This past Tuesday saw the release of Halo 4's first DLC, the Crimson Map Pack. This pack adds new maps to Halo 4's multiplayer mode.  Halo 4 is not the only game to see new content this month. Last week saw the release of Dragonborn, the third DLC for The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. This new DLC for Skyrim pits your character against the first Dragonborn. While this is an awesome looking add-on for Skyrim, PS3 users will still have to wait before they can play it. At this moment, no DLC has been released for the PS3 version of Skyrim. MicroSoft originally had a thirty day exclusive for the first two DLCs which were Dawnguard, another quest focused DLC, and Hearthfire, a DLC that allowed you to buy land, build your own house, a farm, and start your own family. After Dawnguard and Hearthfire, the exclusitivity deal was to have been fulfilled. However, Microsoft had a conniption about Hearthfire. For whatever reason, the 30 day exclusitivity deal was extended to Dragonborn. There is some debate amongst fans about whether or not Hearthfire is DLC or an add-on pack. What people, who think that Hearthfire is not DLC, are not comprehending is that in order to use the content, you have to download it, hence the term DLC DownLoadable Content. It's irrelevant whether or not it adds a new quest or new weapons to the base game, the point is you have to DownLoad it to use the Content. Bottom line is that there are a lot of PS3 fans who feel that Bethesda has not handled this whole thing. There are some who are upset, myself included, with MicroSoft for starting this whole mess in the first place. The problem is that MS has pulled this stunt before with The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion and Fallout 3. And even in that instance, there were five add-ons that never saw the light of day on the PS3. The only difference here, is that with FO3 and Oblivion is that people who owned the PS3 versions of both these games had to wait several months before they could play any of the DLC. This problem did not come up with Fallout: New Vegas. Now Dead Money was the only DLC for Fallout: New Vegas that was exclusive to the 360, after which Honest Hearts, Old World Blues, Lonesome Road, The Gun Runner's Arsenal, and The Courier's Stash all came out within a few days of each other, with only a month or two between each DLC. Whatever the case, Bethesda has indicated that Dragonborn will be out for PS3 and PC in early 2013. I'm not holding my breath at this point, but we will see.

UPDATE: As of this writing, idSoft, the creators of such phenomenal shooters as Doom and Quake, have released the very first DLC pack for their 2011 game RAGE. This new DLC adds brand new areas, weapons, allies, minigames, and even the ability to play past the initial ending. While some see as this as too litttle too late, they have only themselves to blame if the DLC becomes one of the best this year. It's never too late for DLC, especially RAGE.

After years of being in development limbo, Ghostbusters 3 has been confirmed as beginning production next year, with a release sometime in 2014. Sadly, Bill Murray will not be reprising his role as Dr. Peter Venkman. Now, Bill has a reputation of not showing any interest, then showing up for work. Now it's possible, very possible that he could pull the same stunt here. But the only one that knows for sure is Bill Murray. Hopefully, Bill will change his mind.

Since the release of the Ghostbusters videogame back in 2009, fans have been clamoring for a third Ghostbusters film. A third film had initially been planned by Dan Aykroyd(Dr. Ray Stantz) and Harold Ramis(Dr. Egon Spengler), the actors that did the scripts for both of the movies and the videogame. But the choice of script writers in the beginning was not good. A script had been penned by Lee Eisenberg and Gene Stupinsky, the writers who originally did the script for Year One. But that movie and another one, also written by Stupinsky and Eisenburg, bombed at the box office. Since then, the long awaited, long rumored third film has been hanging in limbo. One of the biggest obstacles to get the third movie made has been none other than Bill Murray (Dr. Peter Venkman). Bill Murray is one of the franchise rights holders, next to Aykroyd, Ramis, Ernie Hudson( Winston Zeddemore), and Ivan Reitman, who directed the first two. The movie cannot be made unless Mr. Murray signs off on it, whether he's in it or not. Mr. Murray has been in an I'm in/I'm out/I'm in/I'm out mode since then. The reasons for this are numerous. One of the most popular being the fact that the first script was done by Eisenberg and Stupinsky (okay honestly, would you want to do a movie with a script written by two writers who did the scripts for two other movies that bombed at the box office. that's like swimming in shark infested waters). The other being his sheer stubbornness and cantankerous attitude. After all of this, the movie is moving forward, without Bill Murray. It appears that Murray gave them the okay to make the movie, but he will not be in it. It is sad that Bill will not be in this movie. Hopefully he will reconsider before the movie goes into active production, or he may even consider makeing a cameo appearance. The other problem with Murray not being in it is that actress Sigourney Weaver (Dana Barret) has indicated that if Murray isn't in it, she won't be in it either. So that makes two characters from the first two movies out. One good thing about all this is that a new writer is penning the script for the new film. Fresh off his script for Men In Black III, Etan Cohen will be penning the script for the GB's next outing. Hopefully, he does an excellent job.

Elder Scrolls V Skyrim's first DLC, Dawnguard has just been released. At the moment it's exclusive to the 360 for 30 days, after which it will be available for PS3 and PC. At the moment, there's no news of when, or if, Dawnguard will be coming out on PS3 or PC. This silence has lead to rampant speculation on the Bethesda forums that they(Bethesda) have abandoned the PS3 fanbase. While I would consider this move to be corporate suicide, I honestly don't think they would would do this sort of thing. What we are probably looking at is a repeat of what happened when they released DLC for Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion and Fallout 3. We will see in the days to come.

idSoft is preparing to release Doom 3: BFG Edition in a month or so. The Doom 3 BFG edition is a HD remake of the XB/PC version of Doom 3. The BFG edition will include Doom 3, the Doom 3: Resurrection Of Evil stand-alone expansion, and a bunch of other cool stuff. One of the most noteable changes being made is now you can have your flash light and gun equipped at the same time. In the original D3, you had to switch between a gun and your flashlight, which started to become a problem at times. In D3:ROE, this problem was solved by mounting the flashlight to the pistol (sadly, only the pistol got the light, none of the other weapons got a flashlight). But in the BFG edition, the light is mounted to your character's armor, making it easier to use your favored weapon and still see what your blasting straight back to Hell. There's also a bunch of other cool stuff thrown in as well, such as the original classics, and a couple of new levels for Doom 3.

The imminent release of Halo 4 is approaching, and news on new content continues to pour in. Unlike Halo 3 and Halo Reach, Halo 4 will not have a Legendary edition. 343industries is limiting themselves to only two versions of the game, a standard edition, and a limited edition. The Limited Edition stands out as the best one because it comes packed with all kinds of stuff, probably more-so than any other Halo LE version ever had. So, in a way I guess you could say that this is a Legendary edition in it's own right, without the Helmet or Statues. Halo 4 is shaping up to be one of the best releases this year.

In GB3 news, I just recently learned that Dan Aykroyd has announced that he has a new writing team working on the GB3 script. This news is a welcome surprise. The original writers were Gene Stupinsky and Lee Eisenberg, both of whom rose to notoriety after the dismal failures of the movies Year One and Bad Teacher (seriously Dan, if you hire writers, both of whom wrote for movies that failed abysmally at the box office, that should have sent up red flags right there). It's not known who the writing team is, but we can all hope that these people understand Ghostbusters, and will deliver the best script they possbily can.

Last month saw the official announcement for the Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim's first DLC titled Dawnguard. There is not much known about the DLC at this point, which has lead to much speculation about the plot and story for the game. It's also been announced that Dawnguard will be a thirty day timed exclusive for the Xbox-360, which means that PS3 and PC owners won't get the DLC until a month later. I honestly don't know whether I can believe the thirty day time limit or not, given Bethesda's track record with some of their past releases.

The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion: Shivering Isles:
360 release: March, 2006.
PS3 release: November, 2007.

The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion: Knights of the Nine:
360 release: November, 2006.
PS3 release: March, 2007.

Fallout 3: Operation Anchorage:
360 release: January, 2009.
PS3 release: October, 2009.

Fallout 3: The Pitt:
360 release: March, 2009.
PS3 release: October, 2009.

Fallout 3: Broken Steel:
360 release: May, 2009.
PS3 release: September, 2009.

Fallout 3: Point Lookout:
360 release: June, 2009.
PS3 release: October, 2009.

Fallout 3: Mothership Zeta:
360 release: August, 2009.
PS3 release: October, 2009.

Based on this, I can honestly say that I'm doubtful of the thirty-day time limit for Dawnguard. If it is thirty days, fine. But if not, Bethesda's going to have a lot of people pissed off at them. I was considering adding the Fallout New Vegas DLC, Dead Money to the list, but decided not to as Fallout New Vegas was developed by Obsidian Ent. and not Bethesda.

On the other side of the coin, we have The Elder Scrolls Online, an MMORPG (Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game) set in the Elder Scrolls universe. ESO is currently being developed by Zenimax Online Studios, and will be published by Bethesda. I'm doubtful that this game is going to garner as much attention as Skyrim has. ZOS has the heavy task of appeasing fans of  the TES  series. It's already been noted that the game is going to contradict lore that has already been established by the TES series. Whether it contradicts established TES lore somewhat or a lot is irrelevant. The problem I see coming from this game is the fact that it's contradicting lore that has already been established by the current TES series. People who have never played any of the Elder Scrolls games are going to take these contradictions at face-value, inadvertently find their way to the Elder Scrolls wiki, and start messing up the site. If ZOS expects TESO to succeed, then they need to work with established lore and not contradict anything that has been established by past and current TES games. 

It's definitely a great month for gamers. In addition to DLC coming out for Skyrim, there is also info for DLC for Rage coming out(not quit sure what it is, but it could be anything. Here's hoping for more add-on missions and weapons). Also, recently a new patch was released for Skyrim. Predictably, it has caused problems. Oddly enough, the problems are isolated only to PS3 players(of which I am one). The problem is when the Dragonborn goes to swim in the water. For PS3 players, this is a huge problem, as it causes freezes for PS3 players. Oh well, I'll be waiting for the patched patch, which means that I won't be playing Skyrim for quite a while. I may work on Oblivion for a while.

Some of the new games coming out this year finally have release dates. Borderlands 2 will be out in September followed by BioShock Infinite in October, and ending the year with Halo 4's December release(yyyeeesss, right before Christmas).

Info for the new Halo game continues to trickle down the pipe. Recently, images of the new Battle Rifle have been released. It looks a lot better than the Battle Rifle in Halo 2 and Halo 3. The Master Chief's new armor looks awesome. Halo 4 is shaping up to be one of the best games this year.

Recently, the Replica Prop Forum, a costuming and prop building community on the internet, had their domain name, www.TheRPF.com, stolen by some hackers in Russia(seriously these hackers have absolutely no lives whatsoever, they waste their time doing this crap, and then when they get busted, they do the time) and are currently in, what seems to be, a legal battle to get it back. Unfortunately, the process has been slowed because it's an international problem. Rumors of a reboot of the Doom movie have recently surfaced. The original movie was nowhere-near the games, story-wise. In the original game and Doom 3(a remake of the original), a Union Aerospace Corporation research facility on Mars is attacked by demons from Hell. In the movie, the demons are actually the mutated research facility personnel.

In gameing news, a few weeks ago, PlayStation added PlayStation 2 Classics to PSN. Now some of the best PS2 games will be available for download on PSN. The original KillZone, which came out on the PS2 is slated to be among the PS2 games being remastered in HD for the PS3. Final Fantasy XIII-2 was recently released, and Fallout: New Vegas The Ultimate Edition, is due to be released soon. FF-XIII is the third FF game to receive a direct sequel, the first was Final Fantasy X, and the second was Final Fantasy VII. No word on DLC for The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, although a patch was recently released for the PC version, and the same patch is supposed to be out for the 360 and PS3 versions some time this week. No information has surfaced concerning additional DLC for RAGE, although that's not to say that there won't be.

Well, it's a new year and the news is in some ways good and in some ways......not! Good news first. First off, the long running battle between Bethesda Softworks and Interplay is, hopefully over. Secondly, I recently added some new games to my collection. I recently added Front Mission Evolved, Lego Harry Potter Yrs 1-4, and Hyperdimension Neptunia for the PS3 and F.E.A.R. 2 for XB360 to my game collection. I also purchased Red Vs. Blue Seasons 6-8 to my DVD collection. I also learned that the complete collection of M.A.S.K. Mobile Armored Strike Kommand, and the five part miniseries Challenge Of The GoBots were both released on DVD last year. GoBots and MASK were my favorite shows growing up. Now that the great stuff is out there time for the bad news(always leave bad news for last, that way you have the good stuff to look forward to). The bad news is that I was layed off from my seasonal job at Toys R Us. This sudden turn of events have derailed some plans I had made in advance, such as buying a replacement my portable DVD player. While this is bad, I just learned that I was eligible for unemployment. Hopefully some good will come of this.

A recent online news article has indicated that actor Bill Murray, one of the stars of Ghostbusters and Ghostbusters 2 has sent the script for the proposed third movie back to actors Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis, in a box, shredded. Further reading of the article has revealed that this story comes courtesy of the National Enquirer, a supermarket tabloid. Knowing that the NE is known for printing phoney stories(such as the world ending on New Years Eve), this latest story should not be taken seriously. On the other hand, it could be plausible, as the script was written by the guys who made the abysmal movie Year One(which was directed by Harold Ramis). Mr. Murray may have done this for this reason, and I don't blame him. No offense to Mr. Ramis, but he should have done a better review of the script before the film was made.

In other news, I just saw the first official trailer for The Hobbit, directed by Peter Jackson. The Hobbit, as everyone knows, focuses on the early adventures of a younger Bilbo Baggins. Some of the original cast will be in the film including Ian McKellen(Gandalf), Cate Blanchette(Galadriel), and Orlando Bloom(Legolas). The movie also stars Ian Holm(Old Bilbo), and Elijah Wood(Frodo Baggins). Go to movies.com or Youtube and enter the The Hobbit and you should find it. It looks great.