Tech Olive

As we were informed earlier this week, the Black Ops launch trailer aired during the Steelers vs. Saints NFL game. The trailer features one minute of mostly new footage set to a very nice mood-setting song by none other than the Stones, and even gives us a quick glimpse of President John F. Kennedy, but enough about the trailer, check it out for yourself after the break.

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The past week’s best news and featured content you might have missed, as well as a preview of the week ahead…

Review: Fallout: New Vegas
- Throwing you straight into the action, Fallout: New Vegas starts with you (a courier) being held up, shot in the head, and buried alive. After getting exhumed by a robot companion and revived by the town doctor, you begin the character creation process. The remainder of the core story is driven by your need to retrieve your stolen package and exact revenge; a journey that sees you traveling across the Nevada wastes, growing closer to New Vegas’ light pollution on the horizon.

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Information has leaked that EuroGamer will be posting an exclusive feature on the next Hitman game in their upcoming December issue. Even better for us, a lucky poster over at GameReactor claims to have gotten some of the juicy details a month early, and they sound pretty good.

Set to be titled simply Hitman, the fifth installment of the series is set to be a reboot with a much larger focus on the story, even branching off onto other (playable!) assassins. Hitman will feature both the huge and open-ended assassination missions we’ve all learned to love, as well as linear shooting-and-cover based segments between contracts (presumably to aid the story progression). David Bateman, the voice behind 47 since the birth of the series, will be returning as the voice of 47. The only concerning nugget of info that released was that the game is “being developed alongside the second movie,” but there was nothing to suggest that it’s based off the movie, so we might be safe. To further prove its authenticity, this concept art was provided alongside the information. Though the art bares more than a striking resemblance to this Batman fan art.

So, don’t get too excited until we get the final information from EuroGamer‘s December issue.

via [GameReactor (Translated)]

I Could Eat is a feature that showcases a scrumptious snack or drink that we think other geeks and gamers “could eat” (in other words, would greatly enjoy). If you have any snacks or drinks that you think are worthy of an I Could Eat shout out, let us know!

Alright, I couldn’t actually eat Halloween (not for lack of effort) because it’s not an edible substance on its own, but it does go hand-in-hand with complete strangers giving you free candy all night. On a side note: my mother told me not to go hand-in-hand with strangers, even if they offer me candy, so Halloween is a very fine line that we must walk.

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In honor of Halloween, EA is cutting prices by half of four of its big-name titles. Mass Effect and Mass Effect 2 can both be had for $9.97 each, as well as Dead Space. Battlefield: Bad Company 2 is also on sale for $14.97.

[EA Store via Joystiq]

Remember LimeWire? Of course you do. It was the one P2P program that we all used before we knew any better. The long court battle with the RIAA and LimeWire has finally come to its conclusion. A U.S. federal judge has granted a request made by the RIAA to shut down the has-been file-sharing program. The New York District Court forced LimeWire to shut down in its entirety. So for now on, any LimeWire users who open the client will be greeted with a completely useless piece of software.

via [TorrentFreak]

Thanks, Patrick

It seems with free candy comes free games over at Telltale. For a limited time, you can get Sam and Max’s Night of the Raving Dead episode free in celebration of Halloween. To get the episode, head over to Telltale’s landing page, click “Download the Free Episode!” and go through the checkout process. If you don’t already have an account at Telltale’s online store, then you’ll need to make one, but that’s certainly a small price to pay.

Community manager Josh Olin announced that Black Ops’ launch trailer will premiere during this Sunday’s Steelers/Saints NFL game, as so many previous Call of Duty trailers have before. If you need to catch up on recent Black Ops footage or just waste some time until Sunday, then check out Gametrailers TV’s exclusive and Black Ops’ previous trailer.

With the mountains of free candy that skilled trick-or-treaters will no doubt accumulate this Halloween comes the need for equally awesome games to play while devouring said candy. While Steam isn’t giving away games to anyone that has the guts to ring their doorbell, they are sure making an impressive effort. Among the discounts are big-name titles like BioShock, Plants vs. Zombies, Ghostbusters, Dead Space and more! Head over to Steam’s sale page to see all the deals before they’re gone on November 1st.

We’ve heard many talks about how PC gaming is becoming less and less noticeable. Many devs are slowly turning away from the PC. For example, we all know Infinity Ward’s deal with Modern Warfare 2 for the PC. Rockstar made a pretty crappy PC port of GTA IV and never brought Red Dead Redemption to the PC. Just recently, EA decided to leave out PCs from the NFS: Hot Pursuit demo.

However, according to the lead creator of the BioShock series, Ken Levine, PCs play an important factor in gaming.

“The PC will always be the place that drives innovation. The PC is the place where great game developers are born, even—and maybe especially—where great console game developers are born. Halo, Mass Effect, Call of Duty…PC developers first. And it’s on the PC where the leading-edge ideas form…”

As for the future of PC gaming, Levine says there’s no way of knowing, but…..

“If you want to know the future of gaming, buy a PC. And pay attention. Because above all, that thing on your desk is a crystal ball.”

For the full article by Levine, head on over to Kotaku.