Microsoft 
and 343 Industries aren’t waiting for E3 to start spilling the beans about their biggest game of 2012.
Pre-orders for Halo 4 went on sale today, and to help pump up interest in the game, the publisher and developer have released a lot of details about the game’s multiplayer, a live-action digital series and the obligatory special edition.
It’s 
been 12 years since Blizzard last released an installment of its popular Diablo franchise, but judging by the enormous demand that today’s release of Diablo III is seeing, it might as well have been yesterday.
The game unlocked at midnight Tuesday. Despite the late hour, however, players quickly overwhelmed the game’s servers, extending the pain of people who have been waiting to wear out their index fingers on the clickfest.
The Wii, 
Xbox 360 and PS3 have done well for themselves, as over half of all U.S. households own a modern video game console. That also means, however, that a good chunk of the country still isn’t playing along.
With whispers of next-generation systems swirling — and one confirmed to launch later this year — deciding whether to buy a current generation system isn’t an easy one. Should you spend the money now, or should you wait and be a part of the cutting-edge in the months to come? Systems have typically hit the sweet spot in pricing, and there’s a tremendous catalog of games to choose from (many at discount prices, thanks to “Platinum editions” of top-selling games).
With 
the circus-like E3 expo less than three weeks away (listen closely and you can hear the collective gaming industry screaming in excitement/terror), you’d think the focus would be on 2012.
But with game sales on track right now to hit a six-year low, developers and publishers certainly want this year to end on an uptick, right? Well, of course, they do, but more and more, 2013 is looking like the year where things are going to get really interesting.
After 
flinging ticked off toucans at egg-stealing pigs for the past three years, the developers at Rovio are ready to spread their wings and fly away from the nest.
The creator of the massively successful Angry Birds franchise has a new game on the way, with nary a bird in sight.
Four 
months of 2012 are over. And not one of them has held good news for video game publishers.
Total video game sales came to $630.4 million in April, down 32 percent from $930.9 million a year ago. Video game software sales were especially lousy, down an astonishing 42 percent, coming in at just $292 million. Hardware sales were down 32 percent, according to The NPD Group, which tracks the numbers. The numbers are significantly worse than analysts were expecting, more than double the 19 percent drop Wedbush Securities’ Michael Pachter had warned of.
Sony’s 
troubles aren’t getting any better.
The electronics giant reported a record loss for the 2011 fiscal year of $5.7 billion. More than half of that loss — $3.2 billion — came in the four quarter.
Twenty 
years after revolutionizing gaming, the iconic Wolfenstein 3D is back. And it won’t cost you a dime to enjoy it.
To celebrate the 20th anniversary of the first first-person shooter, id Software and its parent company Bethesda Softworks have released a free-to-play web version of the game that runs right out of your web browser. For folks who prefer their gaming on the go, the developer will also offer Wolfenstein 3D Classic Platinum free to iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch owners for a limited time.
The Force 
is, well, a little tepid with Star Wars: The Old Republic.
Electronic Arts’ much ballyhooed massively-multiplayer game set in George Lucas’s celebrated universe is bleeding customers, losing some 400,000 in the fourth quarter — a number much worse than anyone was expecting.
After 
a week of speculation, Microsoft has formally announced plans to offer a subscription-based Xbox 360/Kinect bundle requiring a two-year paid commitment.
Customers will pay $99 for a 4 GB Xbox 360 and Kinect up front, then will pay $15 per month for the next two years. They’ll enjoy an Xbox Live Gold subscription during that time period, but no additional functionality in the service.
Chris Morris: Journalist 