The MAG Escalation Pack is now live on the US, Canada and Mexico storefronts.

The PS3‘s massive, ever-changing global war just got bigger! Starting today our “Escalation Add-on Pack” introduces the exciting three-faction “Escalation” game mode that throws Raven, SVER and Valor into simultaneous battle on three brand new maps. As an added bonus, Escalation owners also get their hands on nine exclusive new weapons — including assault rifles, sniper rifles, and machine guns! The best part? All this can be yours for the low, low price of $9.99.

To commemorate the release of our new DLC, we’re also unleashing a variety of special offers to our existing and future fans. Here’s our list of deals:

• Escalation Add-on Pack: $7.99 Through November 9 (until 11:59pm Pacific), anyone who purchased our previous DLC pack, Interdiction, prior to Midnight Pacific Time on October 28 gets 20% off the Escalation asking price!
• Interdiction Add-on Pack: $4.99, reduced from its original price of $9.99; this is a permanent adjustment
• MAG Starter Kit: $14.99 Valued at almost $30, it’s everything new MAG users would want: Both the Interdiction and Escalation Add-on packs, a 30-day trial for MAG character slots B and C, six official MAG PS3 avatars that sport Raven, SVER, and Valor characters and badges, and three dynamic PS3 themes (one for each PMC).
• PlayStation Plus Members receive special bargains as well. Through December 14, “PS+” members can purchase Escalation at the discounted price of $7.99 and Interdiction at half price, for only $2.50!

But we’re not done yet. Gamers that play any of our add-on packs between November 2 and November 14 get additional XP bonuses. Specifically, anyone who plays Interdiction or Escalation within that timeframe earns a +200% bonus with every finished match. We’re also including an all-around +100% bonus for playing any MAG mode within the same time frame. In other words, it’s going to be a MAG XP frenzy!

One last thing we want to mention before we go, is how Escalation fits into MAG‘s storyline. Followers of the game’s mythos have been asking us, and it goes a little something like this:

The Neuvonics Corporation has collapsed in the wake of rapid expansion and spending on cutting-edge energy facilities around the world. Three of their most prized investments are up for grabs after on-site personnel walked out late last week. It stands to reason that the security contract for these facilities will go to the company who possesses them, which is why Valor, Raven and SVER operatives are currently en route. Once the dust settles, if their energy production remains intact, the PMC in control stands to make a fortune from these contracts in the years to come.

For additional details regarding Escalation’s gameplay, including a detailed description of the game mode itself and the maps within, check our list of links below. Enjoy the new content!

• MAG Escalation Announcement (w/ Weapons)
• Escalation Map Video Flythroughs
• Escalation: A Closer Look

Want to talk about it? Visit our official MAG forums by clicking this link and discuss Escalation with your fellow fans!

This past summer, many of you took part in our latest MAG Beta program to help us test out a number of new features slated for our recently-released update, MAG 2.0, and future DLC. Thanks to your devotion, we gathered a surplus of fantastic data that allowed us to make MAG a better game… and we’re not done yet!

Though the MAG 2.0 patch has been available since the end of September, the DLC portion of the beta has remained unreleased — but not for too much longer. Starting November 2, our three-faction gunplay whirlwind, the “Escalation” Add-on Pack, will be available for download from the PlayStation Store for $9.99 (US)!

But we aren’t stopping there.

To celebrate the release of the Escalation DLC, we’re offering two other deals to existing and would-be fans. Check this out:

• Interdiction Add-on Pack: Now $4.99 (US); reduced from original price of $9.99 (US)
• MAG Starter Kit: $14.99 (US): An almost $30 (US) value and everything new MAG users could want: Interdiction and Escalation Add-on packs, a 30-day trial for MAG character slots B and C, six official MAG PS3 avatars that sport Raven, SVER, and Valor characters and badges, and three dynamic PS3 themes (one for each PMC).

If you didn’t get a chance to play it in our MAG Beta, the Escalation add-on supports up to 96 players, or one 32-man platoon for each PMC, as a separate in-game mode that pits the forces of Raven, SVER, and Valor against each other at the same time. The aspirations for each PMC is to earn the requisite number of points before time runs out or, if time does expire, to have the most points overall. Whichever team meets this goal wins the map and additional Shadow War points.

Escalation gameplay is set up in two phases: For phase one, all three teams battle to hold the map’s A, B and C objectives — but when any of the three PMCs gains control of two of the three objectives, phase two begins. In this second phase, the original three objectives are locked and a new fourth objective (D) opens up. Now, the PMC that forced the phase shift must defend objective D against both attacking groups as long as possible; if D is lost, then play reverts back to phase one again and the war continues on until we have a winner or time runs out.

As beta players have already seen, Escalation offers three completely different environments (maps) to the MAG universe, including the volcanic beaches “Isla de Magma,” the mountainous “Silverback Ridge,” and the desert wasteland of “Radiant Barrens.” As an added bonus, our new add-on pack isn’t just made up of new maps – there are also nine previously-unavailable weapons we’re throwing into the mix too:

Raven: Gotha Elite (Assault Rifle) | KP21 (Machine Gun) | Kinmark SRS (Sniper Rifle)
SVER: Tamsen MK2 (Assault Rifle | Ariet SFW (Machine Gun) | Rubakho SVR (Sniper Rifle)
Valor: M31 CIR (Assault Rifle) | M245 (Machine Gun) | Sentinel M421 (Sniper Rifle)

If this sounds like your brand of DLC fun, we’ll see you again on November 2!