It seems that we’ve got one such leak on our hands as the official Dead Space website recently underwent an interesting little change. On the main site is a short (2:55) “graphic novel short” that seems to set up the idea of the series’ rather virulent Necromorph plague falling upon a frozen outpost, where a man by the name of John Carver seemingly has to deal with both horrible alien/human abberations and family issues. That’s all well and good, seemingly existing to set up the next installment of the Dead Space franchise.

Peeling back the layers of the website offers us a few stronger hints of what to expect from what we can almost definitely call “Dead Space 3″, and they’re more or less confirming a rumor or two that’s built up around the next installment in Visceral’s scary-shooty adventure. If the phrases “team up in co-op” and “thrilling story” don’t seem like things you’d expect from a rather grisly murder simulator, you may be surprised to learn that both phrases can be found in the source code as highlights! Given the chance to guess, I would say series mainstay Isaac Clarke will be bumping into this John Carver fellow.

As for when EA will actually shed light on this, it’s rather obvious to expect a related announcement in the near future; perhaps at that big convention happening next week. For what it’s worth, the graphic novel short is pretty cool to watch.

That’s the catch with Guild Wars 2: after spending nearly seven years invested in a singular MMO, I didn’t think I had it in me to really get interested in another one. Too many titles had thrown themselves at the heels of the monolith that is World of Warcraft, and I simply hadn’t seen enough of the game to judge for myself if it was worth the plunge. That changed a few weekends ago, when I was able to spend every waking moment of my free time with ArenaNet’s upcoming MMO. It’s safe to say that not only is my interest in what they’re bringing to the table satisfied, but I am more than ready to shout the praises of this game from the highest peaks.

This basilisk probably had it coming, to be fair.

Preview: Guild Wars 2 (Beta Weekend)
Release Date: “When it’s ready”…still
Developer: ArenaNet
Publisher: NCSoft 

If there’s one thing that can safely be said about GW2, it’s that it is not a “revolution” in the traditional sense: you won’t be saying farewell to the idea of quests and their hubs, class-specific skills, or lots of abundant loot. Instead, these genre mainstays have evolved to be more palatable, more immersive and genuinely fun. As a whole, the game is such a joy to play that it kindles a spark that hasn’t resonated with me since the early days I spent in Azeroth.

The adventures of Toast Witjam, a bold human warrior and native of Divinity’s Reach, began with a crash and a bang as he was thrust into the middle of an exciting and dangerous centaur conflict, just seconds after the introductory cutscene. Minutes later? He’s toe-to-wrist with an enormous pair of hands constructed entirely of floating stone, evoking feelings of the biggest end-game raids at level one. While there were few quests that actively rose to quite that grand a scale in the first 20 levels of story content available to players in the Beta Weekend, there’s a clear sense that ArenaNet is all about making quests feel like part of the adventure, rather than a step-by-step list of sights to see.

Those skulls seem awfully big for those little piles of flesh.

This emphasis on a blend of style and substance is at the heart of what makes Guild Wars 2 feel so fresh. The dynamic questing system, in which events and combat scenarios happen around you rather than being handed out one at a time, is just one method of getting experience and making your mark on the world. You could instead choose to focus on the more standardized “renown”/heart-shaped quests, a specific set of Skill Challenges in every region that help unlock a range of mix-and-match abilities, or simply explore what the land of Tyria has to offer, pulling in experience by just locating different points of interest.

A range of options allows a person to approach the game in a way that seems rather unique to the genre: by not limiting a person to quests or a treadmill-esque grind, Tyria feels more lived-in, the beautiful landscapes and scenic vistas existing as more than just a means to an end. It’s easy to spend a considerable amount of time just adventuring, choosing to help citizens when the call arises but not feeling obligated about it.

When you do decide that there are people worth saving, it’s as easy as running into the fray and throwing your sword or spells around. That emphasis on player-friendliness shows its head again by not forcing you into completing any specific event on a time table: if you participate in an event during the time it’s active, you’ll receive a reward proportional to your efforts, laid out in the three obvious tiers of Gold/Silver/Bronze. From what I could tell throughout the many events that caught my eye, it’s almost always possible to show up late to the party and still get a hefty reward: no hero gets left behind.

A rather posh winery serves as one of hundreds of questing locales in Tyria.

Believe it or not, there are a handful of things that haven’t totally won me over yet with Guild Wars 2, but a lot of it is still perfectly capable of being fixed up and brought to the level of quality that most of the game is already sitting at.

This first one may be personal preference, but it feels as if there is a slight tendency to favor ranged combat when you’re in the thick of things. It’s not that melee-users are left in the dust or anything – in fact, there are plenty of rather diabolically powerful abilities that can change a battle’s outcome quickly – but it feels as if someone that prefers using ranged weapons is just going to have more flexibility on the battlefield. Maybe that’s intentional and melee players are supposed to have to deal with a little bit more of a challenge, but it still strikes me as a bit odd.

Apart from that, the real stinker of my weekend in Tyria had to be the chat system. It seems comparatively un-intuitive with regards to whisper chat and cycling through different chat channels, and I often found myself grumbling when my messages ended up broadcasting to the entire region I was in. In addition to that, there seems to be a lack of custom chat channel creation, something that seems inherently important with an MMO that lends itself so well to more in-depth role-playing, or in the case of what the chat channels I’ve seen end up getting used for, horrible commentary about life and the game itself.

All races being on the same team for once is a welcome change of pace.

Time will tell if we’ll see these minor nagging points improved upon. Either way, Guild Wars 2 has so much to offer that it’s hard to get bogged down about the little stuff like that: with one of the most elaborately-detailed and gorgeous landscapes in the genre and an attention to putting adventure first and nitty-gritty mechanics second, ArenaNet is bringing one hell of a contender to the fight for MMO supremacy.

I can’t wait to play again.

Dylan Sabin is Toastervision’s Editor-in-Chief and has often been described as “manic”, “slightly eccentric”, and “a fan of fine cheese”. He decided to give the site-running business a chance with Toastervision, and so far it’s been a pretty rad experience. He can be reached at dylan@toastervision.com or on Twitter @DylanSabin.

Game Previewed: Path of Exile ( Closed Beta )
Release Date: TBD
Developer: Grinding Gear Games
Publisher: Grinding Gear Games

The promise of endgame content.  ARPGs have a fault that lives at their core: the inability to really utilize gear that you spend a majority of your time collecting.  Sure, you use items you find while leveling up your character, but what happens when you hit that level cap and the game turns into a farm-fest?  Normally, you just amass a collection of goods and stare at them in all their glory while they waste away in your stash.  The crew over at Grinding Gear Games, or GGG as they like to be called, have stated that they have intentions of creating and maintaining a form of endgame content in which the gear you acquire will be put to use.  Whether it’s through PVP tournaments, timed dungeon races against other players, special dungeons designed by the developers to test your skill which will yield higher loot rewards, or even the currently dominant system of farming gear for a potential new character you are creating, they’re promising that the gear you collect at higher levels will be put to good use and actually encourage repetitive farming of their high level areas.

Combat can get a little hectic at times. Causing you to choose between fighting it out and potentially dying, or running away like a little girl.

Endgame content is nice and all, but that’s not the only crucial change they’ve made to the ARPG brand of gaming.  When you start playing, you’ll immediately notice a lack of currency in a coin format.  That’s because Path of Exile is strictly based off item currency.  This makes gold completely useless and is therefore not even in the game.  Want to sell some items to the town vendor? Feel free.  They will pay you in bits and pieces of items called Orbs.  These Orbs help in the customization of armor and weapons that you find throughout your travels.  Because the game’s currently in beta, there aren’t many options as far as player trading is concerned, but the overlords at GGG have some ideas as to ways they can keep the trading safe and scam free, which is another aspect that’s plagued the genre.

Orbs are the main currency for the game, allowing player trading and item customization to the extreme.

Customization’s always sought after in games such as this, and Path of Exile has found a way to make customization the most deep and fulfilling that I have experienced.  With the use of a passive sphere grid system – similar to what you’d find in Final Fantasy X - the player fully determines the path of the character.  Along with the passive sphere grid system, players can collect gems throughout their journey that represent skills that are available to you, each of which can be placed in sockets in the gear you find.

If you ever wanted to be a melee class champion with the ability to throw fireballs or ice spears at your enemy, then this title should grab your attention.  You aren’t bound by any class structure.  When you first choose your class you are essentially picking your starting location on the sphere grid as well as starting base stats, but after that it’s open season on customization.  As with any game that offers this much customization, it can be as deadly as it is beneficial.

A basic look at the passive sphere grid. This is just a small portion of the total grid, roughly a third of what is really available.

In conformity with the Diablo series, the game has multiple stages of difficulty that must be cleared in order to reach the next level.  Path of Exile starts out relatively forgiving and basic, so none of your choices will really hinder your ability to play the game.  Of course, as the game progresses the difficulty gets more and more apparent as you find yourself being potentially killed in one hit, even as the beefy melee class that I played.  While this does limit the potential customization of the game, it doesn’t affect how you can use abilities from classes that normally you wouldn’t find suitable for the one you picked.  Since the game is still in closed beta, we only have access to two full Acts on four difficulty settings, with the third Act releasing when open beta starts (possibly in June).

If you hold reservations against playing free-to-play titles because you don’t have the money to compete with those who do, then you owe it to yourself to try this game upon release.  GGG has an avid stance against the fabled “Pay2Win” format that plagues the free-to-play industry.  Expect to see cosmetics, extra character slots, extra stash tabs, and possibly even a sphere grid-clearing and respec option available through their shop.  Don’t expect  players making themselves stronger than others simply because they put money into the game.

If you are looking for an intense dungeon crawling experience that takes a lot from the famed Diablo titles, but improves immensely upon them, then you should give Path of Exile a try.

Path of Exile

You can sign up for closed beta and wait for an email, or you can donate $10 to their cause and receive an instant beta key.  Try not to get too caught up in your current character, though – they’ve already announced that there will be a character wipe when open beta is released.

Take this time to learn the ins and outs of the game so you can get a running start after the final character wipe.  There will not be another reset after the game goes to open beta, and I urge you to give the game a try.  Grinding Gear Games has been true to their core and has given us an experience in which you become the treasure hunter you’ve always wanted to be.

Game Previewed: TERA (Open Beta Weekend)
Release Date: May 1st, 2012
Developer: Bluehole Studio
Publisher: En Masse Entertainment 

On the official TERA website, you’ll find a list of things that En Masse and Bluehole…(snicker)…Studio hopes they’re going to be bringing to the genre battlefield of 2012, and they break down into a few key topics: more tactical and skill-based combat, gamepad support, and all the “other stuff” you’re already familiar with in other massively-multiplayer games. From where I’m sitting, I can agree with almost all of their statement. The problem is that TERA still stumbles into pitfalls that can be the bane of the MMO.

Let’s get to the good stuff first; after playing for quite a few hours over the course of this weekend, I’ve got plenty of praise for TERA. They really took every ounce of power they could from the Unreal engine, and as a result it looks absolutely stunning. Characters and gear are well detailed, and their motions seem very natural. When most games choose a more “realistic” art style for an MMO, I tend to get nervous. One reason that the timeless World of Warcraft is still a standard to compete against is because their cartoon-ish art style has still maintained its relevancy. If a company chooses to go realistic there are only three outcomes: It’s abso-ballsy-lutely terrible, it looks alright, or it’s just gorgeous.

En Masse Entertainment and Bluehole Studio have managed to do the latter…est. Latterest? Regardless, they made TERA look beautiful… too beautiful. It’s as if Aion was Mary and Tera is baby Jesus, shining with light cast down from the sun. Everything is perfect and wonderful, with unicorns and rainbows… until you go where the bad guys are. Killing monsters becomes that much more of a gritty experience, as the mood that TERA conveys by its scenery has gravity to it. When you’re in a bad place you know it, and not because there’s lava flowing about the scene and imps are throwing fireballs at you.

Horse Armor DLC anyone?

The combat you use to dispatch said baddies reminds one of Monster Hunter or Diablo: very streamlined with the slightest bit of lag. The one thing that gets me frustrated with most MMOs is the few milliseconds of lag that happen between pressing a button and seeing the action occur on the screen. It’s a tic stems from the vast amount of first-person shooters that I play, where I can click my mouse and something will happen right away. TERA manages to do just that, and it really lets a person get into the groove of combat. The game forces you to see combat as a series of actions and decisions, not just a directional list of numbers that you have to press in a particular order. TERA’s menagerie of monsters make certain motions before doing certain attacks in the same manner that Monster Hunter monsters do, forcing you to pay attention to your targets movements instead of his caster bar or your Deadly Boss Mods.

TERA is about visuals, not just in-character graphics and environment, but even in combat. A crit is more than just a big number, it’s a big number with blood splattered across it. Monsters and your allies alike cause huge flashes of light and color to appear, a veritable fireworks display every battle. When you kill a monster, experience flies toward you from its body in the form of glowing orbs. These things not only serve to make everything look pretty, but it gives the player a visual representation of gaining experience. If you are off adventuring with someone and want to make sure you are both far enough away to make the quest go by quickly, but also close enough to both gain credit for kills, it is as simple as watching those little orbs. Yes, you could look at the general chat and see if you got +x amount of experience…but with so many monsters to kill, who wants to do that?

Options are just one of the many ways that Bluehole is trying to set their flagship game apart. Just as everyone wants to be original in an MMO, everyone actually approaches the game differently. Who knows, maybe there’s someone out there that would rather look at the general chat for gained experience numbers: the beauty of TERA is that it lets them. You can play with either a keyboard/mouse combo or a gamepad, and it’s super-easy to drag the UI about, customizing it the way you want. Again, options.

There are a few things about TERA that didn’t quite enrapture me as well as the flashy bits and the combat. You might not care as much about these issues as I do, but they’re worth bringing up even if only to present my complete opinion.

To start with, there’s no add-on support to speak of, the game’s EULA forbidding client-side addons that “make the game easier” while their diction tends to lean toward “no addons at all”. This regulation is in stark contrast to one thing that has allowed resident juggernauts like Warcraft to continue to thrive: the support of the community. A good community can make a game last long past its expiration date, and also allows for innovation. I’m a guy that loves to spend an entire afternoon changing the look of Minecraft or my WoW UI, so this saddens me a great deal.

Armor Rating: +90000

Second, let’s talk about the characters: yes, the graphics are good, and the character models are very well animated…but you can tell that there is a serious lean in terms of who this game is marketed at, a certain emphasis on style over substance, or in the case of many female armor models, an emphasis on how little they can show before it’s hard to call it “armor” anymore. I may fall into that marketing demographic, but the High Elf Archer’s starting gear includes a pair of high heels… at least have some semblance of reality.

Beyond those two problems there is little to complain about in TERA. The community is fresh, and the channels are already full of gold spamming and trolls, as it should be. If you don’t like MMOs there is a good chance you won’t like TERA – even with all of their next-gen anti-traditional MMO stigma, it’s still just that: an MMO. The game has plenty of eye candy sans the little pedo-magnet race, features intuitive controls, and does a great job of making combat less boring. I for one will take the plunge and cast my hard-earned money into the bucket for at least six months. Let’s see what En Masse has to offer.

No lie, I’m super pumped. If you’ve already pre-purchased but you haven’t registered your account yet, that may be something you want to address. Do so right here.

Platforms: PC (Exclusive) Developer & Publisher: Hi-Rez (Digital Release) Release Date: April 12, 2012

 Push the Sandrakers Off Our World

At its core, the gameplay in Tribes: Ascend is fairly unchanged from previous iterations, and has only been refined further from its early beta state. You can still keep the spacebar held down to “ski” down hills, achieving ludicrous speeds. You can keep on jet-packing through the air, soaring across mountains and turrets in a strange sort of aerial death ballet. The refinements have come with just how fluid this experience feels: very few shooters have so finely nailed smooth movement at high speeds, and T:A pulls it off with such an enthusiastic “oomph” that it makes other shooters look even slower than they already are by comparison.

The interplay of “skiing -> jet-packing -> repeat” may be the way to move around, but the decent smattering of maps you’ll romp around in across five distinct gametypes can change up how often that dynamic works. Ascend launches with Team Deathmatch and Capture the Flag, still intact from the beta. They’ve also added a 5v5 Arena mode that takes place in several small, geometric arenas that really don’t allow for much in the way of skiing, along with a more modernized “capture points” approach. Gone is the Rabbit mode that I wasn’t terribly fond of in earlier iterations of the game, kept confined to a single custom server – maybe it will come back in some new-yet-familiar form. If it doesn’t, there’s still plenty of different ways to get your fill.

Each gametype uses a different set of maps for the most part, with a few major maps having slight layout changes or cosmetic differences depending on what gametype you’re playing in. Some are wholly exclusive to certain modes: you won’t find an Arena match taking place in the sprawling frozen wasteland of Katabatic, for example. The worlds of Tribes are enormous, with tons of valleys and paths for cranking up the speed, but they’re not so big that it feels like you can get lost in them. Plenty of landmarks are scattered throughout each killing field, and before long you’ll have your favorite paths lodged in your memory. Soaring down a hill only to jetpack up the next and blast an unsuspecting enemy with a shotgun blast is a feeling that I plainly don’t think can be replicated in any other shooter.

Ascend's classes fall into the same three armor classes as previous Tribes games, but their diversity is a huge bonus.

 [VGS]

Tribes: Ascend sets the stage with nine distinct classes, each falling into the standard “light/medium/heavy” armor classes. They’re all fairly specialized, with most having defensive or offensive preferences, but there are enough unlockable options within each potential inventory for a player to change up how their preferred class works. Each class has a bevy of different unlockable options to really set a player apart from their allies, but it’s not on the grandest scale imaginable. For example, you won’t see eight different Pathfinders with eight different primary weapons: only one or two options are available for each class as far as weapons are concerned, forcing players to focus in on one particular play-style while changing up minor things like their perks or equipment packs that offer class-based bonuses.

Each item in the game can also be upgraded a few times on its own via experience or “Tribes Gold”, the paid currency aspect of an otherwise gratuitously free-to-play shooter. While you’ll never have to buy this gold to upgrade your gear, it’s a much quicker path to 100% class completion than slowly grinding out match after match for precious XP. To be fair, a lot of the paid options in this seem to revolve around the idea of attaining what you want more quickly as opposed to items that shake up the balance of the game: gold can be spent on upgrades, “boosts” that double your XP gain for a specified amount of time, or cosmetic skins that are just now getting rolled out.

If a person had to pick something up in the form of a paid option, the boosts are really the way to go – purchasing anything from within the game will bump your account up to VIP status, and in addition to the plethora of bonus XP you’ll gain from the boost itself, you gain a little bit more every time due to that fancy moniker. It’s a nice touch that goes a long way towards making your microtransaction feel like it’s worth the investment.

While the maps themselves are vast, your HUD will always display key objectives so you never feel like you're wandering about aimlessly...unless you actually are.

Go Fast or Go Home

It’s hard to pin down what exactly makes the actual gameplay in Tribes feel so alive. Whether it’s the subtle twists on established game type formulas, like the introduction of flags into the depressingly unchanged TDM trope, or the sheer exhilaration that comes from headshotting some poor fool with a crossbow at 215 Sanics (the hidden measurement of speed, activated by typing in “GOTTAGOFAST” in the Secret Code menu), it’s just plain refreshing to see a shooter that isn’t bogged down by the grip of reality. Ascend is absurd in the best way, enjoying every high-speed chase and catastrophic explosion that it whips up, until the player can’t help but laugh along with it. It’s safe to say that this game just would not work in any sort of realistic backdrop, and I think that’s for the best.

There are a few minor things that I could nag about that don’t quite live up to expectations. There’s no voice communication to speak of, opting instead for the “Voice Game System”, a series of short statements to convey just about any possible situation within a match. It’s no different from what you see in other shooters, maybe a little more expansive in its options, but the small selection of voice-overs used to express these statements start to wear thin the more they’re used. As you might expect, this can lead to some rather enthusiastic spamming of certain phrases. One 15-minute match in particular stands out when the top left of my screen was nothing but a sea of people calling out “Shazbot!”, a singular word synonymous with the series itself.

Occasionally, there will be some hiccups with the servers to speak of, and when they happen you’ll be able to enjoy a minute or so of not really getting to do anything of note. These issues aren’t nearly as prevalent as they could be and only a few have happened in the many games I’ve played, but the world takes on a slightly more frustrating hue when you’re forced to watch your disc grenades repeatedly traverse the same stretch of ground before exploding in your face.

Tribes: Ascend feels like an old-school shooter in a brand new suit. It has all the thrills and speed inherent with the “shooters of yore” while adapting to an easy-to-approach freemium model, and while there is that fairly stiff learning curve I mentioned at the start, it should in no way be a barrier that keeps you from enjoying one of the most insidiously enjoyable shooters since Team Fortress 2. The war between the Blood Eagles and the Diamond Sword is just starting to get exciting, and we’re in the beginning days of a shooter that I hope sees countless battles in the months and years to come.

You can start playing Tribes right this second by signing up on their website. You should definitely do that.

The latest content update is entitled “Where Shadows Lie” and from the sounds of things it’s more of a story conclusion to many of the plot threads that have been building up since the Going Rogue expansion began. Heroes of the world will be able to reunite to finish the Praetorian War against Emperor Cole, who in all likelihood has some nasty tricks up his sleeve. There’s also a new zone, “Night Ward” for mid-level players (30-35) and what I can only assume is a raid of sorts in the “Magisterium Incarnate Trial”…boy, that’s a mouthful.

In addition to the bigger actual “content” things coming to CoH, there’s a flurry of extra stuff you would normally expect in a big content update like this – new mobs, armor, a bunch of VIP content including new quest chains, costume sets and a “Hybrid Incarnate” specialization tree for level-capped folks. Other things slated for this patch are more “quality of life” implementations: look forward to a portal system so people don’t have to rely on those damn heliplanes all the time, as well as a server-wide LFG channel and the ability to join Super Groups at any point you want.

I might have to pop back to Professor Beaksmith, my hulking blue-toned basher with an afro and a sweet beak mask. There’s no official release on this yet, but I imagine it’ll be fairly “soon”. We’ve got some pictures beyond the cut for you, if that sort of thing tickles your fancy.

This XBLA version might be up your alley if you loved what was in the original game and wanted just a bit more; it’s launching with a series of six “Tactical Trials” that, apart from not coming out for Steam, will allow people to be more tacti-cool with their assault approaches. It’s launching for 800 points, which seems like a good buy-in to me. If my Xbox wasn’t a useless, non-functional brick, I’d toss up a review for the port…but alas.

Give the demo a run-through, and if you’ve picked up the full game what do you think of it so far on the 360? Drop a line in the comments below. There’s an official “launch” trailer for the game just beyond the cut, if you like watchin’ fancy things explode.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QHhrCBIlZno

Dubbed the “Resurgence Pack” and due on April 11th for all three platforms (but only free until 2014, so act quickly, I guess), this flurry of extra “things” for the multiplayer side of the final step in the Mass Effect trilogy is adding a lot of things that…well, to be honest it’s a lot of things that people said they were going to add. We’re talking about new maps, character race/class combinations, weapons and the one-time consumables that populate your micro-transaction laden “Equipment Packs”.

To be a little more specific, the two “Firebases”, Hydra and Condor, are quarian and turian outposts that get blasted by bad guys. No word if they’re going to be locations directly from the main campaign a la every other multiplayer map, but I’d say it’s somewhat likely. You’ve also got three new weapons: an assault rifle, “harpoon gun”, and a Geth-produced SMG, and some extra new power-ups like “increased headshot damage” or “increased melee damage”…y’know, what you’ve come to expect from the Equipment Packs if you’ve been playing the multiplayer a bit.

The classes are the biggest draw here, with six new ones filling in some unexpected slots. You’ve got two Geth representatives (Infiltrator / Engineer), two Batarians (Soldier / Sentinel), a Krogan “Battlemaster”Vanguard and an Asari Adept. It’ll be nice to finally play in a 4-player Geth v Geth conflict, if I do say so myself.

Of humorous note is the fact that most of the words down in the image past the cut (which we pulled straight from BioWare’s blog, mind you) has a bunch of Word processor “unrecognized” words pop up.

Highlights include the original Witcher being on the Mac…today for real cheap, along with the “Enhanced Edition” (pseudo-expansion) coming to The Witcher 2 on PC “before April 17th”. Read on for more juicy news from today!

Geralt the Witcher makes his comeback

The titular Witcher, Geralt of Rivia, is getting a lot of exposure this year. To get things started, Mac users have access to the original game starting as of earlier today; this also means that the Steam version of the game is now a SteamPlay title, meaning if you’ve already bought it on PC – which is likely, you’ve got it on Mac now too. He’s also got an iOS comic coming out for free, tailored specifically to the iPad. The story will focus on “a perilous situation where the reknowned monster hunter may finally meet his match”. Also, “werecats”. We need some concept art of those, stat.

PC users aren’t left out in this front, however. They’re getting the big update that CD Projekt RED is calling the “Enhanced Edition” of Witcher 2 on April 17th, but the twist is that people will start pre-loading it on the 11th. If you’ve already purchased the game, you may be interested to hear that you’re getting another back-up copy through GoG.com that same day, courtesy of CD Projekt. Pretty nifty!

I’m excited to see how much bigger The Witcher 2 feels with the Enhanced Edition content – it was already an enormous game at launch.

GoG.com gets bigger, more current games join its forces

CD Projekt’s service for revitalizing old “classic” titles has long been just that, but now it seems like they’re taking a step forward in history as well. Ubisoft’s taking the plunge here, with “Premium Editions” of both the original Assassin’s Creed and Heroes of Might & Magic V (with both expansions to boot) coming to the site. Expect soundtracks, artwork, extra videos…you know, what we’ve come to expect from a Good Ol’ Games release. Are they still officially called that nowadays? I’m not sure.

In addition to that, a brand new game from the creators of Machinarium, entitled Botanicula, is available for pre-order on the site right now. It’s another point and click game, pre-orderable for a seriously low $8.99 until April 19th. It looks like a really interesting game and I’m gettin’ in on the ground floor with it, unlike my rather late-to-the-party discovery of their previous title.

A Post-Apocalyptic Giveaway

Perhaps the most exciting bit of news, and probably one you’ve already heard, is that the classic Fallout is free for the next 48 hours on GoG. Go! Now! Seriously, get it while you can, the servers have been up and down a few times.

That’s all the major stuff from the spring conference; I think I’ll have to sit down with Botanicula and toss up a review for that, but in the meantime, there’s a vault to save.

Dylan Sabin is Toastervision’s Editor-in-Chief and has often been described as “manic”, “slightly eccentric”, and “a fan of fine cheese”. He decided to give the site-running business a chance with Toastervision, and so far it’s been a pretty rad experience. He can be reached at dylan@toastervision.com or on Twitter @DylanSabin.