Macaulay Culkin joins ToeJam & Earl: Back in the Groove! as Executive Producer

The studio behind ToeJam & Earl: Back to the Groove, HumaNature, posted up a press release revealing that Macaulay Culkin is Executive Producer for the game. This seems to have been a secret that the studio has kept close to their sleeve and using it as they near the final stretch towards release. ToeJam & Earl: Back to the Groove releases on Xbox One, PC, PS4, and Nintendo Switch on March 1st!

“I’m honored to be producing the new ToeJam & Earl because it is literally my favorite video game of all time. Plus, Greg Johnson is the tits!” – Macaulay Culkin

You can pick the game up physically via Limited Run Games: PS4 & Switch. Check out the press release by HumaNature studio below:

Team Sonic Racing adds ‘Hidden Volcano’ as new racing track

SEGA has revealed a brand new track for Team Sonic Racing, introducing “Hidden Volcano” race track! Hidden Volcano is a lava zone that is hidden within the Glacier Land area. According to SEGA’s description on their site:

Hidden Volcano is a lava zone course hidden deep within the ice-covered Glacier Land area. This area is distinguished by its lumps of ice created by the scorching hot magma within the iceberg and complicated terrain due to lava rocks. It requires calm judgment and bold technique to conquer its slippery ice roads and varying bumpiness caused by tears in the earth. At the starting line, a lava giant towers above the track and swings its fist downward to block the racers’ path forward.
Check out screenshots of the game below. What do you think of the brand new Hidden Volcano track?
[Source: Siliconera]

Microsoft adds Alien: Isolation to Xbox Game Pass

Microsoft is beefing up their Xbox Game Pass, which is being billed online as a Netflix of games. Which is true, you pay the low monthly fee and have access to a ton of games including Gears of War 4, Forza series and even the newly released Crackdown 3. They are also working on getting older games released on the Xbox Game Pass, this latest update brings Alien: Isolation on the platform.

It should be interesting to see if Xbox Game Pass works out for Microsoft, if you have it and haven’t played Alien: Isolation; get on it!

SEGA trademarks ‘Humankind’ in Japan

The guys over at Gematsu posted up more company trademarks, as you know previously SEGA trademarked ‘Romance: Seven-Colored Adventure Story and now they are trademarking “Humankind”. Gematsu did make a note that Take-Two is going to debut a new game called Ancestors: The Humankind Odyssey at The Game Awards 2018 in a few days. We know SEGA has a history of working with Take-Two in publishing and pushing their games in Japanese market. Who knows.

Sadly all these trademarks are vague without a description on what sort of platform they will be used on. At this point SEGA is so diverse it can be a Pachinko, Mobile or Console game. What do you want to see from this new trademark? What do you think it is? Let us know in the comments below.

Sonic Unleashed and Aliens vs Predator now playable on Xbox One via backwards compatibility

Microsoft has announced a few new Xbox 360 games that will be playable on the Xbox One thanks to backwards compatibility. Out of the three new games, two of them are published by SEGA. If you read the title you know they are Sonic Team’s Sonic Unleashed and Rebellion’s Alien vs Predator. Like always, if you already own the Xbox 360 discs or the game’s digitally, you canstart playing them today on Xbox One for free. If you don’t have the Xbox 360 games, you can buy them right now on the Xbox Live Marketplace.

While we can whine about what each console is doing right or wrong, I love that Microsoft really focused on backwards compatibility and even offered a avenue for publishers to make money on last generation software with no effort on their part. I don’t know if this is a huge system seller for Microsoft, but Its cool for fans that wanna go back and revisit games like Sonic Unleashed, which I know a lot of you might want to do.

Sonic Forces Soundtrack now available to stream on Spotify

Today marks the 1 year anniversary of Sonic Forces, so to celebrate SEGA Japan has now released the Sonic Forces on Spotify. The OST in separate collections, most of the tracks appear in the ‘A Hero Will Rise‘ collection which has 87 total tracks. The other collection is the ‘Vocal Traxx – On the Edge‘ collection which has 10 total tracks.

As for what I think of this being a ‘one year’ surprise, eh? Like, you would just assume that SEGA would put these soundtracks on streaming services because its easy money for them. Like is this really worth waiting a whole year for? Personally would have liked to see Sonic Team release a patch and fix up some of Sonic Forces in-game issues. Shoot maybe add a couple of free DLC chapters fleshing out the story more. I know there is no patch that will make the game amazing, but a patch fixing bugs and other things would have gone a long way in the PR front for SEGA. But I guess a soundtrack is nice too.

SEGA News Bits: Team Sonic Racing Delayed Until May 2019 Reaction

It has finally been confirmed that Team Sonic Racing won’t be hitting this holiday season, instead we will have to wait until May 2019 to get our hands on the upcoming Sumo Digital Sonic the Hedgehog themed racing game. On this episode of the SEGA News Bits we discuss why it might have been delayed, what they can do with the extra time to get Sonic fans more excited and more!

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Team Sonic Racing Delayed To May 21, 2019, Surprises No One

Have you noticed something about Team Sonic Racing? There has been very little hype and update for the game and it seems the reason for that is that the game is being delayed. There have been rumors about this delay in the past but it has officially been confirmed by the Sonic the  Hedgehog twitter account this morning:


It feels to me that this could be a good idea if this actually means we are getting a better game for it. Quite frankly, I’m pretty sure that Team Sonic Racing might have not have done too hot this holiday season with big titles like Super Smash Brothers Ultimate, Red Dead Redemption 2, and Fallout 76 coming soon. What are your thoughts on the delay?

Valkyria Chronicles 4 reveals overpriced DLC schedule

It seemed the last few years SEGA has been pretty smart with pricing, giving us some great content and launch editions for a fraction of the price. Now it seems SEGA is really believing that Valkyria Chronicles 4 will do really well since they announced their DLC schedule and pricing for Americas and Europe.

  • Japanese Voice Pack  | FREE | September 25
  • Tank Decals | Free | September 25
  • Squad E, to the Beach | $6.99 | October 9
  • A Captainless Squad | $4.99 (free with digital pre-orders) | October 23
  • Expert Level Skirmishes | $4.99 | November 4
  • The Two Valkyria | $4.99 | November 20
  • Edy’s Advance Ops | $3.99 (free if you get the limited edition) | December 4
  • A United Front with Squad 7 | $5.99 (free if you get the limited edition) | December 18

That means that it will cost you a total of 31.94 dollars worth of DLC if you want the complete version of Valkyria Chronicles 4. That means if you buy the physical standard edition, since it seems ‘A Captainless Squad‘ is only for digital pre-orders, you’ll end up paying over 90 dollars when its all said and done. Its a bit weird that SEGA is charging more for DLC than they are charging for a Yakuza 0 port on PC. I’m all for DLC as long as its fairly priced and this isn’t. I mean 5 dollars for expert level skirmishes? The game hits North America and Europe on September 25 for PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, and PC. But when is the complete edition coming out?

SEGA News Bits: Streets of Rage 4 Announced Reaction

It is hard to believe that the last Streets of Rage game came out way back in 1994, but we are finally getting a Streets of Rage 4. That’s right, not Streets of Rage Mania or a remake of the older games. A brand new title built from the ground up and on this episode of the SEGA News Bits we discuss the released trailer, the information we know and give you our thoughts on the announcement.

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Shenmue I & II Remasters get first HD texture pack for PC

Wait, didn’t Shenmue I & II Remasters just come out? That isn’t stopping hard working fans from improving upon the release, at least on PC. If you didn’t know, the Shenmue I & II Remasters came out with the original textures from the Dreamcast, which I feel are fine but if you wanted updated textures then modder ‘Dragean’ has you covered! He is working on a HD Texture Pack for Shenmue I & II and the first version has been released!

The HD Texture Pack is set to recreate HD textures for environments and not just upscale the existing textures. The mod isn’t even close to being complete, I mean the Resident Evil 4 HD pack mod has been going on for years, so it could take quite awhile before this mod is completed.So far he has tweaked existing Yamanose textures, added street textures in Dobuita, added Yamanose tree leaves/shrubs/bush sprites, reworked road signs/grass textures, and added some patchy dirt/brick wall textures.  The HD Texture Pack requires Kaldien’s Special K mod (download), Ryo’s clothes HD textures from here, and HD texture pack for walls/doors (by hope3090) can be found here. Check out some of the screenshots to see the differences, see live comparisons over here!

[Via: DSOGaming]