Gaming - Page 545

Doom Eternal's new Ancient Gods expansion is taking an novel approach to DLC, and could signify big changes from Bethesda.

Doom Eternal's latest Ancient Gods Part I expansion is a completely standalone episode that can be purchased on its own and played without the base game. Anyone can buy it and play it even if they don't own the full Doom Eternal release. The news was confirmed in a press release: The expansion will also come with Battle Mode lumped in for free, which makes a lot of sense for Bethesda.

"For players who don't own the Year One Pass, The Ancient Gods, Part One will be available to purchase separately and will include free access to BATTLEMODE. Players do not need to own DOOM Eternal to purchase and play The Ancient Gods, Part One," reads the press release.

Valve, ever the mysterious games company, recently teased a new content update for Left 4 Dead 2--a game that hasn't been touched for years.

The Last Stand is apparently coming to Left 4 Dead 2 in some form, complete with the creepy foggy environs of a coastal lighthouse refuge. The Last Stand was originally a mini-campaign DLC for the original Left 4 Dead's survival mode, which saw gamers trying to defend against endless swarms of undead (basically a horde mode).

According to Valve News Network's Tyler McVicker, the new Last Stand content drop is more than a simple update. There's a lot more to it than The Last Stand simply being adapted into Left 4 Dead 2, McVicker says. Valve confirms the L4D modding community is leading the charge on the content release, but official details on features, length, or platforms are light.

One of the biggest esports tournaments in the world is the annual Dota 2 The International event, which has set a new record as the largest prize pool: $34,351,362.

The first prize for The International currently stands at a huge $15.6 million, while second place receives $4.4 million and third place with $3 million. Even if you come in at 18th, you're still going to take home $85,000. These numbers were last updated on August 27 at 10:17 PM PDT.

Valve hasn't provided a firm date on when Dota 2's upcoming The International will take place, as the COVID-19 pandemic has come in and wrecked it all. We might not even see The International take place this year, and it could eventually be shifted into 2021 -- and that prize pool is only going to go higher and higher, driving more hype around the event.

Microsoft has some of the most incredible real-time weather in Flight Simulator, something that developer Asobo Studios and Microsoft have become the clear leaders in. Now, players are using this real-time weather in Flight Simulator and flying into real storms -- like the current Hurricane Laura.

The videos that you can see online are incredible, so too are the pictures floating around online. The live weather system in Flight Simulator is truly breathtaking visually, but technologically the team at Microsoft and Asobo should be cheered as champions -- it's truly something else.

I mean, they're modelling Hurricane Laura inside of the Flight Simulator world. Microsoft teamed with Swiss meteorological service Meteoblue -- where it splits up the Flight Simulator game world into 2 million separate 100-square-mile chunks.

Bethesda's secretive new sci-fi RPG Starfield will remain a mystery for a while longer, company exec Pete Hines says.

It's been a long time since we heard about Starfield. Announced at E3 2018, the game is Bethesda Game Studio's first new IP in decades and is gearing up to be the next big RPG franchise. There's a fair bit we know about Starfield:

So when will get more news? Not for a while, Bethesda says.

Despite being teased 4 years ago with a mysterious red book in 2016, and a subsequent teaser in 2018, Dragon Age 4 is still in early development. How early? Concept art is still fresh off the presses, and BioWare is only just now working on early combat animations.

New Dragon Age 4 concept art gives us some clues on what to expect from the next installment, including locations, overall themes, and possible character teases. The art seems to show a bunch of locations, including the brutal dark wizardry of the Tevinter Imperium and the Grey Warden's majestic Weisshaupt Fortress in the Anderfels.

The art showcases everything from horrifying titanic bosses, some interesting character designs--that masked rapier-wielding rogue is amazing--, the flying ships of Tevinter, and more breathtaking scenes straight out of Dragon Age's deep lore.

Mediatonic's massive indie hit hits superstar sales with over 7 million copies sold on Steam.

Fall Guys is a massive success and has become the next big indie sensation. The hilarious, colorful, and rather challenging indie has enjoyed massive fame on the Twitch streaming charts, rising to the top slots of Steam's most-played games, and is now the most-downloaded PlayStation Plus game of all time. But it's also sold 7 million copies, making it one of the fastest-selling indies of all time.

In less than a month, Fall Guys has amassed 7 million sales on Steam. Fall Guys beats a handful of gaming's most-popular indies including Shovel Knight, Cuphead, and Hollow Knight. It's only 3 million copies away from Stardew Valley's 10 million sales, a figure which took 4 years of sales across a multitude of platforms.

Sony's next-gen PS5's release date is expected to launch after the Xbox Series X, sometime in mid-November, sources tell VideoGamesChronicle.

In a not-so-surprising revelation, key retail and inside sources think the PlayStation 5 will release sometime in mid-November. This aligns with everything we've heard so far and reflects Sony's traditional console launch timings, which revolve around Black Friday and pre-Christmas spending.

While no exact date has been given by Sony or other sources, recent game release dates may have outed the PlayStation 5's November launch. Two big next-gen games, Black Ops Cold War and SEGA's Yakuza: Like a Dragon, are slated to release on November 13, 2020. We believe the PlayStation 5 will also release on November 13.

As we predicted long ago, Halo: Infinite should be monetized with optional cosmetics, including weapon skins and even Destiny-like ornaments.

New Halo: Infinite merch unlockables confirm the biggest Halo game ever made will have weapon skins and special weapon "charms," which are likely similar to Destiny's ornaments. Certain Halo merchandise come with codes that can be entered online to redeem specific in-game skins for Halo: Infinite.

This pretty much outlines a straightforward cosmetic-driven monetization path for Halo: Infinite. Expect these weapon skins and ornaments to be sold piecemeal on an in-game store for premium currency. 343i already confirmed Halo: Infinite would have microtransactions, which is the entire basis for Microsoft's big live games, and also confirmed that REQ pack lootboxes won't be included.

Real-time-strategy players can finally rejoice as Microsoft has announced the release date for Ages of Empires III: Definitive Edition.

The announcement was aired at the GamesCom Opening Night Live show, which is a digital-only event that was originally planned to take place in Cologne, Germany. Above, you can find the trailer, and as you might have already suspected, the Definitive Edition for Age of Empires III comes with massive graphical improvements such as 4K support and a rebuilding of 3D assets.

Additionally, Age of Empires III: Definitive Edition also comes with a "modernized UI, cross-play multiplayer, and fully enhanced soundtrack and audio". Lastly, Age 3's Definitive Edition also comes with two brand new civilizations, which are going to be exclusive to the Definitive Edition. If you are interested in finding out any more news regarding Age of Empires III: Definitive Edition, check out this link here. If you want to preorder the title, a link to that can be found here.

Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart is coming to the PlayStation 5 and it could be one of the best launch titles for Sony's next-gen console, especially after you check out some new gameplay captured directly from the PS5:

The new footage is from the Gamescom Opening Night Live, where we get a juicy 7-minute video of next-gen Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart on the PS5. The game sees developer Insomniac Games using the ultra-fast NVMe-based SSD inside of the PS5 that lets players "seamlessly warp around levels and even into other dimensions".

In the new Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart gameplay footage, we get our first look at some of the new weapons that Insomniac has planned for us with the Shatterbomb, Topiary Sprinkler, and the Enforcer. Overall I loved the trailer, there is a helluva lot of stuff going on at once with all those particle effects -- and while there's motion blur, it's not a Crysis 2 or 3 level mess.

BioWare celebrates its 25th anniversary with a special Dragon Age 4 tease at Gamescom 2020's Opening Night Live Ceremony.

Dragon Age 4 is still a long ways away. BioWare confirmed the game is only in early production phases right now, but teased a bunch of concept art and early gameplay/combat animation footage at Gamescom, all of which showed next-generation visuals. BioWare confirms Dragon Age 4 is being built from the ground up to target next-gen tech, so the game will likely be exclusive to PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X.

"Since 2014, we've been looking at ways to use next-generation technology to bring the world and characters of Dragon Age to life," said BioWare general manager Casey Hudson.

Activision promises Black Ops Cold War will be fully optimized for PC on Battle.net, but Treyarch and Raven aren't developing the PC version.

The latest Black Ops Cold War press release revealed an interesting tidbit: The PC flavor is being developed by a quadraplex of studios including Beenox, Sledgehammer Games, High Moon Studios and Activision Shanghai.

Beenox, who has extended experience working on Call of Duty ports, is handling principal development of the PC version and the other studios, including the once-mighty Sledgehammer, are offering a helping hand. This somewhat contrasts with previous reports that indicated Sledgehammer, Treyarch, and Raven would all be working together on the same version of the game.

Halo lore master Joseph Staten has returned to the franchise to lead Halo: Infinite's campaign, 343 Industries today announced.

There's good news for Halo fans: Joe Staten is back and is now guiding what appears to be a deceptively-rocky boat. This move seems to speak volumes about the current state of Halo: Infinite's development, and reflects a larger part of Microsoft's game dev business practices. While coronavirus was a major factor for disruption, it's unclear it was the only thing that affected development.

"I'm thrilled to join Halo to help them ship Halo Infinite. As the project lead for the Infinite Campaign, I will be supporting the team's existing, great leaders and empowering them to do their best work," Staten said on Twitter.

I've been a big fan of Secretlab's unique SoftWeave fabric since its debut in 2018, but now the company has just unveiled its latest SoftWeave BLACK3 -- a "reimaginging of the popular Triple Black colorway".

Secretlab explains that there are a number of fans that work for the company itself that love the Triple Black colorway sneakers -- so they went ahead to create something similar with their new SoftWeave BLACK3 by incorporating the tri-color weave with three different, and unique shades of black.

The result is something that looks really slick, but I would love to see it in person with my own eyes -- my review sample is on the way. Secretlab is infusing the worlds of gaming and streetwear with the new SoftWeave BLACK3 -- and I'm really digging it. I can see this chair being super comfortable, while also rocking its own unique look.

Activision-Blizzard's net revenues for Q2 were $1.932 billion, the best second quarter earnings in the last 10 years.

Activision-Blizzard's recent Q2'20 performance saw astronomical spikes in net bookings, operating income, and the historic best Q2 net revenues in the last decade. The company raked in $580 million of net income (+76%) on the back of $1.932 billion in net revenues (+39%), and earnings per share jumped 11 cents to $2.36 for the period ended June 30, 2020.

Growth was driven by the Activision segment, which earned $993 million, or 50% of total revenues thanks to massive spikes in Call of Duty Modern Warfare and Warzone monetization. Warzone itself now has 75 million active players and in-game microtransaction earnings are up almost 500% from last year. Activision segment earnings were up 270% year-over-year.

Gamescom 2020 is almost upon us, and to get that hype train rolling ahead of the opening night, Bethesda has released a teaser for the coming DOOM Eternal DLC.

Back at the start of August, a teaser trailer was dropped for the first DOOM Eternal DLC titled "The Ancient Gods", Part One, and with that teaser was the confirmation that the full reveal would be at Gamescom 2020. Now, Gamescom 2020 is only around the corner, and what better way to kick things off than with a full reveal of what impossible challenge Doomguy is going to overcome next.

As a reminder to everyone, Gamescom showrunner Geoff Keighley took to his Twitter to post a time for the reveal, which is "#OpeningNightLive at 8 pm CEST / 2 pm ET / 11 am PT". More recently, the official DOOM Twitter page just posted their own reminder that the DLC would be arriving "tomorrow". If you have played DOOM Eternal and enjoyed the game's story then this DLC will most likely be for you as its an expansion of the main game. If you are interested in the full list of dates and times for Gamescom, check out this link here.

You might remember when id Software said that DOOM Eternal could handle 1000FPS, well -- someone has done just that, powered DOOM Eternal with enough PC grunt to power it at over 1000FPS.

Polish overclocking team 'x-kom' used an Intel Core i7-9700K processor and ASUS ROG Strix GeForce RTX 2080 Ti, both the CPU and GPU were cooled under LN2 -- and both were heavily overclocked. The Core i7-9700K was pushed to an insane 6.6GHz, while the ASUS ROG Strix RTX 2080 Ti was cranked all the way up to 2.4GHz under LN2 cooling.

The team built a pretty kick ass PC, specced out with:

Microsoft has teamed with Warner Bros. on some gorgeous new Wonder Woman 1984 themed Xbox One consoles, inspired by the Wonder Woman armor, lasso, and villain of the movie.

We have the slick Cheetah-themed console, with Cheetah / Barbara Minerva played by Kristen Wiig. This custom console looks great with a snakeskin pattern, some awesomely-used faux leopard fur, and a themed controller.

Next up we have the Golden Armor Xbox One X console, inspired from Gal Gadot's golden armor that she wears later on in Wonder Woman 1984. The console is made of 24-carat gold leaves, and packs a gorgeous matching Xbox controller.

GUNNAR has just revealed what they're referring to as the "holy grail" of gaming glasses, with their new GUNNAR Lightning Bolt 360 range of glasses. Check out the video they've just posted on YouTube:

The new Lightning Bolt 360 gaming glasses comes in 3 different editions, with the GUNNAR, 6 Siege, and ESL varieties. They are priced between $130 and $140 -- depending on the version you go for.

You do get a "unique lightning bolt design" that doesn't just look cool, it also takes pressure away from your temples. GUNNAR provides 3 different temple options, interchangeable lens (for both indoor, and outdoor use), 3 nose bridge sizes, and a protective case and pouch.