Gaming - Page 486

The new Mass Effect trilogy remaster looks absolutely epic in 4K with HDR enabled, and BioWare also confirms next-gen optimizations for the new re-release.

Mass Effect Legendary Edition drops on May 14, 2021 on PS4, Xbox One, and PC, and will a free next-gen boost on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X consoles. Every game in the trilogy will hit a solid 4K 60FPS with HDR on PS5 and Xbox Series X, but perf is reduced on PS4 and Xbox One.

Sadly there's no ray tracing, but that's to be expected. Although EA and DICE have been helping Microsoft push its new DXR ray-tracing tech on Xbox and Windows 10, the Mass Effect games are built on a different BioWare engine with rasterization, and are pretty old games to boot.

Blizzard is commercializing its 30th anniversary with a series of microtransaction packs that "celebrate" decades of gaming.

Blizzard has tried to monetize practically every facet of their games using tactics like cosmetics, lootboxes, and even Diablo III's dreaded Real-Money Auction House. Now the billion-dollar developer is monetizing its own 30th anniversary celebration.

In a recent blog post, Blizzard outlined key details on the free BlizzCon event going live on February 19-20. In the post they mentioned gamers can scoop up some in-game goodies to commemorate Blizzard's 30-year legacy of gaming. In 2021, Blizzard will indeed by 30 years old.

On the heels of 2020's successful Sonic the Hedgehog film, SEGA and Netflix are teaming up for a new TV show.

After 27 years, the Blue Blur is finally coming back to the small screen. Netflix today announced Sonic Prime, a new 3D animated series that will premiere on the service sometime in 2022. No exact details on the show have been revealed, but we do know Ben 10 creation/production studio Man of Action Entertainment and Canadian animation studio WildBrain Studios are involved in the project.

The new show is a big move for SEGA, who's been hit especially hard by COVID-19 lockdowns. SEGA's arcade gaming business has suffered significant losses as more people stay home away from large crowded areas, forcing the company to sell off 85% of its arcade division shares. The Sonic movie helped revitalize the series and push game sales up, while also grossing more than 3x its production budget.

Google is done investing in Stadia, and will soon relegate the service into a third-party streaming and storefront platform.

Today, Google announced that it will no longer put money into new first-party Stadia exclusives. Google has ceased funding for its Games & Entertainment projects, and both of Stadia's two game studios will be closed. Sources tell Kotaku that roughly 150 people will be affected by the closure. Division head Jade Raymond, who has commanded key roles in the industry, has also left Stadia.

Google will now use Stadia to exclusively sell subscriptions and full-priced third-party games--an unpopular business model in a landscape that's dominated by Project xCloud's tremendous value. It's also worth noting that the entire digital gaming industry is seeing significant surges in revenues, sales, and earnings, so this timing suggests Stadia is (and was) didn't live up to Google's expectations.

Starbreeze Studios needs Payday 3 to save it from financial doom, but the company still hasn't found a publishing partner for the sequel.

Payday developer Starbreeze is in trouble. The company has lots of debt and needs to stabilize its balance sheets with a big new game. Payday 3 is the company's only hope, and Starbreeze's Overkill division has been developing the sequel for years now. There's just one big problem: The game still doesn't have a publisher.

Starbreeze is in a position where it can pay millions to fund Payday 3's development, but it doesn't have the cashflow to publish and distribute the game. It needs the backing of a bigger company like 505 Games, WB Games, or even EA to properly release Payday 3.

Unlike GT Sport, Gran Turismo 7 will be a more traditional racing game that goes back to the franchise's roots.

Gran Turismo 7 should set a new high watermark for the PlayStation 5. Developer Polyphony Digital plans to use GT7 to fully exemplify and flex the PS5's power with high-end performance targets like 4K 60FPS, high-fidelity textures, and enhanced lighting effects via ray-traced visuals. Now we know more details about the next-gen racer.

In a recent interview with Octane Japan, Polyphony CEO Kazunori Yamauchi confirmed GT7 won't follow GT Sport's online-driven esports focus. Instead, GT7 will be a more mainline game similar to the original Gran Turismo.

Twitch viewers watched over 1 trillion hours for the first time ever, breaking new grounds for the billion-dollar streaming titan.

Twitch's SVP Damian Burns just announced the service's new metrics for 2020, and they're absolutely crazy. Viewers watched an astronomical 1 trillion minutes of streams in 2020, up 78% from the 560 billion minutes streamed in 2019.

The other numbers are equally as impressive, with DAUs hitting over 30 million.

PS5 console scarcity is making people go wild--violence ensued in a U.S. Walmart when a woman brutally stomped on another woman's head to get a console, and now crowds in Japan cluster dangerously during a worldwide pandemic.

PS5 consoles are so rare that Japanese retailers are raffling purchase rights in a random lottery. Hundreds of consumers show up at stores for the chance in buying a console, and sometimes chaos ensues. That's what happened at Yodobashi Camera in Japan's Akihabara shopping area a few days ago.

Tons of Japanese consumers arrived and eventually started to crowd and push each other, eventually pressing hard into the protective barriers that separated the workers from possible COVID-19 contamination. The PS5 lottery was eventually cancelled, and the police were called to break up the massive grouping.

We might be seeing the entire mainstream media trying to make anyone connected to GameStop shares and WallStreetBets into whatever slur of the day they can use -- but there is some real good happening, too.

I don't think the good gets anywhere near as much headlines as it deserves, so here we go: u/Lunar033 posted in r/WallStreetBets that he went out and purchased 6 x Nintendo Switch consoles as well as a heap of games and is donating them all to the Children's Minnesota Hospital.

In his post, u/Lunar033 said: "I am proud to do my part in paying forward our good fortune with a donation of 6 Nintendo Switches and games to go with them to the Children's Minnesota Hospital. Cant Stop. Won't Stop. GameStop. (Still long 50 shares I WILL NOT SELL)".

IO Interactive isn't done with the Hitman franchise, and new games could be in development. But post-launch Hitman 3 DLC comes first.

Right now IO Interactive is on a roll. Years after separating from Square Enix, the company self-developed and self-published Hitman 3. In less than a week on the market, Hitman 3 is already profitable and will help fund IO's massively ambitious new Project 007 James Bond adaptation.

Even with the new James Bond game on the horizon, IO says it's not entirely finished with Hitman. A new mainline game could be in the works at some point--which makes sense considering IO wholly owns the Hitman publishing and development rights.

Sea of Thieves can now break the 120FPS threshold on the Xbox Series X console, Rare confirms in a new game update.

Sea of Thieves adds a new performance target to its repertoire, and can now hit 1080p 120FPS on the Xbox Series X with HDR enabled. This is in addition to the other perf targets that include native 4K 60FPS on the system, as well as the base 1080p 60FPS on HDTVs.

"On the Xbox Series X console, a performance mode is available supporting 120Hz at 1080p. Some TVs do not support 120Hz and HDR simultaneously, so HDR may need to be disabled from the Console Settings," reads the update.

Halo Infinite's new grappling hook is a game-changer that adds unprecedented mobility and verticality to PVP and campaign. It's a new multi-dimensional utility with lots of uses, and offers diverse creativity for chaos creation; pulling enemies towards you, yanking explosive barrels or even weapons to you, and uses it to scale high precipices. Even still, 343i is more excited about another unannounced bit of equipment.

In a recent Halo Waypoint update, Halo Infinite sandbox developers tease a new mysterious equipment that can fling players across the map. From the sound of it, the equipment is probably an updated version of the grav-lift from Halo 3; the equipment is physics-based, it depends on timing, and it can send enemies flying.

"The Grappleshot is definitely a favorite of mine, but I'm equally excited about an equipment item we haven't shown yet. It's highly physics-based, has TONS of interactions across our sandbox, and will leave you laughing or yelling, "Did you see that?!" Proper timing is everything with this equipment, and if you position correctly, you could very well send your enemies flying!" said Sandbox Designer Elan Gleiber.

The Securities Exchange Commission has pushed back Roblox's big public offering so it can clarify its financial reports.

Roblox is set to start public trading with a billion-dollar IPO, but the stock can't debut onto the New York Stock Exchange until the SEC gives its blessing. Right now the SEC wants more clarification on Roblox's income, specifically its digital revenues earned from in-game Robux purchases.

The SEC wants Roblox to separate revenues from in-game consumables and the paid subscriptions, specifically how the revenue is amortized over a period. Roblox originally combined these revenues together. The company says this new adjustment will force a re-write of its financials, which could take a while.

IO Interactive is in a "really good place," CEO Hakan Abrak said after Hitman 3 is already profitable after one week of sales.

With Hitman 3, IO Interactive took a chance and self-published a big AAA game for the first time. The gambit worked. Not only did Hitman 3 generate acclaim from reviewers, but it sold tremendously well. So well, in fact, that IO Interactive is already making a profit from the sequel.

IO CEO Hakan Abrak confirmed the news to GamesIndustry.biz, saying that the company's secret sauce lies in the close relationship between its marketing and development divisions. Instead of keeping the division separate, as most companies do, marketing is closely knit with the developers. The result is a clear and concisely communication that's relayed to consumers and fans.

The Division 2 is getting a big update that will enable juicy smooth 4K 60FPS goodness on the PlayStation 5, and both the Xbox Series X and S consoles.

The news was revealed by Ubisoft Community Manager Johan Lindholm, who was replying to someone asking if there would be a State of the Game tomorrow. Lindholm said there wouldn't be a SOTG tomorrow, but did say that: "TU12.1 releases on Feb 2nd with the Resident Evil Apparel Event, a rebalance of the Optimization Station cost as well as 4K 60 FPS support for next gen consoles".

The Medium is here for both the Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S consoles as well as the PC, with some nifty Dual-Reality gameplay done through a dual viewport that seems to really bring the next-gen Xbox consoles to their knees. But now Digital Foundry has done a deep dive on the performance of The Medium on the new Xbox Series X/S consoles, check it out:

Bloober Team, the developer behind The Medium, said that the Xbox Series X CPU and GPU power would let developers "go crazy" and I guess that means the most powerful console in the world being reduced to its knees and dropping to 900p.

The Medium runs at up to 4K on the flagship Xbox Series X and hovers around 1440p, while the Xbox Series S runs it somewhere between 1080p and 900p. But when you do the "dual viewport" mode -- which the game is built around (and explained in the DF video embedded above) both consoles go right into Chug Mode down into the 10-20FPS mark.

A new mod unlocks 60FPS in Skyrim on PlayStation consoles, but it won't work in Fallout 4.

PS5 owners can now play Skyrim Special Edition in 60FPS and circumvent Sony's maddening 30FPS limit. All you have to do is download the Skyrim @ 60fps mod, a user-created mod uploaded to the in-game console mods section. Skyrim was originally meant to run at a native 4K resolution at 30FPS on the PS4 Pro, but with the mod it can hit 1080p 30FPS+ on the base PS4.

The PlayStation 5 in particular runs Skyrim at a solid and consistent native 4K 60FPS via the console's powerful backwards compatibility mode. The PS5 has more memory bandwidth (16GB of GDDR6 RAM) and a much more powerful GPU and CPU combo that can deliver lots more horsepower. The result is a PC-like Skyrim experience in terms of performance.

Naughty Dog's ultra-violent and controversial opus sequel now has more total awards than CD Projekt's best-selling RPG The Witcher 3.

The Witcher 3 is hailed as one of the best games ever made for its RPG storytelling, compelling characters, and gritty fantasy world. The Last of Us II is likewise hailed for similar things, including its riveting story arc of blood and revenge, its varied cast of characters, and ambitious in-game detail. It's hard to compare the two directly--they're too different games--but one metric stands out: Total accolades.

According to GameAwards.net, The Last of Us Part II now has more awards than The Witcher 3. Naughty Dog's sequel sits at 265 awards, whereas The Witcher 3 is at 260. Each game's Metacritic also seems relevant--The Witcher 3 sits at a 92 on PS4 and The Last of Us Part II is at 93 on PS4. It's worth mentioning The Witcher has a 93 on PC, though.

Control's next-gen Ultimate Edition is coming out soon, and will be free on PlayStation Plus next week. Here's what to expect from the game's two performance modes.

Like most next-gen games, Control on PS5 and Xbox Series X has two modes that prioritize either graphical fidelity and visuals or in-game performance. The Series X is locked at just the performance mode and won't be able to maintain ray tracing. Luckily, Control will shoot past 1080p for both of these modes.

We knew that ASUS ROG had teamed with IKEA on a new range of "affordable gaming furniture", but now we have our first look at theh products thanks to a new leak ahead of their launch.

ASUS is expected to fully unveil the new IKEA x ASUS ROG lineup on January 29, but the IKEA China store has listed all of the products ahead of launch -- which works for us. We now get a look at the UPSSPEL gaming desk, a new ROG-themed pegboard, a moving ROG-themed cupboard, and so much more.

The IKEA x ASUS gaming desk.