Everyone has a fighting chance
Gearbox is teasing what appears to be Borderlands 3 that will happen on March 28th during PAX East. It’s “teasing” in the same way that being hit over the head with a bat is “gentle”, leaving little room for doubt that Borderlands 3 is precisely what we’ll hear more about during its presser on March 28th at 11:00 am Pacific / 2:00 pm Eastern.
A few days ago, longtime San Antonio, Texas FGC member (and a personal friend of mine) Anthony Dwayne Garcia was found unresponsive in his room by his parents. He has suffered a severe stroke, placing him into the ICU — where he unfortunately has not yet woken up. To make matters worse, Anthony is currently uninsured, which will place tremendous financial strife on him and his family.
The fighting game community has risen to the aid of their fellow community member in his literal fight for his life: to start, the San Antonio FGC has come together to try to raise funds for Anthony and his family this month. A GoFundMe page has been set up by his friend Adam Aldana; so far about $1,500 has been contributed to help with medical costs, but the goal is still a long way away. In addition to this, at San Antonio’s upcoming tournament event River City Rushdown, which will be taking place March 30, 2019, all venue, pot, and raffle ticket fees will be donated to Anthony’s family at the end of the event.
Anthony’s friends ask that even if you can’t offer financial assistance to his cause, please at least spread the word by sharing the news on social media platforms, and show how the FGC is a family for one another in times of need. Any help at all is of the upmost importance to save Anthony’s life.
Sources: GoFundMe, River City Rushdown (Facebook event page)
Bandai Namco have officially announced the 2019 TEKKEN WORLD TOUR today with a new trailer — and some information on what will be different for this season. Expect to see some new locations as Tekken 7 competition explodes at over more than 25 tournament stops this year!
Competition will be divided into a number of different categories this year, including an all-new category for 2019:
Master+: TEKKEN World Tour’s max value tournament category will be held exclusively at the Evolution Championship Series (Evo) in Las Vegas from August 2-4, 2019 at the Mandalay Bay Resort. The Master+ tournament will award Ranking Points to players placing 1st through 49th place.
Master: Offering high-level points for top-tier competitive players throughout the world, these tournaments are the pillars from which TEKKEN World Tour will be built for 2019. Master tournament events are expected to draw international competition and will award Ranking Points to players placing 1st through 25th place.
Challenger: These regional tournaments focus on offering Ranking Point earning opportunities to locations not served by Master tournaments. Challenger tournaments award Ranking Points to players placing 1st through 13th place.
Dojo: Brand new for TEKKEN World Tour 2019 are Dojo tournaments. In an effort to promote competitive participation to TEKKEN 7 players at a more local and grassroots level, TEKKEN World Tour is establishing this new opt-in tournament category. Dojo tournaments will enable tournament organizers from around the world to apply for their tournaments to be awarded TEKKEN World Tour Ranking Points. The Ranking Points available at Dojo tournaments will scale based on tournament size. This opt-in system creates opportunities for players to compete for Ranking Points outside of Master and Challenger class events. All Dojo tournament applicants must use the TEKKEN World Tour opt-in system on smash.gg and register their tournament for consideration. Depending on the bracket size, Dojo tournaments can award Ranking Points to players placing 1st through 9th place.
Points earned at TEKKEN World Tour tournaments are awarded according to a player’s tournament placements. Each placement at a TEKKEN World Tour tournament, from Master+ to Dojo, is worth a different number of Ranking Points. Players’ point aggregation will be taken from their best three results from Master+ or Master events, best three results from Challenger events, and best four results from Dojo events. At the end of the year, the top 19 players awarded the most TEKKEN World Tour Ranking Points will be invited to compete at the TEKKEN World Tour Finals. Travel and lodging considerations for invited players will be covered by TEKKEN World Tour. The TEKKEN World Tour leaderboard will be viewable on www.tekkenworldtour.com and via the TEKKEN World Tour’s league page on smash.gg.
From the official press release:
TEKKEN World Tour 2019 kicks off on April 20th, at MIXUP in Lyon, France then continues throughout the year with additional North American based stops in Georgia, New Jersey, Texas, Illinois, Florida, Washington, California, and Toronto, Canada. International tour stops will include Japan, Malaysia, South Korea, Australia, Dubai, United Kingdom, Germany, Poland, Italy, Argentina, Peru, South Africa, and more. The TEKKEN World Tour Finals will make its return to Asia in 2019 when the world’s best TEKKEN 7 players converge upon Bangkok, Thailand to determine who is the true “King of the Iron Fist Tournament” – more information will be shared at a later date. Prospective competitors can register to compete through each regional event’s registration page to begin their fight to the top of TEKKEN World Tour’s leaderboard.
“Now entering its third season, TEKKEN World Tour for 2019 is going to be bigger, reach more players with its innovative Dojo tournaments, and generate more excitement than ever!” said Eric Hartness, Vice President of Marketing at BANDAI NAMCO Entertainment America Inc. “Every year, the TEKKEN World Tour has set the stage for some of the most dramatic stories to come out of the esports world and we look forward to entertaining the millions of fighting game fans around the globe with another great season of high-level competitive TEKKEN 7 play!”
“Fighting games represent the roots of esports, the early days of fans gathering in arcades and living rooms and making competitive gaming a shared community viewing experience,” said Richard Thiher, Product Manager at Twitch. “As the premier destination for esports, we are proud to carry on that tradition by bringing fans together from all around the world to watch, chat, and experience the best plays TEKKEN 7 has to offer.”
Source: Bandai Namco Entertainment [press release]
Mistover is an upcoming hardcore RPG from the same developers behind both TERA and PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds. Mistover is considered a “deep, strategic RPG” with tons of replayability and a procedurally generated dungeon system to keep the game fresh every time. The game is something of a “cross between the mechanics of Darkest Dungeon with the thrilling dungeon crawling experiences found in Etrian Odyssey”.
Niantic has finally revealed the first information about its upcoming augmented reality game, Harry Potter: Wizards Unite. Players will be able to travel the Wizarding World in the “real world” along with millions of other players. Familiar characters from the movies, books and Fantastic Beasts films and content from each are all part of Harry Potter: Wizards Unite.
Standing Stone has brought both Lord of the Rings Online and Dungeons & Dragons Online servers back to life after more than three days of downtime. The downtime came as a result of persistent issues encountered with a datacenter move. As a result of the downtime, however, developers have some good news for players in the form of XP gains for the next several days and that a package of compensatory goodies is being prepared for players of both games.
UDON Entertainment has announced a five-part one-shot comic book series for the Street Fighter franchise in 2019; headlining the releases is Street Fighter: Menat #1, which focuses on the title character seeking justice for the death of her master — and can only find retribution through M. Bison. This original story is written by the longtime comic writer, Ken Siu-Chong and is drawn by Hanzo Steinbach, who is known for Ultra Street Fighter II #1 and the Street Fighter vs. Darkstalkers series. Street Fighter: Menat #1 releases on March 27, 2019, and will retail for $3.99 USD.
The next issue in the one-shot series is Street Fighter: Wrestlepalooza #1 and features the grappling big shots Alex and Mayor Mike Haggar as they fight to put an end to the Mad Gear gang. Ken Siu-Chong also writes this comic, and is accompanied by French artist Panzer. Street Fighter: Wrestlepalooza #1 releases on April 24, 2019, also for $3.99 USD.
The third entry in the one-shot series is a Free Comic Book Day exclusive! Street Fighter: Sakura vs. Karin #1 releases on May 4, 2019, and is a Silver Sponsor for the event. Don’t miss the epic match-up between the two high school rivals that blends traditional Street Fighter action and esports at their arcade battlefield.
You can pre-order the first two comics at FocusAttack using the links below — or ask for them at your own local comic shop! Be sure to snag your copy fast so you don’t miss out on the alternate covers!
Be sure to keep checking UDON’s official page for more information about the remaining one-shot stories. Two more tales remain!
Source: UDON Entertainment
After being announced back in September at the Tokyo Game Show and following location tests in Tokyo, Nagoya, Osaka, and Fukuoka, Street Fighter V: Type Arcade — the physical arcade port of Street Fighter V: Arcade Edition, running on Taitio’s Viewlix cabinets and utilizing the NESICAxLive System — will finally be released for Japanese arcades on Thursday, March 14th.
In addition to some HUD changes that see player names, titles, and rankings found above the health bar (as opposed to below, on console), the most notable difference is the implementation of a new Ranking System, exclusive to the port. Instead of utilizing the League Point system that can be currently found on the home versions, Type Arcade will make use of both Battle Points and Player Points, which should allow a user’s individual progress, tracked by a NESICA card. The official announcement trailer is below.
With Final Round 2019 also around the corner, could we see Capcom finally break their silence and unveil some new Season 4 characters to coincide with this new release? Back in the Street Fighter IV cycle we saw Yun and Yang join the SFIV cast alongside the release of Super Street Fighter IV: Arcade Edition — and Evil Ryu and Oni further bolstered the roster as time-release characters — so there’s certainly a precedent in place for Capcom to potentially have surprises to roll out for console/PC alongside the arcade version. In the meantime, you can visit the official Street Fighter V: Type Arcade website for more information.
Source: taitochannel (YouTube)
For the third day in a row, Lord of the Rings Online and Dungeons & Dragons Online remain down after issues cropped up at the data center. Over the last couple of days, developers have hopefully sent out notification that “progress is being made” but have also continued to extend downtime. The latest estimate for servers to come back online is 11:00 am Pacific / 2:00 pm Eastern today.
Warhammer Vermintide 2 is turning one year old and developer Fatshark is celebrating by inviting fans to a free play weekend on Steam. In addition, those who choose to purchase the game will find a sweet 60% off discount price of just $12 and a limited-time level that will only be available for the next ten days.