With The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt launching this week to a great deal of critical acclaim, we're now getting to dig into the technical side of the game. Digital Foundry has compared the two console versions, and those fortunate enough to own both platforms may not have as easy of a choice between the two as they expected.
We already knew the PS4 version would run at 1080p and the Xbox One version would employ dynamic scaling that would allow it to move from 900p up to 1080p. Digital Foundry found it rarely hit the latter mark, and while the resolution disparity becomes noticeable in some spots, in other ways the two versions are indistinguishable.
Where the differences really emerge are in terms of frame rate. During cutscenes, the PS4 version is capped at 30fps, while the Xbox One version is allowed to fluctuate. A higher frame rate isn't necessarily a good thing in this case, and Digital Foundry found the steady 30fps to be preferable. But that isn't always the case, as when the PS4 frame rate drops, it immediately locks itself to 20fps, whereas the Xbox One version might drop as low as 20 but then immediately increase.
During gameplay, both systems have trouble maintaining a consistent frame rate when moving through the large city of Novigrad, while combat sequences "flatten[ed] at around 30fps." Both systems experience their own variety of issues when riding through forests. The result of all this is that "neither console version feels as smooth as it should, and each is prone to big dips during gameplay."
Obviously, if you have the necessary hardware for it, PC is the ideal platform from a technical standpoint. Digital Foundry approximates the visual quality of the console versions to be around "the PC's mid-point in terms of overall quality--with extras like velocity-based motion blur, chromatic aberration, bloom, and light shafts all engaged."
Developer CD Projekt Red today released a new patch for the PC version of Witcher 3 that will also soon be available on consoles. You can read about that here.
Ashley Johnson, who provided the voice of Ellie in Naughty Dog's acclaimed post-apocalyptic game The Last of Us, has signed on to work on Telltale Games' Tales from the Borderlands series.
Telltale's Laura Perusco revealed the news on Twitter earlier today. Another Telltale employee, communications lead Job Stauffer, shed some more light on Johnson's role in the series.
"Without giving anything away, just know that she plays a *very* core character," he wrote. "Episode 3 is bananas!"
Before her role as Ellie in The Last of Us, Johnson appeared in the TV show Growing Pains and the Mel Gibson movie What Women Want. Her other video game credits include various Ben 10 games and Infamous: First Light.
Johnson isn't the only celebrity featured in Tales from the Borderlands. Seinfeld and Family Guy actor Patrick Warburton and comedian Chris Hardwick also play major roles. In addition, video game voice acting veterans Nolan North, Troy Baker, and Laura Bailey have parts in the series.
The first two Tales from the Borderlands episodes, Zer0 Sum and Atlas Mugged, were released in November 2014 and March 2015, respectively. Telltale has not yet announced a release date for the third.
Being an RPG, there's a fair amount of reading to do in The Witcher 3, particularly on the inventory screen where you might be comparing various numbers with each other. It's a real problem, then, that much of the in-game text is exceedingly small, making it difficult to easily read--though this is something that will thankfully soon be fixed.
In response to a tweet inquiring about the issue, CD Projekt Red community lead Marcin Momot explained, "We are working on addressing the font size issue right now. Another patch coming soon."
The size of the in-game text has been a source of complaints since Witcher 3 launched earlier this week. Some users have resorted to using the PS4's zoom feature that was added in the March system update, but that's cumbersome and arguably only useful inside of menus.
You can see the issue in the screenshot above (courtesy of NeoGAF), though if you're sitting close to a computer monitor, it may be difficult to see that there is a problem.
There's no word on exactly when the patch resolving this will be out, but a new patch--1.03--was released today on PC. This largely deals with fixing various bugs and improving performance, but the console version of the patch said to be coming "very soon" might also deal with the text issue. We've contacted CD Projekt Red to find out more and will report back with anything we learn.
In the meantime, here are the full patch notes for the PC version of patch 1.03:
Improves stability in gameplay and the UI
Improves performance especially in cutscenes and gameplay
Fixes grass and foliage popping that could occur after density parameters were changed
Improves Nvidia Hairworks performance
Boosted texture anisotropy sampling to 16x on Ultra preset
Sharpen Post-process settings extended from Off/On to Off/Low/High
Blood particles will now properly appear after killing enemies on the water
Corrects a bug where player was able to shoot bolts at friendly NPCs
Improves menu handling
Corrects an issue with Stamina regeneration while sprinting
Fixes a cursor lock issue that sometimes occcured when scrolling the map
Episode four of Game of Thrones: A Telltale Games Series will be released on May 26, the developer announced today. Telltale Games has also revealed a new trailer, which can be viewed below. The episode is titled Sons of Winter and continues the story of House Forrester as they struggle to survive in The War of the Five Kings.
The episode will launch on May 26 for PC via digital distribution services including Steam, and for PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 3 via the PlayStation Network. An Xbox Games Store release for Xbox One and Xbox 360 will debut a day later on May 27, and an iOS and Android version will launch on May 28.
The series will span six episodes in total, at $5 each or $25 for the entire season. The series is based on the world of HBO's Game of Thrones TV show, which itself is rooted in George R. R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire universe. The most recent entry in the series, Episode Three: The Sword in Darkness was well-received in GameSpot's review, scoring an eight and noted for hitting a high point for the series thus far.
Check out some screenshots from episode four below.
The Need for Speed franchise still has a lot of upside when it comes to its commercial potential. That's according to EA developer Ghost Games general manager Marcus Nilsson, who tells GameSpot as part of the new Need for Speed reveal today that the franchise has seen better days when it comes to sales.
"Need for Speed, ten years ago, sold a lot more copies than it sells now," Nilsson said. "Which means we have a lot of room to move up. We have a global, known brand; it's strong. But I think we have a lot of upside for this franchise based upon getting our details and information and features in order."
Nilsson's comments came in response to a question about if he felt much pressure working such a storied franchise. He said, "Not really, if I'm perfectly honest with you. I don't feel pressure by it. I feel humbled to be associated with it."
"I think it depends on what type of Need for Speed you're looking at. If you look at Rivals last year, Rivals was obviously a game almost without any type of story. The Need for Speed movie obviously has a narrative that pulls you through," Nilsson told GameSpot.
"People kind of had different opinions about that narrative and how good that is or how bad it is. I think [the movie] captures some stuff of what Need for Speed is. I think it captures the action driving, it's all about the car and edge-of-your-seat driving. But I think it didn't fully deliver on everything the brand needs to be."
EA studio Ghost Games today announced the next Need for Speed game, an open-world racer inspired by the Underground series and featuring an "innovative" story. Check out GameSpot's full report on the new game here.
This year's Need for Speed game is a "full reboot" of the iconic racing series, and is due to launch this fall for Xbox One, PlayStation 4, and PC, developer Ghost Games announced today, following numerous teases. Ghost isn't sharing much in the way of specifics about the game (look for more at E3, general manager Marcus Nilsson tells GameSpot), but the studio has shared a teaser trailer.
What we do now know are high-level points about the new Need for Speed game. First, the game (which is inspired by the Underground series but doesn't have a name yet) will be an open-world, day-to-night racer featuring "deep customization," car culture by way of a partnership with EA's own Speedhunters, and even an "immersive narrative" that Ghost says will pull players through the game.
We recently had a chance to speak with Nilsson about the new Need for Speed game. Among other things, he talked about how an extra year of development benefited the game, the pressure he feels working on such an iconic series, and why story--yes, story--will play a major role in the new title.
The extra year
2014 was the first year in a decade that EA did not release a new, core Need for Speed game. Ghost used the extra development time to think about what the franchise really stands for, and that took time.
"Need for Speed needs to understand what it really is," Nilsson told GameSpot. "What are the core values of the brand, what are the types of experiences that we want to give to gamers? And sometimes it can be hard to do that when you have different development teams in different parts of the world. So the theory, or the strategy, for us was to become the owners of Need for Speed."
Nilsson
After Ghost was finished with Xbox One and PS4 launch title Need for Speed Rivals, the studio formulated an idea for a "very specific game."
"To build that specific game, we needed time and needed to understand from fans: what is the type of game you want us to build?" Nilsson said. "So what we've been doing in this year off is we've been trying to understand what people think Need for Speed should be standing for."
The end result of spending an extra year on development is a better overall product, Nilsson says.
"What people get from this year that we didn't ship a game, is they get a game that delivers on all the core tenets of what Need for Speed should be. And they get that in a very high quality form," he explained.
Pressure
Need for Speed is one of the most iconic video game franchises in all of gaming. It's been around for two decades and even recently spawned a major blockbuster starring Breaking Bad's Aaron Paul. Given the weight of working on such a massive media property, you might think Nilsson was feeling some pressure.
"Not really, if I'm perfectly honest with you. Need for Speed, ten years ago, sold a lot more copies than it sells now," Nilsson said. "Which means we have a lot of room to move up. We have a global, known brand; it's strong. But I think we have a lot of upside for this franchise based upon getting our details and information and features in order. I don't feel pressure by it. I feel humbled to be associated with it."
The missing piece: story
Need for Speed games are known for their white knuckle action and lovely visuals, not usually story. But the new Need for Speed, surprisingly, will place a major emphasis on narrative. Nilsson says more details on the game's "innovative" story will be revealed later, but he shared some thoughts on how a strong story could make all the difference in helping revitalize the Need for Speed brand.
"We are taking a very innovative approach to how we tell a story. That's actually probably as much as I can say at this time," Nilsson explained. "If you just go back three years with Need for Speed: The Run, there were stories in Need for Speed. Absolutely not the best executed stories. But we had stories. And I think a missing piece from the last games we had has been narrative. I think we can deliver a better game to our fans if we connect to them emotionally through story."
Online/social features
Nilsson also stressed that the new Need for Speed will advance the seamless online mode from Rivals, AllDrive, offering players a range of new tools to help them start playing with friends and groups.
"We're doing a lot more with that now," Nilsson said about the new Need for Speed's online mode.
In the single-player story, other people can enter your game and interact with you. "So it creates a very almost distraction-based gameplay for you as you play in this world," he said.
Standing out in an increasingly crowded racing genre
"Quite clearly, there's more interest in the genre. I've seen some numbers from the industry saying it's growing again. I quite frankly think that as we move to new consoles, new games try new ways...even if it's just pushing graphics, or pushing more polygons, or better physics in the cars," Nilsson said. "You can give more to the user on these more powerful hardware consoles. Having said that, I think each game will have to find its niche and it's more about quality execution than ever. So you need to be able to deliver really high quality, because of the competition we now have, which is far more than just games. TV, Facebook, whatever it is. But I am very happy to see more energy and interest in the racing genre."
Ghost Games, based in Sweden, is a subsidiary of EA. More information about the game will be announced during EA's E3 briefing, which is scheduled for Monday, June 15, at 1 PM PDT
Ubisoft's has rolled out a new deal to entice people to buy The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt from their PC digital store. Anyone who buys a digital copy of The Witcher 3 from Uplay will also receive a free game.
There is no word on how long the free game offer will last. If you're interested, you may want to act quickly. Head to the Uplay page here to check out the deal.
Nintendo and The Pokemon Company on Thursday announced Pokemon Super Mystery Dungeon, the next entry in the turn-based Pokemon spinoff series for 3DS.
Details about the game are light at the moment, but it appears it isn't deviating too much from the core series, which has now sold more than 13 million copies worldwide.
In its very brief announcement, Nintendo said Super Mystery Dungeon will offer "even greater, randomly generated dungeons." Players will do battle with the help of Legendary and Mythical Pokemon in their effort to "save the world in a sweeping tale of adventure and mystery."
Super Mystery Dungeon will launch for 3DS in North America this winter.
The most recent entry in the series was Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Gates to Infinity, which was released in the west in 2013. In a 5/10 review, critic Heidi Kemps wrote: "It's as cute as a button, but dull, simplistic dungeon exploration drags Gates to Infinity into mediocrity."
Nintendo has announced it will no longer sell the 8GB Wii U in Japan.
According to Nintendo Everything's translation, the Nintendo website states the basic white model is "slated to go out of production shortly" which means only the black 32GB model will be available to purchase.
However, due to Nintendo's commitment to continue shipping Wii U Basic models across western territories, it is unlikely that production has completely ceased.
Speaking to GameSpot, a Nintendo spokesperson said it "currently has no plans to discontinue the 8GB model outside of Japan."
"Though I cannot confirm when it will be launched or any other details of the system, since I have confirmed that it will be 'a dedicated video game platform with a brand new concept,' it should mean that we do not intend it to become a simple 'replacement' for Nintendo 3DS or Wii U," Iwata explained in Nintendo's latest earnings report.
Sony on Thursday announced plans to livestream its E3 2015 media briefing at movie theaters across the United States and Canada as part of a promotion called "PlayStation E3 Experience."
This is the second year of PlayStation E3 Experience. Tickets sold out very quickly last year, so Sony is increasing the number of theaters for the 2015 event by 150 percent to more than 75. At least one theater in every state across the US--including Hawaii and Alaska--will host the event. Plus, three cities in Canada will take part.
Like last year's event, PlayStation E3 Experience will be free. You can grab a ticket on Wednesday, May 27, starting at 9 AM PDT / 12 noon EDT through this special website, which will also provide a list of all participating theaters. Eighty percent of theater capacity will be reserved for ticket-holders, while the remaining 20 percent will be available for people on the wait list.
Everyone in attendance will get to watch Sony's entire E3 briefing, as well as a 30-minute show hosted by Geoff Keighley and featuring developer interviews immediately following the event. Plus, attendees will go home with a "PlayStation surprise" to be revealed later. Last year, this prize was pretty nice--early access to the Destiny alpha and a code to play the Battlefield Hardline beta, as well as some physical goodies.
Dead Island developer Techland's first-person co-op slasher Hellraid has been put on hold. The Polish developer confirmed the news on Thursday through a blog post published on its website.
"We would like to officially announce that our dark fantasy [first playable prototype] game Hellraid will not be released this year as previously planned, and the development of the game has been put on hold," it said.
Techland explained that it recently conducted an internal analysis of the project and determined that, as the game currently stands, it is "not meeting our own expectations." The game isn't canceled outright, however.
"Therefore, we decided the best course of action would be to send it back to the drawing board and invent our dark fantasy title anew," Techland added.
GameSpot saw a demo of Hellraid at E3 last summer, but critic Kevin VanOrd was not entirely impressed.
For more on Hellraid, check out some images in the gallery below. But be aware that, because the game has now gone back to the drawing board, these images might not be representative of the project.
CD Projekt Red on Thursday released a new patch for the PC edition of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, which includes various optimizations for graphics and overall performance, as well as some bug fixes.
What's more, the patch (via Polygon) improves performance for Nvidia Hairworks, meaning the hair and fur you see in the game should look better than ever.
This patch is coming to the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 versions of The Witcher 3 "very soon."
The full Witcher 3 May 21 patch notes are below.
Improves stability in gameplay and the UI
Improves performance especially in cutscenes and gameplay
Fixes grass and foliage popping that could occur after density parameters were changed
Improves Nvidia Hairworks performance
Boosted texture anisotropy sampling to 16x on Ultra preset
Sharpen Post-process settings extended from Off/On to Off/Low/High
Blood particles will now properly appear after killing enemies on the water
Corrects a bug where player was able to shoot bolts at friendly NPCs
Improves menu handling
Corrects an issue with Stamina regeneration while sprinting
Fixes a cursor lock issue that sometimes occurred when scrolling the map
If you'd like to see more Xbox 360 games released on Xbox One, you're not alone. Top Xbox boss Phil Spencer says on Twitter he'd also like to bring more last-generation games to Microsoft's new console.
However, he also warns that you shouldn't get your hopes up.
"Lots of 360 games I'd like to bring to XB1," Spencer said to a fan who asked about Fable Anniversary being released for Xbox One. "Only so much time and want to focus on making new games. Not easy tradeoffs."
Fable Anniversary, currently available for Xbox 360 and PC, is an updated version of 2004's Fable.
The Xbox One does not currently support backwards compatibility. However, Microsoft said back in September 2013 that the Xbox One is technically capable of delivering a game-streaming service, which could in theory allow older-generation games to be played on the new console, like PlayStation Now.
What Xbox 360 game would you like to see released on Xbox One? Let us know in the comments below.
According to data from SteamCharts.com, Tera developer En Masse Entertainment said that the MMO had more concurrent players than its competitors since it launched, with an all-time peak of 18,454 concurrent players. By comparison, Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm has an all-time peak of 7,401 players, EVE Online has an all-peak of 3,690, and The Elder Scrolls Online has an all-time peak of 5,067.
However, keep in mind that these numbers are counting Steam players only, not the total number of players in each game, who don't necessarily use Steam to log in.
Overall, new and returning players pushed the total number of Tera accounts to over 4.5 million in North America and 20 million worldwide.
You can check out more impressive figures about the game in the infographic below, like how many Gabe Newells you could buy if you had a dollar for every gold someone looted since Tera launched on Steam.
Rockstar Games, along with its parent company Take-Two, has launched a lawsuit against the BBC in a bid to prevent the broadcaster from airing an upcoming drama based on the real-life story on the development of Grand Theft Auto games.
The corporation said the action was "necessary" after failed talks with the broadcaster. In a statement sent to GameSpot, Take-Two said it has "filed suit against the BBC for trademark infringement based on their movie currently titled 'Game Changer' as it relates to Rockstar Games' Grand Theft Auto video game series."
GameSpot understands that the Game Changer production team had not been assisted by Rockstar Games employees during the research stage of its programme.
Take-Two suggested that it had been in talks with the BBC on several occasions, though didn't explain its intention in those discussions, and claimed that no resolution with the public broadcaster had been reached.
"While holders of the trademarks are referenced in the film title and its promotion, Rockstar Games has had no involvement with this project," the publisher said.
"Our goal is to ensure that our trademarks are not misused in the BBC's pursuit of an unofficial depiction of purported events related to Rockstar Games. We have attempted multiple times to resolve this matter with the BBC without any meaningful resolution. It is our obligation to protect our intellectual property and unfortunately in this case litigation was necessary."
In a statement, the BBC said it "does not comment on legal matters."
Ahead of the release of Splatoon later this month, Nintendo has posted a new Iwata Asks feature about the non-violent Wii U shooter. The in-depth Q&A dives deep into the unique game's origins and more. .Among the highlights is the fact developers experimented with other characters before landing on squids.
Nintendo's Hisashi Nogami reveals that an early demo for what would become Splatoon depicted a "white cube in a maze," a character that Nintendo president Satoru Iwata referred to as tofu.
"There was a white thing and a black thing shaped like blocks of tofu, and they were shooting ink and they had to steal each other's turf," Nogami.
The developers joked that the original basis for Splatoon was "a fight between a block of sesame tofu and a block of firm tofu."
A later prototype for Splatoon added a rabbit as the main playable character. Why a rabbit?
"Well, a lot of it was because of design factors," Nintendo's Seita Inoue explained. "Rabbits are white to begin with, so it would be easy to tell if they were inked. They've got long ears that would move when they did, so you could see them moving and when viewed from above, it would be easy to tell which direction they were facing by the direction of the ears."
On top of this, Nogami said if gamers were asked if they would rather play as a block of tofu or a rabbit, everyone would choose the rabbit.
"Tofu is a bit hard of a hard sell, so we decided to turn the characters into something humanoid," another Nintendo developer, Shintaro Sato, explained.
But rabbits led to another problem.
"When people asked 'Why rabbits?' and 'Why are the rabbits shooting ink?' we couldn't give them a rational explanation," Yusuke Amano said.
The team later got together for a brainstorming session and it was decided that squids would be the main character, in part because the developers wanted a character that could switch between "ink creature form" and "humanoid form." A squid was the perfect solution.
Also in the Iwata Asks feature, it's revealed that Nintendo thought about seventy different ideas before landing on what would become Splatoon. What's more, the team reveals that the version of Splatoon shown off to press at E3 last year was only 10 percent finished.
"At E3, we only had one weapon. We only had one stage, and only a mock-up of the sequence," Nintendo's Tsubasa Sakaguchi said. "So when we returned from E3, our big issue was figuring out how to turn all that into a product."
Splatoon launches May 29 exclusively for Wii U. You can try the game ahead of launch through a one-hour demo scheduled to be held this weekend. For a closer look at Splatoon, check out some images in the gallery below.
Following the introduction of 60fps video playback last year, YouTube on Thursday announced a new update that will let people conduct 60fps livestreams. The one catch, at least for now, is that the higher frame rate is only supported as part of an early preview for HTML5-compatible browsers.
"When you start a live stream on YouTube at 60fps, we'll transcode your stream into 720p60 and 1080p60, which means silky smooth playback for gaming and other fast-action videos," YouTube explained in a statement. "We'll also make your stream available in 30fps on devices where high frame rate viewing is not yet available, while we work to expand support in the coming weeks."
YouTube said it appreciates that better frame rate is a key concern for video game streams. As such, the Google-owned video giant has worked with game capture technology companies like Elgato and XSplit for new version of their capture technology. The new versions of Elgato Game Capture, XSplit Broadcaster, and XSplit Gamecaster are available now, YouTube said.
What's more, YouTube pointed out that any app using the site's new livestreaming API can mark their stream to run at 60fps.
In addition, YouTube has rolled out what it called another highly requested feature for livestreaming: HTML5 playback.
"As of this week, YouTube live streams will use an HTML5 player in supported browsers," YouTube said. "And because our HTML5 player supports variable speed playback, you can skip backward in a stream while it's live and watch at 1.5x or 2x speed to catch back up."
The introduction of 60fps livestreaming, and more announcements to come later, are part of YouTube's effort to go head-to-head with Twitch. According to a report from March, "Gaming and eSports in particular are going to be a big driving force for the new-look YouTube Live."
Microsoft's E3 2015 briefing next month will be 90 minutes long, about the standard runtime for the company's yearly event, Xbox boss Phil Spencer recently confirmed on Twitter.
Spencer went on to say that Microsoft's E3 planning team recently completed a rough run-through of the event. It was too long, and edits will need to be made.
"We did a rough end to end run of show yesterday--still too long," Spencer said. "I like the games we have in the show, not easy to edit it down."
Spencer didn't say if any announcements will need to be cut entirely to keep the event down to 90 minutes. But that's possible, given Microsoft has already said it's saving some reveals for Gamescom.
Overall, Microsoft appears to have huge plans for E3 2015, previously teasing that the show will highlight the "greatest games lineup in Xbox history." What do you want to see at the show? Let us know in the comments below.
Developer CD Projekt Red has responded to concerns that The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt's graphics were "downgraded" throughout the course of development. In a interview with Eurogamer, key developers from the Polish studio frankly acknowledge that the visuals for the final game--released this week to high praise--don't exactly match a video shown during the VGX awards show two years ago. They also explain why.
First, CD Projekt Red co-founder Marcin Iwinski stressed that developing The Witcher 3 for consoles did not hold back the PC edition.
"If the consoles are not involved there is no Witcher 3 as it is,"Iwinski said. "We can lay it out that simply. We just cannot afford it, because consoles allow us to go higher in terms of the possible or achievable sales; have a higher budget for the game, and invest it all into developing this huge, gigantic world."
"Developing only for the PC: yes, probably we could get more [in terms of graphics] as there would be nothing else--they would be so focused, like if we would develop only on Xbox One or PlayStation 4. But then we cannot afford such a game."
Asked specifically why The Witcher 3's graphics might have looked better in the VGX video (below), Iwinski explained that this footage--captured on PC--was derived from a "vertical slice" of the game. This demo was built specifically to run in as high fidelity as possible. It didn't have the game's full open world to contend with, and that helped boost the visuals.
"This is the nature of games development," he admitted.
Iwinski went on to suggest that, "Maybe we shouldn't have shown that [trailer], I don't know." But he also stresses that CD Projekt Red never set out to mislead anyone with the footage.
"It's not a lie or a bad will," he said. "We don't agree there is a downgrade but it's our opinion, and gamers' feeling can be different. If they made their purchasing decision based on the 2013 materials, I'm deeply sorry for that, and we are discussing how we can make it up to them because that's not fair."
Iwinski and the rest of the CD Projekt Red team have been personally affected by the graphics fallout.
"We don't feel good about it," Iwinski said. "And I treat it very personally." CD Projekt Red marketing manager Michal Platkow-Gilewski added: "The whole team was touched by this."
Finally, CD Projekt Red says there is a major patch coming soon to The Witcher 3 that should offer a series of graphical improvements. For the PC edition specifically, another new patch will allow players to edit .ini files. This should let players tweak their visual settings even more than they already can.
Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment has released a new live-action trailer for Batman: Arkham Knight showing a number of average Joes in situations that compel them to become the Batman.
To be clear, there's zero gameplay in here, but it's a cool trailer nonetheless, partially thanks to the use of Nine Inch Nails' The Wretched.
An Amazon listing for two versions of Batman: Arkham Knight was recently spotted. The first is just the standard version of the game, while the second is called the Comic Bundle, and features an in-game skin ("Batman First Appearance"), along with an exclusive, 25th anniversary version of an Grant Morrison's acclaimed graphic novel Arkham Asylum: A Serious House on Serious Earth.
Following a swathe of recent bans, Daybreak Game Company, developer of online zombie survival title H1Z1, has decided to give cheaters a second chance, provided they release a public YouTube apology.
Daybreak president John Smedley took to Twitter to tell players e-mailing him that they'd have to publicly put their tail between their legs to have their bans lifted.
Dear Cheaters who got banned. Many of you are emailing me, apologizing and admitting it. Thank you. However.. You're doing it wrong
Naturally, YouTube apology videos cannot be marked as private and Smedley has asked that they be address to the rest of the H1Z1 playerbase instead of its developer.
"Although you hurt our business, this is about [fellow players] not us," he said.
Thus far, Smedley has retweeted three apology videos and confirmed these three players' bans have been lifted.
"So far we've unbanned three people out of 30k we've now banned. One of which is probably about to get re-banned for taking his video private," Smedley said on Reddit.
"I want to make sure it's clear there are consequences for cheating. You don't just get to make a video and get unbanned. This is a very limited time thing to try and raise awareness of what's actually going on," he added.
"You may say 'hey there clearly aren't consequences if you are unbanning people'. Let's get back to the part where I said we've unbanned three people. If these videos go far and wide and it elevates the importance of getting rid of the cheaters in PC gaming, I feel it's an excellent trade."
For those who enjoy a little schadenfreude, you can watch the three apologies below.
Among the most popular H1Z1 hacks was ESP, a cheat that allows users to see the location of other players, ammo, and weapons.
In February, Sony Online Entertainment was bought out by an investment management firm based in New York called Columbus Nova. SOE, now operating as Daybreak Game Company, looks after Planetside 2, H1Z1, and DC Universe Online.
At the time of writing, Castlevania: Symphony of the Night director Koji Igarashi's crowdfunded spiritual successor has raised $2.5 million and, in its latest project update, beta access was announced.
Although there wasn't much in the way of details, the Kickstarter page states that eligible backers will be able to "play early builds of the game," as well as "help the development team squash bugs," and "provide valuable feedback."
"All $60+ digital and physical PC copies will be eligible for the beta," reads the update, "but the beta version will only run on Windows."
Igarashi is opting not to rely wholly on a traditional publishing deal for the project, instead taking to Kickstarter to get the game off the ground. Part of the funds required to develop the game had already been raised, so the Kickstarter campaign was aimed at generating awareness, as well as increase the overall product budget, and to release physical Xbox One and PS4 discs as backer rewards.
Igarashi is serving as Ritual of the Night's director/producer. Castlevania series composer Michiru Yamane is returning to work on the game's music. Development duties are being handled by Inti Creates, the Japanese studio behind Mega Man 9 and Mighty No. 9.
An expansion to PlayStation 4-exclusive role-playing game Bloodborne has been confirmed by Sony. The president of Sony Computer Entertainment's World Wide Studios, Shuhei Yoshida, posted the announcement on Twitter today.
Yoshida also confirmed that more information on the expansion would be released "later this year." GameSpot has reached out to Sony for comment and will update this story as more details become available.
The massive multiplayer online game market is such an incredibly huge and diverse one. With so many titles to choose from, an MMO absolutely has to do something new or interesting if it hopes to catch the attention of any gamers. For the Korean action MMO Blade & Soul, that something is its unique martial arts-themed world and its combat system.
For the uninitiated, Blade & Soul is an incredibly popular MMO that was initially released only in Korea in 2012 and it garnered even greater success as it launched across China, Japan, and Taiwan. The game's world is steeped in Asian mythology and heavily inspired by Wuxia, a Chinese epic literary style focused on martial arts heroes (i.e. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and House of Flying Daggers). It will be releasing in North America free-to-play this winter.
Blade & Soul's premise is simple (and probably familiar to any martial arts film fan): a mysterious antagonist kills your martial arts master and you have to pursue them to find out why. It literally feels like something cut out of a Wuxia film with its grand vengeance-fueled martial arts film premise and its vertical environments filled with Asian architecture. But even if Blade & Soul's story and setting don't draw you in, then its combat might be what grabs your attention.
Blade & Soul's combat system is more akin to action-based MMOs such as TERA and Guild Wars 2. But what differentiates its combat is how much it feels like a full-on action game. When engaged in battle, combat is presented with over-the-top attacks and quick dodges that look like something you'd see out of Devil May Cry or Bayonetta. For instance, I got to see a character launch an opponent into the air and then follow up with an air attack flurry that smashed them into the ground. But this action game feel isn't just in its presentation, its also reflected in its gameplay.
As opposed to other action MMOs, stringing together attacks and abilities in Blade & Soul is much more reliant on precision and reflex rather than just timing and position; you really only have a window of 1-2 seconds in-between moves. Furthermore, the moves you use can only be chained into combos depending on the situation or previous skill you used. So you're not just randomly using powers as their cool downs wear off, you're coordinating a string of attacks and abilities in a specific order to cause the effect you want. This makes combat more contextual and focused on the moment-to-moment than combat systems from other action MMOs.
"We want people to internalize [the combat system] and understand how a character plays," NCsoft community director Omeed Dariani said during my hands-on time. "It's kind of like a fighting game, because when you start talking about high-level PvP, you can't be looking down at the keyboard or looking down at tool bars, you have to know what your characters do."
My hands-on time with Blade & Soul was very brief so I wasn't able to try the combat system's more advanced techniques, but from what was shown, the game has the potential to attract players looking for a change of pace from other MMOs.
But how Blade & Soul will compare to the popularity of other MMOs largely depends on how well it can transition to a Western audience. Typically, Asian MMOs get a bad rap for having way more grinding than Western MMOs, but NCsoft has addressed that they will be reducing this element so players can focus on Blade & Soul's quest and side-quest content. Additionally, the game's free-to-play model could also be a big issue depending on what content you'll have to pay for.
With its epic Wuxia inspired world and unique combat system, Blade & Soul looks to have a lot to offer players when it launches this winter. While its too early to tell if it can overcome the struggles of transitioning to the West, there is no denying that what's at its base is quite special.
If only the "Experimental" graphics settings you can see below actually existed in the cops-and-criminals-themed first-person shooter Battlefield Hardline. Sadly, it's just a video created by a production company called the Replay Collective, but it's still impressive and worth a look.
The video, which was uploaded to YouTube by LevelCapGaming, shows you what Battlefield Hardline would look like in real life, using actors, practical effects, and an overlay of the game's familiar head-up display.
To see just how much effort Replay Collective put into this short video, check out this behind the scenes video as well.
The add-on includes new maps, guns, gear, and vehicles, as well as a new Bounty Hunter mode. What's more, Criminal Activity includes six new masks, including scary rabbit and gorilla ones.
Unfortunately, Visceral did not share any new details about Hardline's Bounty Hunter mode. In addition, the only image of Criminal Activity released so far is the one embedded here.
Below is a roundup of everything included with Criminal Activity, courtesy of Visceral. The expansion launches in June across all platforms, while Battlefield Premium ($50) members will get to play first.
Criminal Activity includes:
Four fast-paced new maps: Backwoods, Code Blue, The Beat, and Black Friday
Two new rides
Two new ammunition types for specific weapons
A new gadget
Three new weapons
A nailgun battle pickup
New Bounty Hunter game mode
Six new masks: two animal masks, and four new police headgear options
Three additional Hardline expansions will follow: Robbery (summer), Getaway (fall), and Betrayal (early 2016). Pricing has not been announced for people who buy Hardline's expansions outside of the Premium offering. However, history suggests that they will go for $15 each.
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