“The exciting next chapter in the awesome Sins of a Solar Empire universe has arrived. A full-fledged expansion to the original, Sins of a Solar Empire: Rebellion draws you even deeper into the galactic struggle for supremacy with appealing new factions, terrifyingly cool new ships of all sizes, enhanced lighting and particle effects for increased visual pleasure and all-new victory conditions.”

PC games:

• Anna
• Diablo III
• Game of Thrones
• Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City
• Serious Sam HD: The Second Encounter – Legend of the Beast DLC
• Sonic the Hedgehog 4 Episode 2

Movies opening this week:

• Battleship
• Elena (limited NYC)
• Hysteria
• Lovely Molly (limited)
• Mansome (limited)
• Polisse (limited)
• The Dictator
• Virginia (limited)
• What to Expect When You’re Expecting

Blu-Ray releases:

• 1900
• Albert Nobbs
• Before and After
• Being John Malkovich (Criterion Collection)
• Born Yesterday
• Bringing Down the House: 10th Anniversary Ed.
• Cat Planet Cuties
• Chronicle
• D.O.A.
• Duets
• Emperor & The White Snake
• Father of the Bride: 20th Anniversary Ed.
• Gone Fishin’
• Hell on Wheels
• History fo the World in Two Hours
• Holy Man
• Ken Burns: The War
• Kill Bill 1 & 2 Double Feature
• Leon the Pig Farmer
• Mr. Wrong
• National Parks Exploration Series – The Grand Canyon: A Wonder of the Natural World
• National Parks Exploration Series – Yosemite: The High Sierras
• New York Stories
• One for the Money
• Princess Diaries: Two Movie Collection
• Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Celebration
• Rampart
• Resistance
• Seven Wonders of the Buddhist World
• Smithsonian Channel: Aerial America – Pacific Rim Collection
• Spaghetti Western Double Feature: Grand Duel & Keoma
• Terminal Velocity
• The Grey
• The Odessa File
• The Order
• The Universe: The Complete Season Six
• The Woman Knight of Mirror Lake
• Top Gear Great Adventures 5
• Walking Tall: The Trilogy
• White Squall
• WWII in HD Collector’s Ed.

“Diablo III continues the epic Diablo storyline, with players taking on the role of one of five heroic characters – barbarian, witch doctor, wizard, monk, or demon hunter – and embarking on an epic quest to save the world of Sanctuary from the corrupting forces of the Burning Hells. As players adventure through rich and varied settings, they’ll engage in pulse-pounding combat with hordes of monsters and challenging bosses, grow in experience and ability, acquire artifacts of incredible power, and meet key characters who’ll join them in battle or aid them in other ways . The game features the intuitive interface, fast-paced action, and visceral gameplay that Diablo players have come to expect and enjoy.

Designed from the ground up to leverage the full functionality of the Battle.net® platform, Diablo III also provides gamers with industry-leading matchmaking and communication tools, allowing adventurers to seamlessly join forces for cooperative play. Battle.net also provides the infrastructure for the Diablo III auction house, a feature-rich marketplace that Sanctuary’s heroes can use to trade their hard-earned treasures. To learn more about the auction house and the other features of Diablo III, please visit the official website at http://www.diablo3.com.”

“Set in the year 3049 during the early stages of a massive interstellar war, MechWarrior Online puts you in command of the most powerful war machine to ever walk the field of battle, the mighty BattleMech™. Command your Mech™ and customize it to suit your battlefield role; upgrade systems, replace weapons, and tweak armor with endless options.”

“Both Blizzard and Valve recognize that, at the end of the day, players just want to be able to play the games they’re looking forward to, so we’re happy to come to an agreement that helps both of us stay focused on that,” said Rob Pardo, executive vice president of game design at Blizzard Entertainment. “As part of this agreement, we’re going to be changing the name of Blizzard DOTA to Blizzard All-Stars, which ultimately better reflects the design of our game. We look forward to going into more detail on that at a later date.”

“We’re pleased that we could come to an agreement with Blizzard without drawing things out in a way that would benefit no one,” said Gabe Newell, president and co-founder of Valve. “We both want to focus on the things our fans care about, creating and shipping great games for our communities.”

“The Perpetual Testing Initiative allows players to easily create, share, and play Portal 2 puzzles. The Initiative comes with a simplified Puzzle Maker that allows that creation of mind-bending puzzles without ever leaving the game.
 
The Puzzle Maker directly publishes maps to the Steam Workshop where users may browse, vote on, and select to play them. Selected puzzles are automatically downloaded and installed inside Portal 2.
 
For more information please visit www.steamgames.com“

“The International was launched last year in Cologne, Germany during Gamescom with 16 of the most elite Dota teams competing in a group stage, double elimination playoff format for a grand prize of $1 million. This year, The International moves to Benaroya Hall in Seattle, WA during the PAX Prime event, August 31 – September 2, 2012.

The tournament will again be broadcast in multiple languages, free of charge.

Coming to the PC this year, Dota 2 promises to take the unique blend of online RTS and RPG action that has made Dota popular with tens of millions of gamers around the world.

For more information on Valve and its games, please visit www.dota2.com“

“A predator’s thirst for prey cannot be satiated by anything other than a perfect kill, and soon players will be wielding the blood-parched, unrelenting force of history’s greatest generation of hunters – the dinosaurs.  Delivered with immense pride by developer Lukewarm Media and publisher Reverb Publishing, Primal Carnage sets players in a man versus pre-historic beast online deathmatch as savvy survivalists collide with foes of brute force, allowing players to choose a side. A new video of alpha footage showcasing the FPS/third-person blend has been unveiled, and it packs a ton of primitive fury and human finesse.

For more information about Primal Carnage, check out the website at www.primalcarnage.com“

“Set in a gothic-noir universe resembling a fantastical 19th century Europe filled with monsters, magic, and weird technology, The Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing will follow the son of the famed hunter, known in-game as Van Helsing, in a tale wrought with wry humor and snappy dialogue. Van Helsing, a larger-than-life hero possessing a dark yet romantic charm, will follow his path to the dismal land of Borgovia where former supernatural foes have enlisted his help to defeat a new scourge terrorizing the ravaged Eastern European city. With an assortment of extraordinary characters, an engrossing storyline, and a beautifully dark and gothic art style, The Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing looks to bring RPG enthusiasts an anachronistic adventure like no other.

“Being located in Eastern Europe and having experience developing RPGs, Van Helsing is a natural fit for us; it’s a project where we can demonstrate our expertise in both domains and create something novel that RPG fans can appreciate,” said Viktor Juhász, lead writer at NeocoreGames. “We’ve always enjoyed crafting games from legendary tales, but with our own twist, and Van Helsing provides us the perfect game world to experiment with.”

The Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing is slated for a late Q4 2012 release.”

“Warlock: Master of the Arcane is a new fantasy strategy game from Paradox Interactive and Ino-Co Plus. Set in the universe from the “Majesty” series, you are challenged to build an empire of steel and magic and unite Ardania at the point of a wand.

Warlock: Master of the Arcane is released today, May 8th via retail and all major digital distribution platforms for a recommended retail price of $19.99.”