Game Theory released a video a couple weeks ago and given Marc Laidlaw's recent Episode 3 fan fiction I thought it was well worth sharing. If you've played Half-Life or Half-Life 2 the G-Man is featured in the story and I'd argue is one of the main characters of Half-Life 2. Since G-Man isn't explained well in the games there are many theories online about who he is and the one Game Theory presents is a pretty compelling one. Since Marc Laidlaw is the only author of the Half-Life series answering questions right now someone asked him about Game Theory's G-Man theory and his response was pretty interesting.

I don't want to spoil anything so firstly I recommend you watch the Game Theory video above and then click the Twitter link below for Marc's answer. ALSO if you haven't already, read Marc's recent Episode 3 story(Epistle 3) because we all deserve closure.

https://mobile.twitter.com/marc_laidlaw/status/900986007746510848

Marc Laidlaw's Epistle 3:

http://cheerfulghost.com/jdodson/posts/3447/this-is-my-final-episode-former-valve-writer-marc-laidlaw-finishes-half-life-3

Half-Life 3 may never be released by Valve but former Valve writer Marc Laidlaw has posted some fan fiction that he is calling Epistle 3 that wraps things up. It's a short and very touching story of Gordon Freeman and Alyx Vance after the events of Half-Life Episode 2. Does it wrap up the story? Yep. Does it feel like a genuinely epic and proper ending to Half-Life 3? Absolutely. Does it answer every question and tie up every loose end? Nope.

Marc's site is getting crushed right now so check out a GitHub version below. Marc's version changed names and gender swapped the characters and this version fixes that:

https://github.com/Jackathan/MarcLaidlaw-Epistle3/blob/master/Epistle3_Corrected.md

Original story will be available when the Internet stops killing his website:

http://marclaidlaw.com/epistle-3/

Marc is talking on Twitter about why he wrote this and answering some questions about the G-Man specifically:

https://mobile.twitter.com/marc_laidlaw/status/900980779802439680

Reading Marc's story now a couple times through really gave me closure and the way he writes is so immersive it made me feel like I was back playing the game. Even if Valve never gets around to releasing Episode 3 this was the closure I needed.

A new video is out that shows the new abilities Samus can find in Metroid: Samus Returns. The new Aeon abilities such as scan pulse, lightning armor, beam burst and and phase drift are new to Samus Returns and are powered by a new Aeon energy meter. The trailer seems to imply that the new abilities are optionally available to find which might allow the game a more open ended path to navigate through. The original Gameboy version of Samus Returns is pretty linear and also very hard to navigate as there was no(that I remember) in game map system requiring you to resort to making your own OR finding one online. Samus Returns includes a modern in game Metroid map AND it looks like it might not be based on the original Metroid: Return of Samus game map. Samus Retruns seems to be, though i'm not entirely certain until I read a review or play it, a revisioning of the Gameboy title that changes up quite a few things including the classic map locations and bakes it up fresh for a modern audience that might not be familiar with the original game.

Metroid: Samus Returns comes to the Nintendo 3DS on September 15th.

PortsCenter with Ben Paddon is quickly becoming on of my favorite new YouTube shows about gaming. PortsCenter is essentially a review show but focuses on a particular game port and all the ports and history surrounding it. Sometimes the port is bad and sometimes it's good and in the case of the Super Nintendo SimCity port it's transcendent. In this episode Ben talks about that and how the SNES SimCity port was created by Nintendo under license from Maxis, something I didn't know before. I agree with Ben here as SimCity on Super Nintendo is the only version of classic SimCity I return to. I've never personally built a Megaopolis city as that's quite hard to do but i've gotten close just never quite hit 500,000 citizens.

After searching for the last couple months to find a used NES Classic I finally found one. After scouring the local retro scene and Craiglist I finally just lucked into picking one up from someone at work that no longer wanted it. It's in great condition as it wasn't used much and it was quite a bit of fun to play this evening. Looks like there is a lot of choices for buying a second controller as well as controller cord extensions that are not too expensive. I decided to buy two cord extensions so if I get a SNES Classic and the cords are too short I can use them with it.

One thing I hope to do is write up a quick review for each of the games on the NES Classic and now that I have one, we'll see how that works out. I've played many of the games on it but some I'll be flying in with a fresh perspective as some of the really early Nintendo games such as Ice Climber i've not played.

I'm really happy to have finally picked up a NES Classic and now I plan on focusing on finding the original box for it.

In 1992 Kirby's Dreamland hit Gameboy and the Nintendo puffball train hasn't stopped since. There is a new Kirby game coming to the Switch next year but until then we can pour one out for the little marshmallow that can eat... anything. One thing I didn't know as I was watching the 25 years of Kirby video above is how many Kirby puzzle games there are. It makes some sense as Kirby is a lovable puff-thing that you can put in any game to make it instantly more charming.

Brink didn't get great reviews when it launched or garner much praise but today it went free to play on Steam. If you are looking for a free multiplayer shooter to play that offers interesting character customization, parkour gameplay mechanics and a bit more... the price is right. If you want you can still pickup the games DLC but the base game is entirely free and right now there are quite a few people playing it on Steam so if you do try it out, you won't be the only one playing.

http://store.steampowered.com/app/22350/BRINK/

The US release Super Nintendo Classic trailer has gone up and this retro feast confirms many details that were in the Japanese Famicom Classic trailer. Live rewind & game borders are coming to the Super Nintendo Classic. Last night pre-orders went up on Amazon and Best Buy and sold out quickly. Many were happy to secure one but many were sleeping, including myself. Hopefully the rest of the pre-order sites go live today and there is a brief window where I can pick on up.

If you are interested in getting on I urge you to check the Nintendo page for retailers that have yet to go live with pre-orders like Walmart & Target:

https://www.nintendo.com/super-nes-classic

There is a brand new trailer out for the Super Famicom Classic that you need to watch. Firstly the trailer is incredibly charming even though I don't understand most of it. That said, it's still fun to watch and it's a bit sad to notice how many games we didn't get released in the states that look like fun. At the end of the trailer they go over some new features to the Super Famicom Classic that I imagine will be in the Super Nintendo Classic such as a setting to select different borders for games AND the ability to live rewind a game. There also appears to be some kind of feature where you can control Mario in the menu to select a game.

I hope when Nintendo said they'd release more Super Nintendo Classic units they meant it because I really want to get one and open it on Christmas. But you know... i'm not really counting on it.

Age of Empires IV was just announced at this years Gamescom with a brand new trailer. As a huge Age of Empires fan I'm really interested in this news and hope Microsoft can work amazingly well with Relic Studios(the developers creating Age of Empires IV) to make a game that fits in with the style of Age of Empires. The original Age of Empires featured early progression from very early tribes to bronze age and later early civilization level units. Age of Empires 2 started you in a later civilization stage to end up solidly in the Dark Ages / Castle age. Age of Empires 3 was set around the time that America was colonized roughly around the years 1492 to 1876 so my thinking is that Age of Empire IV will be set after that. Getting an Age of Empires that starts in the 1800's and ends up in the 90's, 2000's or later era seems really interesting to me. Traditionally Age of Empires has featured older civilizations but i'm interested in seeing a new take on modern RTS combat.

All that said, the details on Age IV are sparse to non existing so as more information drops i'll keep you updated.

https://www.ageofempires.com/news/age-of-empires-event-at-gamescom-live-wrap-up/

All The Definitive Editions!

Age of Empires Definitive Edition is coming which is a 4K HD revisioning of the original Age of Empires that should release at some unspecified date. In keeping the Age of Empires hype train rolling Microsoft released that they will also create Definitive Editions for Age of Empires 2 and Age of Empires 3.

"We started off announcing the release date for Age of Empires: Definitive Edition, October 19th, 2017! What a great way to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the original game! AoE: DE will launch with a ton of awesome new features, but we have kept a lot of things the same to preserve the feel of the original game. Take a look at the list:

• Attack Move


• 250-300 population cap​


• Rally Points Basic


• Rally Points Contextual (Intelligent Villagers)


• Grid default key layout​


• Select Idle Military


• Select Idle Villagers


• Unit queueing


• Right-click mouse scroll


• And MORE!

We then announced that we will be releasing Definitive Editions of both Age II and Age III, keep an eye out for more details about those!"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q3rDhoWcVgQ

I wonder how Age of Empires 2 Definitive stacks up to Age of Empires 2 HD? I thought Age of Empires 2 HD was an incredible rebuild of the game and it works great on Steam so i'm wondering what Microsoft is going to for the definitive edition? I suppose they could remake the graphics in 4K but i'm not sure Age of Empires 2 HD really needs that but then again, I love the original 2D graphics.

What are you looking for in Age of Empires IV and what do you think about Age 2 and 3 Definitive Editions?