About Brandin Tyrrel

Weekly Roundup compiles all the biggest news stories, reviews and features from the week into one handy post on the weekends.

A bit of a slow week due to the holidays, but it’s hard to complain with a week of great XBLA sales. XBLA Fans wants to know if you picked up anything good during the holiday deals.

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We love Xbox Live Arcade. The variety, the quality…the price! Today, Black Friday, the holiest of US shopping days, aims to make that last point even sweeter by slashing …
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Thanks to Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment and Monolith Productions and their ongoing efforts of to get your MOBA skills up to snuff, the fourth video in their MOBA Mastery guide is available for your dissection. The video series, aimed at exploring the genre in broad strokes and progressively finer detail in preparation for the December 5 launch of Guardians of Middle-earth, continues to peel away another layer of strategy this week. Like an unending, informative, Tolkienian onion.

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What’s better than new Minecraft skins? Halloween-themed Minecraft skins, of course. Oh, better than that? Halloween-themed Minecraft skins for charity? No? Halloween-themed Minecraft skins for FOUR charities?

That’s exactly what’s on the table in this, the final week, of Crafting for a Cause — the Minecraft: Xbox 360 Edition event where all proceeds of the limited edition Halloween Skin Pack go directly to charity. Our friends over at PlayXBLA want you to know that Microsoft, 4J Studios and Mojang have selected four great causes, to which they’ll donate the full 160 MSP ($2) value of every pack sold.

In an amazing show of support, the Minecraft: Xbox 360 Edition community has already purchased over $700,000 worth of the Halloween Skin Pack in the three short weeks this event has been running, but there’s still time to donate/get-your-hands-on-these-exclusive-skins. Each skin was handcrafted by the hardworking folks at some of the best development studios around, including: 343 Industries, Twisted Pixel, The Behemoth, Climax Studios, Rare, Tequila Works, Mojang and 4J Studios themselves.

In order to whet your appetite, XBLA Fans has lovingly compiled all 55 skins into easy to digest, alphabetically ordered slides for you to peruse at your leisure. Hit the jump for the goods. If even one of these great skins catches your eye, please consider purchasing the pack for 160 MSP before it’s too late! Crafting for a cause will continue to collect contributions until Monday, November 26. You really can make a difference!

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Last week we got word that The Walking Dead: Episode 5 – No Time Left would shuffle onto Xbox Live Arcade on November 21. In order to ease the anticipation, or maybe to crank it up, Telltale Games has released the above trailer for your…enjoyment? Note that the video contains strong language. If that’s not your speed, hit the jump to check out some screenshots from the upcoming season finale.

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Life’s full of heated, bitter rivalries. Microsoft v. Sony. Chevy v. Ford. Pepsi v. Coke. Yet with the big names gobbling up most of the confrontational spotlight, 3AM Games has dared to strike out and ask the unlikely questions. Questions like, “Cthulhu and… magnetism?” The answer, it seems, is yes.

Magrunner, the first title from the independent studio, is a first-person action-adventure puzzler set in the near-future, developed on Unreal Engine 3. By harnessing the power of the Magtech glove, Magrunner aims to test your reflexes and your wits based on the simple principles of magnetism as you square off against the Cthulhu Mythos inspired by the works of the author, H.P. Lovecraft.

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It’s that time of year again — SPIKE TV’s annual Video Game Awards. This year marks the tenth anniversary of the tribute show, showcasing the big names …
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Weekly Roundup compiles all the biggest news stories, reviews and features from the week into one handy post on the weekends.

Another week of Xbox Live Arcade is in the books. This one’s been all over the map, celebrating the 10-year anniversary of a service that brings us all together. With so much happening on this platform of ours, it’s easy to lose sight of just how good we have it. If it weren’t for Xbox Live, none of us would be here, so XBLA Fans wants to know, what’s your favorite memory from the past ten years of Xbox Live gaming? Let us know in the comments and Happy Birthday, Xbox Live!

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The first official screenshots from the upcoming sci-fi action RPG Mars: War Logs paint a pretty bleak picture. Developed by Spiders, best known around Xbox Live Arcade for Faery: Legends of Avalon, Mars takes place a century after a global catastrophe devastated the colonists of the red planet, who are now governed by perpetually warring corporations struggling to control the precious supply of water.

Players take on the role of Roy Temperance, a multi-talented renegade (the best kind of renegade) who’s story is intertwined within the “cyberpunk” narrative. By unlocking and upgrading dozens of perks and skills, players will be able to develop Roy’s fisticuffs prowess as he engages in real-time battles against the corporate overlords and the creatures of Mars. Players are also able customize their experience through equipment crafting and a decision-driven plot that will purportedly impact the future of Roy, the many characters he encounters and the very future of Mars.

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As reported last week, Minecraft Xbox 360 Edition was scheduled to receive a healthy dose of fixes, changes and additions in the form of a title update. Today, Major Nelson, …
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