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  • Tomb Raider: Lara Croft Reboot New Details Revealed

    // Gradly // blog, Games, News, Poster, Rants & Raves, Wallpaper No Responses

    An internet scan of Spanish gaming magazine Hobby has potentially revealed some interesting details about the next Tomb Raider game. As reported by G4tv via neogaf, the game is a reboot of the series and features a younger, grungier Lara Croft, but according to the info in Hobby, Croft’s latest outing is going to be downright gnarly, with pain and injury to the iconic character as a big part of the game.

    Here’s a translation of how the magazine describes the start of the game:

    “Lara wakes up tied up and hanging upside down in a dark cave, having no idea about how she got to that situation. The first thing is getting out of there. The solution to this task already shows the new spirit of this game: to release her from her captivity: we have to hurt Lara. Making her swing, we have to make her approach a torch to put her on fire. That way, her ties will burn and she will be released, but at the same time she gets burn as well. You see: you have to make her have a bad time to get out of the situation. But the problems haven’t ended. Just after getting released, Lara falls over a bar of iron which punctures her in her side. With the face deformed by the pain, the young girl has to put it out rudely. We help her pressing a button as quickly as possible, in one of the common activities in this game: quick time events. While we are looking for an exit to the game we find an intriguing altar…”

    On a gameplay level, Tomb Raider will feature a semi-open world, where exploration is encouraged, although, according to the game’s developers, this isn’t Grand Theft Auto, so it sounds like it won’t be a totally open world. Lara will gradually gain abilities and weapons as she progresses, going from a relatively green youngin to a more experienced adventurer throughout the game.

    Tomb Raider will take a page from Batman: Arkham Asylum in that it will give you an investigative view. By pressing a button you’ll activate a view which will put a different color on “interesting” elements in the environment: the background and non relevant objects will be shown in shades of grey and the clues in yellow.

    So what do you guys think: Are you excited for the Tomb Raider reboot?

  • EA Acquires Firemint

    // Gradly // blog, Games, iPad, iPhone, News No Responses

    Indie Studio Firemint, the Australian company that has produced iPhone and iPad gaming hits like “Flight Control” and “Real Racing,” which have 4.5 million and about 2 million downloads in the App Store, is about to be acquired by the game giant within the next four weeks. EA announced that they’ll likely close the deal soon, giving no financial details regarding the acquisition.

    “The Firemint team is remarkable for its critical and commercial success,” said Barry Cottle, Executive Vice President and General Manger of EA Interactive. “Having them as part of EAi will accelerate our position as worldwide leader in game development for mobile devices and online gaming platforms.”

    The agreement follows EA’s recent acquisition of Mobile Post Production Inc. (MPP), the worldwide leader in high quality cross-platform development and porting of games for smartphones.

    Late last month, Firemint released an HD version of “Real Racing 2,” which allows users with the iPad 2 to hook up the device to a 1080p HDTV. Users can disconnect without interuppting the game, Firemint said.

  • Can iPad Recreate The Magic of Microsoft Courier Using Taposé?

    // Gradly // Apple, blog, Gadgets, iPad, Microsoft, Rants & Raves No Responses

    We all remember Microsoft Courier, the highly anticipated but ultimately cancelled dual-screen tablet. Here is what GIZMODO had to say about the device:

    Courier is a real device, and we’ve heard that it’s in the “late prototype” stage of development. It’s not a tablet, it’s a booklet. The dual 7-inch (or so) screens are multitouch, and designed for writing, flicking and drawing with a stylus, in addition to fingers. They’re connected by a hinge that holds a single iPhone-esque home button. Statuses, like wireless signal and battery life, are displayed along the rim of one of the screens. On the back cover is a camera, and it might charge through an inductive pad, like the Palm Touchstone charging dock for Pre.

    Despite the fact that the Courier video about was little more than a tech demo, it turned heads like few other announcements in tech history. Part journal, part “digital scrapbook”, the Courier concept was everything Microsoft is least known for: enigmatic, magical, startlingly intuitive, strikingly beautiful.

    Part of what made Courier so exciting was how open-ended and freeform it was: it envisioned a future in which information is gathered, scattered, circled, captioned and written by hand, then tossed between the margins with (I imagine) a sort of da-Vinci-meets-Evernote bliss. It’s no surprise that, to many of us, Courier’s “death”—its entire existence a vaporware dream—was one of the sadder days in this industry.

    But now, some measure of the “little notebook that could” is coming back. A Kickstarter project called Taposé aims to bring Courier-like functionality (including split views, drag-and-drop mapping and organizing, and the infamous “Middle Bar”) to the iPad. It’s too soon to tell exactly what features will be included, and of course, the Courier was designed for use with a pen, but the Taposé project has already received nearly $15,000 in funding, with another 19 days to go. That means the project is legitimate, it’s got capital, and it’s really happening!

    Head on over to Taposé to see more about what went into the elaborate re-imagining of what’s considered by many to be Microsoft’s best idea to date. Could our iPads recreate some of that magic?

    [via appadvice]

  • Apple Introduces New Quad-Core iMacs

    // Gradly // Apple, blog, News, Tech. 2 Responses

    The online Apple Store has just came back, new iMacs rolled out. As speculated, the latest refresh to Apple’s all-in-one desktop computer brings second generation quad-core Intel Sandy Bridge series of Core i processors, and the new Thunderbolt I/O port, along with a number of other enhancements.

    Here are the detailed specs for each base configuration:

    • 21.5-inch, 2.5 GHz Intel Core i5, 4 GB RAM, 500 GB 7200 RPM HD, AMD Radeon HD 6750M
    • 21.5-inch, 2.7 GHz Intel Core i5, 4 GB RAM, 1 TB 7200 RPM HD, AMD Radeon HD 6770M
    • 27-inch, 2.7 GHz Intel Core i5, 4 GB RAM, 1 TB 7200 RPM HD, AMD Radeon HD 6770M
    • 27-inch, 3.1 GHz Intel Core i5, 4 GB RAM, 1 TB 7200 RPM HD, AMD Radeon HD 6970M
    The new iMacs also all incorporate Thunderbolt ports, including two on all 27-inch models, and an SDXC card slot, in addition to one FireWire 800 port, four USB ports, a slot-loading dual-layer SuperDrive, audio in/out ports and an Ethernet connector. New iMacs are currently available in Apple’s online store.