Gaming - Page 1005

In an article earlier today, I wrote about Gears of War 4 shaping up to be one biggest games for the PC this year. But during the interview with Technical Director Mike Raynor, it looks like Xbox Scorpio could run it at close to PC settings, at 4K.

Raynor said: "When we built this game over the last three years and went to a new engine, we optimized for a new console generation. We've made a foundational technology for the franchise to work over the next 10 years. We've authored content with 4K in mind. We support 4K texture resolutions, additional features".

He added that Gears of War 4 is ready for future hardware, with more horsepower and new features. Raynor continued: "We're not gonna hit reset [with the next game] and be thinking, 'How are we going to do this? We're not ready for it.' I can't go into specifics about Gears 4, but look at what we're doing on Windows, what we're doing on Gears 4-it looks pretty good for what we'll be able to do on future hardware".

Gears of War 4 is nearly here, and we're beginning to hear very positive things about the PC version of the game, which almost feels like we've slipped into a Bizarro world with PC ports these days.

Ars Technica got their hands-on some preview code of the PC version of Gears of War 4, with the site confirming the game includes an 'Insane' graphics setting, something they ran on their GeForce GTX 1080, Core i7 processor and 32GB of RAM. This hardware is pretty beefy, and it wasn't enough to handle the game at 4K.

The resolution was dropped from 4K to 1440p, with Ars noting it "still looked gorgeous" and ran at 60FPS with the graphics settings set higher than the Insane settings. Technical Director Mike Raynor told Ars: "DirectX 12 is a big part of how we're able to get additional performance out of the PC. The DX12 graphics API takes away a bunch of layers from the developer and hardware. It's letting us have more direct control over what the GPU's doing...".

Some gameplay footage of Star Wars Battlefront 3 has emerged, in its alpha build form that was being developed on all the way back in 2008.

LucasArts cancelled the game before it launched, but with the leaked footage, we get a good glimpse at what the team was working on. The video shows off a little of the campaign from Star Wars Battlefront 3, with Old Republic heroes X1 and X2 arriving on Tatooine, with a new mission. They fly out of the hanger on their starfighters towards Tatooine, without a single loading screen - impressive, especially for 2008. We're only seeing this type of thing in games now, nearly 10 years later.

The second video is a continuation of the first, following X1 and X2 as they respond to a Tusken Raider attack. The sound effects used a hilariously bad, but we can see the overall shape of what LucasArts were working on, especially when it comes to the lack of loading screens.

If it wasn't already scary enough, it looks like Alien: Isolation could soon have official VR support. The game has been demoed in VR at some trade shows, partnering with Oculus and throwing you into Alien: Isolation on the Rift. I've played it, and it could shape up to be one of the best VR horror games.

Sony European head Jurgen Post spoke with MCV, where he said: "VR has caught the whole company's attention. We have a lot of VR kits in the office and people are playing with it. We are exploring ways to release games. We've not announced anything, but we are very close to making an announcement".

The best bit: "We did Alien: Isolation about three years ago on Oculus Rift, it was a demo that was bloody scary. To bring that back to VR would be a dream and dreams can come true". Yes please, Creative Assembly.

EA has just revealed Battlefield 1's minimum and recommended PC specs, but they're not too demanding.

In order to run Battlefield 1 and minimum spec on PC, you can get away with using some outdated hardware like an AMD Radeon HD 7850 or a GeForce GTX 660, but you'll need at least a newer Skylake-series Intel i5 6600K CPU and 8GB of RAM. Recommended specs still aren't too demanding with DICE advising you to have at least a GeForce GTX 1060 or an AMD RX 480, 16GB of RAM, and an Intel i7 4790 or equivalent CPU.

Read More: EA is centralizing its Battlefield games under a single UI

Yakuza games aren't nearly as big as Grand Theft Auto-style open worlds, but it's still impressive when bigger games don't have any loading screens--especially on non-PC platforms.

SEGA has confirmed that Yakuza 6--which still hasn't been confirmed for localization in the West--will have absolutely zero loading screens when it launches on PS4 in Japan. SEGA describes Yakuza 6 as "completely seamless," but you still shouldn't expect the game to be a massively-scoped open-world endeavor.

"We've worked hard to make this game completely seamless. You can engage in the central adventure, get into battles, watch drama scenes, and go back to the adventure, all without any loading screens. Go into any building or any room or any floor without loading," Yakuza creator Toshihiro Nagoshi told IGN.

Tekken 7 has entered the 60FPS realm, and its newest trailer gives us a glimpse of that gloriously smooth chaos we can expect in 2017.

As a die-hard Tekken fan, I'm extremely excited about Tekken 7 for two reasons: one, we'll get to wreak total havoc with our favorite characters in 60 frames-per-second for the first time ever, and two, it's the first fully-fledged Tekken game we've had in almost 10 years (Tekken 6 came out in 2007). Tekken fans have been starved for a continuation for a while now, and Tekken Tag Tournament 2 was genuinely awesome, but the game didn't propel the series forward.

Tekken 7 will also see the epic battle against father and son as Heihachi faces off against Kazuya one last time. The game also features a bunch of new characters, with a good portion of our old favorite fighters jumping back into the fray.

Not too many PC games have split-screen co-op, with even fewer console games even supporting it. Interestingly enough, Gears of War 4 will have local co-op for its campaign with the devs describing the addition as a "labor of love."

"From a development standpoint, it is quite difficult to support. We have to deal with multiple inputs, we have to deal with focus, we have to deal with UI placement. Developers have got to put some effort into it to do it right, it's not just something you can tack on." Gears of War 4 Technical director Mike Rayner told PC Gamer.

Gears of War 4 will also support cross-play on Xbox One and Windows 10 PCs for online campaign co-op and co-operative Horde mode, player vs AI gametypes, and private matches. Gears of War 4 even supports LAN multiplayer and co-op on Xbox One and PC, too.

No Man's Sky creator Sean Murray hasn't posted anything on Twitter in a full month now, reinforcing the idea that the dev is huddling down amidst the lies and misleading ad campaign.

I've been watching Sean Murray's Twitter account for a bit now, and I'm not really surprised that he hasn't Tweeted anything for a month. No Man's Sky continues getting patched--a new patch rolled out for the game on PS4 today--yet Murray remains completely silent. This is probably one of the worst things he can do right now, and most gamers think he's just laying low to let all the chaos roll over until everyone forgets about No Man's Sky and moves on. Meanwhile the official Hello Games account hasn't Tweeted in weeks either, with its last update on August 27.

In order to salvage the wreckage that is No Man's Sky and Hello Games' public image, Murray needs to shed some light on what went wrong. Why did he lie about the game? Why was the game missing so many features? What happened? These are questions he needs to answer, and I think there's a huge reason why he can't: it'd breach the contract he signed with Sony. Even still, he needs to do something. He can't just pretend nothing happened. I know the devs are likely busting their ass with updates, but the majority of gamers see him swimming in the millions of hype-bucks he conned off of naive gamers. To illustrate Murray's silence, Redditor MasRemap made this infographic:

Hello Games rolls out a new patch for No Man's Sky on PS4 that fixes a crucial HUD oversight, and now I can actually play the game again.

I've been quite vocal about lambasting Hello Games for their horrible decisions with No Man's Sky updates, namely the previous patch that pretty much broke the game for me. You see, before now the game had a serious problem with its heads-up display: it would mix up places you've been with the places you need to go.

At launch, No Man's Sky only showed you where you need to go and places you haven't discovered. Once you got to an area marked on your HUD, it would disappear after you discover it. Hello Games decided to patch the game and show you where you've been so you could return to those places.

Another day... another crappy PC port, this time in the form of the latest version of Pro Evolution Soccer, or PES 2016. Konami is behind PES 2016, which uses the Fox Engine, the same engine that powered Metal Gear Solid 5 - and while it looked good in MGS, it doesn't here.

The PC version of the game is especially bad, with it at times looking worse than the console versions of the game - which don't look too good to start with.

The PS4 and Xbox One versions of PES 2016 have a slew of weather and sweat effects, as well as better color and lighting effects.

Pokémon GO players will have to wait just a little bit longer to discover the famous 'Ditto'. Niantic CEO John Hanke, continues to remain strong in keeping the Pokémon's location a secret, as he was asked a question about it recently at TechCrunch Disrupt in San Francisco days ago.

Hanke's panel response regarding the character's whereabouts: "I can't tell you how to find Ditto, because that wouldn't be any fun when you did find him if you did." He then later did promise to audiences that they would be able to eventually find the Pokémon but, as to how long that may take, we don't know.

Ditto, known for transfiguration, takes on the appearance of other Pokémon, but is still not considered to be a rare or legendary character, hence the questions regarding it's location. Rumors tease that when it does appear, the Pokémon should be an easy one to obtain.

Hideo Kojima is in the headlines for a couple of reasons, first he came out and said he has nothing to do with the new Metal Gear Survive game - and now he's teasing his mysterious new game: Death Stranding.

Death Stranding would have to be one of the most unique games teased in the last decade, with Kojima being asked during the Tokyo Game Show if Death Stranding would be released before the 2020 Olympics being held in Tokyo. He said: "To go a little further, there is a movie called Akira, and it will be out before the year in which Akira is set".

Kojima added that the online side of Death Stranding would be a "different kind of online play than anything we've seen before", adding that there will be a female protagonist that will join The Walking Dead star Norman Reedus - but I need to know, will she be naked, like Reedus is in the small teases we've had of the game so far? Kojima added: "This game will show a different side of Norman Reedus than fans of The Walking Dead might expect".

If you've seen anything on Konami's upcoming Metal Gear Survive, you'll know why the internet cast it into flames - it doesn't look like anything we've seen from the Metal Gear franchise so far... but did series creator Hideo Kojima have anything to do with it? Of course not.

During an interview with IGN, Kojima said: "That's nothing to do with me", with Yoji Shinkawa - a former designer on the Metal Gear series adding: "If I had worked on that game, it would have mechs in it". Kojima then added: "The Metal Gear games are about political fiction and espionage. Where do zombies fit in with that?"

Destructoid makes a good point in their article, saying that "Metal Gear Solid V had zombies in it, so what is the difference?" - yeah, what is the difference, Kojima?

Upgradeable consoles would be a huge change to the current console slate, but according to President and Global CEO of Sony Interactive Entertainment, Andrew House, isn't going to happen on his watch - at least not yet.

House recently talked with DigitalSpy about the upcoming PS4 Pro and Sony's goals with the PlayStation VR headset - which launches next month, where House was asked if he could see a future where the PlayStation would be upgradeable, like a PC. House replied: "It's very tough for me to envisage that at this point".

If we rewind to just last week, I wrote an article where House himself said that one of the driving reasons behind the beefier PS4 Pro consoles was that so gamers didn't jump to the PC for 4K gaming goodness. House said: "I saw some data that really influenced me. It suggested that there's a dip mid-console lifecycle where the players who want the very best graphical experience will start to migrate to PC, because that's obviously where it's to be had".

Cloud Imperium Games have shown off a new video of Star Citizen, with its newly implemented Vision Stabilization system. The results? Freakin' gorgeous, check it out:

Star Citizen's new vision stabilization system was displayed at 1080p 60FPS, looking ridiculously smooth. It's a massive change to the head bobbing issues that some gamers haven't, and still don't like about the game - but it seems the team has pulled off the vision stabilization system perfectly.

It looks super smooth to move around, but it feels like they're preparing for a console release with this... or is it just me? But hot damn, do those graphics look good... my gaming PC is screaming already.

Microsoft has finally confirmed it's "monster" Project Scorpio console will be the first console to render games in native 4K.

Microsoft's finally said what we've been waiting for: Project Scorpio will render games in native 3840 x 2160 4K resolution unlike Sony's new PlayStation 4 Pro, which uses Checkerboard Upscaling techniques to upscale base 1080p resolution to 4K.

"Any games we're making that we're launching in the Scorpio time frame, we're making sure they can natively render at 4K," Microsoft Studios Publishing general manager Shannon Loftis told USA Today.

At E3 2016, Capcom and Microsoft revealed the latest 'Dead Rising 4' trailer, with the new title set to be released exclusively for Xbox One and Windows 10 this coming December. Dead Rising 4's new trailer is titled 'Return to the Mall', with main character Frank West back again killing zombies in the middle of a shopping mall.

The 1.5-minute action packed video starts off with West fighting his way through a large wave of zombies, in what seems to be set in a standard food court. Throughout the duration of the clip, it is obvious that hoard has overrun the mall, and it's deemed that the fate of the mall, and the world, is in the hands of the Frank... but this time, it's done with extra features.

The new upgraded armour and weapons are just some of the additional perks provided. West uses high-powered guns and explosives in order to break through the rampage of zombies, with the most exclusive upgrade being seen at the end of the trailer, with a wardrobe update. Frank's new armour is in the form of a mechanical suit, accompanied by heavy duty guns and bionic like abilities, too.

Grand Theft Auto 5 was a great looking game by default, but the mods that are available make it look jaw-droppingly gorgeous - and now the beautiful GTA 5 Redux mod is here, blowing us all away. You can get the new GTA 5 Redux mod right here.

The mod requires 70GB of HDD space, and as for the PC, the developer notes "with optimal performance, and the ability to handle a 5-20 frames per second drop in comparison to the 'vanilla' game, the variance between 5 and 20, is due to the players choice of ReShade presets. All the different options come with a different style, as well as performance impact".

There is lots going on though, including:

Here's to another lazy PC port, with multiple Steam reviews saying BioShock: The Collection and its remaster of the original BioShock games being a "lazy" PC port with a myriad of problems.

One of the reviews said: "The game looks like [BioShock] in pretty much most regards, only a better lighting and a VERY slightly sharper texture pack was implemented. The game looks good with 1080p, when it wants to run well, it does so brilliantly. Problem is ... it has stutters, [and] apparently people have crashes (I only played 30 mins but those were fine) as well".

Other problems with BioShock: The Collection is that it won't launch, and some reviews aren't happy with the texturing options, and more. There were good comments about the new textures in the remastered BioShock games, with one of the reviews saying the improved textures were almost worth the purchase of The Collection.