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Sid Meier’s Civilization 5 Coming Soon to PC

Civilization from the renowned strategy and simulation game developer Sid Meier has long been one of the strongest titles in the PC games market. After several incarnations, Civ 5 is now coming out for the PC as the title once again seeks to improve on its past and offer players a brand new way to engage the game via their computers. In the past, the Civ franchise has branched off into several different variations of the original game and sought to appeal to console gamers with Civilization Revolution which offered a style of fast paced game play that divided players into 2 camps: those who loved Civ Rev and were pleased with its slimmed down system or those who hated the loss of depth that the console title was said to have. Reviewers have now gotten to have hands on interaction with the new title and they are reporting that they find it to appeal to the grand, epic nature of the original titles and still bring together the smoother, quicker style of play that made the console title easier for many to get into.

According to reviewer consensus, Civ 5 will still take between 8 and 12 hours to play through from start to finish so those gamers who had craved a long game experience will be able to have that, but a lot of tedious elements have been eliminated say fans. This means that the game will focus more tightly on realistic action than on the more murky simulation side. Fans are likely to be divided by the changes, but this is par for the course when dealing with a classic same game industry observers.

Streaming MLB Baseball Games Coming to Playstation

Fans of pro sports have long turned to video game consoles to get their off season fix in the form of many wildly popular titles that cater to sports fans, but Sony’s Playstation 3 is looking to add a bit more depth and interactivity to the package by offering a unique feature: streamed games from the Major League Baseball’s live games that will enable players to watch the games unfold over their consoles. Players will be able to get signed up at the official MLB TV site so that they can watch what are known as ‘out of market’ ball games, meaning games which are not shown to players in certain regions. The MLB tends to focus its broadcasts towards those in areas near the teams they are broadcasting and since so many players are fans of teams they either do not live buy or cannot afford tickets or time to go see, this is seen as a premiere solution for fans from Sony. The digital distribution package will definitely give fans an easy way to watch their games over the internet without being limited to a computer screen that is often smaller than their TV set.

Sony intends to leverage this victory as it continues to work to be seen by consumers as a source for digital entertainment that could well replace the modern PC in US and Japanese homes for those who are focusing their web surfing on mobile smart phones that have become an increasing part of both Western and Eastern hi tech life styles. The goal Sony has in mind is to bring families back to the living room together to enjoy more group oriented entertainments as a whole instead of being relegated to individual PCs in seperate rooms.

11th Installment of Madden Series to Be Cutting Edge

One of the most popular sports titles ever to hit a console system has been the Madden series of NFL style football games which have developed an enormous following for fans of the genre. Each year the games try to up the ante and fine tune the play experience to give gamers an even better, more realistic or more entertaining experience – depending upon the goals of that release. This year, the focus is on speeding up the action so that the games will play more quickly than they did with the 10th installment of the series. The developers are looking to reduce the standard game time of nearly an hour from Madden 10 down to only half an hour for Madden 11. Publisher Electronic Arts’ EA Sports division is in charge of the release and has made the decision that designers can totally alter the play calling system so that coordinators for both defense and offense will give players advice on what sort of play they could execute to gain an edge over the competition on the field.

Using the patented GameFlow system unique to the Madden series, the game will be able to leverage the built in AI to reduce play time by half since the computer will show players which plays would make the most sense in their given circumstances and eliminate the need for having to decide which play would work. This is a boon for gamers who are not strategy oriented or who lack an in depth knowledge of NFL play books.