Microsoft

CLD ainaveltsaC nI snruteR draculA

Lords of Shadow 2—the latest variation in Konami’s long-running Castlevania series—let you play as Dracula. Its upcoming add-on will keeps it in the family, making the alpha vampire’s albino spawn playable in the Revelations DLC. Set during the period where Dracula lay dormant for 1,000 years, Revelations will be a story-centric prequel to the events…

Gun Smuggler Uses Xbox 360s To Hide Illegal Weapons

Joseph Bunger, 34, faces up to 25 years in prison after pleading guilty to smuggling firearms internationally, with the parts hidden inside Xbox 360 consoles. He was arrested last year after Australian customs authorities opened one of the consoles he’d shipped from the US to find “a 9mm pistol, gun parts and two empty magazines.”…

So That Titanfall Xbox One WAS Real. Sort Of.

Back in January, there were rumours that Microsoft would be releasing a special Titanfall-branded Xbox One console. That machine never actually appeared. At least, it never did for consumers. At least one of the consoles was made though, as it was presented to Respawn today by Microsoft. You can see in the image above that…

A New DirectX Is Coming

I hope you didn’t get too comfortable with DirectX 11, because DirectX 12 is right around the corner. Microsoft has released a teaser image, showing that more info will be revealed at GDC (on March 20). That gives you just under two weeks to get the fear, paranoia and Windows 8 jokes out of your…

The Xbox One’s Controller Now Has “Increased Sensitivity”

Last month, Titanfall developers Respawn said that, after consultation with Microsoft, some changes were going to be made to the Xbox One’s controller. Now we know exactly what those changes were. The statements, from Respawn’s design lead Justin Henry, said the original controller input “was a little overly twitchy”, and that a pending update would…

Project Spark goes into beta today and a select group of folks can start using their Xbox Ones to make games. The creation suite has already been in beta on PC for Windows 8.1 users, letting do things like recreate Minecraft inside Project Spark. If you’re already in the Windows beta, you’ll also get access…

“We don’t have any information on the Xbox One hardware,” BlazBlue producer Toshimichi Mori told Siliconera. “I’m curious if Xbox One will even come out in Japan. I’ve been asking people about it and not one person has given me a definitive answer.”

Cortana has a Different Look on the Windows Phone

Cortana, the digital consigliere coming to Windows Phone 8.1, won’t be represented by the light blue apparition of a woman. Cortana will, appropriately enough, be a halo. It, uh, she? will be represented by a blue ring that animates whenever she’s speaking or thinking, says The Verge, citing sources inside Microsoft and providing some screenshots…

Age of Mythology? It’s been too long, old friend, too long. An extended edition of the fantastic (and weirdly forgotten) strategy classic is on its way to Steam

Good news for gaming headset owners: The Xbox One March update will bring with it support for optical Dolby audio output, meaning that your Astro/Turtle Beach/other gaming headset will finally get a full surround signal. Polygon‘s tested an Astro headset and they say it works great.

Civilization Revolution and Dungeon Defenders are the March offerings from the Xbox 360 Games with Gold program. Xbox 360 owners will be able to snag these games free from March 1-15 and 16-31 respectively.

Here’s a list of some of the indie developers participating in Microsoft’s ID@Xbox program to make games for Xbox One. Bonus points if you recognize them all.

Almost nailed it! The Achievement Hunter crew is back on track with GTA V, and they’re really pushing the limits of possible stunts this time. Watch the whole clip below. The giffy part starts around the 13 minute mark: Things to do in GTA V – Achievement Knievel [YouTube] Dayshot is an image-based feature that…

See The New Xbox One Dashboard In Action

Get a good look at the Xbox One’s new dashboard update in this video released by Microsoft’s Major Nelson today. The update—which includes improvements to party chat and the friends list on Xbox One—will go live in March, just in time for Titanfall. Looks good!

​Castlevania: Lords of Shadow 2: The Kotaku Review

Over nearly three decades and dozens of games, the Castlevania series has let players battle through iconically fragmented gameworlds and crack the Belmont family’s whips against Dracula. Now, with Lords of Shadow 2, the biggest, baddest vampire of all is yours to control. The shift from implacable archfiend to playable hero changes everything about him,…

The Xbox One Can Stream Games Via Twitch Starting In March [UPDATE]

Next month, an update will bring the popular Twitch video game broadcasting service to the Xbox One in a way that home consoles have never seen before. It will launch on March 11, just in time for Titanfall. According to AP, the update will allow Xbox One the ability to live stream games via Twitch…

Microsoft’s Devices and Studios Group – which includes Xbox – has a new boss. It’s Stephen Elop, a guy who recently ran (unsuccessfully) for CEO of Microsoft. While doing so, Bloomberg reportedhe “would also consider selling healthy businesses such as the Xbox game console if he determined they weren’t critical to the company’s strategy”

Microsoft Confirms Titanfall-Xbox One Bundle

Microsoft confirmed this morning that a Titanfall/Xbox One bundle will be offered. It arrives the day the game launches for that console and PC. It’s $499 and will include a digital copy of the game and one month of Xbox Live Gold. Realize this is not a Titanfall console—the Xbox One itself is the same…

Microsoft Teases JRPG Fans [UPDATE]

That’s Phil Spencer, one of Microsoft’s top gaming executives. Sakaguchi, of course, is Hironobu Sakaguchi, creator of Final Fantasy, now at Mistwalker, where he has released a few Xbox-exclusive JRPGs like Lost Odyssey and Blue Dragon. Hope Phil isn’t just messing with us, because the Xbox One sure could use some JRPGs. (I’ve reached out…

​Now There’s an Actual Remote for the Xbox One

The Xbox One is supposed to revolutionize the way we watch TV, with voice and gestural commands letting us search and change channels without pressing any buttons. But Microsoft will be putting out a physical remote control dedicated to media watching anyway. Y’know, just in case the revolution takes a while. The Xbox One Media…