It seems Minecraft won’t be banned in Turkey after all. A spokesman for the Turkish Embassy in Washington D.C. has said that the ban is “out of the question”. According to Christian Science Monitor, Fatih Oke said:

“A ban is quite out of the question. There will be no ban. The game is not banned and is not going to be banned, the Family and Social Policy Ministry does not have that kind of authority to ban any product. I understand that this is what has been said in the Turkish media, but it is incorrect.” 

This, of course, follows some rather interesting reports from the country earlier this week claiming that Minecraft would be banned due to its violence. Advocates of the ban claimed that the game encouraged kids to inflict pain on animals, bullying and social isolation.

Fortunately, it does seem that the agency doesn’t have the power to carry through this ban.

The release date for Final Fantasy XIV’s first expansion, Heavensward, has been given a release date by Square Enix at PAX East. The expansion will release for everyone on Tuesday June 23rd, but those who pre-order will gain access from the 19th through a special early access weekend.

Rumours had hinted that gamers would expect to see the expansion arriving in the spring, but director Naoki Yoshida told attendees of the panel at PAX East that more time was needed to further polish the elements. The expansion will bring a lot of new content to the world of Eorzea, and that introduced a whole heap of new bugs and incompatibilities to the game which couldn’t be fully fixed in time for a sprint release date.

Mac gamers will also have their long wait ended as Mac support will launch around the same time as Heavensward does.

Blizzard have announced the formation of a new eSports tournament related to their game of Heroes of the Storm and specially for students. The name? Heroes of the Dorm. The reason this is a mainly student tournament is that the main prize is that the entire team will have their college tuition paid for entirely by Blizzard. There’re also other prizes available for winning which amount to about $450,000 in value.

Any team that signs up and is verified as being eligible for the event will also receive access to the Heroes of the Storm beta in order to compete. The competition is only open to residents of the US and Canada (excluding Quebec), and to register you must have a team of five and register them before March 26th. The teams eligible will then compete in online group stages between March 28th and March 29th, and the top 64 teams will compete in Single Elimination brackets between April 11th and April 19th with the top four team moving onto the final event which will be televised on ESPN.

The top four teams will already win something just by getting to that final point, with prizes including a gaming PC, headset and mousepad (as well as the flight to the event being paid for of course). Teams that make it to the top 64 bracket will also receive $40 in Battle.net funds to purchase heroes ready for the event.

Anyone not eligible for entering can take part in fantasy brackets that will be live during the event, allowing for predictions to be made on the matches. The top five there will also win a gaming PC each, and the top prediction wins $10,000. 25 random winners will also receive prizes and all participants will receive a unique Azmodan portrait.

Heroes of the Dorm Site: [x]

The latest Street Fighter game, Street Fighter V, has been given a release date by Capcom. The news came in the form of a PAX East merchandise advertisement, mentioning the release time for both the PC and PS4 version which will feature cross-play functionality.

The game itself was unofficially announced through a game trailer that was accidentally uploaded a little bit too early. After a few days Capcom decided to formally announce that the game was being made, with a demo of it being shown in action at least year’s PlayStation Experience. The advertisement though has revealed more, most importantly that Capcom is aiming for a release time of somewhere in the early part of 2016. The cross-play functionality will allow players on both platforms to interact and play matches against each other.

The Capcom website says of the game “Everyone is fired up for Street Fighter V, coming to PS4 and PC next Spring.”

Yacht Club Games announced today the release of their first Shovel Knight Expansion. Plague of Shadows has you playing as one of the baddies from the main game, Plague Knight, who is in a quest to become the head of the Order of No Quarter. Plague Knight will have his own his own skill set including being able to craft loot into new equipment and power-ups. The expansion will also bring new objectives and bosses, and more.

Shovel Knight: Plague of Shadows is due to release in Spring 2015.