That's a question PC Gamer asked themselves over the course of the last week, re-imagining 2012 blockbusters like Mass Effect 3, Far Cry 3 and Assassin's Creed III as primitive text-based adventure games.

The results are sometimes funny, sometimes cutting, and quite often both.

You can read through four of them below.

The Text Adventures That Never Were: Far Cry 3 [PC Gamer]
The Text Adventures That Never Were: Assassin's Creed III [PC Gamer]
The Text Adventures That Never Were: Mass Effect 3 [PC Gamer]
The Text Adventures That Never Were: Hotline Miami [PC Gamer]

Over the past week, hackers have made substantial progress in their efforts to hack Nintendo's 3DS handheld. While, yes, this will have negative consequences for things like piracy, I'd like to think you, dear reader, can see the more practical benefits of getting under the system's skin.

Like getting around the 3DS' region locks for game cartridges.

Hacker Neimod claims to have got "full control" of the 3DS via kernel mode, with one of the benefits of this being able to run a game from any region on any region's handheld.

This is important to those importing games, as well as those who'd like to get a 3DS in a fancy colour scheme that's not yet available in their region.

Nintendo will of course fight moves like this every step of the way, but if you're a regular Joe who would only use this kind of thing to give Nintendo more money, I wouldn't let your conscience weigh you down too heavily if you're excited for this progress.

More Nintendo 3DS hacking progress [Tiny Cartridge]

Still regarded as one of the finest strategy games ever made, Ensemble's 1999 classic Age of Kings has long been dead as far as publisher Microsoft is concerned.

As far as fans are concerned, though, it's all stations go, as a new expansion called Forgotten Empires has just been released, which introduces new campaigns, maps, units and entire civilizations, like the Magyars, Incas and Italians.

You can grab it at the link below.

Forgotten Empires [Site, via Reddit]

Seeing as I post a Fine Art feature almost every day, it's only right that we take a minute to honour some of the best concept, production and promotional art the world got a chance to see in 2012.

Due to the nature of the field—one in which art can be locked away for years—and also the fact I often share images from older games, I'm not going to simply post the best art (both concept and promotional) that's appeared here in 2012, because it's been from all over the place. Nor am I going to assume to be posting the best images drawn in 2012 because, as explained above, most of those are probably still under lock and key for a few years.

So I'm going to post the best pieces of art for games that came out in 2012. That seems the most fair!

The gallery above features art from games like Mass Effect 3, Syndicate, Assassin's Creed III, Halo 4 and Guild Wars 2, just to name a few. I've only selected one piece from each game; the links to the credited artists in the gallery will take you to a lot more.

Assassin's Creed III, by Remko Troost.
Diablo III, by Duncan Fegredo.
Dishonored, by Sergey Kolesov.
A Game of Thrones, by Cyril Tahmassebi.
Guild Wars II, by Daniel Dociu.
Halo 4, by John Liberto.
Hawken, by Khang Le.
Mass Effect 3, by Matt Rhodes.
Syndicate, by Brad Wright.
XCOM, by Piero Macgowan.
ZombiU, by Morgan Yon.

They're from ThreeA, so your loved ones will need the time to save up, but look at them. They'll be worth it.

We've seen these before in their unpainted prototype state, but these painted models are just to die for.

Still no word on a release date or price.

ThreeA x VALVe Portal [ThreeA]

There was, once upon a time, a serious plan to bring a Metroid movie to the silver screen. With John Woo directing. Seemed like a good idea at the time, but various things conspired to sink the project, chief among them Nintendo itself.

As former producer Brad Foxhoven tells IGN, while Nintendo at first surprisingly gave its blessing to the project—being big John Woo fans, apparently—the company was also aware of how badly it could be burned when Hollywood takes liberties with its characters.

"Nintendo was definitely discouraged by [Super Mario Bros.], but felt that with John [Woo] they would be in better hands," Foxhoven told IGN. "The challenge for us was that it felt that the biggest lesson Nintendo learned from Mario was to hold onto their rights even tighter, limiting collaboration when it came to translating Metroid to the big screen. Our entire development time was spent exploring the Metroid world, and what we could—and couldn't—do within it."

The biggest of these problems concerned Samus' back-story, which the producers would need to explore if they were making a movie about her. "What are they doing when they are NOT fighting? What is their daily existence and relationships?", he adds. "What are Samus's aspirations, history, and fears? Nintendo appreciated the questions, but had never thought about them before, and ultimately didn't have a lot of answers. In the end, they felt uncomfortable with our team being the ones to propose those answers."

The Metroid movie project eventually fell apart in 2007, with Nintendo and Team Ninja doing their own Samus back-story in Metroid: Other M for the Wii.

Whatever Happened to the Metroid Movie? [IGN]

NBA Live 10 is one of six EA Sports titles that will lose online support on Jan. 11., according to a notice from Electronic Arts. While retiring online features for sports titles more than a year old is not uncommon for any sports publisher, killing multiplayer support for NBA Live 10, which released in 2009, is noteworthy as it symbolically means the end of any professional basketball simulation offered by EA Sports.

A scan of NBA Live's multiplayer community on PlayStation 3 just before publication showed 377 online and 36 playing a game in progress.

NBA Live 10 released in October 2009, and when EA Sports' NBA Elite reboot failed to launch in 2010, the label still kept the game active and offered roster updates for that season. EA Sports moved its NBA development to Florida following the NBA Elite 11 debacle, and then sat out 2011, a year that opened with the league's owners locking out the players and canceling two months' worth of games.

EA Sports intended to deliver a reconstituted NBA Live 13 as a downloadable title this year but failed to meet that goal. In September, it canceled the game and put NBA Live off until next year, if it even releases then.

No EA Sports NBA product has appeared on retail shelves since 2010's NBA Jam, which released for the Wii in October and was later hustled into service for the Xbox 360 and PS3 to cover for Live/Elite's absence. NBA Jam's 2010 retail release also is affected by the server shutdown, and will lose online support on the same day, Jan 11, 2013.

Other EA Sports games affected include FIFA 11, NHL 11, Madden NFL 11 and NCAA Football 11, all released in 2010.

Online Service Updates [Electronic Arts]

Thanks to a dedicated community, the PC version of Grand Theft Auto IV has been continually polished and upgraded since its release all those years ago. To the point where, now, it looks like something from the future.

The iCEnhancer series of mods, which we've featured before, are being updated to 2.5 (this is an alpha preview), and the results are amazing.

This looks as good as a quality first-person shooter. The fact that this kind of fidelity can be applied to an open world game the size of Liberty City is just mind-boggling.

iCEnhancer 2.5 Alpha - First preview [YouTube]

A 29-yard field goal as time expired put Minnesota and our favorite MMO/XCOM-playing punter in the playoffs. Well done.

2K Sports hasn't said specifically when its infamous exclusive pact with Major League Baseball ends, but it's a good bet that day comes on Tuesday, Jan. 1, 2013.

If someone picks up that license, it'll be the first big story of the year for sports video gaming. If no one picks up that license, it'll be even bigger.

Forecasting 2013, the skies are dominated by baseball. Sports video gamers have long accepted that the Xbox 360 will have no new video game next year. Baseball's absence will be most conspicuous in all the new Wii U households, which will find they have no viable baseball option, unless you count MLB 2K12 for the Wii, which has no online multiplayer and no singleplayer career mode and is the standard-definition port of a game that was already, well, ugly in high def.

The death of MLB 2K has been known—or at least gone without a denial—since May, if not longer. But I still have days when I'm standing in the shower, washing what little hair I have left, and I'm panicked by the thought of a surprise announcement of a Major League Baseball video game other than MLB 13 The Show.

Maybe someone struck a deal a long time ago that had to be kept secret until 2K's license ran out, I think. No, that's profoundly unlikely. 2K's deal was for third-party publishing; if someone was building something in secret, it would be a console maker—Nintendo or Microsoft. Both publishers exited licensed sports video games a decade ago, with the GameCube's NBA Courtside as Nintendo's last such title, and NHL Rivals and NBA Inside Drive as Microsoft's last gasp on the Xbox.

The smart money is on baseball—still alive and well on the PlayStation 3 and PS Vita thank you very much—coming back to Microsoft and maybe Nintendo after the next console generation emerges. Even if a new licensing deal is done, the announcement of it could be held up; any publisher who plans to make a baseball video game for a new console won't do so until it is announced by its manufacturer.

E3 2013 will be a watershed for sports video gaming. If we get to June with no announcement from anyone about a simulation baseball title—and we might—we can start worrying about that's sport's true appeal as interactive entertainment. It may very well be a sport that only supports boutique titles like Sega's MLB Manager Online and the unlicensed Out of the Park Baseball for PC. Or MLB the Show on PS3.

Here are some other stories to look for in 2013:

WWE, Quo Vadis?

THQ is in Chapter 11 and its own filings show it has no plans for a WWE-licensed game beyond WWE '14, which would release next November. Its arrangement with the pro wrestling circuit lasts until 2018 and is said to still have $45 million left on it, which is something like 20 times THQ's current market capitalization.

THQ could sell its exclusive UFC license to EA Sports at the last minute because EA Sports already had both an interest in mixed martial arts, and an engine supporting it, as evidenced by EA Sports MMA of 2010. The WWE is entirely different. EA Sports' fighting division up in Canada is now consumed with pushing out a UFC title, and when the next generation of console hardware arrives, folks will be expecting Fight Night on it, too. The unique demands of a pro wrestling simulation—which require matchmaking, stagecraft and storylines in addition to "realistic" combat—make this an incredibly complex product to develop from the ground up, especially after the expectations set by the WWE/Smackdown vs. Raw series.

Yuke's Future Media Creators is an independent company, and some armchair speculation has it that the WWE should just take over the relationship with Yuke's and publish the game itself. That's a great idea. Who's going to pay the marketing costs? Who's going to pay the vig to Microsoft or Sony for the downloadable content? For the title updates? I think the WWE is too busy managing its own television and pay-per-view partnerships, a nationwide tour of events, and licensed merchandising to want to take this on.

It's more likely this gets snapped up by another publisher. Ubisoft is said to be interested; Activision has shown interest in licensed sports development through the two NASCAR games it has published by Eutechnyx. It's a rich company with zero debt that knows how to sell a million copies to a lowbrow market.

NBA Dead?

I see almost no way for NBA Live to come back on this console generation. When it was canceled in September, EA Sports' boss, Andrew Wilson, said the label would "sit out the full year and stay focused on making next year's game great."

That wording doesn't mean exclude wiping out plans NBA Live on the 360 and PS3, and shifting all development to the next console generation. The brand carries heavy baggage, and the hardcore sports gaming crowd shaping much of the discussion pre-release can't be convinced that it takes four years to create a worthwhile basketball simulation, downloadable or otherwise.

If EA Sports is intent on delivering NBA Live to the PS3 or Xbox 360 next year, it'll be to reestablish the name only. Their better bet is to wait for a new console and hope to catch 2K Sports napping. As NBA 2K is the only sports video game 2K publishes, much less the only licensed game that label publishes, and is annually one of the best sports video games available. that hope is probably unreasonable.

The NCAA Needs a Comeback

While still an enjoyable, eminently playable video game, no franchise appeared more stale in 2012 than NCAA Football, especially after its Madden sibling introduced a new career suite and real-time physics. NCAA Football is in serious trouble if it intends to play out the string of this console generation with a physics engine upgrade and minimal improvements come July. "Road to Glory" and a spinoff Heisman Challenge are the only true overhauls this series has seen in the past two years, and it doesn't sound like either will get much of a remake come 3013. If this game's managers are doubling down on the Dynasty mode, something 90 percent of users already play, then NCAA 13 needs to look, sound, play, and feel a hell of a lot different in 2013. Something better than the birdbrained offensive line blocking seen every year would be a big step in this direction.