Tech Olive

Finally deemed worthy of receiving the PC port of Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood, PC gamers can now pre-order Brotherhood through Steam, to ensure you’ve got your hands on it as soon as it releases on March 17th. By pre-ordering, you will automatically be upgraded to the “Digital Deluxe Edition”. What does the Digital Deluxe Edition include? I’m glad you asked:

• 2 Exclusive Single-Player Maps: The Trajan Market & The Aqueduct
• 2 Multiplayer Characters:
  • The Officer – Death’s Finest Ally: Few have seen him. Even fewer have lived to tell about it. Fear is his friend, and Death is his ally.
  • The Harlequin – The Walking Nightmare: Behind the gaudy costume and twisted smile lies the soul of a merciless Assassin.
• 1 Ezio Skin – Helmschmied Drachen Armor: Fashioned by the Helmschmied Armory in 1489, only a few sets were completed due to the weight of the metal. Very few men proved strong enough to wear it.
• The Original Codex Written by Altaïr: Take a closer look at the history of the Assassins and art of Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood.
• Multiplayer Characters Collectible Trading Cards: A set of trading cards featuring all the characters of Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood Multiplayer, including their kill moves and biographies.
• Map of Rome
• Assassin’s Creed Lineage – The Complete Movie: Explore the events that revolve around Ezio’s father, Giovanni Auditore da Firenze, and gain insight on the Assassin’s Creed story and universe.
• Making-Of Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood – Behind the Brotherhood: Go behind the scenes with the development team to learn about how the game was made and Ezio’s continuing story.
• Game Soundtrack: 22 songs from the original game soundtrack by Jesper Kyd.
  Digital Premium Edition content is only available via download

Despite the series’ dominance on the western setting, it seems developer Techland has grown tired of the old wild west, and have decided to spice things up by Modern Warfareing their Call of Juarez series up. Ubisoft released word that the next game would be titled Call of Juarez The Cartel, and would be taking place in modern-day Los Angeles, California and Juarez, Mexico.The game’s expected release window is currently Summer 2011.

“Call of Juarez The Cartel is an action-packed shooter game with a strong story, interesting characters and a wide variety of gameplay options,” said Adam Novickas, director of marketing at Ubisoft. “The game will bring the best elements of the Wild West into modern times with a very gritty and relevant plot.”

We’re unconvinced.

[Press Release]

In honor of the semi-official gamer’s holiday, Winter-Een-Mas, Ubisoft is offering 30% off their downloadable PC titles (excluding pre-orders). The discount lasts until midnight (PST) on the 31st, so head over to their online store and grab yourself some good deals.

Happy Winter-Een-Mas 2011!

The Bargain Bin is a weekly feature that helps out gamers in this tough economy. How does it help? Once a week, it offers a great and cheap game ($10 or less) to keep you going until your next paycheck.

Since the classic days of coin-operated machines at your local arcade, 2D side-scrolling shoot-em-ups have been struggling to find their place in mainstream gaming. As such, it’s been even harder for fans of the genre to get their fix. Today, the Bargain Bin aims to help ease some of that laborious searching.

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For a short time only, the Games for Windows Marketplace is offering Deus Ex: Game of the Year at 90% off, making it only $0.99! As one of the classics from a decade past, this is the best chance you’ll get to jump into the Deus Ex series before the third game, Deus Ex: Human Revolution, releases in “early 2011.” Head over to the GFW Marketplace to take advantage of the deal.

via [Eidos Twitter]

If you were hoping to play Ubisoft‘s upcoming Driver: San Francisco and Ghost Recon Future Soldier by early next year, it looks like you’ll have to wait a little longer — maybe even much longer. Ubisoft mentioned in their massive 25-page financial press release that both games will be pushed into Ubisoft’s 2012 fiscal year (seen on page 13). This means that both games are now expected to release sometime between April 1st, 2011 and March 31st, 2012. Ubisoft did not say why both of these titles were delayed.

[Press Release PDF via Joystiq]

The Bargain Bin is a weekly feature that helps out gamers in the tough economy. How does it help? Once a week, it offers a great and cheap game ($10 or less) to keep you going until your next paycheck.

From the game’s description: “Congratulations, you’ve just been cast in your first slasher movie! You’ve been given your big break by the notorious Director X. His methods have produced some of the finest grindhouse films ever committed to celluloid.” Sound interesting?

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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)]

Far Cry 2 was not only the first game that I reviewed here on Tech Olive, but it was also my very first article on these holy pages (Fun Fact: This also marks my 1,000th post for Tech Olive). Since then, I had felt the need to go back and write a proper review for the game. Well, here we are, two years later to the day and it’s time to revisit and rewrite that review with all the experience points knowledge I have gained over the past two years of writing for Tech Olive. As luck would have it, this also marks the first time I’ve sat down and played the game since that review. Without further introduction, let the show begin.

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There have been several reports that Ubisoft’s fighter jet sim Tom Clancy’s H.A.W.X. 2 has been delayed yet again to mid-November. Many readers on the game’s official forum have said that they’ve received emails from Ubisoft stating that the PC release date as been pushed back to November 16th. Further proof can be seen on the game’s Steam page, which has H.A.W.X. 2 slated for simply a “Fall 2010″ release, instead of the September 30th date that once was displayed.

No official word from Ubisoft yet, but it’s only a matter of time before they address this head-scratching situation.

via [Big Download]