North American broadcast 6am Pacific Nintendo has announced a worldwide Nintendo Direct broadcast for tomorrow, January 23. It will be a Wii U-focused affair, with president Satoru Iwata dropping knowledge on the future of their newest console. As always, it will be streamed live onNintendo’s website, with the Japanese broadcast set for 11pm Japan time, which means a morning broadcast for us.Europehas a time set for 2pm UK time, and Nintendo of America just updated us with a 6 a....

‘A year of celebration’ According to the Licensing Source Book Europe(which boasts about the $6 billion in franchise revenue to date), there will be a huge blowout 30th anniversary forSonicin 2021 that will function as a “year of celebration.” It will entail “new games, digital content, events, major announcements and a tailored licensing program.” Now, don’t get too excited. “New games” could mean “one new 3DSonicgame” and one or more mobile runners....

Old dog, new looks It’s 2016 and Ezio Auditore da Firenze is about to waltz back into our lives. He’s proverbially old —Assassin’s Creed IIcame out in 2009 — and literally old as we’ll see inRevelations. He’s looking better than we remember him, though. Makeovers traditionally aim to smooth any blemishes, but this one emphasizes every wrinkle and highlights every scar. Ubisoft released this comparison trailer forAssassin’s Creed: The Ezio Collection, a remastered take onAssassin’s Creed II,Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood, andAssassin’s Creed Revelationsfor current consoles....

Accompanying an incredibly shortteaser trailerfor theChaos Risingexpansion to Relic Entertainment’sWarhammer 40,000: Dawn of War IIis something slightly more useful: actual in-game screenshots. Oh joy! Further digging on that THQ site lead me to find two things out. First, the game has glorious box art which will undoubtedly cause you to cry out “blood for the blood god” into the night, so don’t even consider viewingChaos Rising‘s cover when in a public place....

How does Varric’s chest hair look on PC? The third installment in theDragon Agefranchise is finally here. If you’re like me, you are cautiously optimistic with this one after playingDragon Age II. I’m more of a tactical player, and felt that I was left in the dust last time around. I don’tmindthe action-oriented combat, but as a famous little girl once said, why not both? As Chris mentions in his review,Dragon Age: Inquisitiondoes a decent job mushing the two together....

Get version exclusive Pokemon inScarlet & Violet The newest Tera Raid Spotlight event is live inPokemon Scarlet & Violet, and this one deserves your attention. From February 3rdto February 5th, Armarouge and Ceruledge will appear more frequently asBlue Star Tera Raids. These can appear as either 4-Star or 5-Star encounters and will sport any Tera Type in the game. Unlike past raid challenges, it appears there are no preferred Tera Types that will appear over others....

One less press conference to set my alarm for at least It has been announced that Sony Computer Entertainment and the PlayStation brand will not be at next year’s E3 expo, marking the first time in its 24-year history that the giant has no-showed the exhibition. Speaking toGame Informer, Sony laid out the thinking behind the decision. “As the industry evolves, Sony Interactive Entertainment continues to look for inventive opportunities to engage the community,” said a statement....

Oh, I’ve been to Prague Well, I haven’t “been to Prague” been to Prague, but I have watched this 17-minuteDeus Ex: Mankind Dividedvideo. The Czech town serves as the game’s hub as Adam Jensen runs around the City 17-like dystopia. As the developer-guided demo notes, you can either get excited — all uptight and violent — or opt for more pacifist ideals like electrocuting guards to definitely-not-death. Square Enix is hitting theDeus Excampaign trail hard today, surely eager to capture everyone’s attention before E3 next week....

Twinsanity This week, retro publisher Hamster added yet another old-school shmup to its expansive Arcade Archives range, as Tecmo’sGemini Wingis now available to download on PS4 and Nintendo Switch. Released in arcades in 1987, before seeing huge success with a series of home computer ports,Gemini Wingis a vertically scrolling shmup which pits one or two players against armies of strange fantasy enemies, including scaly cycloptic serpents, weird tentacled skulls and giant Venus flytraps....

Flagpole in the face! Will Christiansen is a professional animator who worked onHalo 4, specifically focusing on the Assassination animations based onhis show reel.Halo 4on a whole is anamazing technical feat, so I love this more individualized look at the game. The animations look great as it is when you’re playing, but you really can’t but help to appreciate it even more so when we get a focused look. Will also has a demo reel of his work fromHalo: Reach,and seeing the two side-by-side shows you how much Will’s work has improved in just a few years....

Giant monsters, go Like clockwork, a new expansion has rotated intoMagic: Arenawhile everything else currently in standard is still in play. Ikoria is now live inMagic: Arenaand in paper form in Asia, with the worldwide paper release pushed back to May 15. The gist is that Ikoria is focusing on new big creatures (including Godzilla) and classic planeswalkers, a marriage of new and old thatMagicconstantly does so well to suck in new players and veterans alike....

Switch it on The Witcher 3is one of the few games that keeps on giving, beckoning people back to it like a siren’s call. Whether it’s the clever DLC expansions or plain old graphical mods or updates; it’s very easy to get sucked back intoWild Hunt. The Switch version was perhaps the best effort by CD Projekt Red to keep people talking about it, which thankfully fit on one giant game card....

Rat Race The final playable race forTotal War: Warhammer IIhas been revealed as the rodent based Skaven. Fans speculated this from the initial trailer, which showed a rat biting at the corpse of a fallen warrior, but now the cat is officially out of the bag. Or, rat, perhaps. As Sega so delicately puts it, “Their motives obscured, the devious Skaven are a highly numerous species who inhabit vast subterranean lairs....