A new update for Spiral Knights brings the Winter holiday to the town of Haven … and turns up some answers (and more questions) within the Clockworks.

Winterfest

As the planet of Cradle has ticked a few degrees over and ushered in wintertime to the town of Haven, the snow-based festivities have begun: it’s time for Winterfest, which means a blanket of snow, Snipes in the holiday spirit, and … Impostoclaus! In addition, as part of the Winterfestivities:

Event Hub

New to your Spiral Knights interface — the Events Hub! More than just a way to keep tabs on what ongoing events you might be able to join, the Hub helps you to keep tabs on past events as well as personal statistics, accomplishments, and achievements by friends and guildmates.

Of particular note to the old-school video game purist: the Events Hub features a running high score, tallying levels, Coliseum matches, and crowns acquired.

Heat Amplifiers

This is definitely worth noting: Heat Amplifiers have allowed Knights to accrue extra heat energy in dungeons. Now, they’ve received a technological upgrade, granting double the un-amplified heat Knights would gain! Additionally, you can acquire Heat Amplifiers with different capacities, lasting for 2 days, 7 days, or 30 days.

Scenario Rooms

While a beautiful, icy, cake-like glaze coats the surface of Cradle, the ever-shifting layers of the Clockworks have revealed something new within: Scenario Rooms are new rooms which have begun turning up in existing levels.

Scenario Rooms offer more than meets the eye (and sometimes much more). Some direct bits of story & lore, of interest to Knights who find such things interesting, can be found … as well as some more indirect mysteries and hints at the larger mystery of the Clockworks itself. You will also encounter special bonuses from such rooms … take note, for some Scenario Rooms are much more rare than others!

European Servers

Some news from the meta-Clockworks that keep the game humming along, there will now be new European servers open for Spiral Knights! Here are the official notes from Three Rings which those of you in Europe (and some of you here) will want to be aware of:

• Implementation of new servers is to reduce latency for European players.
• When you join a pick-up game or enter a town, you will be matched with other players in your region.
• By default, your region will be automatically determined based on your IP.
• If you wish to manually configure your preferred region, you may do so via the Option menu (in the General section, under Region).
• Your knights, items, friends, guild mates, etc., will remain unchanged!

Interface & Bugfixes

Some upgrades have been applied to the interface for Spiral Knights, including preview personal color changes for your Knights both in shops and at the Auction House. For more information — and for some minor bugfix-type items — skate on over to the Spiral Knights patch notes here!

You’ve read the recent postings about Metal Sonic and Amy in Sonic CD. Now we’re happy to debut a full 5 minute video featuring Sonic Team Art Director Kazuyuki Hoshino talking about the creation of this fan favorite game. Insight into logo design, character design, enemy design, and inspiration on the future and past versions of levels. We hope you enjoy this video!

Sonic CD Fanart Competition

We’re nearly done picking all the winners for the SONIC CD Fanart contest and will be ready to show you the results and winners very shortly. We’ve done a few art contests now and we’re still very impressed with the different styles and overall creativity – it makes picking winners that much more difficult. We’ll have more info on this contest very soon, stay tuned!

Last year, we asked for you to send us photos of your SEGA and Sonic-themed holiday decorations, and we enjoyed it so much that we want more!

We want to see your Sonic and SEGA-themed tree toppers, ornaments, stockings, dreidels , menorahs, or any other winter decorations you have. Just take a photo and send it to communityteam@sega.com along with your name, location, and any other details or story you think we should know along with it. We’ll pick some to feature on the blog at the end of the week before we go on our holiday break.

Here’s some of the photos we received last year!

On some of our Japanese games, the developers take great pride in painstakingly researching every aspect of the game to make sure it’s accurate. Here is a sneak peek at the lengths one such dev team went to research 12^th century Japanese Warrior Monks in their recently released iPhone game – Samurai Bloodshow. Take a look!

GameStop is offering special rewards for those who participate in their PowerUp Rewards program. The Dan Marshall Pack alongside the Multiplayer Pack are both available for those that pre-order Binary Domain.

The Dan Marshall Pack

An enhanced weapon for Dan: ‘SOWSAR-17 SBMOD type G’ Assault Rifle

Assault: Physical Enhancement I -> Health +10%
Assault: Protective Coating -> Defense +10%
Assault: Quick Prompt -> Reload Speed x1.5

To receive the Dan Marshall Pack you must:

1. Must be Power UP Rewards Pro Member
2. Must Pre-order Binary Domain
3. Must Pick up Binary Domain in 48 hours to receive this pack

Binary Domain is available this February and can be pre-ordered by clicking this link here.

There are more Sonic 20th Anniversary statues up for grabs! From today through Friday December 16th, you can enter at Destructoid to win a 20th Anniversary statue and a copy of Sonic Generations. Read all the details and official rules here.

From Destructoid:

This week’s 25 Days of Giving is brought to you by Sega! All this week we’ll be giving away a ton of Sega goodies starting off with Sonic the Hedgehog’s latest offering with five copies Sonic Generations for the Xbox 360. That’s not all! We’re also giving away full size 20th Anniversary Sonic figures!

To enter, you’re going to need to answer the three questions below and email your answers with the subject line “SUPER SONIC” to contests @ destructoid.com. You have to leave a comment here (NOT ON THE SEGA BLOG) letting us know you’ve entered as well (please don’t post your answers in the comments!)

We’ll be picking five people at random (that got all the questions right) after the contest closes on December 16 at 11:59PM CST. Limit one entry per person and contest is open to anyone with a US based shipping address the prizes can be shipped to. Good luck!

QUESTION 1:

In the original Sonic games like Sonic 2 and Sonic 3, seven Chaos Emeralds and a certain number of gold rings would let you transform into Super Sonic. How many gold rings did you need?

QUESTION 2:

In Sonic Adventure 2 on the Dreamcast, what promotional partner did SEGA team up with to introduce Sonic’s new rail-grinding ability?

QUESTION 3:

In the Generations version of Rooftop Run, originally from Sonic Unleashed, Classic Sonic’s stage has surprise references to at least two original Sonic levels. Can you name one of these levels?

 

IMPORTANT NOTE: This contest is administered by Destructoid, not SEGA. Please direct all questions about the contest to Destructoid. Please read the official rules. Answering the questions and/or commenting on the SEGA blog will not enter you into the contest.

Since we’ve posted the announcement and gameplay trailers for Crush3D, I know a lot of fans of the original Crush have been wondering how the story compares. In Crush3D, Danny has decided to help his good ol’ pal the Doc out once more, volunteering to be a tester for the Crush machine. Long story short, the robot the Doc designed to help Danny navigate through his own imagination decides she likes Danny a little bit too much to let him leave easily.

In Crush3D, you’ll help Danny find his marbles and try to escape his own imagination. It’s unlike any puzzle game you’ve ever played (unless you’ve played the original, I suppose). Are you excited about Crush3D? Let me know in the comments if you have any questions!