Best of 2013: New Xbox Launch Line-Up Rumours
by Cottingly Welles
First Published: April 27, 2013
Voted For By: Ed
Reason(s) for Vote:
We may never truly know where Cottingly Welles came from, what drives her, or what her demands will be when she eventually conquers our industry and rules over us with an iron fist, but what I do know is that thanks to this article, I have no intentions of standing in her way. I’m of no doubt in my mind that every secret she uncovered here was, in fact, cold hard fact until the bigwigs at Microsoft saw her revelations and had no choice but to pull the plug lest Sony or Nintendo get ideas and use them to their own ends. In essence, that’s why I’ve picked this, because I want people to know The Truth™, and until they’ve scarfed every word down with a side-order of revelation salad it’s possible they’ll never know. She’s the hero that Gaming deserves, but not the one it needs right now. And so we’ll hunt her, because she can take it. Because she’s not a hero, she’s a silent guardian, a watchful protector, the Games Knight.
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Never one to settle, and always willing to go where no ordinary rabbit would dare, our brave journo, Cottingly Welles, tackled one of the most talked about topics in gaming this week – the new Xbox – putting her wafer-thin reputation on the line to bring our readers the bleeding edge info that everyone wants to know. We’ll hand the baton over to her.
After watching every episode of The Real Hustle back to back, I used my newly acquired knowledge to secure a low-level cleaning job at Microsoft HQ, where I was tasked with removing the bloodstains of despairing gamers who had thrown themselves against the glass doors, and with emptying the bins labelled ‘Top Secret, Do Not Look In Here’.
After searching the offices high and low for three days, I finally looked inside the Top Secret bins and my patience and journalistic expertise paid off. Even though I was chased from the premises by killer robot bees controlled by the MS CEO by means of a platinum Kinect sensor, your faithful jammy journo survived to bring you the following knicker-wetting details.
I can exclusively reveal that the titles being considered for the new console, dubbed Xbox ShaftU, are as follows:
Crystal Maze
Details were uncovered that the actual physical game box (retailing at a modest £79.99 + first born) will contain the following: Leopard skin coat, bald-cap, harmonica, and chastising note from ‘Mumsy’ will come in a fetching crystal box, which will require no small degree of dexterity to open. It is also rumoured that should you fail to open the box before three minutes is up, a specially appointed MS rep will seal up your front door, locking you in until your friends or family buy you out. Details are still scarce, however.
And the game? No piece of household furniture will be safe, as this Kinect release jailbreaks the classic Channel 4 title from retirement and thrusts it back into your living room. Crystal Maze will see some returning themed zones: Aztec, Medieval, Futuristic, coupled with a new entry: Games Industrial. The latter will see the player traversing puzzles such as ‘Is This Game Misogynistic?’, ‘Tweet My Dorito Slogan To Win A Crystal PS3′, and the controversial ‘Best Boobs In Gaming’, where players have three minutes to line up cardboard cut-outs of famous gaming fillies in order of boob size, perkiness, and overall desirability.
A ‘Harass A Gaming Booth Babe’ challenge is also said to be part of the Skill Game contingent, in which you have sixty second to hurl as many boorish, inappropriate, or sexist remarks at a cosplaying booth babe as you can until her tears fill up a cylinder to the point where the crystal can float free. Also rumoured is an extremely challenging Physical Game called Swag Raider, which sees gamers in an expo like chamber, given just three minutes to repeatedly storm a mountain of themed plastic, guarded by a lifelike PR demon, and gather as many swag tags as they can, which then have to be fed into a container, eventually tipping the crystal free in order for them to safely exit.
Fun House
With the Xbox ShaftU trying to use fun to cover up the inconvenience of an ‘always on’ system, MS snapped up the rights to hit nineties kids’ TV show Fun House and have created an intriguing Kinect title. Beloved DJ and British sex icon Pat Sharp makes a welcome return, lending his voice and newly-regrown spiky mullet to the colourful, energetic title that will see a new generation of gamers having a ‘whole lot of fun’, with ‘digital prizes to be won (terms and conditions apply)‘.
Through the magic of Kinect, players will get the chance to drive go-carts, ogle cheerleaders, and, of course, storm the legendary Fun House in all its rope bridge and ball-pondy glory for the chance to win bragging rights and a Sharp Mullet ™ hairpiece for your avatar.
Takeshi’s Castle
Everyone’s favourite mental TV show has been transformed into a boisterous fall-on-your-face ‘em up, once again utilising nobody’s favourite Kinect functionality. Games include the popular Bridge Ball, which has been tweaked so that the balls are branded, allowing some of Xbox’s advertisers to literally get in your face. Unbranded balls can be unlocked for a minimal fee which is still TBA. Other games are Stepping Stones, which will play achievement unlock sounds as contestants traverse them, and the popular Spinning Mushroom game, with players able to purchase a DLC pack which offers them extra handhelds and a slower rotation.
Charging Doors has undergone a cosmetic makeover, with bright ads for Netflix and sports appearing on them, offering a consolation prize of a 10% discount to any Gold Members who sign up, should they fail to make it through to the next round.
The game box is said to be rather sizeable, containing crash helmet, gloves, branded cod piece, Takeshi mask, and vallium. DLC in the shape of stupid costumes can be purchased, and your Avatar can be imported into the game. Should you fail to successfully storm Takeshi’s Castle your Gamertag will be branded with the tag ‘Loser’ and your Avatar will appear in a dashboard-hogging ‘Hall of Shame’ for thirty days. It can be removed early for 400 MSP or for signing up with Netflix.
Knightmare
This popular TV franchise has been dragged from the retirement dungeon and given a fresh lick of paint for the ShaftU, including its host, the ever-orange Treguard. In this multiplayer-only, so ner nerrr, title from EA, players can team up with up to four mates to try and puzzle and sidestep their way through the dungeon, facing down all manner of perils, from talking walls, to crying walls, to walls with spikes in, along with ineffectual shuffling goblins, giant digital spiders and, of course, the sheer stupidity of their team mates. The game is said to have extensive replayability, with three branching questlines offering hours of frustratingly-slow fun being screamed at over Xbox Live by your teammates. Player choice is a key component of this title, with players able to make live or die decisions based on choices such as whether to steal the cheese or the bar of gold from a table belonging to a talking wall.
The game box will come with the famous Knightmare Helm (Kinect Functionality in-built), but the limited edition featuring the Eye Shield was cancelled on account of the Eye Shield being shite, pointless, and game-breaking.
The Interceptor
Who doesn’t love running around the countryside wearing a metal backpack, being stalked by a raving lunatic in a helicopter? Well, now you can have that same asthma-inducing experience from the comfort of your living room, as the classic TV show gets the AAA treatment.
This co-op title is being developed by Bethesda and will ship with two metal backpacks. The limited ‘defibrillator edition’ will be a GAME exclusive and will be a must for any hardcore players hoping to snag one of the game’s thousand achievements – one of which is ‘Heart Stopper’ – play the game through three times in 24 hours on hard difficulty… for 1 point.
Players will have limited time to traverse the beautifully-rendered countryside in real-time, taking part in a series of pointless mini-games in order to eventually earn keys. These keys will unlock the metal backpacks, potentially revealing a large cash prize… unless your leather-coated foe, the Interceptor, has managed to shoot the sensors on your pack with his big manly laser gun. The packs that ship with the game will open via a signal from the Kinect sensor if you haven’t been hit, but all cash inside will be in MS dollars, which are subject to an exchange rate decided daily at MS HQ by throwing a dart at a child’s numeric wallchart. A 35% handling fee and 20% BACS fee also apply.
You heard it all here first, folks. Now, if you’ll excuse us, we have to go and send Cottingly a food parcel and arrange for the return of her Dogtanian DVDs from Sony.
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And she’s never been heard from since