Gaming - Page 277

Fallout London looks to be one of the most ambitious Fallout 4 mods ever made, and it finally has a release date.

Fallout London is an impressive expansion-sized mod that's coming in April 2024 to Fallout 4 on PC. The team spent tens of thousands of hours crafting a realistic irradiated London city that's replete with UK culture, complete with its own overseas Pip-Boy variant, the Atta'boy.

The sheer size, scope, and dedication of Fallout London is noteworthy. The mod is just as big as the entire original game combined with the excellent Far Harbor DLC. There's a multitude of customization options, including custom races, and even extra companions with unique dialog options.

According to reports, illegally-obtained confidential material stolen from Insomniac Games indicates the studio had pitched a live service Spider-Man game, but this project had been cancelled a while back.

Microtransactions are great for business. Sony's games division makes billions of dollars a year from its 30% commission on live service games like Fortnite, Call of Duty, Apex Legends, and Genshin Impact. PlayStation sees how much money these games make and now it wants a piece of the pie. That's why Sony has embarked on an ambitious plan to release 6 live service games by 2025--it used to be 12, but Sony delayed half of these games.

Some games, like Naughty Dog's online multiplayer take on The Last of Us, have been cancelled. Other cut projects include a multiplayer Spider-Man game pitched by Insomniac Games.

This unsuspecting PlayStation 1 game was hiding a big secret for 23 years.

Alien Resurrection released in 2000 for the PlayStation 1 and was generally received as a competent first-person shooter. On the surface, there wasn't anything truly groundbreaking or remarkable about the sci-fi FPS, but the final game actually contained something it shouldn't have ever shipped with: an exploit that allows gamers to play burned PSX game backups.

For over 2 decades now, Alien Resurrection has been hiding a PlayStation 1 boot exploit which offers a nifty trick for playing pirated/burned games. Alien Resurrection's boot exploit is only accessible via a special cheats menu. The secret was revealed by original game developer Martin Piper, who broke his silence by informing YouTuber Modern Vintage Gamer about the feature.

A new patent from Sony Interactive Entertainment could hint at dedicated AI processors in future PlayStation consoles.

Sony has filed an interesting patent (US20230405461) that may rely on AI tech in order to operate. The patent is for a robust "predictive assistance" solution that leverages artificial intelligence to study play patterns through a predictive lens, and then react accordingly, providing tips to players when needed.

For example, if a player is trying to beat a boss but repeatedly fails, the patented tech would give the user an on-screen hint on how to defeat the enemy. Sony already has something similar to this with the PS5's Game Help feature, but that isn't reactionary and is instead a series of static Wiki-style tips and tricks. Sony's patent would be more dynamic, smart, and highly conditional by contrast.

As Sony achieves 50 million units sold to consumers, Microsoft may be struggling to find market share in video games hardware.

Sony has high hopes for the PS5. The company hopes to ship 25 million consoles this fiscal year, and eventually beat the PS4's 117.4 million sales. Data shows that Sony is almost halfway there, having achieved hefty PS5 metrics like 50 million sell-through and over 46 million sell-in.

Microsoft, on the other hand, appears to be once again having trouble gaining market share. New estimates from analyst firm Ampere Analysis indicate that Microsoft has sold 7.6 million Xbox Series X/S consoles throughout 2023, compared to the PlayStation 5's strong 22.5 million.

Sony Interactive Entertainment management expects 2023 to be a record year, potentially even topping last year's $26.9 billion revenue.

Thanks to a lucrative billion-dollar digital ecosystem of games, services, and content, alongside profitable consumer-grade electronics that sell tens of millions of units, Sony PlayStation has remained at the top of gaming's Big 3 for years. That could change now that Microsoft owns Activision Blizzard King.

Even still, Sony still forecasts this year to break new records. The PS5 did just reach 50 million consoles sold through to consumers, moving 14 million systems in a 9-month period--a new PlayStation record.

The first Nintendo Switch flashcart may be ready to launch sometime in 2024.

Nintendo's current Switch handheld-console hybrid has been uniquely resilient to flashcarts due to tightened security. The Switch's GameCards are built with Nintendo's proprietary tech and have been tough to crack. The Switch actually features a dedicated ASIC that communicates directly with the GameCards through a custom protocol designed by Nintendo.

If recent reports are accurate, then big progress has been made. It appears that the first Switch flashcart is here, and it may be ready to release in January 2024. In a NickMoses05 stream, a guest from the modding scene speculates that the flashcart could be running via an exploit, potentially a GameCard-based exploit that no one currently knows about. It's also possible the flashcart requires a modchipped Switch in order to function.

Star Citizen's new Legatus bundle is out, and this time it costs more than 3x annual minimum wage salaries.

Star Citizen is famous for its wide monetization purchase structure. Roberts Space Industries offers a multitude of buy options for players including whole spaceships that can command thousands of dollars. There's also a big shortcut for gamers who want to sidestep a lot of that grinding.

The space sim sells whole ship packages in order to make money for development and maintenance of the game itself. The most notorious package is the Legatus bundle, a somewhat-annual collection that packs in 100+ ships and pieces of content for the game. RSI describes Legatus as the "definitive armada," so you're basically buying a fleet of ships for a set price.

The developers behind the beloved Dark Souls series announced the servers supporting online play for Dark Souls 2 would shut down in March next year on two old consoles - PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360.

FromSoftware took to its official X account to announce the news that has seemingly smacked dozens of gamers right in their digital hearts, with the company writing Dark Souls 2 servers on the PS3 and Xbox 360 will be shut down on March 31, 2024, which will result in online play being disabled and message popping up on-screen if a player attempts to connect informing them of such.

FromSoftware reminded gamers that servers being disabled won't affect offline gameplay, and PC, PS4, and Xbox One servers for Dark Souls 2 "will not be affected". FromSoftware didn't forget to thank the players of Dark Souls 2, as the now incredibly popular series began on the PS3 and Xbox 360 generation of consoles, and judging by the replies to FromSoftware's X post, many gamers have very fond memories of those servers and are sad to see them go. As I am.

Bethesda Game Studios has celebrated the success of Starfield by taking to the company's official blog to share some interesting stats about the recently released title.

The launch of Starfield was met with mixed emotions by the gaming community, with some players thoroughly enjoying the sheer scale and possibilities of the space exploration title and others who expressed the lack of open-world RPG feeling through hollow, disjointed world-building plagued with loading screens.

Despite the divisive launch, Starfield is still being enjoyed by millions of gamers around the world, and according to Bethesda, the average Starfield player spent 40 hours exploring the universe, which is likely a number much higher than you would expect considering the title's rocky start. Bethesda revealed in an infographic that 13 million players had enjoyed Starfield and the future updates it has planned for the title.

Digital dominates 2023's annual spending in the video games market.

GamesIndustry.biz's annual Year in Numbers datasheet has been published, revealing a dearth of information about the interactive entertainment's overall performance in 2023. The infograph, which includes a multitude of key metrics from the world's top analyst firms, underlines a trend that has been growing for some time: Digital gaming is taking over.

According to Newzoo, digital made up about 95% of 2023's video games revenues, or about $174.5 billion. This value includes both full game purchases made on storefronts like the PlayStation Store, Nintendo eShop, Steam, and the Xbox store, as well as in-game purchases and microtransaction spending across all platforms.

Embark Studios scores big with its debut game, The Finals.

The Finals has amassed 10 million players in just 15 days' time, a milestone that makes it one of the most popular FPS games of the year. The squad-based shooter throws players in a twisted game show arena and pits them in a battle of survival and objective-based chaos. The irreverent style mixes with Overwatch-like classes and abilities, fast-paced FPS carnage, and dynamic environment destruction to deliver a fresh take on the current FPS market.

"To all you 10 million contestants (!) who have entered the arena since launch - a huge THANK YOU!" Embark said on Twitter.

New draft rules from Chinese regulators has startled investors, leading to a $80 billion selloff of gaming stock.

China's National Press and Publication Administrations recently published new rules that, if implemented, could disrupt the global gaming market. Concerned about the social effects of gaming, including gaming addiction, Chinese regulators passed laws to limit playtime. Now the government agency has drafted new mandates aimed at reducing the amount of money that consumers spend in digital games.

The rules, which have only been drafted and not instituted, would bite into the multi-billion dollar revenues made by Chinese companies like Tencent and NetEase. The new regulation would require Chinese companies to set a maximum cap on how much money players can spend while playing a game.

Insomniac Games delivers an official response to the recent ransomware cybercrime responsible for leaking confidential materials.

Ransomware group Rhysida recently infiltrated Insomniac Games' internal database and leaked more than 1.7 TB of confidential and highly sensitive data onto the internet. The files included plans on Insomniac's new games, content assets, earnings figures, employee data and info, and a playable build of the upcoming studio's Marvel Wolverine game.

Revealed in the attack was Spider-Man 2's heavy-hitting $300 million budget alongside a multi-year exclusivity agreement between PlayStation and Marvel for the X-Men IP. Now Insomniac has shared their thoughts on the attack with a public statement, saying that despite the leaks, Marvel's Wolverine won't be cancelled and the studio is unwavering in their determination.

If you're looking for a reason for some festive cheer - and you love RPGs, and have been holding off on Baldur's Gate 3 - the good news is that Larian's game has just been discounted for the first time ever on PC.

Head on over to Steam and you'll see that Baldur's Gate 3 is now 10% off, making it a tempting purchase for those looking for a good adventure to keep them entertained over the holiday period.

Scratch that - a great adventure, not just a good one, as Baldur's Gate 3 couldn't really be any more highly-rated. The RPG scooped the Game of the Year title at The Game Awards, beating stiff competition from the likes of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom and Alan Wake 2.

Bethesda's latest year in review update offers a look at what's to come in Starfield in 2024.

Starfield isn't like other Bethesda games. Starting in February 2024, the studio plans to roll out consistent updates to the space sim every six weeks. This cadence will yield all sorts of changes, tweaks, and upgrades over the base game, including but not limited to actual content additions and basic/in-depth quality-of-life updates.

So what's on the horizon for 2024? The developers have already teased that "new ways to travel" are coming to Starfield next year, but the blog post also confirmed new details like unique difficulty options, a new survival mode, and fresh templates and parts for enthusiast ship builders.

EA has published a new design update for its Frostbite games engine, and confirms that all EA dev teams can choose whichever engine they'd like to work on.

Originally designed for FPS games, DICE's proprietary Frostbite engine has grown up throughout the years. The engine is now used for everything under the sun at EA, including third-person action-adventure RPGs like Dragon Age.

Interestingly enough, the publisher now says that developers are essentially free to pick what game-making toolset they want to make their game with--Unreal Engine, Unity, etc. This is a stark contrast to 9-10 years ago when EA pushed its studios to all use Frostbite, even BioWare, who worked incredibly hard to get Mass Effect and Dragon Age games running on Frostbite.

The development teams behind Fallout, Elder Scrolls, and Doom just got a new boss.

Microsoft has reorganized the structure of its video games business to make way for its $68.7 billion acquisition of Activision Blizzard King. The games division has shuffled executives around as it integrates ABK into the existing Xbox infrastructure, creating new positions like the first-ever president of Xbox (Sarah Bond) and a new Xbox Content & Studios president role (Matt Booty).

The shake-up also sees Jill Braff stepping in to lead ZeniMax and Bethesda's game development teams. Braff will oversee ZeniMax Online, which includes the teams behind The Elder Scrolls Online, as well as Bethesda Softworks, which is the banner that includes studios like Bethesda Game Studios (Fallout, Elder Scrolls, Starfield), id Software (Doom, RAGE), Arkane (Dishonored, Redfall, Prey), MachineGames (Wolfenstein, Indiana Jones), and Tango Gameworks (The Evil Within, Hi-Fi Rush).

Sony no longer plans to remove Discovery TV content from the PlayStation Store.

Weeks ago, Sony announced that it would be deleting over 750 pieces of Discovery digital video content from the PlayStation Store. This wasn't just a de-listing, but would have been an outright deletion and removal of all of the affected shows. Users who had purchased the content would have had their access rights stripped and the shows simply would have vanished from both the storefront and user libraries.

Now Sony has confirmed that the deletion will no longer take place. PlayStation gamers will be able to keep all of their purchased Discovery TV shows and content. The reason? WB Discovery and Sony have signed a new deal.

SEGA shares brief details and a few new screen captures of its upcoming retro remakes.

At The Game Awards 2023 showcase, SEGA announced plans to resurrect a bunch of classic game IPs with new releases. Beloved Dreamcast and Genesis franchises like Crazy Taxi, Jet Set Radio, Golden Axe, the beat-em-up Streets of Rage, and even Shinobi are coming back with new games. SEGA launched a marketing campaign called Next Level for these games.

Exact details like platform availability have not been announced, but SEGA has delivered a few new descriptions on the games in a recent company-wide presentation.