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Reboot: This Week In Games: "GTA Online" Free Money, NYCC and Daz Wants His Due

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Gaming is complex, so catch up each week with the short and dirty in Reboot: This Week In Games.

This week Rockstar released some real improvements to Grand Theft Auto Online and because of its rocky start wants to give every player who logged on during the October release month half a million in free GTA$, make it rain daddy.

Comic Con hit New York City this week and besides more bizarre than normal dress on the subway a bunch of game news also reared its head. Complex was on the ground playing upcoming games and checking out the best cosplayers, straight to your eyeballs.

If you're looking forward to playing Battlefield 4 on your PC then make sure you check out the specs released by Nvidia this week. It’s going to take over your harddrive, all of your harddrive. Hope you like textures!

RELATED: Reboot: This Week In Games: "Battlefield 4" Beta, "GTA Online" Fixes and the Search For More "Deus Ex"

RELATED: Reboot: This Week In Games: "GTA V" Vehicle Glitch, Steam Machines and Drake Loves "FIFA 14"

RELATED: Reboot: This Week In Games:"GTA V" Is Making Billions, Xbox TV Programming and Nintendo Loses a Pioneer


Gaming tech this week

Microsoft's marketing department will use data collected through the Xbox One and its Kinect 2 sensor for internal marketing and sell it to outside companies, this despite previous statements to the contrary. Users will be able to turn this monitoring off but it's unclear what impact that may have.

As reported by Advertising Age, Microsoft marketing executive Yusuf Mehdi held a presentation where he explained how the Xbox One could revolutionize advertising, including the making of user data available for market research.

Valve unveiled details about its ambitions to take over our living rooms with its Steam Machines last month. But Microsoft studios chief Phil Harrison, speaking to MCV UK, said that while he personally has great admiration for what Valve is doing he doesn't see the Steam Machines as a threat to the Xbox One.

"We think the Xbox One business model, developer ecosystem and retail support, will make our platform very successful," Harrison said. "It is unclear to me, until I see Valve's product and understand all of their announcements, exactly what they are doing."

Sony has a little unwanted attention for its next-gen console when reports surfaced that more than a thousand Chinese college students were forced to manufacture Playstation 4 consoles through a mandatory work study program at a Foxconn facility.

In other PlayStation news

Sony boss Shuhei Yoshida has revealed new details about the PlayStation 4's new controller, the DualShock 4. The Dualshock will work with PCs at launch, controlling "basic functions" on Windows PCs adding, "the analog sticks and buttons will work just fine."

The advanced features of the Dualshock are unlikely to be functional on PCs anytime soon. Features include a light bar, touch pad and motion sensor.

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The "GTA" sidequests page:

TMZ is reporting that Rapper Daz Dillinger, ex-member of Dogg Pound, says Rockstar Games tried to lowball him on tracks for Grand Theft Auto V then used them anyway. This according to a cease and desist letter Daz shot off to the makers of GTA V.

In the letter Daz and his attorney claim that "C-Walk" and "Nothin' But the Cavi Hit" are used in the game even though Daz turned down Rockstar's "offensively low offer of $4,271 for both songs."

In other art imitating life news, or maybe the other way around: Voice-actor Shawn Fonteno, the voice of Franklin in Grand Theft Auto V, was a rapper back in the 90s named Solo who knocked out Ice Cube. TMZ reports:

"Fonteno used to rap under the name Solo — and back in the day, he appeared in the documentary Beef 2 describing a fight with Ice Cube, in which he claims he knocked out the rapper over a business dispute and stole his chain.

Grand Theft Auto V has just crushed 7 Guinness World Records. Rockstar Games' latest goldmine is now the fastest selling video game in a 24-hour period and the "fastest entertainment property" to generate a billion bucks.

GTA V reached $1 billion in retail sales within three days of its release on September 17, breaking the previously head record by the Call of Duty series. In its first day of retail sales more than 11.21 million copies of GTA V went into the hands of gamers, generating revenue of $815.7 million.

Lastly check out this Trevor-centric cut-scene edit from YouTube user KetothoPL edited in the style of a horror film. It's easy to see how GTA V could easily become a survival horror game. A get away from Trevor DLC would be pretty damn scary.

Shoot, scoot, give back.

Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 is giving back to the soldiers and heroes their games are based around.

Through the Call of Duty Endowment program, players on Xbox 360 will be able to support U.S. war veterans by downloading content for the game over the next week.

Available at a discounted rate, Xbox 360 players can buy 17 different personalization packs for Call of Duty: Black Ops 2. These packs allow users to fully customize the look of weapons, at a 25% discounted rate through the Xbox Live Marketplace from October 8-14. Profits generated during the discounted period will be donated by Treyarch and Microsoft to the Call of Duty Endowment.

Call of Duty: Ghosts wants your harddrive, all of your harddrive. PC gamers take note because this years CoD system requirements have gotten a huge bump up from last year. You can blame next-gen consoles for the massive system increase.

Nvidia has released the minimum system requirements for Infinity Wards' Call of Duty: Ghosts the next-gen console-centered shooter. Last year's release, Call of Duty: Black Ops II, required 4GB of RAM memory and about 10GB of harddrive space. This year Ghosts is going to gobble-up 6GB of RAM memory and a whopping 50GB of your harddrive.

While Battlefield 4drops on current-gen systems, Xbox One owners will have the opportunity to download the Second Assault DLC pack for Battlefield 4 when the console releases November 22.

EA recently announced the map pack, which features four "fan favorite" maps from Battlefield 3, and would be available first on Xbox One. No price details have been announced as of yet for the pack, or when it will be released on other platforms.

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NYCC Comic Con

Complex Editor Hanuman Welch and photographer Erik Erikson are our boots on the ground today at New York City Comic Con. Check out some of the best cosplayers they've seen today. Batman villains and vixens are a popular theme, as well as steampunk everything, including Batman and a badass looking steampunk Wonder Woman to boot.

If you missed out on the show this year, Twitch was running live viewing of several panels and a liestream of the show floor. Check out recaps on Twitch. Panels covered this year will include Batman: Arkham Origins with producer Eric Homes and voice actors Roger Craig Smith (Batman) and Troy Baker (The Joker). Twitch will also be capturing video from the show floor including interviews and a direct stream from Twitch's booth.

Lots of game news will be coming out this week but as a preview Strider. We’re happy to report that the new Strider we played at Comic-Con NY is everything we could want in a sequel (Reboot? Retelling?) and more. The demo had us running, slicing, sliding, and shooting off orbs just as we used to do back in the old arcade and Genesis days. But this world of Strider is a lot darker than the original, and even darker than the one seen in Strider 2 a few years back as well.

"GTA Online" gonna make it rain

On Wednesday Rockstar dropped a massive patch to give some of the most glarring bugs in "Grand Theft Auto Online."

"This title update will resolve the cause of players losing their gameplay progress except for some specific instances where players purchase a vehicle and the save does not occur due to a cloud save failure," Rockstar writes. "A fix for that particular issue is being worked on and we will provide an update as soon as we know when this will be resolved."

Rockstar Games is giving every player of Grand Theft Auto Online half a million in-game cash to make up for its rocky start.

Since GTA Online's launch on October 1, there have been all kinds of problems, mostly related to the huge popularity and the large number of users that brings. Since then, performance has improved and Rockstar announced a "stimulus package" as an apology for Los Santos players who went online this month. Half a million in GTA$ is about to be dropped into each and every player's bank account starting this week.

It's almost been unspoken word that eventually Grand Theft Auto V would make it's way to PC. Now it seems that may happen sooner than expected.

Multiple reports are pointing towards GTAmaking it's PC debut as early as the first quarter of 2014. Rockstar has remained relatively quiet about the possibility of a PC platform, but multiple industry sources believe they are moving in that direction.

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