Gaming - Page 655

Washington senators and congress chastise Blizzard for stifling free speech in the recent Blitzchung esports China controversy.

Billion-dollar games titan Activision-Blizzard is under fire from Washington officials for the infamous Hong Kong fiasco, which saw the American company ban a professional Chinese esports player for expressing pro-Hong Kong liberation sentiments.

Today Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Congressmen Mike Gallagher and Tom Malinowski, and U.S. Senators Marco Rubio and Ron Wyden sent a joint letter condemning Blizzard for its decisions. Officials describe Blizzard's decision as kowtowing to Communist China as to not jeopardize access to the overseas region's lucrative gaming revenues.

After five years of development, Respawn's big new action-adventure Star Wars game is completely finished.

Jedi: Fallen Order could restore balance to the galaxy of Star Wars games. Typically dominated by grindy service games like Battlefront, Respawn's new game is a singleplayer-only adventure that combines Uncharted's exploration and environmental interactivity with Sekiro's suave and stylish swordplay, and a hint of Dark Souls rolling and dodging thrown in for good measure. It's described as a "Jedi power fantasy" by Respawn and takes place in a unique timeline between Episodes III and IV when the Jedi were being ruthlessly hunted down and slaughtered.

Now Respawn says the game has gone gold, meaning it's mastered and ready to ship to gamers across the globe. We'll probably see a few updates released here and there, but the core experience is intact.

Stadia will go through some intense growing pains at launch, and many of its features are limited.

The main reason to buy into Google's new Stadia game-streaming service is to play games on devices you already own without having to buy consoles or a PC. Stadia promises to wirelessly beam hit games to your Chromecast Ultra, laptop/desktop via Chrome browsers, and your Pixel 3-4 smartphones. But there's a lot of catches, especially when it comes to its controller.

The Stadia controller only supports Wi-Fi connectivity at launch. It won't have Bluetooth connectivity (that'll come later, Google promises) so it has to be plugged into your PC or even your phone to play games. That's a massive blow to on-the-go Stadia game streaming--no one's going to carry around an OTG cable and transform their Pixel phone into a bulky/awkward handheld gaming system.

The Switch isn't the ideal platform for The Witcher 3. It's locked to 720p 30FPS for good reason: There's lots of visual trade-offs to get the huge open-world RPG to run on the Switch's lower-end Tegra hardware, namely draw distances, lighting effects, and overall graphic settings. Now modders are using hacked Switches to get even more out of The Witcher, hitting up to 60FPS on the handheld-console hybrid.

Of course you need a jailbroken Switch for this to work. By hacking the Switch's firmware via a hardware exploit, gamers and modders can basically turn off the frame limiter and overclock the Switch's Tegra X1. This works for a lot of games, and even unlocks extra post-processing effects in The Witcher 3. Sadly 1080p resolution isn't possible--the game is capped at a hard dynamic 720p resolution when docked.

Not only can the Switch theoretically run The Witcher 3 at up to 60FPS while docked, gamers can adjust a number of extra settings to improve visual fidelity and clarity.

Blizzard Entertainment blessed the Nintendo Switch with Overwatch recently and while Switch players are enjoying the title in hand-held mode, how do the graphics pan out when compared to the already released PS4 version?

Thanks to Gaming Boulevard, we have a great side-by-side graphics comparison between the Switch version of the game and the PS4 version. From the above video we can see that the Nintendo Switch version has been hit with some quite considerable graphical downgrades (as expected). These graphical downgrades come in the form of the game appearing lighter, shadow quality being reduced, render quality distance being reduced, overall texture quality reduction and much more.

While these graphical downgrades are clearly apparent, they are more than necessary to get the game to run at a smooth 30FPS on the handheld console. According to Yanagi, the Nintendo Switch version of Overwatch, "For the Switch version of Overwatch, we really want to deliver the authentic Overwatch experience. The gameplay has to feel like Overwatch and the game has to look like Overwatch. For fixed platforms like the Switch, we do our best to configure the game to the optimal settings to achieve this goal."

The release of Luigi's Mansion 3 is right around the corner and to increase excitement levels just that little bit more Nintendo have released a short teaser trailer.

For those that don't know, Luigi's Mansion 3 will allow for players to team up with Gooigi to battle the games story mode that will pit players against some cool mini-games and of course some ghost capturing action. The new commercial video that is above shows Luigi taking down multiple different ghouls and then using his ghost catching apparatus to poop out Gooigi, a green doppelganger of Luigi.

Back in June, Nintendo hosted a Nintendo Treehouse event where they played Luigi's Mansion 3, so if you happened to miss that and are interested in some gameplay, head over to this link here. Nintendo also released a cinematic trailer for the game that includes other iconic Nintendo characters such as Mario, Peach and Toad, more on that here. Luigi's Mansion 3 will be released on October 31st exclusively for the Nintendo Switch.

Halo Infinite co-developer SkyBox Labs has launched their newest title 'Stela' on Xbox One today. 'Stela' takes players on a cinematic experience surrounding a young women in her final days of a mysterious world.

According to the press release, 'Stela' will introduce players to a once-thriving land that is now dying and a young women who journeys through the dying lands in search for some form of hopeful survival. Players will encounter beasts and monsters along the way who have occupied the land as their own.

Players will be faced with puzzles in gorgeous cinematic landscapes that are sprinkled with some touching single-player story that doesn't have any audio. 'Stela' is a platformer title and according to Shyang Kong, Co-Founder at SkyBox Labs, "For Stela, we really wanted to blend together a touching story with outstanding music and beautiful landscapes to make an experience that is grand in scale yet still personally intimate". Stela is available now for Xbox One for $19.99. For more information, head over to the 'Stela' website here.

Photoshop will be launching on Apple's iPad by the end of the year, but unfortunately the editing software will be arriving some missing core features.

According to Bloomberg, Adobe will be debuting Photoshop CC without some important features that many editors would deem completely necessary to the program. Scott Belsky, Adobe's Cheif Product Officer has said that that Adobe is working extremely closely with Apple to bring as many of the Photoshop features over, but unfortunately this will take some time to do.

Beta testers of the software have said to Bloomberg that many features such as "filters, the pen tool and custom paintbrush libraries, vector drawing, color spaces, RAW editing, smart objects, layer styles and certain options for mask creation" were missing. One beta tester said "Feature-wise, it feels like a beefed-up cloud-based version of their existing iPad apps and not 'real Photoshop' as advertised." Another tester who declined to be named said "I understand it is based on desktop Photoshop code, but it doesn't feel like it right now."

Since the release of the newest season in Apex Legends, gamers have been obliterating their opponent with the newest sniper, the Charge Rifle. Those days of laughable downs are now over.

Just a couple of days ago, developer of Apex Legends, Respawn Entertainment announced that they would be balancing the charge rifle after the community was clearly overusing it. Those balance changes are now live, and the adjustments come in the form of increasing the amount of ammo that is used per shot, changing the mag size, and decreasing damage slightly.

One of the other issues with Season 3 was players realizing that they could perform quips while in the drop ship, and since quips could be heard by players in close proximity troll gamers decided to spam the same quips over and over again. As you can imagine this was quite annoying, so Respawn has fixed this issue as well. Respawn also say they have fixed "initial circle issues" but since there is no patch notes its hard to tell what this exactly means.

Just in time for the holiday season, Respawn Entertainment have dropped two Apex Legends Special Edition retail bundles priced at just $19.99.

A new press release has been issued out detailing that consumers will soon be able to pick up the physical Apex Legends Lifeline Edition and Apex Legends Bloodhound Edition for both Xbox One, PS4 and PC. The Lifeline special edition contains; Legendary Lifeline Guardian Angel skin, Legendary Flatline Chooser of the Slain weapon skin, Exclusive Lifeline Winged Guardian banner, Exclusive Lifeline Angel Struck badge and 1,000 Apex coins.

The Bloodhound Edition contains: Legendary Bloodhound The Intimidator Skin, Legendary PDW Wrath Bringer weapon skin, Exclusive Bloodhound Feeling Impish banner, Exclusive Bloodhound Tormentor badge and 1,000 Apex Coins. Both of these retail bundles are available in-stores today. For more information about Apex Legends head on over to the website here.

We all know who Ninja is -- the most famous game streamer who left Twitch in a huge way for Mixer, and now singer/actress mega-star Lady Gaga is wanting to know who he is. Lady Gaga recently took to Twitter simply asking "@Ninja, who are you".

Tyler "Ninja" Blevins replied from his own Twitter, saying "Ask @Drake" -- referencing the time he set records for Twitch streams playing Fortnite with Drake back in 2018. It gets worse though, as Lady Gaga tweeted the day before "What's fortnight". Really... all that money, all those people around her, all that brain power and influence and she hears about "Fortnight" without Googling what it is?

Now sure, Lady Gaga -- or as she's known by her real name Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta, could be genuinely wanting to know about Fortnite. But, do you come onto the internet and then on Twitter where she has just shy of freaking 80 million followers and ask 'What's fortnight' without doing a quick Google search?

Sony has recently joined the fun world of cross-play between consoles and PC, with the worlds of Sony, Microsoft, Nintendo and the PC all merging in some, but not all ways.

One of the largest games to support cross-play is coming very soon with Activision's big release in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, but there are a bunch of games that support cross-play between the Xbox, PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch, and of course... the PC. It's not all fun and games (heh) but there are full cross-platform supporting games that I will list, and partial cross-platform support in games.

The folks over at DigitalTrends made a great list of all games supporting cross-platform, and split them into platforms. It's a big list, and it'll continue to grow. But for now... this is what you can expect -- with a note that some of them aren't out yet, with Call of Duty: Modern Warfare launching on October 25.

What if Dino Crisis got the same remake treatment as Resident Evil 2? Capcom hints that it's possible.

Capcom's new 2019 Annual Report outlines the company's future, including its plans for new games, business models, and platforms. The most exciting tidbit is Capcom's promise to resurrect dormant IPs with new releases, likely remastered or even remade in the potent RE Engine. Capcom likes re-releases and remasters (all companies do), and the company talks about bringing back old IPs every fiscal year. Now Dino Crisis fans have a new sliver of hope for a new game: Without a new release for nearly two decades, it doesn't get more dormant than Dino Crisis.

"Our initiatives are to (1) strengthen digital sales, (2) bolster our title lineup through the full-scale execution of our 60-month and 52-week maps and (3) awaken dormant intellectual properties," Capcom said in the report. "We will revive dormant intellectual properties for which we have not recently released new titles by increasing the number of our developers."

Capcom promises not to infuse its games with tons of microtransactions, lootboxes, or gacha-style purchases.

Capcom has been hitting out of the park lately with its big singleplayer games. But even as it pivots towards live gaming with Monster Hunter World, the company won't suddenly turn into EA, Ubisoft, or Activision with aggressive monetization.

Capcom wants you to actually enjoy the games you play and not feel pressured to buy a ton of extra content, making them an outlier in today's industry alongside devs like CD Projekt RED.

The Nintendo Switch line has sold 15 million units to date in North America, Nintendo today announced.

Nintendo's console is already a huge global success that routinely makes over $1 billion for Nintendo every quarter. Now with the Switch Lite in the picture, sales are set to rise--in fact they already are. Total Switch and Switch Lite sales have reached 15 million in North America, and hardware purchases are up 20% YoY in Q2, likely thanks to the cheaper $199 Switch Lite.

At 15 million sales in North America, the Switch has now eclipsed the Wii U's total lifetime sales by 1.44 million (the Wii U sold 13.56 million units total). These numbers also show North America comprises 40% of the total 36.87 million Switch units that've been sold to date.

Activision has pivoted hard away from lootboxes, confirming Modern Warfare won't have randomized microtransactions.

Activision is turning a new leaf. Today it promised the new Call of Duty: Modern Warfare reboot won't ever be monetized with lootboxes or supply drops. Instead, Infinity Ward is rolling out cosmetic skins on an in-game store as well as a new battle pass scheme borrowed from games like Fortnite.

Modern Warfare will have multiple battle passes that span seasonal content updates and playlists. There's two battle passes: A free version available to everyone, and a premium version that rewards you for COD Points as you play and lets you unlock special themed skins. All weapons and attachments can be unlocked for free by playing the game, even if you don't buy the battle pass.

What if the Nintendo Switch played old-school Game Boy games? Then you'd have something like the new Analogue Pocket handheld.

Retro company Analogue recently announced the Analogue Pocket, a new handheld that plays classic carts from Game Boy, Game Boy Advance, Neo Geo Pocket, Game Gear, and even Atari Lynx. The handheld sports a small 3.5-inch LCD panel with a mighty 1600x1440p resolution, expandable memory via MicroSD, a headphone jack, and USB Type-C for quick recharges. It's not an emulation machine and won't play ROMs, but instead focuses on FPGA and allows developers tons of control over the device's architecture.

The Analogue Pocket can be docked for play on an HDTV, making it a transforming handheld-console hybrid like the Nintendo Switch. Wireless controllers like 8Bitdo's awesome lineup can be connected to the dock via Bluetooth or gamers can hook peripherals right into the dock's USB ports.

Red Dead Redemption 2 is an absolute technical marvel on PC, completely blowing consoles out of the water (and rightly so).

Rockstar's dramatic Western is probably the best-looking console game to date. So it's only natural for it to be immaculate on PC, but it somehow looks better than my expectations. Today Rockstar dropped a trailer for Red Dead Redemption 2 running at 4K 60FPS, showing what visual masterpieces should look like.

Everything from the reflections, the atmospheric lighting, draw distances, silky-smooth frames, god-rays...you name a graphical or environmental effect and it looks amazing in the footage. Rockstar promises to harness the power and flexibility of PC with tons of platform-specific optimizations like:

Fallout 76's ambitious new Wastelanders update has been delayed to Q1 2020, Bethesda today announced.

Fallout 76 is still trucking along thanks to big new free expansions and updates, but the biggest one to date has been pushed back. Dubbed Wastelanders, the update will add human NPCs to the world and transform it into an actual Fallout game. Wastelanders brings a bunch of new characters that offer quests, fight alongside you, and even break up into factions that you can ally with or clash against.

"We've been working on our biggest update yet. It's called Wastelanders, and it'll fundamentally change the game. This is a long term story we're telling. Year One was about the Vault doors opening and all of you settling the wasteland."

Season 5 for PUBG has been detailed by developer PUBG Corp, and from the released details players can expect some new awesome teammate mechanics.

From above trailer we are shown a bunch of new mechanics that PUBG Corp will be introducing into the live game when Season 5 is released. Players will be able to lay down spike traps to pop the tires of vehicles, throw certain requested items to teammates at a press of a button, and throwing some melee weapons at enemies for that little bit of extra awesome glory.

PUBG Corp will also be adding vending machines in Season 5 where players will be dispense painkillers and energy drinks. These vending machines will be available in Miramar and Camp Jackal. If the above trailer isn't enough to get your hyped for the new season head on over to the official PUBG website where you will find the rest of the details there. A link can be found here.