The Weekly Wrap

The Weekly: January 4-11

Welcome back to The Weekly, your one stop spot for all your gaming news.

After a Christmas and New Years hopefully filled with games, let’s not forget those unlucky games releasing just after holiday season. Chief among these that really does deserve your attention is a Wii U racer that’s not Mario Kart. Fast Racing NEO is a timely return to form of arcade racers and provides a boost to a stalling Wii U line-up. With slick visuals and even slicker gameplay that provides a welcome challenge, Fast Racing NEO borrows a lot of what made F-Zero so good on previous Nintendo consoles while still bringing something new to the racetrack.

In terms of games set to release this year, Square Enix has confirmed that Final Fantasy IX will be gracing the West via Steam early this year. No date has yet been confirmed nor if the game will be available on mobile like it is planned to be in Japan. Meanwhile the Final Fantasy creator has teased a new title for 2016 with no details yet given on the project.

It was a seemingly great 2015 and the perfect way to enter 2016 for Microsoft as both Halo 5 and Rise of the Tomb Raider passed 1 million sales. Will 2016 be just as successful for the gaming giant?

Although just entering 2016, it seems like we won’t be seeing another triple A Assassins Creed game until 2017 with the next entry ‘Empire’ slated to release next year. Another game we won’t be seeing for another year is Scalebound, the dragon themed Xbox title, which has been delayed due to development issues.

CES 2016 has seen a slew of nifty new gadgets and hardware, Alienware’s worlds first OLED gaming laptop a particular eye brow raiser. The OLED screen reportedly allows for a one millisecond response time. OLED screens have been trialled in smart phones and non- gaming laptops but Alienware is the first to bring the technology to a gaming market.

Were you a fan of Capcom’s 2012 RPG venture Dragon’s Dogma? Well if so, Capcom has some good news for you admitting that a sequel is often being discussed by developers from the original. Would you like to see a sequel?

Game piracy is a problem still causing havoc within the industry but according to Chinese cracking group 3DM, pirated games will be no more within two years. They believe encryption technology is getting so good free games will be a thing of the past. Game over it would seem for gamers not willing to pay to play.

It looks to a be a big year for virtual reality with Sony announcing that they have over 100 titles currently in development for the technology. The first of the VR consoles to hit the market will be Oculus Rift which is expected to ship in April. Interestingly Oculus CEO Palmer Luckey has spoken out saying that they’re not actually making money on the consoles because they’re selling them so cheaply. That said virtual reality itself is reportedly set to make $5.1 billion in 2016 alone.

Whether we wanted it or not, Homefront is getting a sequel and Homefront: The Revolution looks like it will be ‘gracing’ our consoles sooner than later. According to a leaked image of a gift card with the game’s release date, the game will release in the US on the 17th of May. Prepare yourselves accordingly.

Despite a new game that is definitely worth checking out, the Wii U has been dead and buried for quite a while. And Nintendo’s next console dubbed NX is preparing to make itself known with a report claiming Nintendo will reveal the console before E3 this year. This all adds weight to the hope it will release later this year and in turn fulfill Nintendo’s plans to ship 20 million of them by the end of 2016.

When it comes to Pokemon you truly do have to catch them all and now you can with the mythical Pokemon Hoopa coming to select stores across Australia and New Zealand. Special codes will be distributed and made available to those who make it to the stores from January 18 to January 29 and have a copy of one of the Pokemon games on 3DS.

In eSports news, a leading Australian Counter Strike:GO team that’s part of organisation 24/7 eSports, has had to dump several foreign players they recruited due to reported match-fixing. The players brought in from Vietnam are considered cheaters as part of public opinion back in Vietnamese gaming circles but no details to the exact nature of the cheating have yet been revealed.

Casting our eyes to the gaming forecast and skies are finally clearing after a barren few weeks over Christmas that saw very few new releases. On the horizon this week is The Banner Saga on PS4 and Xbox One while Assassin’s Creed Chronicle’s: India will hit most gaming platforms on the 12th, check out the 2.5-D side scroller

And that my fellow gamers, was the week that was, game on!