In a post on its website, developer Sledgehammer Games explained that the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 versions of its game have hit a "hard memory limit," prohibiting the developer from adding new weaponry. The explanation came in response to fans asking for more guns on those platforms.
The studio is planning on making the weapons in question available on Xbox One, PlayStation 4, and PC, so last-gen players were understandably wondering whether they'd get them, as well. But Sledgehammer head Michael Condry wrote that even though the developer has promised platform parity, the last-gen versions simply do not have enough memory available.
"Many of you have asked about [the guns] coming to prior-gen consoles," he said. "Since launch, we've been committed to delivering a seamless experience between the two console generations and PC. We have hit a hard memory limit on last-generation consoles. This memory limit prevents us from adding more weapons to those platforms. We don't like it any more than you, because we care about Advanced Warfare players on all platforms, but it's a limitation that is outside of our control."
In spite of the hardware limitations, Sledgehammer still plans on releasing the next DLC pack for last-gen consoles. Additionally, Treyarch has announced the upcoming Call of Duty: Black Ops 3 for last-gen as well, indicating that Call of Duty still has life left on the Xbox 360 and PS3.
Rainbow Six fans who are particularly excited for the series' return can pick up the newly announced Collector's Edition for Siege, which includes a mix of digital content and physical items.
Ubisoft revealed the contents of the CE today, which will be available for the PC, Xbox One, and PS4 versions of the game. You'll get the game itself, the season pass, a backpack, and more. The full list follows, courtesy of Ubisoft:
Rainbow Six: Siege Standard Edition
Season Pass
Steelbox -- Designed exclusively for the Collector's Edition
CTU Operators Hat -- Flat-brim snapback hat
Compass Carabiner -- Black and gray carabiner with a compass and bottle opener
Operator Backpack -- Military-style backpack with a padded laptop pocket. Comes with seven Operator badges that attach to the sides of the backpack with Velcro.
Art of the Siege Tactical Guide -- Exclusive 120-page guide
The tactical guide sounds as if it's essentially a strategy guide; it offer a mix of information on the game's maps, weapons, and characters.
This package costs $150 and is, curiously, only available through Ubisoft's online store. (In the case of the PC version, you'll be limited to getting the digital version of the game.) Other retailers will only offer the $60 game itself and the $90 Gold Edition, which consists of the game and the season pass.
Batman: Arkham Knight launched today along with the guide from Brady Games. Unfortunately, the guide didn't get the title of the game right.
In the image above, taken at our local GameStop, you might notice a problem with the word "knight." However, the printer did get the more complicated "Arkham" just fine.
While not as egregious as getting something wrong on the actual game case, like Driveclub did last year, it's one of those things that's hard to unsee once you've noticed it.
A new patch for The Evil Within allows players to do away with what a number of fans have been complaining about since launch: letterboxing.
Up until now, The Evil Within had to be played with a 2:35:1 aspect ratio. What this meant is that you're playing the game with black bars at the top and bottom of the screen, similar to when you watch a movie in its native resolution. While this lends the experience a somewhat cinematic feel, many wished there were a way to disable the effect and play the game in fullscreen.
Following the release of a new patch today, letterboxing has finally become an option. Bethesda announced the latest patch allows you to do away with letterboxing and rebalances the Casual difficulty setting, promising more ammo and some kind of "adjustments to the game's health bar."
PC players were already able to play in fullscreen, first with a console command and then with a proper option in the settings menu. But up until now, console players were forced into the letterbox experience whether they liked it or not.
Bethesda explained last year that the unusual (for a game) aspect ratio is "used for gameplay purposes, as certain elements display in the black areas of the screen."
Developer Tango Gameworks also imposed a 30 frames per second cap on the game's framerate. This, too, was something that ultimately became an option in the PC version, though Bethesda describes the 30fps/letterbox setup as the way The Evil Within is meant to be played.
Playing games is fun, relaxing, and it can even be educational--but it's usually not exercise. In a new study, almost a quarter of children polled believe otherwise.
The recently published Youth Sports Trust report found that a surprisingly large number of kids think that playing a video game with a friend counts as "being active." The study polled 1,000 children between the ages of 5 and 16. Kids between 7 and 8 years old were most likely to believe this at 31%, while those between 15 and 16 were least likely at only 15%.
The British organization also found that a third of all respondents interact with friends more on social media than in the real world.
On the bright side, the study found that 75% of children still enjoy physical education classes.
Ultimately, the study concluded that the integration of technology with children's lives cannot be stopped, and it's important to find a way to combine tech and games with exercise.
Hopefully, many kids play Wii Sports or Just Dance, games that actually do get players active. Did you ever consider gaming to be a physical activity when you were a kid? Let us know in the comments.
Microsoft has announced the latest round of Xbox One and Xbox 360 games and DLC that Xbox Live Gold members can pick up on the cheap, and it's a list of games headlined by Wolfenstein and Evolve.
Publisher Ubisoft has opened a waiting list for players who want to be among the first to play The Division beta when it first launches on Xbox One in December.
The sign-up website, found here, explains that the first beta will be a timed exclusive for Microsoft's home console, with PC and PlayStation 4 betas earmarked for "early 2016". This timed exclusivity deal was announced during Microsoft's E3 2015 press conference.
Ubisoft has warned that there are "a limited number" of access codes available for the three system betas. To guarantee a spot on any platform, customers will need to pre-order the game. A guide to signing up can be found here.
Tom Clancy's The Division is a four-player online co-op shooter set in an apocalyptic New York. The game is in development at four separate Ubisoft studios, and is set for release in March 2016.
GameSpot's latest impressions can be found in the video below.
A visit with Wargaming founder Victor Kislyi is always a delight. At E3 2015, I sat down at a conference table at which Kislyi presided, and he was as animated and excited as he was the first time I spoke with him about World of Tanks half a decade ago.
"So the story goes like this," Kislyi begins, and I prepare myself for a tale of the ages--and you know, perhaps it is such a tale. He is going to tell me the story of how long-dormant space strategy series Master of Orion is getting a new lease on life. The intellectual property was up for auction, and, as Kislyi says, "the competition was fierce." The battle for MOO may not have been won by tanks, but to hear Kislyi share his tale, you might think it was bloody all the same. He was fighting for his company to own a piece of PC gaming's history, and of PC gaming's future.
Kislyi is quick to dismiss fears that the upcoming, Wargaming-published Master of Orion reboot will be a victim of the company's free-to-play tendencies, as represented by World of Tanks, World of Warships, and World of Warplanes. MOO will be a standard retail game without any freemium elements, and is being made not by an internal Wargaming studio, but by Argentinian developer NGD Studios. "They're like me and Wargaming six years ago," says Kislyi, who sees the same kind of passion in NGD that existed in his own. As a result, Wargaming has devoted all sorts of resources--financial and human both--to make the game as good as it can possibly be. Why is Wargaming taking the project on in the first place? It's a reasonable question to ask; Kislyi himself says that the game is clearly not a "financial live or die thing." Says Kislyi, "We're doing this purely from the standpoint of demonstrating our passion, giving back to the community, bringing back the legend."
Master of Orion has been in development for over a year and a half, and I watched Wargaming Director of Vision Chris Keeling play the game as he crammed in as much description as he could in the 30 minutes that we had. (Aside: We should all be so lucky as to earn the title Director of Vision.) Before we could get started, however, Kislyi gave me a quick rundown of what to expect: "21st-century graphics, professional triple-A voiceover, interface, and of course lots of additions that will make Master of Orion suitable for today's world. Life is moving a little bit faster these days, so the things we tolerated in the early '90s, the younger generation may not."
Kislyi's statement may make you worry that NGD is planning to abandon important features of the original MOO for being too old-fashioned, but to get things right, the developers are involving a number of talents that helped design the original game, including composer David Govett. Also returning: all the races from the original game, including the Alkari, a race of space birds that squawk with gusto at every possible opportunity. Each race has a fully-voiced introduction, and your advisor is a chatty sort; I may have tired of hearing the Alkari consultant screech his lines if he didn't manage to be so charming while he did so.
The Sakkra have never heard of this "Wrex" you speak of, so stop asking already!
From here, Master of Orion plays out much like many other 4X strategy games, it would seem, albeit with a huge dose of humor and personality, along with character animations captured directly from the actors portraying them. As the game begins, you select a line of research to follow, begin producing supplies on your homeworld, and assign populations to the tasks you most need them for. Doing so is simple: you click and drag the silhouette representing a portion of your populace from one job to another, making scientists out of workers at no resource cost to you, and thus altering how quickly you produce the associated resources. You reap diminishing returns by assigning more and more population to a particular activity, such as farming, however. Kislyi impressed upon me that keeping this interface clean was an important task.
"We deliberately eliminated decimals," Kislyi says. "Like in Civilization, 16.5 production produced, 16.7, multiply this by seven turns left...you have to get a calculator! Here, we want people to be able to calculate quickly, you don't have to pull up Excel. We want you to concentrate on strategic, philosophical, aspirational, diplomatic goals, but math should be easy. Accessibility. We deliberately separated resources into one type. Usually in these kind of games, you have kind of like hexes. You know, one hammer, two food, like that." He points out how those usual hexagonal abstractions are represented differently here, and Keeling adds that if you want to crunch the numbers, you can hover the mouse over the associated icons to reveal detailed information.
The game looks very pretty. Not shown: layered planetary atmospheres, which look terrific.
There wasn't time to talk about elements such as taxation, pollution, and morale, but you will have to consider them in Master of Orion. And of course, this is a space strategy game, so while you spend time managing individual planets, you must also expand across the galaxy, meeting new races as you go. "AI races have a long memory, and they're very smart," says Keeling. On cue, the Mrrshon empress appears, welcoming you to the galactic community with a purr, and suggesting that if you scratch her back, she'll scratch yours. (Meow!) In time, you'll run into the Klackon (bug people), Darlok (evil wraiths wearing cloaks), Psilons (big-headed humanoids), and a number of other races, putting too much energy into dominating the competition to wonder why a race of space dwellers looks and behaves so much like earth cats.
As the various races gain control over different regions of the galaxy, you'll have to negotiate your way past other races' starbases, or simply blast your way through. Diplomacy allows you to open up exploration routes, as well as to create different types of pacts, set up trade deals for specific materials, establish treaties, and so forth, though be warned: the AI often has its own interests at heart. (The Darlok is known for espionage, so allowing you through may assist in their current plans, for instance.) In any case, controlling the routes between stars is vital; fortunately, your space factories are ready to produce bases when you need them, in addition to asteroid mines, outposts, and so on. Whether you need to produce materials or establish and defend your borders, space factories manufacture what you need.
The Bulrathi love peace, harmony, and long walks along the beach. Just kidding. They love war.
All the while, GNN (that is, the Galactic News Network) is there to report on the drama as it progresses. "Time is running for the colonies endangered by an imminent supernova," drones the robotic anchor, with just enough mockery in her voice to make you wonder if this network is as unbiased as you'd want it to be. Supernovas may be dangerous, but so are are your fellow emperors--and so are you. Eventually, it might come time to crush the race of kitty-cats that once offered to scratch your back. The only example of combat I saw was the visualization of a planetary bombardment, so I can't say yet exactly how battles will play out--and Wargaming isn't yet ready to share the details. I can confirm, however, that the Mrrshon leader will call you a filthy mongrel for declaring war.
You don't have to focus on war; you can seek a diplomatic victory, an economic one, or a technological one as well. I'm hoping that each path to triumph is as satisfying as the last, and Keeling's promises of an intelligent AI makes me look forward to engaging in diplomacy with these weird and wonderful leaders. I've heard some people wonder aloud if now is the time to resurrect a 4X space strategy series, but recent games like Endless Space, Galactic Civilizations III, StarDrive 2, and many others have proven that the genre never died. It's comforting to know that one of the genre's grand masters still has a place at the table.
Square Enix's Tetsuya Nomura has one again indicated the recently announced Final Fantasy 7 revival may be more reimagination than remake.
Speaking to Wired, Nomura, who is directing the project, said the development team doesn't "want to interfere with what makes the original title so iconic," but said it wouldn't be a like-for-like reproduction of the beloved RPG classic.
"In terms of taking such an iconic game and giving it a fresh feel, we can't go into too much detail but we're not intending for this to become a one-to-one remake, or just the original Final Fantasy 7 with better graphics," he said.
"There are certain plot points we don't want to interfere with or disturb, nor will we want to change elements that fans have very big attachments to."
According to Nomura, the team is aiming to re-invent the game for a new generation of fans, but also make the experience fresh for fans of the original.
"My goal with the remake is to make it apply to the current era, the current generation of players that are going to be coming into contact with or playing Final Fantasy 7 for the first time through this remake.
"I want to make it so it's relevant to the modern era, as well as having an element of surprise. It has to be something that riles up this sense of wonder and amazement. I don't want to change it so much that it's unrecognisable, but make sure that it's something fresh and new [but still] recognisable as Final Fantasy 7. That's what I'll be keeping in mind as I work on this."
Nomura also discussed the difficulties in bringing a game which told its story primarily through text boxes in line with modern storytelling techniques, along with adding production effects.
"We're taking something that's text based with no voice over. If we add voice over to it, that will trigger some adjustments that need to be made to accommodate for that. Then, because we're making it in full HD, we'll need to think about all the resources that are needed to populate the screen.
"We'd need to go in and see what needs adjusting in that aspect. It's like a chain of events; 'OK, we're going to revamp this part, what do we need?', and see if there are any changes that creates. As I say, we can't go into the specifics at this point but we'll need to revisit elements within the game to see what is appropriate."
Nomura previously suggested that Final Fantasy 7's story could deviate from the original at E3. Speaking to GameSpot, he said that the upcoming PC-to-PS4 re-release of the classic Final Fantasy 7 would be available for those looking to relive the exact same experience.
"We've announced an HD port version on the PlayStation 4, and then we have the remake coming to PS4," Nomura said.
"You'll have this extremely, very, very pretty FFVII existing on the same plane. We feel that if that happens, it's like, why have the same exact game?"
The Final Fantasy 7 Remake is in production with key members of the original game's staff on board. Yoshinori Kitase, who directed the original, is serving as producer on the remake. Scenario writer Kazushige Nojima also returns for the project.
Keiji Inafune (Mega Man, Mighty No. 9) is well known for his critical stance on the Japanese gaming industry, and his struggles fighting the hierarchy within Capcom caused him to step out on his own in 2010 after decades of employment. At the Tokyo Game Show that year, a month before his landmark departure, Inafune boldly told the New York Times that everyone at the convention is "making awful games," and that "Japan is at least five years behind."
Keiji Inafune
Nearly five years have passed since that interview, so when speaking to Inafune during E3 last week, I had to know: have things gotten any better? The following discussion touches on many topics, including the recent successes of Koji Igarashi's and Yu Suzuki's Kickstarter campaigns, but Inafune's comments there sparked a deeper discussion about the fear culture that's holding back Japan's mainstream developers and publishers. To him, it's not just xenophobia, but also a deeply rooted fear of standing out and taking risks that has prevented Japan from thriving in the global development community at large.
Now that Mighty No. 9 is almost finished, what has the crowdfunding process taught you about the relationship between a creator and their fans?
Inafune: The one thing I learned throughout this campaign is that, during the normal development cycle, you always have the fear that 'what if this game doesn't do well? What if people don't like this game I'm making?' But, you don't have this fear with a Kickstarter project because you already have, in our case, 70,000 people backing you. These people will love my game for sure, so I kind of feel safe and protected in a way. This is a fresh feeling for me, and recently we just saw Metroid Prime [referring to the announcement of Recore, Inafune's collaborative effort with ex-Metroid Prime developers], the whole thing blowing up in the community. In the normal game making cycle, you always have that kind of fear. In the back of your head, that will sometimes really affect you, but that didn't happen in this case.
Before Might No. 9, you had some very serious concerns about the state of game development in Japan. Things seem to be on an upswing, but, how do you feel about the future of Japanese game development compared to the past, when you thought it was in trouble?
Inafune: I think the biggest change since three years ago, not just by myself, but Igarashi-san and Suzuki-san have had huge successes on Kickstarter, and that alone is proving that the North American market wants Japanese games made by these creators. We've totally proved that. This is something that the Japanese publishers should have seen long ago, and I think things are changing now because of these Kickstarters, and the publishers should understand that the market wants us to make Japanese games. So, from here, hopefully publishers will make some movements of their own. Hopefully it's not just the three of us, but more Japanese creators can make their own Kickstarter [campaigns] and make their own dreams come true.
Kickstarter solves one problem, but what other problems have to be solved for Japanese game development to improve at large?
Japanese creators and Japanese companies need to start looking outside of the box. They can't just stay inside Japan and make their own game and bring it to E3 and hope it will be a hit. That's not going to happen. You have to work with foreigner companies, in North America, Europe, and other places around the world so there's a new taste coming into your game.
The language barrier is always there, that's not going to change. But, if you always stay away from the world market, just because of that, you're not going to evolve. So, the next thing is that people should get out more and see outside of Japan more. You can't just stay inside, hoping that your game will be a success around the world. That's not going to happen.
Does that behavioral tendency come from a place of overconfidence or fear?
...you need to know new things and you need to make new things. Staying inside of Japan and not coming out because you're shy isn't going to help at all.
I think it's definitely fear, to my understanding. Japanese people are shy and they are scared of things that they don't know. Because of that they just stay inside and never come out. That's not the case for all Asia. Chinese people are not that shy compared to Japanese people. You can't hope you will achieve something good but not try because you're shy, that's a bad cycle for anything. Especially for game creators, you need to know new things and you need to make new things. Staying inside of Japan and not coming out because you're shy isn't going to help at all.
What will be the tipping point that causes that shift for the Japanese development community?
I think more success on Kickstarter from Japanese creators should ignite this movement a little but more. Even now, with Igarashi-san, Suzuki-san, and myself having success on Kickstarter, that's just three of us. I think other creators are still scared of the North American market. If we stick with this movement a little bit more, maybe other creators will feel comfortable coming out and trying out the North American market, because there's definitely potential. So, I really hope this can continue.
Typical Japanese, they don't like to be in the frontier of anything. They actually hate doing something new and starting something by themselves. But, they will follow if somebody starts it. If one person raises their hand, others will follow. I do a lot of panels inside Japan as well, in universities and colleges, but whenever I ask the crowd if they have any questions, then they will stay silent for at least five minutes or so, and then someone will raise their hand, ask one question, and then others will start following. So, myself, Igarashi-san and Suzuki-san, we're on the frontier of this movement. If more people can raise their courage and come out, I think that will lead more people to challenge the North American market.
It's very unlikely that anything could happen outside of Kickstarter. You might not understand this, but a lot of Japanese game creators are salaryman, they're just there to do their work. They're not actually creating the game they want to make because that's the order they're given by their superiors. I have been fighting against my superiors my whole [career] because I want to make something that I really want to make, and not too many people really do that in Japan, because worst case, they can get fired. Without the company's support, you won't even have the money to make the game to begin with. So, everyone just becomes 'yes men' in the company, so that's a really bad cycle, and I don't think it's a cycle that can change just because of a couple Kickstarters. At this point, I can't really say something other than kickstart will change things.
The Xbox One's backwards compatibility support for Xbox 360 titles will include functionality for DLC content, Microsoft has revealed.
Microsoft's official Xbox Support Twitter account addressed a query from a follower regarding transferring DLC for Xbox 360 titles to the Xbox One, saying the console will support it, but "DLC of specific titles is up to the publisher."
@SomberShadowI Hey there, good question! While the console allows it, DLC of specific titles is up to the publisher :) ^GC
According to the platform holder, digital Xbox 360 titles already purchased via XBLA, as well as retail discs of last-gen titles, will eventually be "natively" playable on Xbox One.
Phil Spencer, the head of Xbox, said the decision to support Xbox 360 games was made to "make 360 owners look at Xbox One as a safe place to play."
"Millions of people made investments in 360 content," he said. "We thought the right thing to do was to make that content go forward, but we didn't know [how difficult it would be]."
The PC edition of Batman: Arkham Knight appears to be carrying noticeable bugs and glitches, especially for those using AMD graphics cards, with message boards lighting up as players report numerous problems.
Chief among the PC version's technical issues are sporadic freezes, frame-rate stutters, and audio glitches. Some players had expected issues after Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment adjusted its system requirements, leaving with it a warning about AMD compatibility problems.
[Update 1: Developer Rocksteady has released a statement: "We're aware that some users are reporting performance issues with the PC version of Batman: Arkham Knight. This is something that Rocksteady takes very seriously. We are working closely with our external PC development partner to make sure these issues get resolved as quickly as possible." Update Ends]
[Update 2: A mass of disappointed customers have begun to criticise the game on its user Steam page. At the time of going to press, 70 percent of customers have not recommended the title, with some 2,000 customers penning negative reviews. Update ends]
Gary Lake-Schall, the VP of game technology at Warner Bros Interactive, wrote on Steam that "there are some known issues with the performance of Batman: Arkham Knight for PC owners using AMD graphics cards."
He added: "We are working closely with AMD to rectify these issues as quickly as possible and will provide updates here as they become available. We thank you for your patience in this matter."
Technical discussions on the games forum NeoGAF offer some unofficial workarounds to various problems, including means to lift the 30-frames-per-second cap.
Batman: Arkham Knight shipped across North America and Europe on June 23.
Nintendo asked Burnout and Need for Speed developer Criterion Games to work on a demo for a new F-Zero title.
According to Nintendo Life, former Criterion Games creative director Alex Ward confirmed Nintendo wanted the studio to pitch a new F-Zero game for the Wii U in early 2011.
According to an unnamed source, Nintendo was "hard pressed for time" as it wanted to unveil the game at E3 2011 alongside the console.
Criterion, however, was working on multiple versions of Need for Speed Most Wanted for its parent company EA at the time. As a result the studio was not able to work on F-Zero.
As pointed out, it's interesting to note that Nintendo--at one point--was seeking to revive the dormant futuristic racing series for Wii U. Furthermore, it wanted a third-party developer to collaborate with, instead of developing it internally.
This is a strategy Nintendo has continued to use in bring back old properties. At E3 Nintendo revealed Star Fox Zero, which is being developed by Bayonetta and Wonderful 101 studio Platinum Games.
No new game in the series has been released since F-Zero GX, which shipped on the GameCube in July 2003. That game was co-developed by Sega.
It is unknown whether Nintendo has decided to drop plans to bring back F-Zero, either for the Wii U, or its next home console.
PlayStation executive Shuhei Yoshida has discussed the changes to ICO and Shadow of the Colossus developer Team ICO, and has provided insight into how development on The Last Guardian has changed over the years.
Speaking during a GameSpot x Kinda Funny interview at E3 2015, Yoshida was asked about the current status of Team ICO, and indicated that the developer had splintered into smaller, independent teams.
"It depends on how you define Team ICO," he said. "Many members of Team ICO--which was originally a small team of around 20 plus--moved on to Shadow of the Colossus. After that [Fumito] Ueda-san became independent, but worked with creation team.
In 2011, it was reported that Ico and Shadow of the Colossus director Fumito Ueda had left both the development team for The Last Guardian and its parent company Sony.
According to Yoshida, this was a "rearrangement of the relationship."
"Now Ueda-san has established his reputation, he [wanted] more freedom on how he spends his time. He may want to work on other concepts, so he chose to become independent, but also still work on The Last Guardian. [It's] the main project he's working on.
"So, Ueda-san was not fired," he said, referring to previous rumours. "That was totally bogus. He chose to become independent."
The Last Guardian was shown during Sony's press conference, with a new studio called Gen Design attached to the project. Yoshida revealed this studio is comprised of Ico and Shadow of the Colossus developers, and it is working with Sony's own Japan Studio.
"Gen Design's president used to be the lead programmer on ICO and Shadow of the Colossus," he explained. "Core members of the Shadow of the Colossus, under him, became independent, to do creative stuff. But the main development team is still in Japan Studio."
"Ueda-san was not fired, that was totally bogus. It was a rearrangement of the relationship, he chose to become independent."
As for the lengthy delay in re-introducing The Last Guardian, Yoshida confirmed that the shift from PlayStation 3 to PlayStation 4 required much of the game to be rebuilt.
"The project went on so many technical changes. We decided to move the project to PS4 in 2012, but because the PS3 code was so optimised for SPUs on that console lots of code had to be thrown away and rebuilt.
"It was a tough decision to move from PS3 to PS4 because it was running on PS3. But not at the performance [level] we needed … We knew [we had to decide] whether to continue the game on PS3 with a compromised vision, or move to PS4."
"During that time Ueda-san and the core creatives were continuing to work, but without the game up and running, they had a long time to wait."
"The setup was very good, in that they had a little bit of their own space, and could work on some new other concepts, but main development is [being done] in Japan Studio and Gen Design providing lots of creative contributions to the project. Ueda-san is directing the overall creatives."
Asked if ever there was a point where Sony considered abandoning The Last Guardian, the PlayStation exec said the response from fans and questions from journalists helped reinforce Sony's commitment to the project.
"I believed in the concept," he said. "Ueda-san and the core members always wanted to it to be realised. But what made us continue to work was the encouragement from people. Journalists always asked us every year [about it]. We knew lots of people were intrigued by the game and were waiting for it to arrive. Because of that I felt it was my responsibility to get it completed.
Sony's decision to re-reveal The Last Guardian was based on its confidence in the project and the 2016 release window, according to Yoshida.
"The project is in a really good state," he said.
"We moved the project to PS4, and we could have said that the project was now on PS4, but I didn't want to do it until the time when we were confident about our [release] window and we can show it running on PS4.
"My thing was, when we re-announced The Last Guardian, we had to have it totally running on PS4 at the right performance and be confident about the release window that we announced. In our mind, we have the tech, vision, and design down. Lots of levels have already been made, so we are confident about 2016, so we [announced] it."
The Last Guardian launches in 2016 exclusively for PS4.
Shuhei Yoshida, Sony's head of worldwide studios, has addressed the sparse showing of Project Morpheus during PlayStation's E3 2015 press conference, and explained that key details remain undecided.
Asked during the GameSpot x Kinda Funny stream on why Sony only took two minutes during its media briefing to promote its VR headset, Yoshida replied: "When we spend more than two minutes on anything other than core gamers games, [people] hate it."
He nevertheless assured that the Morpheus project was "going very, very well."
"We have 20 games that are playable at E3. We had to turn down more submissions from both third-parties and first-parties to prioritise what we wanted to show."
He added: "The hardware is on schedule. Lots of games are being created. Some we are showing will hit the launch date that we haven't decided as of yet. So it's going really well."
Concerning the RRP, Yoshida previously said Sony's aim was to go "as low as possibly can be done."
"We are not talking about any specific number, but this is a console business. We try to provide the hardware at the lowest possible cost so that more people can come in. And so that developers can make games on to create the market. So we'll have the same approach."
The full video interview with Yoshida can be found below.
Early adopters of Bungie's FPS Destiny have been promised that they will receive a number of exclusive perks in the future, as a thank-you for their loyalty.
Bungie community manager David Dague made the pledge following backlash against the company for locking other perks into expensive bundles.
The controversy stems from what Bungie is adding to the collector's edition of its next expansion, The Taken King.
Only those who buy this deluxe bundle will receive some exclusive emotes and other in-game items. Those who buy the standard Taken King expansion will not receive these.
The matter is complicated further because The Taken King Collector's Edition is a vast bundle of Destiny's first three expansions, as well as the base game, and is priced at $80. It means that loyal players, if they want to acquire the bonus emotes, must pay for all this content once again.
Bungie's relationship with its online community envenomed further following an interview with The Taken King's creative director, Luke Smith, who appeared to not fully grasp the problem.
Then late on Monday, following a wave of complaints from Destiny fans, Dague promised that loyal fans would be receiving bonuses.
Dague told Forbes: "Year-one players won't get the same perks as people who buy a collector's edition. They'll get something better. Tune into the Weekly Update for more."
It is still unclear what this content is, and who will receive it, and who won't, and when it will arrive, and whether new players can buy it, and whether the other add-on content will remain locked to the Collector's Edition.
CD Projekt Red has detailed the latest free DLC content update for its critically acclaimed open-world RPG The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt.
The latest content includes the Skellige armor set, as well as a new Skellige's Most Wanted contract.
CD Projekt Red previously detailed plans to release sixteen free expansions for The Witcher 3. The first two, The Temerian Armor Set (for your horse) and the Beard and Hairstyle Set (for Geralt), were released when the game launched on May 19.
The remaining ten will be released on a weekly basis throughout June and July.
CD Projekt Red co-CEO Marcin Iwinski previously explained why the studio is giving away content for free. He said that free content is a means of saying thank you to fans.
"As gamers, we nowadays have to hold on tight to our wallets, as surprisingly right after release, lots of tiny pieces of tempting content materialize with a steep price tag attached. Haven't we just paid a lot of cash for a brand new game?" he said. "At CD Projekt Red, we strongly believe this is not the way it should work and, with The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, we have decided to do it differently. This is our way of saying thank you for buying our game."
Looking further ahead, CD Projekt Red plans to release multiple paid expansions for The Witcher 3. The first of these, Hearts of Stone, will launch in October.
Shuhei Yoshida, president of Sony's Worldwide Studios, has provided provided a little more information on Dreams, the next game from LittleBigPlanet developer Media Molecule.
The PlayStation 4 title shown during Sony's E3 press conference and pitched as a connected world of user creations. For many, however, the short-and-sweet gameplay demo created a number of unanswered questions.
Speaking during the GameSpot x Kinda Funny E3 stream, Yoshida provided a little more clarity on what Dreams is, describing as "a next-gen creation platform" that is "much more flexible" than LittleBigPlanet.
"In LittleBigPlanet you pretty much made new levels of an action game," he explained. "With Dreams, you don't have to make a game. You can make a game, but if you're a painter, you can just create beautiful, painterly looking drawings. Or you can just animate the character. Or you can [remix] other people's creations."
Yoshida indicated that Media Molecule's goal with Dreams is to empower people to create and express themselves using easy-to-use tools.
"The basic concept is to make creation more intuitive, and putting that in the hands of people who aren't trained to use the complex 3D packages. But make the artistic person feel like they're creating art as if they're doing it in real life.
"We are envisioning artists or musicians will contribute something they're really good at, and share it with lots of people. It's a community of creators where anyone can take anyone's creations and mash-ups to create even grander projects, including games."
According to the Sony exec, Dreams' appearance during the PlayStation conference was a tease to get people thinking about the project ahead of more thorough demo at Paris Games Week.
"It's a huge project," he said. "You can slice and dice the project in many different angles. It's huge in terms of potential for what it can do."
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"For people to understand what it is, it's going to take time to digest. We decided we can't throw everything in at the same time. So we strategised to use this E3 to pique interest in people; to show pretty graphics, real-time creation, flexibility to animate, add music, and get people thinking about what it is.
"At Paris Game Show we're going to show a lot more of its scope."
Media Molecule co-founder Alex Evans appeared on stage at Sony's E3 press conference to reveal the Dreams, presenting it as a canvas for expression which attempts to recreate the sensation of lucid dreaming.
Evans said the feeling of moving through surreal, wonderful worlds built by other players would be the main focus of the game. Players will be able to create, share, and explore a huge connected network of dreams. The studio calls this web of user-created surreal worlds the "Dreamverse."
Parent company Time Warner posted advertisements for several openings at Monolith. These include positions such as producers, artists, and programmers. The descriptions describe Monolith's pedigree, culminating in a focus on Shadow of Mordor as a huge success for the company.
Although Monolith hasn't said anything about a sequel to the game yet, it's a safe bet to assume that we haven't seen the last of Shadow of Mordor. It sits at an 87 on Metacritic, and it won a number of different Game of the Year awards.
In December, Shadow of Mordor's design director remarked that the game was just the beginning of what the studio wanted to do with the Nemesis system, and that there was a ton of potential for more storytelling using the enemies. "There's a lot more to explore and a lot more we can do to develop those villains," he said. "And to be super honest, it was our first go, so we've just scratched the surface with what we can do with the Nemesis system."
Keep an eye on GameSpot for more about Monolith's next title as it becomes available.
Destiny's next expansion The Taken King comes out in September, and it will have a couple different editions to buy. One of them, the collector's edition, costs $80 and includes several in-game items that cannot be purchased separately.
Trying to understand this decision, Eurogamer interviewed The Taken King's creative director. Instead of clarifying anything, this interview confused the choice even more. Eurogamer asked the director about the emotes that are only available with the collector's edition, and he responded, "If I fired up a video right now and showed you the emotes you would throw money at the screen."
The interview instigated controversy on the internet, and it motivated developer Bungie to respond. Bungie's community manager, known as Deej, took to Reddit to try to quell some of the anger. He stated that, along with giving exclusive rewards to one-year players, Bungie will take another look at the different editions for purchase.
"I understand that you want me to go on record right now with something that will address the disappointment that's being expressed here," Deej wrote. "I'm going to [defer] to the Bungie Weekly Update, in which we'll talk more about the things we're doing to celebrate the year-one Guardians who helped us build this community. I'll also revisit our goals in offering different versions of The Taken King. Ever heard the old adage about trying to please everyone?"
The Weekly Update will be published on Thursday, so check back later in the week on GameSpot for more news about Bungie's response to this controversy. In the meantime, read our previews of The Taken King's story and new multiplayer mode.
It's always hard to judge just how good a game looks before it comes out. Streaming videos, no matter how high-quality, have compression artifacts that decrease the visual fidelity of the source material.
That's why it's nice when a developer releases direct-feed footage available to download. Forza Motorsport 6, the upcoming Xbox One-exclusive racing simulator, now has a 2-minute direct-feed video from gaming website Gamersyde. Even though it can be streamed, I recommend downloading the 500-megabyte video to see it in its highest quality.
If this video is representative of the final product, Forza 6 looks incredible. The reflections in the glossy paint of the car are clear, and the car hydroplanes as it goes through puddles. Environments are crisp and detailed, as well.
Forza 6 launches on September 15. Recently, developer Turn10 spoke with GameSpot about how it's dramatically improving the way rain interacts with cars in the game, including making it possible for cars to lose control due to puddles on the tracks.
Keep an eye on GameSpot for more news about Forza 6 as it becomes available.
It's well known at this point that Minecraft is a pretty amazing creation tool for players willing to dedicate a lot of time, but the biggest pixel art image created in the game might just be the most impressive example of motivation and determination. Check it out:
Streamer Tholar Tholarian asserts that his recently finished image is the biggest ever made. It used 1,128,960 blocks to create a piece of art worthy of being framed. According to the creator, he spent 23 weeks on this project. And for those who think that the image is faked, he streamed the final steps with thousands of viewers on Twitch and then later posted it on YouTube. It's an almost unbelievable feat, but it really was done in Minecraft.
You can watch Tholar place the final blocks in his picture of StarCraft's Kerrigan in the video below:
He isn't just doing this for fun, either: his streams help raise donations for Make-A-Wish Ireland.
What's your greatest Minecraft creation? Let us know in the comments.
Nintendo's Wii U system has struggled to keep up with the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. It has sold 9.5 million units as of May since its launch in late 2012, in contrast to the PS4's 22.3 million since late 2013. Nintendo executive and Mario creator Shigeru Miyamoto believes that its lackluster commercial performance is due to its cost and its launch environment.
In an interview with NPR, Miyamoto explained that the Wii U's price was probably too high to be attractive to consumers. Launching at $300 for the basic set and $350 for the option with more storage, the Wii U was not much cheaper than its more powerful competitor, the PS4. "So unfortunately with our latest system, the Wii U, the price point was one that ended up getting a little higher than we wanted," he said. "But what we are always striving to do is to find a way to take novel technology that we can take and offer it to people at a price that everybody can afford."
Super Mario Maker will let you build Mario levels.
He went on to describe how Nintendo attempted to push tablet technology forward with the Wii U's gamepad, but ultimately released the console too late to take advantage of the popularity of tablets. The company positioned the gamepad as the console's selling point prior to launch, and it was supposed to accompany games as a second-screen companion. Nintendo, however, didn't anticipate the proliferation of tablet technology.
"I think unfortunately what ended up happening was that tablets themselves appeared in the marketplace and evolved very, very rapidly," Miyamoto explained. " The uniqueness of [the Wii U's tablet] features were perhaps not as strong as they were when we had first begun developing them."
Miyamoto also went into depth about how he came up with the concepts for Mario and The Legend of Zelda. He was heavily inspired by his childhood experiences, and he drew from European comics to make the iconic plumber. Further, intuitions about human psychology led him to make the original platforming games. You can read the whole interview at NPR.
Remember all of those games that you played when you were a kid? Now you can go buy them again. Starting today, GameStop is selling retro games and systems online and in its stores.
Be cautious, however. All of the games being sold in this new program are pre-owned. You'll have to turn to Ebay or another retailer for any mint-condition factory-sealed software you've been looking for.
This marks the beginning of vintage hardware and software sales for the store, which often phases out old games in favor of newer consoles. The store stopped sellingPlayStation 2 games in 2013, but began again in March because of high demand.
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