About Brandin Tyrrel

We have a winner! Congratulations to: Luke Altman – We’ll be in contact with the winner soon to explain how to claim his/her prize! The correct answer was “Pipistrello” from Castle Crashers (check the original image after the jump). Thanks for entering, everyone, and don’t forget to try again tomorrow!

Welcome to day four of our seven-day Battleblock Theater XBLA multiplayer beta code giveaway contest! At some point in February or March (the exact date has yet to be sorted out), The Behemoth’s Battleblock Theater will begin a closed beta, with 10,000 XBLA gamers getting access.

Sound like fun? Want in? Then all you have to do is guess which Behemoth game character is pictured in the above distorted image. Post your best guess in the comments below, and remember, if you don’t win today, be sure to keep coming back as we’ll be picking a winner every day for an entire week. Good luck!

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We have a winner! Congratulations to: aSMiLoN (@aSMiLoN) — We’ll be in contact with the winner soon to explain how to claim his/her prize! The correct answer was “the Blue Knight” from Castle Crashers (check the original image after the jump). Thanks for entering, everyone, and don’t forget to try again tomorrow!

Welcome to day number two of our seven-day Battleblock Theater XBLA multiplayer beta code giveaway contest! At some point in February or March (the exact date has yet to be sorted out), The Behemoth’s Battleblock Theater will begin a closed beta, with 10,000 XBLA gamers getting access.

Sound like fun? Want in? Then all you have to do is guess which Behemoth game character is pictured in the above distorted image. Post your best guess in the comments below, and remember, if you don’t win today, be sure to keep coming back as we’ll be picking a winner every day for an entire week. Good luck!

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Undead Labs’ forthcoming zombie-apocalypse survival simulator continues to shamble toward an “early 2013” release. To help lighten the unbearable wait, Labs has maintained as much transparency as possible, fostering a dialogue with the community that’s more give than take. The latest in that line of communication was supposed to be a teaser trailer Undead had hoped to debut, but alas, it’s not ready. That’s the bad news.

The good news is the reason for the delay: a studio-wide crunch to submit the “first complete version” of the game to Microsoft to begin the initial round of certification testing. A milestone the studio reports being “very close” to achieving.

Fortunately for those of us who look forward to these sorts of things, Labs’ community manager and information conduit, Undead Sanya, has secured several screenshots from the upcoming teaser. We expect the trailer to hit any day now, but in the meantime, we certainly appreciate the sneak peek. Hit the jump to check out the sparse digs you might find yourself holed up in when State of Decay releases later this year.

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This week’s deals offer some Xbox Live Arcade favorites and a few retro classics at deeply discounted prices. Xbox Live Gold Members can snag the exclusive sales starting today, …
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The wildly popular card game that encourages you to kill everything, backstab your friends and make off with the treasure, is coming to Xbox Live. Steve Jackson Games’ Munchkin is the dungeon-diving experience “without any of that stupid role-playing stuff.” Its irreverent humor, easy-to-learn rules and addictive cutthroat gameplay have spawned a Munchkin empire; spinning off dozens of expansion decks, a board game, and ironically, a role-playing game.

The Munckin invasion of the Xbox 360 is being spearheaded by Tinderbox Entertainment, an independent developer of both videogames and traditional board games. First announced back in 2011, the Munchkin team has been working diligently to translate the game digitally, stating on their official Facebook page in early January that we can expect the finished product, “Soon. Munchkin for Xbox is coming soon.”

Earlier this week, an image of the game popped up on Steve Jackson Games’ official Twitter page. Though they’re quick to call it a demo, it appears to be shaping up nicely and will hit Xbox first, before being migrated to other undetermined platforms afterward. They also qualified what to expect with the initial release, indicating that post-release content could potentially introduce the many expansion sets in the form of downloadable content.

We’re working to confirm whether Munchkin will be an officially branded Arcade title, but it’s hard to imagine it landing anywhere other than Xbox Live Arcade. Hit the jump to check out the first in-game image. Read More

This week’s deal offers up the seminal adventures of Mega Man on Xbox Live Arcade. Capcom’s Mega Man 9 and Mega Man 10 are both available now, through February 4, for …
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The development studio helmed by Goichi “Suda51” Suda, Grasshopper Manufacture, has been acquired by GungHo Online Entertainment, a Japanese company primarily known for online game services and the Ragnarok series. Fans …
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Guardians of Middle-earth‘s ever-expanding stable of seasoned heroes was bolstered again today, as Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment and Monolith Productions inked the newest name to the roster. Radagast the Brown, the nature-conscience wizard recently featured in The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, lends his particular set of skills to the ongoing war for Middle-earth.

Radagast enters the fray as an enchanter, similar to Gandalf, dealing ability damage and crowd control through with his many area-of-effect spells. To compliment his arsenal, Radagast is able to increase his attack speed, and reduce controlling effects on himself and his allies, making for a potent ally in any skirmish. You can see him working his magic in action by checking out the character profile video, after the jump.

Everyone eager to battle with the brown wizard can purchase him individually or as part of the Season Pass, which includes all existing and future downloadable characters, as well as the forthcoming Survival mode for 1200 MSP. Additionally, players will have the opportunity to compete in “The One Road” challenge this weekend. Running February 1 through 3, the competition requires you rack up the “Most Wins on a One-Lane Map” in order to walk away with 500 XP, 20,000 Gold, and three Mithril level items to outfit your utility belt.

Those not yet waging war across the lanes of Middle-earth can get up to speed with our Guardians of Middle-earth review and helpful guide.

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The fix is in for the next round of changes coming to 4J Studios’ Minecraft: Xbox 360 Edition. The best-selling XBLA title of 2012 will get patched up with a host of new changes, tweaks and bug-squashing fixes with the release of Title Update 8. As we reported earlier this month, Minecraft‘s endgame content event, aptly titled “The End”, was pushed from production of the forthcoming update, citing a need to concentrate on a number of issues that popped up with the release of Title Update 7. Everyone eagerly awaiting the chance to duke it out with the infamous Ender Dragon can breathe easy knowing the content has been rescheduled for Title Update 9.

As for the many fixes stuffed into this release, you can expect things to be getting back to normal within the blocky reaches of your biomes. Appearing on PlayXBLA, the finalized change list is quick to address the many crashes and freezes introduced in the previous update, including: the random Kick Player crash, the random crash when loading the tutorial, and the dreaded sign-writing/autosave freeze.

What’s more, these fixes are merely the tip of the iceberg. With nearly forty items in tow, Title Update 8 should help to smooth things over while you chip away at that fortress you’ve been meaning to finish. There’s no official word as to when this panacea will be administered, though 4J Studios issued a tentative schedule of “this month” via their official Twitter page, when asked by a curious fan.

Hit the jump for the complete, lengthy list of fixes and changes coming with Title Update 8.

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Now that the year 2012 has been set firmly in the books, the boys back at the lab have poured over the raw data to bring you the top arcade titles of the year. The figures, based on full versions sold, were tallied from January 1, 2012 through December 31, 2012, and made public thanks to Xbox Live’s Larry Hyrb.

No surprise to anyone was Minecraft: Xbox 360 Edition topping the list this year. Having launched in May, the massive Minecraft community helped propel the title to well over 5 million downloads by year’s end. More impressively, the arcade adaptation outsold its robust PC cousin by nearly a million copies, securing Xbox Live Arcade as the fastest (legally) growing Minecraft community of 2012.

Trials Evolution rode into the second spot of the year’s most-purchased title on XBLA, and despite the staggering difference between first and second place, did very well for itself. Our Game of the Year, The Walking Dead wrapped up the third spot thanks to critical acclaim and its infectious word-of-mouth campaign. Pinball FX2 and Counter-Strike: Global Offensive rounded out the top five, in that order.

Amazingly, the never-say-die mantra of Castle Crashers has proven itself again; moving the sixth most number of copies nearly half a decade after its initial release. Filling out the top 10, in order, are: Gotham City Impostors, I Am Alive, Fruit Ninja Kinect, and finally, Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater HD.

You can check out these titles in list form, along with the rest of the top 20, after the jump.

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