Teens in Tech - Games

Editor’s Note: Brandon is a new writer for the Teens in Tech blog, focusing mainly on gaming. With the addition on Brandon, we look forward to featuring more news about gaming.

As an avid gamer and an attendee of Blizzcon, I could not be more excited for the new Blizzard game — Diablo 3. It has been ten years since the Diablo 2 most recent expansion, Lord of Destruction, and it has been 11 years since the launch of Diablo 2. It goes without saying that the Diablo community is overdue for a new game. Read to learn more about the newest addition to the Diablo family!

One day Fabian Fernandez-Han saw that his father was using ETrade to make investments. Fabian, who then knew little about the stock market, asked his father what he was doing. Shortly after Fabian was managing his own portfolio of stocks. Eventually Fabian stumbled upon the NYSE Financial Futures Challenge, a competition for kids to build solutions to teach investing and financial literacy. Thus Oink-A-Saurus was born…

Microsoft’s recently launched Xbox Live Rewards program rewards gamers for buying games and seems to be utilized as a way to get more gamers to subscribe to their Gold Xbox Live service. How does this affect us, the gamers? Well, it all depends on how you look at it. Read more, after the jump.

The market for gaming headsets seems to be a bit overcrowded these days. How are you supposed to be able to tell the difference from your Turtle Beech headsets and your Razor or Logitech devices? Today I will be reviewing a piece of equipment brought to us by a lesser known company, Nox Audio. Their flagship headset, dubbed the “Specialist,” is available for order from their website. Let’s find out what makes this device so special in my exclusive review.

The ability to interact with your Xbox account is a really cool feature that Windows Phone 7 has. While Xbox doesn’t make this available anywhere else (maybe there are a few third party apps), Sony wants to. Sony is launching an app to both the iPhone and Android in early 2011, that will allow users to access the PlayStation Network. The app will have the ability to view trophies, view friends’ games, and view online statuses. Sadly, the apps will not be available in the US at launch. The countries that will be receiving the app at launch are: UK, France, Germany, Spain, Italy and The Netherlands. There will be more countries following shortly after. To download the app iPhone users will be required to have iOS4, and Android users will be required to have Android 1.6 or higher.

Can’t get enough Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood? Lucky for you, Ubisoft has just announced its first game add-on, but that’s not the best part. As that same luck would have it, the new DLC will be available for download at no extra charge!

The content pack, which will be made available to both Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 users December 14th, will feature a new map as well as a new game type. It might not seem like much, but there’s always the non-existent price tag to keep in mind.

Fable III follows the epic saga of a young prince as he ignites a revolution to overthrow his own brother, the corrupt king in the industrialized fantasy world of Albion. You take on the role of the prince, and face an open ended fantasy world where your choices affect many different aspects of the adventure. The Fable series has been long credited for its open world, freedom of choice, and casual atmosphere. How does Fable III stack up with its predecessors? Let’s find out.

For the past few days I have really been enjoying the latest installment in Peter Molyneux’s hit Fable series. The latest version, Fable III, sees the familiar world of Albion undergoing an industrial makeover as well a revolution of sorts with you, the hero, as the movement’s figurehead. Fable III has been known as the casual gamer’s role playing game, and Fable III is no different. While I may not necessarily classify myself as a casual gamer, I still find myself having a lot of fun with this game.

Only a few days after its release, Fallout: New Vegas has already been stirring up mixed reactions among the gaming community. Reviewers either love it or they hate it, and not without good reason, or so it seems. Check out some of these reviews, after the jump.

Arenanet’s latest blog post has caused quite the stir among the Guild Wars community. Although it is now considered “old news” by Guild Wars fans, the impact will be felt for some time. In essence, Arenanet has revealed how characters from the original Guild Wars will be able to transfer their achievements over to Guild Wars 2, a revelation that has been long promised by the developer. Arenanet didn’t just reveal the process, they told players exactly what items they would be receiving when the sequel is released, and exactly what they need to do to unlock more rewards. This move has breathed new life into the original game as players scramble to collect items, beat missions, and run quests in an effort to gather up as many points as possible before Guild Wars 2′s inevitable release.

Whenever a game’s soundtrack is either lacking or nonexistent, it usually doesn’t take long for me to start up some music to drown out the monotony. For many gamers, they simply can’t face certain games without their favorite personalized soundtrack to back them up. Of course, for most of us, starting up our video game system of choice isn’t immediately followed by turning up the tunes. So, let’s start off with a question or two: when do you listen to music whilst gaming, and what do you listen to?

Age of Empires is a real time strategy (RTS) series well known to gamers, young and old alike. Three versions of the game have been released over the years, the oldest in 1997 and the newest in 2005. The latest installment of the game seems to be an exploratory move into online territory with Age of Empires Online. Currently in closed beta, the only way you’ll be experiencing the game at this point is through an invitation. Good news: invites aren’t too difficult to come by.