Imagine a shooter where you can freeze time and unleash your firepower on a group of frozen, powerless enemies, or reach out and rip the gun from an opponent's hands, or even glide over electrically charged water unharmed. Imagine what a shooter might play like if you could rewind time to avoid disastrous results or solve mind-bending puzzles. Now imagine no longer and instead just play the game. Along with slow motion, you have constant access to all these powers. These abilities, previously unexplored in the genre, radically alter your approach and open up a whole new world of battlefield tactics.

TimeShift for Xbox 360 is a perfect marriage of established genre gameplay and previously unexplored innovations in the FPS genre.

It's worth noting as well that the HUD (Heads Up Display) for the Beta Suit is among the very best in the genre. It's clean, descriptive, and actively helpful.

• Active help: Your suit can choose the most appropriate time-power on the fly, and will suggest solutions to various obstacles and puzzles.
• Damage alert: The Beta Suit clues you into how badly damaged you are, and there are both visual and voiceover cues, so you'll never be confused when you should back out of danger and replenish those health and shields.
• Radar intelligence: R adar identifies and distinguishes between enemies and allies, but also notes whether they're above, below, or on the same plane as you.
• Red or green: Your aiming reticle will turn red when hovering over an enemy, and green when aimed at an ally. This is great for identifying enemies that blend in well with the environment.

Further RefinementsThe time shifting powers certainly help distinguish TimeShift from its competition, but there are other equally sophisticated gaming refinements.

• Secondary fire: Each and every gun in TimeShift has a secondary fire option. From the assault rifle's grenade launcher to the pistol's four-round burst to the E.M.F Cannon's devastating overload burst, each weapon has two distinct uses.
• Puzzle time: Gunplay makes up the bulk of the game, but the developer has wisely broken up the intense bouts of action with thoughtful, time-based puzzles. It may be something as simple as freezing time to safely walk through a burst pipe, or a bit more complicated such as having to rewind time to rebuild a shattered walkway, but it provides a fun break from the combat.
• Allied personality: So often in first-person shooters you feel alone and isolated from the world around you, but in TimeShift, nearly every ally walks and talks with a personality all their own. From the characters' quips on the battlefield to incidental but often critical dialogue, TimeShift does a remarkable job of bringing life to its science fiction settings.
• Scripted events: Like and , TimeShift makes great use of scripted events to advance the story, and to unlock level areas. For example, you may have to hold out against waves of Dr. Krone's cronies until an enormous tank shatters a nearby wall, inadvertently allowing you access to your next objective.

A Stitch in Multiplayer TimeWith time-warping mechanics acting as the innovative foundation for the entire single-player campaign, many wondered how they could apply those same principles to a multiplayer environment. The answer is as effective as it is simple. The use of Chrono grenades establishes time-altering "bubbles" that affect every player equally, thus eliminating the problem of, say, freezing time for some players but keeping it real-time for others.

Depending on the grenade thrown, anything caught in a Chrono bubble will freeze, slow down, or even reverse its path. This deceptively simple mechanic makes for multiplayer matches unlike anything else available on the console.

TimeShift for Xbox 360® is a perfect marriage of established genre gameplay and previously unexplored innovations in the FPS genre. If you're still undecided whether TimeShift is worthy of consideration, don't take our word for it, give the free, playable demo available on Xbox LIVE® Marketplace a whirl.

Article by Ryan Treit

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        AUSTIN, Texas, Nov. 6, 2007 - NCsoft® Corp, the world’s leading developer and publisher of online computer games, today announced the formation of a new development studio in Mountain View, California. The announcement comes as the company begins a renewed push to further develop the City of Heroes® property, which is now 100 percent owned by NCsoft. Previous to today, ownership of the intellectual property (IP) was split between NCsoft and Cryptic Studios, the original developer of the project.

        The new studio will be built around key members of the City of Heroes team from NCsoft and Cryptic Studios including the art, programming and design team leads.

        “We’re happy to announce that NCsoft has acquired full ownership of the City of Heroes IP,” said Brian Clayton, NCsoft executive producer and manager of the new studio. “Our plans are clear. We are now in a position to make a major reinvestment in the City of Heroes product line. With our existing Cryptic and NCsoft team as the core, we will be able to run our current service without any interruption to our players, expand our studio to deliver triple-A content, and take City of Heroes to new heights.”

        NCsoft will soon be announcing formal plans for the City of Heroes IP, which will include expansions and sequels to the popular comic-book inspired massively multiplayer online (MMO) game.

        Matt Miller, Lead Designer on the City of Heroes project and formerly with Cryptic Studios said, “We’re thrilled to be bringing the CoH franchise to the next level. And we couldn’t be more pleased to be working completely under the NCsoft banner. We feel that City of Heroes’ best days are in front of it.”

        For more information about City of Heroes, go to http://eu.cityofheroes.com