Gaming - Page 696

Fallout Miami gets new gameplay footage showing off a bright tropical wasteland off the irradiated coasts of Florida.

Pink sunsets. Palm trees. Waves. Beach shores. Clear pools of shimmering water. These are hardly things you associate with Fallout, but thanks to the immensely talented team behind the Fallout Miami mod, all this and more is coming to the post-apocalyptic RPG. It's a far cry from Vice City's brilliant neon-lit streets, sleek sports cars, and alluring nightlife, but Fallout Miami does capture the look, feel, and historical landmarks of post-nuclear Miami.

The Fallout 4 mod is being built from the ground up by a team of volunteers, and will have content comparable to a pretty big expansion when it's ready for release. "Fallout Miami comprises of a large section of Miami Beach. The in-game map is twice the size of Far Harbor. The geographic area covered is roughly from South Pointe Pier to Fontainebleau Hotel," the team says.

The biggest reason the Epic Games Store is an appealing platform for devs? Money, of course.

Epic Games has two major ways it lures developers onto its PC store: upfront cash from signing six- or twelve-month timed-exclusivity deals, and the promise of keeping 88% of revenue from all games sold. Both mechanisms are extremely powerful and attractive for everyone from smaller-scale indie devs like Saber Interactive to mega-million publishers like Ubisoft, Deep Silver, and 2K Games. Exclusivity is the only real advantage the Epic Store currently has over Steam, especially since Epic really doesn't make very many games any more besides Fortnite updates. Epic won't stop until it forces Steam to adopt a new revenue split--and it's forcing change with its Fortnite billions.

But how much does Epic pay out for these deals? It paid $2 million for Phoenix Point's one-year exclusivity. Now Sniper Elite developer Rebellion says Epic is paying quite a bit of cash to snag games for its store. "Generally I think I would prefer not to do exclusives but I understand Epic's position with it. Quite frankly they are paying through the nose to build their store. All credit to them, it's fantastic, and we'll take some of their money, thank you very much," Rebellion co-founder Jason Kingsley said at a recent Develop event in Brighton, UK.

Thanks to the recent U.S.-China trade war, other major tech titans are pulling some of their console production out of China.

The specter of pricey tariffs have scared companies like Nintendo, Microsoft, and Sony into moving games hardware manufacturing and assembly from China into other overseas regions, sources tell Nikkei Asian Review. New amendments would raise tariffs on China-imported goods by 25%, including console games hardware and accessories.

All three of the games industry's major players recently warned that tariffs would tremendously disrupt the precariously balanced and carefully calculated hardware industry, which relies on strict budgets and tight supply line margins to operate. The companies say that 96% of all consoles imported into the U.S. were made in China, and the region is host to major plants like Foxconn that create and assemble critical components such as processors. As a result of these disruptions, the MSRP of games console hardware is expected to rise as companies pass the increased costs onto consumers.

Epic boss Tim Sweeney explains why his company's new fledgling PC storefront keeps buying up exclusivity rights, and acknowledges its shortcomings.

Right now there's only one reason to use the Epic Games Store: it's the only place to buy and play certain games on PC. This is a huge advantage that Epic isn't about to give up any time soon. Epic is using its Fortnite billions to win over indie developers and even big-name players like Ubisoft, Deep Silver, and Take-Two. But for Epic, this strategy isn't necessarily about making money, or at least directly: it's about making a more sustainable industry for devs.

"We believe exclusives are the only strategy that will change the 70/30 status quo at a large enough scale to permanently affect the whole game industry," Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney said on Twitter.

Final Fantasy VII: Remake might be a full-on PlayStation 4 exclusive after all, at least according to recent comments from Square Enix.

Despite issuing a press release hinting otherwise, Square Enix appears to rescind its earlier confirmations that Final Fantasy VII: Remake is only timed-exclusive on the PS4. "The highly anticipated FINAL FANTASY VII REMAKE will debut first on the PlayStation 4 computer entertainment system on March 3rd, 2020," reads the pre-E3 press release.

Xbox Germany recently erroneously announced the Remake for Xbox One, seemingly confirming our suspicions of a release on PC and Xbox. Now the games-maker says they flat-out don't have plans for other platforms. "As previously announced, Final Fantasy 7 Remake will be released for the PlayStation 4 on March 3rd 2020. We have no plans for other platforms," Square Enix told IGN. But it literally previously announced that the Remake will only release first on PS4, not that it's exclusive to PS4.

The Mortal Kombat 11 director, Ed Boon has taken to Twitter to tease the new DLC character Nightwolf that is on his way to Mortal Kombat 11.

This isn't the first time Boon has teased the upcoming DLC fighter, the first image that he released not to long ago showcased the characters hatchet. This time, Boon has released an image of the characters face and we can see the some of Nightwolf's facial features and color.

Judging by these teasers and how much Boon is teasing the character, we can assume that sometime soon we will be getting a reveal trailer for Nightwolf, so stay tuned. Mortal Kombat 11 is available on Xbox One, PS4, Nintendo Switch and PC.

Being a gamer and coming across a piece of gaming art that truly captures the excellence of the desired game or franchise is always a pleasure. Today is one of those days, as we take a look at the legacy The Legend of Zelda franchise has created.

The above image was created by John Su, who is an programmer at Blizzard Entertainment and an art hobbyist. Looking at the image now, we are taken back to the roots of what The Legend of Zelda franchise has done for gamers. We can see the design progression of both Zelda and Link as the franchise paved its way forward, and while there is always certainly going to select fan favorites I believe each of the drawings provides some level of satisfaction for fans.

John Su has also posted in the Twitter thread other fun ideas he had when designing this piece, we can see that the Super Smash Bros. smash orb was jokingly placed in the middle of Zelda and Link and also a rupee. While this art piece is obviously incredible, I can't help but float the idea across that Ganon and his design progression would be a welcomed addition. Nice snag Destructoid!

One of the biggest gaming franchises ever released is no doubt the Halo franchise, and while you might not know the names behind the series other than Bungie, a decorated co-creator of the franchise has teased a new title.

The big name behind the new title which is called 'Disintegration' is Marcus Lehto, he was the creative director at Bungie for years as the Halo franchise was being rolled out. Disintegration seems to be taking the same route as the Halo, as the title is a sci-fi shooter and judging from the trailer players will be taking to the stars for an adventure.

Lehto will be developing the game with his own indie studio V1 Interactive and is also partnering with 2K Games' Private Division label for publishing purposes. There isn't much else to talk about for Disintegration, other than that more news is going to be released at this years GamesCom on August 19th. The trailer says that a "full reveal" will be happening on this date, so make sure to keep your eyes peeled for Disintegration if you are a fan of Halo.

Valve is not a company known for being transparent with gamers so the news of the new project Steam Labs is an interesting move, as the normal way concepts work is that a company (Valve in this case) is always making something new.

Not all things worked on are finished, and those that are aren't the same when they are finished, and some new things are great. Steam Labs will see Valve offering gamers an early look at early concepts that might, or might not end up in the public version of Steam. Some of these new concepts include Valve using micro trailers that go for 6 seconds when you hover your mouse icon over the in-store graphic.

Valve has teased the first three experiments in Steam Labs are:

If you thought some of the serious StarCraft II players were hard then you ain't seen nothing yet as Alphabet Inc. (the parent company of Google) have opened up their DeepMind Alphastar AI into StarCraft II for a limited time.

In a blog post the company explains: "Experimental versions of DeepMind's StarCraft II agent, AlphaStar, will soon play a small number of games on the competitive ladder in Europe as part of ongoing research into AI. If you would like the chance to help DeepMind with its research by matching against AlphaStar, you can opt in by clicking the "opt-in" button on the in-game popup window. You can alter your opt-in selection at any time by using the "DeepMind opt-in" button on the 1v1 Versus menu".

You won't know if you're playing against the DeepMind Alphastar AI or not, as it's purely there to see how players react to the AI (and whether or not they even know they're playing against it). If players knew they were playing against an AI they would play differently, this way the results will stay unaffected.

If you are a collector then you would know that Pokemon cards hold some of the highest of value, so how heartbroken would you be if you ordered a $60,000 card and it got lost in the mail?

The Pokemon card is Trainer No. 3 and is one of the most valuable Pokemon cards on the market because of its rarity and historical value. The card was awarded to the third place winner at the 1999 Pokemon competition in Japan called the Super Secret Battle. According to Polygon, the card was sold for $60,000 on eBay by pokemonplace and was sent out to the buyer via UPS with $50,000 worth of insurance attached to it.

pokemonplace managed to get in contact with Polygon and said: "My responsibility was to ship the card to Aramex [...] a middle man company that then ships the card to the buyer. The tracking information I have was with registered mail and shows tracking and a signature. Aramex claims they haven't received it and signed for a bulk lot." Since a signature was made, pokemonplace cannot claim the insurance back on the card, and since nobody knows where the card is or has gone to pokemonplace is left dead in the water.

A new report has come out saying that PUBG battle royale has been banned in Jordan by the Telecommunications Regulatory Commission (TRC) for negatively impacting gamers.

An interview was conducted by Roya's "Nabd Al Balad" program on Tuesday, July 9, Shaqrah said "Fortnite game is one of the games expected to be banned." As well as PUBG being banned, the TRC also says that they are planning on banning 6 more games and it seems Fortnite is in their scopes.

The ban has come from a recent study that reportedly confirmed that PUBG was negatively impacting gamers of all generations. At the moment no other games have been banned as of yet, but it seems that it won't be long before other battle royale titles could be in the sights of the TRC.

A new press release by Amazon Game Studios has shined a new night on the upcoming Lord of the Rings MMO, revealing details about what players should expect from the title.

According to the Amazon press release, the upcoming Lord of the Rings MMO will not be based on the Peter Jackson Trilogy of movies but instead will be taking players to Tolkiens beautifully detailed world from the books. Amazon also said that the game will be completely separate from their Lord of the Rings TV show that is scheduled to release sometime in 2021.

Amazon's official statement regarding the new MMO is "The game will give fans around the globe a new, immersive game experience for epic exploration of the vast world of Tolkien." They also say that Amazon Game Studios is partnering with development veterans who worked on Destiny, Planetside, WoW, Everquest, Defiance and Rift. The studios that will be tagging along for the adventure include Leyou Technologies and its Althon Games label.

Nintendo today announced the Nintendo Switch Lite, a smaller and more limited model for $199 coming this September.

The Switch Lite sees many features omitted from the original $299 SKU and might weaker in power. The Switch Lite can't transform and is a handheld-only device aimed at replacing the flagging 3DS lineup. It can't be docked for dedicated home console play and has two controllers fixed to its sides that don't feature IR sensors or HD Rumble.

It also has a full D-pad, which is something the original model still doesn't have (not officially anyway). The Lite has a smaller 5.5-inch screen with 720p resolution (down from the 6.2-inch screen of the original) and the chassis has been shrunk to 3.6x8.2x.55 inches in dimension.

Some brand new screenshots have been released for Hideo Kojima's upcoming title Death Stranding. The screenshots showcase to us some gorgeous environments as well as a close up of the main character.

The screenshots were released sporadically on Hideo Kojima's personal Twitter account over the past few days. From the screenshots we can see the main character Sam Bridges in a variety of different environments. We also get a close up of his face which seems pretty cool even though it slightly blurry.

The other screenshots give us a great look at some of the diverse environments players will be taking on. We see Bridges sitting down in a field of grass, taking on a rocky terrain while being coated in rain, and leaning over in a lush green environment which has scattered rocks amongst it. The screenshots have been provided within the entirety of this article, Death Stranding is scheduled to release on PS4 on November 8th this year.

Studio MDHR's critically acclaimed platformer title Cuphead has seen extreme popularity since it has arrived on all platforms. Its so popular that now recent reports have said the titles reached the 4 million units sold milestone.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Cuphead which was developed and published back in 2017 has now finally reached the 4 million units sold mark. The title recently released on the Nintendo Switch which no doubt helped bolster the sales as the Switch is home to 30 million users.

The last time we heard about Cuphead's sales was about a year ago and the title was sitting at around the 3 million mark. Since its release on the Switch that number has now grown to 4 million. For those that don't know, Cuphead has become a one-of-a-kind platforming title that captures a fantastic hand-drawn art-style of the 1930's, but splices the platforming with some extreme levels of difficulty. There is currently a DLC for Cuphead in the works titled The Delicious Last Course, its set to arrive sometime in 2020.

Blizzard have released another graphics overhaul for StarCraft Remastered, this time round we are introduced to StarCraft Cartooned.

The above trailer gives us a funny and quirky introduction to StarCraft Cartooned which has been created by Carbot Animations. The overhaul lets players choose in the graphics setting if they want their game to appear cartoonish across the board. The graphics changes every unit, building, structure, map, menu and mission with this cool fresh new art-style.

Not only can players enjoy the single player campaign with a new splash of color, but they can take that color to online/multiplayer games as well. It should be noted that this graphics mod can only be applied to StarCraft Remastered and will also cost $15. For more information check out the official link here.

Nintendo has revealed some new job listings on their official website and they suggest that The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild 2 will feature some form of dungeons.

According to the job listings found on the Nintendo of Japan website, Nintendo are in search for new 3D computer graphics designer that will be tasked with the games terrain. The other tasks include fields and dungeons. A second listing says that Nintendo are after a level designer to "work on the planning and implementation of dungeons in addition to events in-game".

If Breath of the Wild 2 has more of a concentration of dungeons we could see massive expansion of the game below the surface. At the moment we don't know when Breath of the Wild 2 will be released, but if its going to be anything like the first game we will be in for a wild ride of delving into a meticulously developed world.

Borderlands developers Gearbox Software are in full-swing in terms of making sure Borderlands 3 players are looked after quality-of-life wise. That of course means loot, loot and more loot.

Above we are introduced to the Borderlands 3 ECHOcast Twitch Extension which allows for Borderlands 3 fans who are tuning into the Borderlands 3 World Wide Gameplay Reveal get interactive with Twitch streamers. Fans will be able to see the contents of the streamers backpack, skilltrees, and even spawn special events in-game.

Of course Gearbox will be giving away some free early loot for Borderlands 3. Players will have to link their SHiFT and Twitch account to get access to the Rare Chest Events, but not to just use the extension itself. Check out the the listed features in the entirety of this post for a more official breakdown, or just watch the above video and listen to claptraps new voice actor walk you through it. Borderlands 3 is scheduled for release on September 13 for Xbox One, PS4 and PC.

Gearbox Software has introduced Borderlands 3 players to a new pinging system that will make communication in-game much easier amongst teammates.

Above is a video released onto the Borderlands YouTube Channel that gives us as quick introduction to the pinging system. We can see that this new system is very similar to that of Apex Legends' pinging system. Players will be able to tag enemies, lootboxes, walkways, chests, players and other characters. While this system is used extremely frequently in Apex Legends and will no doubt be used extensively in Borderlands 3, there is already some issues I have with it.

Since the pings have an icon image over-layed on whatever object or character that has been pinged, it makes it quite difficult for players to see the pinged target if its far away. A prime example of this is at 14 seconds in the video, where the player tags the enemy from a distance. The ping actually cover the entirety of the enemy making it unnecessarily difficult to see. To solve is this issue I'd recommend Gearbox making the ping icon more transparent.