnage after the break.

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The Secret World is officially live, and we’ve both locked it in a room with our most dangerous mythical creature, Adam, and hurled questions at creative director Ragnar Tornquist until he cracked – by which I mean “willingly and jovially answered my questions in a highly consensual fashion.” And today, the insane brutality continues. Specifically, we discuss free-to-play, what Tornquist plans on doing next (hint: probably not another MMO), social gaming, whether or not MMO business models hurt fun, and more.

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#electronicarts The publisher behind games like Mass Effect and Madden says it won't be selling its games at brick-and-mortar stores for much longer. More »

Details for GameStop's North American FIFA 13 pre-order bonuses are in, and they look shockingly familiar. GameStop pre-orders will receive one gold pack per week for 24 weeks, each of which consists of 12 items, including players rated 75 and up, contracts, stadiums, staff and badges, along with one "rare" item.

Pre-orders will also receive a steelbook case featuring FIFA 13's cover athlete, Lionel Messi.

These offers mirror the Ultimate Edition announced for the UK, available through pre-order and on launch day, September 28 in the UK, only. The gold packs are meant to be used with FIFA's Ultimate Team, the online ecosystem that last year was subject to a flurry of hacks.

SimCity Social‘s open beta first really started bothering me when I stopped playing it. And not for the reason you might think. Someone called me on the phone while I was poking around and still mourning the fact that “OppressionVille” was too big for the city name field, so I looked away from my burgeoning burg for, oh, 15 minutes. When I returned, nothing had changed. No tornadoes had struck. Nothing caught on fire. Yes, SimCity Social is a turn-based game, but that only partially robs it of the gleeful insanity that so characterizes’ Maxis’ most-famed of llama-loving city builders. After all, that structure could work if given proper treatment.

Here, though, it’s symptomatic of a much larger problem: SimCity Social is about as easygoing as they come. There have been (at least, after a few hours) no downsides to my actions – no tension or intrigue. Sure, neat things (like a UFO crash) occasionally happened, but they largely served to stuff more Simoleons into my jingling mayoral pockets. Well, until typical social game stuff took center stage, anyway.

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