Gaming - Page 638

With the help of some Back To The Future time-bending antics, Saint-14, aka the best character in the Destiny mythos, is coming back.

Today Bungie announced Destiny 2's new Season of Dawn, which brings a ton of new content and systematically builds off of the Season of the Undying and Vex Invasion events. Season of Dawn sees Guardians manipulating time to resurrect legendary Titan Saint-14, who's only really been seen in small flashbacks and lore books.

The season takes us back to Mercury for a big planet-wide event. This time the Cabal are our targets, and they're trying to alter history so they actually win the Red War. Osiris built a special time-machine called the Sundial, which was literally made to save Saint-14, aka the most badass Guardian that ever lived. Osiris failed, Saint-14 died...but now we have a shot at preventing his death and bringing him back.

According to documents acquired by Vice, a PlayStation gamer was using Sony's online PS Network to set up big drug deals.

A brave gamer was apparently using his favorite past-time to sell substantial amounts of cocaine. The documents reveal the suspect, Curtis Alexander, had used the PlayStation Network's in-game voice chat and messaging system to orchestrate hefty drug deals. A source reveals Alexander allegedly sold up to kilograms of cocaine at a time, and used PSN to communicate with buyers.

The informant told the FBI, who then sent a warrant to Sony that demanded tons of info on Alexander including any recorded messages sent or received on the PlayStation Network, and his gaming habits. We still don't know what game Alexander used to contact buyers on, but it's probably a big online game with tons of players--maybe Call of Duty or Destiny.

Riot Games has settled their gender discrimination lawsuit for $10 million, the LA Times reports.

Riot Games has a big problem with how it treats women. A huge 2018 expose from Kotaku revealed the billion-dollar League of Legends maker is endemic with sexism, harassment, and sophomoric behavior which fostered a hostile work environment for its female workers. Riot has since pledged to change its ways, but it's worth mentioning leadership hasn't shifted much. The news was followed by a huge gender discrimination lawsuit filed against the developer months after the reveal.

Now little over a year after the expose, Riot Games is settling the lawsuit. The company has agreed to pay $10 million divided up to all current and past women employed by Riot since 2014. The studio has employed 1,000 women since that time, but full-time employees will receive a bigger chunk than outside contractors.

CD Projekt Red isn't holding back at all for Cyberpunk 2077, and one of the aspects the developer is honing in on is the NPC's that are present throughout the world.

If you are a fan of CD Projekt Red games, you might have played the critically acclaimed title, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. In that game, players could experience extensive dialogues with NPCs (non-playable characters). CD Projekt Red is planning on going above and beyond The Witcher 3 with Cyberpunk 2077, and according to Story Director, Marcin Blacha, the game's dialogue takes up "two thick books" worth of writing.

Blacha also talks about how Cyberpunk 2077's game dialogue compares to The Witcher 3, and he says that Cyberpunk 2077 has much wider scale stories than The Witcher 3. This is because the problems that are being discussed by NPC's aren't small human squabbles, but instead, they are bigger problems that are more relevant to the entire world. Having this level of dialogue in a game will create a high level of atmospheric immersion for players, and I think that's what CD Projekt Red is aiming for.

Remember 1997's Starship Troopers? Well, that movie concept is being converted into a real-time strategy game that you can enjoy.

The culture classic movie Starship Troopers is receiving its very own real-time strategy game adaptation, players will be able to assume the role of the humans and slaughter billions of bugs. Judging from the above trailer, the game appears to be a lot like Earth Defence Force spliced with Command and Conquer aspects.

The developers of this coming title are The Aristocrats and judging by the titles Steam Store listing says, players will be involved within planetary campaigns that will pit them against the bugs. Campaigns will be "dynamically generated"and will be take players through a storyline where missions will change depending on the hard choices that will be presented to them. The Steam page also mentions that there will be dozens of unique unit types and abilities, extensive technology tree, heroics, explosions, gore and of course bugs. It has a "out in 2020" release date.

Since Sony own Insomniac Games, and the fact that Marvel's Spider-Man was an overwhelming success selling over 13 million copies, fans can expect there will be some kind of sequel.

There is no doubt that Sony and Insomniac Games are cooking up some form of sequel behind the scenes, and according to former Games Informer news editor, Imran Khan, they already are. Khan said during the latest Kind Funny Gamescast video that "I know too much about [Marvel's Spider-Man 2], so I can't speculate too much".

Imran continues and says that while players of the first Spider-Man might think that it will still be some time before they receive a sequel, "I think a Spider-Man 2 will come sooner than we think". This is promising news for Spider-Man fans are a sequel is definitely most welcomed. What won't be appreciated though is if Sony and Insomniac re-skin the first Spider-Man and just sell it back to fans as Spider-Man 2 with no new improvements. The sequel will have to feel new, more mechanics, more suits, new enemies etc.

Can you believe it? Sony launched the original PlayStation console 25 years ago, first touching down in Japan on December 3, 1994. Now look at where we are, 100s of millions of PlayStation consoles launched in that time and the most hyped of them all -- the PlayStation 5, launches this time next year.

Sony Interactive Entertainment President and CEO Jim Ryan wrote on the official PlayStation Blog to celebrate the occasion, reiterating that the original PS1 sold 100,000 units on its first day on sale -- the original PlayStation was the first console in history to sell over 100 million units.

It didn't take Sony long to pass that, as the PlayStation 2 came along and became the best-selling console of all time, racking up an insane 155 million sales.

Battlefront II is getting re-released just in time for Episode IX: Rise of Skywalker.

Apparently Battlefront II will get a big game of the year-style re-release on December 5, complete with tons of free cosmetic skins for heroes and troops, as well as extra content. The game will include all of Battlefront II's DLC content on-disc and grants access to new hero skins lifted right from Rise of Skywalker.

This move is fairly common for live games, especially ones that've been around for a while. No Man's Sky saw a similar re-release on Xbox One that included all content on the disc. It's a way to strategically re-engage a core audience of players who want to continue their Star Wars experiences right after seeing Episode IX, as well as fold new players into the service-based pay ecosystem and sell a new full-price game to boot.

Halo: Reach is finally coming to PC tomorrow, but it won't have a midnight launch on Steam or the Windows Store. You'll actually have to wait until the next day to play.

343 Industries confirms Halo: Reach will go live on on PC on Tuesday, December 3, 2019 at 10AM PST / 1PM EST. It's also simultaneously launching on Xbox One. There's no pre-loading either, so you'll want to use Steam's remote download feature

This is disappointing news to anyone like me who's looking to jump right into the fray with a classic midnight launch on the digital platforms. We should also probably expect insane volume to knock the servers down or cause some performance hiccups, especially since Reach will be on three different platforms on PC: Game Pass, Steam, and the Windows Store.

Nintendo has had quite the swing around when it comes to console sales with its portable Switch console versus the Wii U, with stellar sales during the holiday quarter.

According to new analyst estimates by Bloomberg, it seems Nintendo will sell a huge 9.5 million Switch units in the holiday quarter -- as well as shifting an even larger 65 million games. It was the gigantic Black Friday sales that have spiked analysts' interest, with Morningstar Investment Services analyst Kazunori Ito seeing his interesting piqued.

Ito said: "This is typically where sales begin to peak out, but it looks like the Switch may have a longer life cycle. With a [living room] console and a portable player in a single machine, Nintendo has a very effective platform for selling game software".

The development team behind the Project CARS series has been acquired by Codemasters, forming one giant racing game studio.

Codemasters is known for its publishing efforts with the following racing franchises; F1, GRID, DiRT, and other arcade racers such as OnRush and Micro Machines. Now Codemasters has decided to acquire their fellow local counter-part developer Slightly Mad Studios, who are known for their development on the successful Project CARS series.

According to Codemasters CEO, Frank Sagnier, who spoke to GamingIndustry.biz, the acquisition of Slightly Mad Studios "will create a global leader in the racing genre. Their focus on AAA quality and the passion that they put into everything they create mirrors our own. Both companies have a number of world-renowned, successful franchises along with exciting product development pipelines, supported by leading IP and some of the best talent in the gaming industry."

Real-time strategy games aren't nearly as popular as what they used to be, so what will Age of Empires IV have that will pull in new gamers and keep them there?

During an interview with Adam Isgreen, the creative director of the Age of Empires franchise, the question was brought up about how Age 4 will attract new players and keep them there. Isgreen says, that a lot of what Relic is doing is concentrating around the campaigns, and what they are specifically working on has "never been done in an Age game before".

Isgreen also continues on and says that due to having more compute power available for development, they are able to implement what has been called as a "analytic-based tutorialising, and all kinds of things where we can see how players are playing and be like, 'Hey! Did you know you can do this? Or hey, this cool thing that you're not doing?'. Isgreen hopes that these new systems will bring new players in, and keep them there. If you are interested in checking out the full interview, click this link here.

Star Citizen continues to break records before the game is even fully realized, with over $251 million in crowdfunding so far.

Chris Roberts' brainchild continues to get more backers and funding, with 2,448,963 backers at the time of writing and a huge $251,132,094 in funding so far. The last week saw a gigantic spike in funding, with gamers pouring a huge $8 million into the game this week alone.

CitizenCon 2019 was held in the last few weeks, with major updates to Star Citizen taking place in Alpha 3.7 and a tease of the new icy microTech planet, too. This is where the developers were able to tease the upcoming dynamic weather system (coming in 2020) as well as Planet Tech 4.0 (which is coming with Alpha 3.8).

Right now Google Stadia controllers are only wireless when paired with a Chromecast, but that'll change in 2020.

In a rather strange move, Stadia, a platform built around accessibility and convenience, launched without one of the most convenient features on its own proprietary controller: Wireless gaming. To use the Stadia controller with a Pixel 3 phone you have to hook it up via USB, and likewise for PC gaming on a Chrome browser. The Stadia controller actually has built-in Bluetooth radios, but they don't actually connect to other devices--yet at least. Instead, the controller bypasses other devices and connects right to Stadia servers via the internet.

That'll change in 2020. Google confirms that the controller will soon support wireless Bluetooth pairing with PCs, tablets, and phones next year: "Stadia Controller wireless support for laptops, desktops, and select tablets and phones is coming in 2020."

All games are built on compromise. Coders, designers, and programmers constantly make new systems and bring them to game directors, who then whittle things down to what's important. If it makes it into the game, it's often a result of direct compromising. Jedi: Fallen Order had an extra layer of compromise because of Lucasfilm.

Lucasfilm are the gatekeepers to the Star Wars brand. When anyone makes anything based around Star Wars, whether it be a game or a TV show, Lucasfilm has to approve and give the greenlight. Nothing gets made without Lucasfilm's approval. This has always complicated Star Wars game development, as far back as the troubled fiascoes with Star Wars 1313, which saw George Lucas coming in and frequently ordering big changes, to Visceral's now-cancelled Project Ragtag, and of course Respawn's mega-popular Jedi: Fallen Order.

While watching the big Jedi: Fallen Order dev documentary, I noticed one big trend: compromise. The devs had to constantly look for approval from Stig Asmussen, the game director on Jedi: Fallen Order, but the decisions also had to sift through Lucasfilm. Compromise is needed for iteration, aka the life's blood of video games development. Tons of repetitive Iteration is how developers constantly build off of one another to make a finished product. Games are the result of thousands of hours of experimentation to see what works and what doesn't.

Sony's PlayStation 5 devkits have been spotted multiple times now, complete with a crazy-looking ventilation system and a front LCD panel. But what about the next-gen Xbox? According to The Verge's Tom Warren, Project Scarlett devkits are few and far between.

Apparently Project Scarlett devkits are somewhat rare, at least according to The Verge's Tom Warren. It looks like Microsoft is very sparingly doling out what devkits that are available to first-party developers, likely to teams like Turn10 who was tremendously instrumental in shaping and fine-tuning the Xbox One X. The first phase of Project Scarlett devkit rollouts hasn't really happened yet, hinting Microsoft is still working on the hardware--which bodes well considering Project Scarlett's massive backward compatibility capabilities.

"Hardly anyone has [Project Scarlett devkits], and they're nowhere near final. That's why you're hearing a lot of nonsense about them not being powerful etc. Microsoft wants to surprise Sony this time," Warren said on Twitter.

The latest leaked PS5 devkit photos show the consoles turned on and operating, complete with an LCD panel with real-time hardware usage and a DualShock 5 controller to the side.

A bit ago we spotted the first PlayStation 5 devkit photos, but the system wasn't actually powered up. The PS5 devkit has that distinctly expansive ventilation system for heat management and easy stackability, hinting there's some serious horsepower under there, and a screen similar to Project Scorpio's devkit that gives out key info in real-time, including RAM and CPU usage, but the exact values are fuzzy.

There's also a small look at the upcoming PS5 controller, at least the prototype of one. We can't get a good look at the controller but it seems to match the new ergonomic design outlined in the DualShock 5 controller patents. There's apparently no lightbar.

EA and developer Respawn Entertainment have built an already great-looking game in Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order, which is also the fastest-selling Star Wars game ever -- but now it looks even better with the Fallen Order Cinematic FX mod applied.

The video above is a comparison video between the vanilla (no mod) and then the Fallen Order Cinematic FX mod on the right, which uses Depth Haze to add blurring as well as ambient fog in the distance. On top of that, it has been color graded with the ReShade effect that really makes the game pop on top of the ReShade Bloom effect that adds a glow effect to effects -- making those lightsabers look even more realistic. It's subtle, but effective.

You can grab the Fallen Order Cinematic mod right here from Nexusmods.

It's time: Baby Yoda needs to be in a game. We can't wait for Disney or EA to do it. Luckily, we have modders.

Baby Yoda, aka the best thing about modern Star Wars, is coming to Battlefront II. Not as DLC, but as an unofficial mod. Skilled Battlefront modder Nanobuds1220 is bringing everyone's favorite fuzzy green boy to the long-lived shooter as a playable hero, complete with custom textures.

Obviously Baby Yoda (or, as he's officially known at Disney, The Child) has grown up quite a bit and isn't so innocent and lovable as in The Mandalorian. He's followed in Yoda's footsteps and become a badass Jedi with a little cloak and levitation powers.

The Atari VCS still sounds like an iffy gamble to me, but the company is clearly serious about making the product happen. Pre-production manufacturing is just about wrapping up and Atari gives an update on what's next.

In a big Atari VCS progress update, Chief Operating Officer Michael Arzt discusses the most important part of the new console: The games. Official details are still vague, and we don't know which big publishers or which games are coming to the Atari VCS. Arzt asserts that "several game studios" are secured for the console's launch but no details have been revealed so far. The console's innate compatibility with the Unity engine will favor games made with said engine tech.