What a fantastic three years it’s been- in the last three years, GamingBolt has grown from being just a blog to a full fledged site, where we cover more than we ever imagined we would. We have built a great staff, accumulated some pretty loyal readers and have strived to get better in every way possible. When we’re not working day and night to give you the best content possible, we’re thinking of features to include in our site to give you the best experience possible. In the past three years, we have upgraded our site twice, and now the time has come to give you another upgrade, which is also the best we’ve built so far.

We present to you GamingBolt Version 3.0.

Over the next few months, we’re going to upgrade GamingBolt and include ground breaking features, ranging from community to content. We are going to launch Version 3 in phases, two of which are going to be released within 3 or 4 weeks of each other. What you see right now is the first phase, or Phase 1, as we have internally referred to it so far.

Here’s a brief rundown of the major features we have included in the site with the launch of Phase 1:

A flexible home page for a better user experience:

Using the power of Ajax and PHP we have totally revamped the home page. Users can now sort articles in to various streams like Reviews, Interviews or the Hottest Videos. In addition to that, the home page also features the latest screenshots and videos. Gone are the days where you have to wait for the page to load a video. Now you can click on the thumb and the video will load for your right there- a pop up window will open on the same page and you will be able to view the video without having to go to a new page.

Better Reviews:

In addition to our “The Good” and “The Bad” sections in our reviews, we have also included the usage of badges. In the coming days, you will start seeing reviews with badges. We also have proper review archives now.

Flexible and Faster Galleries:

A huge complaint our readers have had with our content in the past was that our Gallery system was archaic, and that loading through separate pages was a pain. We have optimized GamingBolt.com, and surfing through our new and improved galleries is much easier now. They’re also more flexible, and we can now showcase images and videos in the same gallery.

Videos:

Videos have been heavily revamped on GamingBolt. Not only are all video posts much better presented than before, they’re also easier to view. On the home page, if you click on the thumbnail of the video you want to view, it will appear in a pop up, and you will be able to view it without having to go to a different page (as described before). You can still view them traditionally by just clicking on their links, though, if you want to. You can also check our new video gallery over here.

News:

A much more streamlined way of viewing news. Need I say more?

Revamped Comments:

Comments are more intriguing and fun when you can vote down or up other people’s comments.  We have revamped our comments system, urging the user voice their opinions.

Top 10 Users:

Users can now compete for the top spot in the leaderboards. As of right now, users can gain points by registering, commenting and visiting the site daily. In addition we may donate points to the most active user. In Phase 2 we will expand the scoring system to the forums as well — more details later.

What’s more- the top user at the end of March, 2012, will get a free PS Vita. So make sure you keep commenting and stay active!

Hottest Videos:

Like all other videos on our site, you can see the hottest vidoes in a sidebar on all pages of the site, and by clicking on their thumbnails, you can view them then and there, without opening a new page.

And of course, better content:

As always, we will try our best to bring you better content in every way possible- in quantity and quality.

Of course, we weren’t able to tell you about all the upgrades we have made to the site, simply because there are so many, so why don’t you roam around and look for yourself? It might get you some of those points you need to win a free PS Vita!

In the next few days, we will be launching Phase 2 of Version 3.0, and with that, we will be giving you user profiles, private messaging, user scoring, achievements, ground-breaking forum features, an active community and much more. We’ll give you more details when it launches, so be on the lookout, and stay tuned to GamingBolt.

Remember- the top user at the end of the month of March will get a free PS Vita. 

We hope you like the all new GB. You can give us your feedback, too, it’s always appreciated. Send us your feedback via our “Contact Us” page. You can follow us on Facebook and Twitter, and subscribe to our YouTube channel as well.

Signing out,

Rashid Sayed

The Big Boss

GamingBolt.com

We want to take this chance and wish all our readers a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year- stay tuned to GamingBolt, we’ve got something big planned for you. We are a growing website, and we want to keep growing, and we will. Your feedback is appreciated, and we’re listening to everything you are saying- we will be a better site.

2011 has been an awesome year for gaming- we’e had awesome games like Skyrim, Uncharted 3, Modern Warfare 3, Skyward Sword and so many others. We saw the launch of the 3DS, the PlayStation Network hack, Duke Nukem Forever’s super-belated and horrendous release, the announcement of the Wii U, the PS Vita… Then there was E3, which, albeit a bit disappointing, was still our best coverage of the event in our short history as a wesbite.

We also managed to end the note on a high with our Game of the Year awards. We hosted the biggest awards on the internet this year, boasting of over 60 categories. You can see our nominees and winners here.

We’ve been writing several features regarding what to expect out of 2012 in video games, and how this year was, and we’ll be writing more. And though the next few days will definitely be slow in terms of activity, we will keep posting anything that we think is interesting and might pique your curiosity.

As an Indian website, we’ve undoubtedly performed better than our expectations, as evident by our loyal readers visiting us again and again. Next year, we will strive to reach out to many people, and we have just the things in mind to do that. 2012 will be a huge year for GamingBolt, and it will be nothing short of a revolution. Our staff has worked day and night providing our readers the best news, features and reviews and hopefully our coverage will expand to many areas.

And so here we are, at the end of our third year as a gaming site. We’ve been growing, thanks to you, our readers, and we will grow more- we have a lot of big things planned, and we’re hoping you’ll like it. Again, stay tuned, and Merry Christmas!

Games

Mass Effect 2

Many times hailed as the Game of The Year, Mass Effect 2 takes Commander Shepard back into hyperspace in this thrilling third person shooter/role playing game. The cast and speech is so good, you might almost kid yourself that you’re watching a movie. The shooting is suprisingly solid and every moment seems fresh- there’s very little repetition, a notion that has taken leaps and bounds since the original Mass Effect.

Call of Duty Black Ops

With a stunning single player campaign and the same great multiplayer you’ve come to expect from the Call of Duty series, you can’t go wrong with Black Ops. If you’ve played all of the previous Call of Duty series and been underwhelmed, then Black Ops won’t change your mind. Fortunately, for the vast majority of the huge fans of the game, there’s lots here to like, from new and improved killstreaks to a small overwork of the perk system. No more One Man Army. Hooray!

Starcraft II

Yes, it’s been a long wait, but it has been worth it. With enough new features to entice newcomers, while retaining plenty of old aspects of gameplay, there’s enough here for veterans too. Battlenet, when it works, tends to work well, and many happy hours of hectic multiplayer fun are guaranteed.

Civilization V

Sid Meier once again gives you the chance to build your nation up from the stone age in one of the most addicting games ever created. Are you man enough to take on the challenge? The tactical combat system has taken a huge overhall and the interface is as slick as ever- if you have ever felt slightly daunted by the sheer scale of previous games, there’s no better game in the series to jump in.

Just Cause 2

If you just like causing chaos, throwing cars into big gangs of dudes and just plainly blowin’ s*** up, then Just Cause 2 is the game for you. The sheer number of crazy stunts you can pull off make it almost worth the money straight away. And as if you needed any extra pushing- it’s $7.50 on Steam for a limited time only!

S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat

If you like the thought of a combination of Fallout 3 and Good Gunplay, you owe it to yourself to check this out. If you played previous games in the series and was underwhelmed by it’s mediocre gunplay, shoddy graphics and bugs, then think again about Pripyat- while not totally bug free, it’s the most immersive and stable S.T.A.L.K.E.R game yet.

Hardware

Still rocking your default mouse and keyboard?

Still squining at your elderly monitor?

It’s time to upgrade

Logitech G15 Keyboard

With stunning reviews all over the internet, this beastly keyboard is all the board you need to play to the max. With 18 programmable macro keys and it’s own LCD screen displaying stats such as CPU usage, ping and more,  the G15 makes an awesome upgrade from the bog standard.

Razer Tarantula

Forget PC’s- even keyboards get onboard memory nowadays. The Rzer Tarantula not only sports some of the most comfortable keys fingers ever layed on, it also has enough memory to store up to about 5 different gaming layouts, all fully customizable.

Logitech Mx518 Mouse

With a funky design, a big hump, thumbrest and 2 programmable additional buttons, what’s not to like? Despite fitting in at the budget end of gaming mice, this offers great value for money. This editor owns the Mx518, and I can say from personal experience the mouse is fantastic, rugged and great for those with big hands.

Cyborg R.A.T. 9

It might well be the ugliest piece of kit you ever lay eyes on, but the Cyborg R.A.T is second to none when it comes to customization. From interchangeable pinkie grips, palm rests and custom weighting, this is the mouse for you if you’ve never quite managed to fit in with other gaming mice.

Razer Naga

Always running out of room for those all-so important hotkeys? Then check out the Naga. With 17 MMO-based programmable macros , you’ll never run out of buttons again. It is also available for a terrific price due to recent cuts at around $70.

Here is a video showing just how much the gaming industry loves us and has even heard of us when I asked man people.  First up we have star James C. Burns who does the voice over of Sgt. Frank Woods in Call of Duty: Black Ops and then we have G4TV’s X-Play co-host Adam Sessler giving some GamingBolt.com shout outs.  James C. Burns also let it slip in  separate interview that he will voice Captain Forrester in Dead Space 2 and he… well.. bites the dust pretty quick in the game apparently.  Burns somehow didn’t even know what Call of Duty was until he was approached for the role, never the less, he did an amazing job.  Once again thank you James and Adam for your time and support.

Now back to the point. I am here to announce two important updates. Here they are:

1. Game Store: Now you can buy games right from our site. Get the best deals for all your games and accessories. We are supporting all major consoles and handhelds. Check it out here.
2. Removal of forums: One of the things that never really got going was the forums. Forums was an experimentation by us to see whether our readers will actually like them and start discussing their favorite games and topics, but I guess it was just a little early to start experimenting. However we will consider bringing back the forums again when the time is right.

We are working on a lot of other features as well, which we think will increase our overall readership. One of them being the FaceBook connect feature.

Anyways, that’s it from me for now. Stay tuned with GamingBolt for more news and updates.