Gaming - Page 538

Bethesda is giving away free copies of Quake to everyone who tunes into Quakecon 2020 next weekend.

Quakecon 2020 kicks off next weekend on August 7, and to celebrate Bethesda is giving away id's classic brutal FPS Quake during the event. To grab your free copy, simply log into Bethesda.net and add it to your account. This version of Quake will be exclusive to the Bethesda.net launcher of course.

The publisher also plans to give out Quake II for free if a $10,000 charity donation threshold is reached during the weekend show. This will be a nice bonus to anyone with RTX cards thanks to the new Quake II raytracing update. There's various other freebies like an ESO pet, a special Quakecon skin for Doom Eternal, a new Quake Champions weapon skin, and a Fallout 76 outfit.

Halo: Infinite could have as many as three monetization paths that all weave together and reflect Microsoft's emphasis on services, engagement, and recurring revenues.

Halo: Infinite isn't just a game. It's a platform that'll span the next 10 years of Halo games. More importantly, it's a gateway to monetization that's explicitly tied to Xbox Game Pass. Infinite has been built from the ground up to monetized engagement in a number of ways.

It's an open-world FPS with RPG elements that're designed to keep you playing for a long time. It also has replayable multiplayer. Both have been built to incentivize continued Game Pass subscriptions, but just in case you don't buy Game Pass, 343i and Microsoft have lots of other opportunities to monetize you.

343 Industries hasn't outright said it, but Halo: infinite is pretty much a live service game with two big components: A reactive, sprawling open-world campaign mode that'll change with new updates, and free-to-play PVP multiplayer.

Back in August 2019, I said that Halo: Infinite sounds a lot like a live game. Now we know that's exactly what's happening. Halo: Infinite is a platform, not just a game (something else we predicted), and will be the centerpiece for the next 10 years of Halo.

There won't be any more Halo sequels; Infinite is quite simply the Halo Waypoint of Halo games. Infinite is basically Destiny 2's base game.

It's finally happening: Kunitmitsu is coming to Tekken 7 alongside a ton of new moves and optimizations.

Today Bandai Namco announced Tekken 7's new fourth season pass update, which includes a bunch of new moves for every single playable character (even DLC fighters), tightened online play with server P2P optimizations, and a tease for a classic fighter. While the publisher didn't confirm who's joining the roster, the tease can only be the ultra-fast Kunimitsu, the Manji clan thief who made a splash in Tekken 2.

Read Also: Tekken 7 Review: King of the Iron Fist

Obsidian's hilarious Fallout New Vegas in space game is getting two major new expansions as well as optimizations for the next-gen Xbox Series X.

Read Also: The Outer Worlds Review: Out of this World

The devs at Obsidian just made good on their promise of new The Outer Worlds DLC. Two new expansions are planned, first Peril on Gorgon on September 9, then Murder on Eridanos in 2021. Both expansions are priced at $14.99 each but you can buy the season pass for $24.99 to bundle them together.

Microsoft has just provided two new nuggets on information from Flight Simulator, which is about to make its descent onto gamers' systems on August 18 -- now, also on Steam.

In a new update, Microsoft explained that Flight Simulator "heralds a new era of data-driven flight simulation". In the update, Microsoft continued: "One of the exciting implications of this is that the data that makes up the world is always improving, and players can look forward to a simulator that evolves over time".

The post continued: "Thanks to our partnership with Bing, players will enjoy new, even better terrain, and an ever evolving, machine learning-fueled simulator that grows over time".

Activision and Infinity Ward struck gold with Call of Duty: Modern Warfare and the massively popular Warzone and its battle royale greatness.

There are big changes brewing in Warzone's upcoming Season 5, which could see the entire map of the fictional city of Verdansk changed -- it could be nuked, flooded, invaded by aliens (which Elon Musk just confirmed built the pyramids, and I'm not joking) or something completely new.

We have no idea, and that is exciting -- because it'll be the first map change since Warzone launched.

Microsoft has just revealed that Flight Simulator will be coming to Steam after all, releasing on August 18. Flight Simulator will be dropping on Windows 10 and Xbox Game Pass on the same day, with Steam pre-orders for the Standard, Deluxe, and Premium Deluxe now up for grabs.

Not only that, but the developer has surprised PC gamers with support for TrackIR and VR support. The company is happy to announce it will have day one support for TrackIR while VR support will begin later this year when HP launches its Reverb G2 headset.

Microsoft details both TrackIR and the HP Reverb G2 on their website, adding:

Outriders isn't even out yet, and People Can Fly is already working on a new AAA IP for next-gen consoles at its newly expanded studio.

People Can Fly, the devs behind Square Enix's new interesting-looking multiplayer shoot-and-loot game Outriders, is making a brand new AAA IP for the new PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X generation of consoles. The new project will be led by People Can Fly's fresh New York-based studio, which will work with its other UK and main Polish branches.

The studio also says that its different branches will work on different games. While People Can Fly Rezszow and UK will assist in the game, the main studio in Poland will be mostly focused on Outriders.

id devs Marty Stratton and Hugo Martin will talk about Doom Eternal at the digital Quakecon 2020 event, and we could get some info on next-gen optimizations for the game.

A bit ago, we predicted Doom Eternal could be among the first games to hit rock-solid 120FPS on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X. This was predicated on the id Tech 7 engine, which runs buttery-smooth on PC and is able to even maintain 60FPS on the older (and rather weak) 2013 launch Xbox One console.

The engine should easily be scalable on the PS5's and Xbox Series X's 7nm AMD SoC tech, which sports a Zen 2 CPU and Navi RDNA 2 GPU. But nothing has been announced so far. That could change in early August at Quakecon 2020.

Halo 3 ODST's Firefight is the best. Reach is good, but ODST is on a whole other level. It's a four-player co-op survival-fest with no equipment--just your wits, your weapons management skills, and silenced 2x scope pistol. Now 343 Industries reveals how it's completely revitalizing ODST's Firefight mode for MCC.

Today 343 Industries confirmed some exciting news about Halo 3 ODST's Firefight mode on the Master Chief Collection, including new weapons, gametypes, custom games, and more. Halo 3's weapons are coming over to Firefight. This is a big, big deal that adds a new dimension of play.

343i says a lot of Halo 3's weapons are coming into ODST's Firefight that simply weren't available before. We'll see weapons like Halo 3's BR55HB cross over, and 343i teases a redacted weapon. What could it be?

For the most part, Xbox is a good sport. Halo: Infinite, 343 Industries, and Microsoft all got a grilling over the recent Xbox game showcase stream. Halo: Infinite, a game that's supposed to sell Xbox Series X features, just didn't look very next-gen. And then Craig, the stoic goofball Brute that was at the right place at the right time, showed up and became a meme legend. Thus Halo: Infinite has become synonymous with Craig the Brute.

While 343 Industries is 'very serious' about fixing Halo: Infinite's graphics and shadows, they're still rolling with the punches and trying not to take things too hard. In this business you really have to. When something you've worked hard on for years gets lambasted, memed, and made fun of, you kind of have to roll with the tide a little.

Xbox division head Phil Spencer is in the same boat. On Twitter, Spencer pulled a PR maneuver to embrace Craig instead of ignoring and deflecting, or promising Craig will look much better in ultra-HD resolution. Spencer says that Craig is now the official Xbox mascot. He's not, of course. The official Xbox mascot is the Game Pass logo, which is more important than Master Chief or Minecraft's Steve.

Rumor has it EA is interested in buying A&T's Warner Bros. Games division, which includes top-tier dev talent like Netherealm, Rocksteady Studios and Avalanche Software. This is exactly the kind of thing EA wants to get more of.

EA wants to make new acquisitions, but the company is more interested in buying new talent than it is new IPs. Case in point: EA didn't buy Respawn to acquire the Titanfall IP, but to secure the dev team behind the game. The same could be true for the rumored $4 billion Warner Bros. Games division sale.

So is EA buying Warner Bros. Games? No one knows for sure, but EA CFO Blake Jorgensen says they've looked at the buyout potential in a recent Fiscal Year Q1'21 earnings call.

UPDATE: 343i today confirmed Halo: Infinite is indeed free-to-play, and that it'll support optional 120FPS modes on Xbox Series X and PC. No graphics details were discussed.

New leaks suggest Halo: Infinite's campaign and multiplayer will be separated into two parts, and multiplayer will be free-to-play for everyone.

Halo: Infinite might actually two games in one. There;s the huge open-world campaign that's basically a living sandbox combination of Spartan Ops and Firefight, complete with objectives, RPG-esque upgrades, a huge overworld map, and co-op play. This will be the paid version. Then there's multiplayer, which according to info from Retailer Smyth's Toys, will be free-to-play on PC and Xbox.

For a next-gen system-selling game, Halo: Infinite has been criticized for its lackluster and rather current-gen graphics. Now 343 Industries delivers an official comment on the matter, promising to take all feedback very seriously.

Mechanically, Halo: Infinite looks like a great game. But the visuals are bogged down by the new dynamic lighting system, which takes the definition out of textures and models that're in shadowy areas. Will this change before launch? Possibly.

343 Industries says they'll release a ray tracing update post-launch, which will add much-needing lighting to make the high-end textures really pop. But now the devs talk more about their plans.

COVID-19 has closed down practically every major worldwide sporting event, delaying and cancelling leagues and seasons. Now fans are turning to big EA games like Madden and FIFA for their fix.

EA, like other games companies, is benefiting tremendously from COVID-19. Consumers are staying at home and buying more games to play in their off time. This goes double for EA. As the world of sports is put on hiatus, gamers are recreating seasons of their own in EA's billion-dollar sports franchises.

In a Q1'21 recent earnings call, EA CFO Blake Jorgensen brought up a good point. Now that football and soccer seasons have been suspended, the only real way to continue engaging with these sports is through EA's games. This has led to a massive surge in digital revenues like game sales and microtransactions.

If you played the Hyper Scape open beta, you probably would have noticed that there were some balancing issues with the game.

These balancing issues ranged from hacks (abilities), to some guns feeling just a little bit too strong. Disclaimer - personally, I have been smashing Hyper Scape, and at the current time of writing this I have already maxed out the Battle Pass (Tier 30), and because of the time I have spent playing the game I believe I have a decent understanding of how the title feels and plays out.

Ubisoft says in its patch notes found on the website that this patch is directly aimed at what is "Time-to-kill (TTK)", which is exactly what it sounds like - the time it takes to kill someone once combat is engaged. Ubisoft says that the community voiced concerns about the TTK being too slow, and because of that, they have decided to buff the damage on many guns, while simultaneously nerfing most hacks across the board. Most notably, Ubisoft has nerfed the Protocol V, Mine Hack's overall power level, and the Invisibility Hack.

Ubisoft has taken to its social media to announce that its new battle royale shooter will be leaving open beta and enters its first official season.

According to the Hyper Scape Twitter account, the free-to-play battle royale will be leaving open beta on PC on August 2nd. The Ubisoft website says that all progression made throughout the open beta will be crossed over to the full release of the game. Additionally, Ubisoft has also announced that Hyper Scape will be making its way over to the PS4 and Xbox One on August 11th.

Season 1 will come with a slew of new changes, some of which include a new gun, the Dragonfly, a new hack, and a Magnet. Season 1 is titled "The First Principle", and will be adding new limited-time game modes, as well as new features for Crowncast (Hyper Scape's interactive Twitch extension). Season 1 will also come with some lore insight into how the world of Hyper Scape came about. If you are after more information on the first season of Hyper Scape, check out this link here.

NVIDIA has been slowly adding more and more games to its GeForce NOW game streaming service, but there's some new news that is exciting.

The company has now made it possible to synchronize your entire Steam game library with GeForce NOW, by turning the option on in Settings > Sync Game. Once you've got your Steam account synced with your GeForce NOW account, you can then identify all of the games that have support for GeForce NOW.

Once it has scanned the GeForce NOW compatible games, the new games will turn up in the My Library section of GeForce NOW.

Star Wars Squadrons is a $40 game for a number of reasons, and it looks like EA is changing how it sees Star Wars games.

Typically when a game with online play is lower priced that means it'll have in-game purchases. mTX is a way to offset the lower retail price tag. On the surface, Star Wars Squadrons has the potential to be a big live service game monetized with microtransactions.

It has a grindy upgrade-based gameplay loop complete with cosmetic and game-affecting content, online multiplayer, and a campaign. It also fills a void left by Battlefront II, which has now been sunset.