Remember the PocketStation? Released in Japan for the original PlayStation, it was a Memory Card peripheral outfitted with LCD screen and the ability to run software. Turns out the PocketStation’s shape works very well in backpack-form.

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Tetsuya Nomura shares his thoughts on Kingdom Hearts: Dark Road and believes that its creation was destined to happen.

The post Tetsuya Nomura Believes Kingdom Hearts: Dark Road Was Destined To Happen appeared first on Siliconera.

Well, the time has finally come. After that March tease a lot of folks have been itching to figure out who is going to be kicking off the second Fighter's Pass, and it's none other than Min Min, revealed from series boss Sakurai's own home.

Spring Man was an obvious guess (and typically the poster boy of the game alongside of Ribbon Girl), several folks pointed out that given Spring Man's status as a trophy assist, he should be removed from the running. Whether he's coming down the line or not (multiple Arms characters would be pretty odd, right?) it doesn't matter: Min Min has the spotlight today. So why Min Min? Sakurai states that Yabuki-san, the producer of Arms, said "he wanted [her] in." Well that'll do it!

She'll sport different arms that can be used in tandem with one another (an aspect of Arms proper), which can be "bent" up and down to aim her (long reaching) melee attacks. The A button controls the left arm and the B button controls the right arm, which allows her to wield a wildly different playstyle compared to most of the cast. Sakurai points out that Min Min is hard to hit with counters, as her basic attacks are at a range (while also noting that her wind-up is long, leaving her open to punishes).

In a country with Ultraman, Godzilla, and Gundam stores, it was only a matter of time before an official Kamen Rider store opened in Japan.

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The Last of Us 2 is Sony's biggest launch this generation.

Purely on boxed copies, it pipped previous record holder and fellow Naughty Dog game Uncharted 4, which sold fractionally less during its own launch weekend.

It's likely many more people downloaded the game, although UK digital sales are not counted.

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Amongst the ludicrous number of games, demos, and announcements that piled onto my desk last week (note to self: buy a desk), there’s a space reserved for Across The Grooves.

This time travelling, introspective visual novel picked a thread of my affection and tugged at it in the midst of the noise of EGX. It’s out now, and it looks as intriguing as I remember.

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In a normal year, we’d all be sitting down to a string of E3 announcements this week, but alas, we’ll have to settle for several months of not-E3 instead. Still, I’m sort of glad there aren’t hundreds of new game slices to pore over this week, as part of my brain is still obsessing over all the demos I played last year, chief among which is top-down 2D Dead Space-alike Xenosis: Alien Infection. Made by NerdRage Studios here in the UK, this was one of my favourite games from EGX Rezzed back in 2019 (has it really been 100 years since the last game show?), and its spooky, action-packed demo still gives me goosebumps even now.

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Industry giant Nintendo may be making plans to pump the brakes on its foray into mobile gaming, following disappointing numbers from its various releases in comparison to other to games and apps from other mobile publishers.

Over the years Dirt has been many things - all-encompassing off-road driving experience, a hardcore rally simulator, a knockabout arcade racer - but Dirt 5 could well be the biggest departure yet. Made beyond the walls of Codemasters' Southam campus for the first time, it's being developed by the company's Cheshire studio, previously known as Codemasters Evo and of course before all that going under the Evolution banner. It should be no small surprise, then, that Dirt 5 often feels more like a new MotorStorm game than a new entry in Codemasters' long-running series. And really, that's no bad thing at all.

Given how widely mourned the good old-fashioned arcade racer is, you certainly can't complain when one as unashamedly arcadey as this rolls up. Dirt 5 is bright and brash and eye-searingly colourful, and isn't so much about threading through a sodden Welsh forest in the dead of night - you've got Dirt Rally for that - as it is muscling through overstated caricatures of international locales, tearing through a Norwegian fishing village as it's pounded by ocean waves, or screaming through a Brazilian favela before racing directly under Rio's Christ the Redeemer. Extreme weather is a key feature here, with electrical storms, snowstorms and heavy rain delivering the sort of drama I haven't seen in a racing game since MotorStorm Apocalypse. It's loud and over-the-top and an awful lot of fun.

A new video by Digital Foundry has analyzed exactly what kind of graphical upgrades we can expect from Bluepoint Games' remake of Demon's Souls for PS5, by painstakingly comparing the clips with their PS3 equivalents.

While it doesn't take a genius to see the graphical improvements in the remake that was first revealed by Sony in its PS5 reveal showcase, the video also shows where the increased console power has been used to change and update detailing.

Previously sparse corridors have been turned into rotting halls overgrown with ivy and weeds, where much of the original game's sparse architecture has been upgraded into a grander, more imposing gothic style.

I love lines. There’s so much you can do with a line, and at the same time there’s very little that you need to do to a line in order to make it look good. All you need is contrast, soft lighting, a few warm pastel colours, all set against a comforting piano-zen soundtrack; and you’ve got a simple yet sophisticated aesthetic to match your simple yet sophisticated puzzle game.

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EA's chief studios officer Laura Miele has shared new details on the company's ambition to be a more inclusive and diverse company, and why that will help the outfit to make the best games.

Speaking to GI.biz, Miele shared that EA has created a new set of internal guidelines called the "Inclusion Framework" that studios use to help make more inclusive characters and stories. Miele pointed to Kim Hunter, the fictional female hero of the FIFA story mode in recent years, as an example of a development team creating a game with the aim of helping to appeal to a wider audience than before.

"We want to make games for everyone, and our games and characters must be as diverse as the communities we serve," Miele said. "One way we enable that is our Inclusion Framework, a set of filters designed to challenge our thinking and help our studios develop more inclusive characters and stories across our games. A great example of this is FIFA. The team has adopted the framework and completes a diversity assessment every year. It enabled the FIFA team to ensure Kim Hunter was a unique and truly authentic character and a gaming first--the first female playable hero in a sports story."

Call of Duty: Warzone added a new melee weapon in Season 4--the Kali Stick, a pair of sticks that can be used as melee weapons to quickly beat down an opponent. Generally, a new melee weapon is not as exciting in a game like this as a new powerful gun. As it turns out, though, the Kali Stick is incredibly deadly in the right hands.

YouTuber Vikkstar123 has released a video of him and the other members of his three-person squad racking up a win in the Call of Duty battle royale game only using Kali Sticks to hurt their enemies.

While secondary grenades like flashbangs are used, and the squad also use vehicles to move around the map and riot shields to protect themselves, their kills are all scored with these sticks.

A number of new domain registrations have sparked speculation after they were shared on the Resetera forums, as picked up by Video Games Chronicle. They include suicidesquadgame.com, gothamknightsgame.com, and suicidesquadkillthejusticeleague.com, all of which have been registered in June by MarkMonitor Inc. While the link to Warner Bros hasn't yet been confirmed, MarkMonitor Inc. is the same domain broker used to register wbgames.com.

WB Games Montreal, the studio behind Batman: Arkham Origins, has been teasing a new Batman game for months now with the slogan "Capture The Knight". This has led fans to assume that the Gotham Knights domain registration is tied to--and has revealed the name of--WB Games Montreal's new game.

Crossfire, which is one of the world's biggest FPS games on PC, is coming to the Xbox platform as a timed-exclusive for Microsoft's console--and it appears there will be a beta ahead of launch.

WindowsCentral noticed that a listing for a CrossfireX beta has appeared on the Microsoft Store. The product page states that the beta will begin on June 25. The file size is 5.88 GB. You can see a variety of screenshots in the gallery below; click each image to see it in full size.

Golf on Mars, the sequel to 2014’s simplistic golfing game Desert Golfing, is now available on iOS and Android with a Steam version coming on June 29.

Similar to its predecessor, Golf on Mars is a golfing game with procedurally generated stages allowing for thousands and thousands of holes to play. While minimalistic, the sequel seems to contain a bit more than jagged land with structures, plant-like things, and standing bodies of water.

The first game seemed endless at first, until one player found the end at hole 65,535 in 2016 and the game’s designer fixed some of the game’s “impossible holes” a year later.

According to game’s description, the game contains “roughly 25,770,000,000 golf holes” along with some lore:

For centuries, philosophers and mathematicians have gazed up at the night sky and wondered:

“Is there Golf On Mars?”

The year is 2866. Mars is 35% terraformed, finally enough to allow the playing of the game of.. Golf!

Golf across an infinite* rocky Martian surface. Discover golfing obstacles that make us Earthlings gasp in awe!

—

*Infinity is impossible to represent on any non-quantum computer. In actuality there are roughly 25,770,000,000 golf holes in this game.

Golf on Mars is now available on iOS and Android devices for $2.99.

Naughty Dog's grim adventure The Last of Us Part II has debuted at number one in the UK Charts. More significantly, it is Sony's fastest selling PS4 release this generation, beating  previous record-holder Uncharted 4: A Thief's End's launch sales by a slim 1%.

As noted by GamesIndustry.biz, the hugely-anticipated sequel has taken sales by storm. Not only is The Last of Us Part II the UK's biggest physical release of the entire year, outselling Nintendo's Animal Crossing: New Horizons by 40%, but it is also up 76% on the launch sales of the original TLOU, which dropped on PS3 back in 2013. It's worth remembering that all of the above statistics count for physical sales only, so one can only imagine the numbers once you include global digital downloads.

If there's one place to hold a memorial for the esteemed Sir Ian Holm, it's in Middle-earth itself--albeit the online version. Lord Of The Rings Online players across multiple servers celebrated the life of an actor most known within the fandom as playing Bilbo Baggins in the LOTR films, but who also lent his voice to Frodo in the 1981 BBC radio play of the same story.

After the news that Holm had passed away on June 19 at the age of 88, around 300 players on the Evernight server marched to Rivendell to visit the Bilbo Baggins NPC in the Last Homely House in Rivendell, while the song Far Over The Misty Mountains Cold played as an homage to his first ever adventure.

The roleplay server Laurelin had players gather at Bilbo's home, Bag End, where a dwarven minstrel played music for the crowd of mourners.

Nintendo might be looking to step away from developing new mobile games, according to a new report by Bloomberg. A report published on the site details how Nintendo seems likely to focus on Switch in the future, with fewer mobile games being developed.

Nintendo has made over $1 billion from mobile games since 2016's Super Mario Run, but over 60% of that figure came from a single title--Fire Emblem Heroes. In 2017, following the release of Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp, it was reported that Nintendo wanted to ramp up mobile development--this might no longer be the case.

According to Bloomberg, Nintendo president Shuntaro Furukawa said in May that the company is "not necessarily looking to continue releasing many new applications for the mobile market," and that their move into mobile development was largely motivated by the Wii U's failure to sell well. While the Switch is performing well, especially with the sales figures of Animal Crossing: New Horizons, their mobile titles are not showing similar growth. He also said that a major increase in revenue from mobile was not expected this financial year.

Today Compile Heart released a new trailer and new images of the upcoming Mary Skelter dungeon-crawling JRPG Mary Skelter Finale.

The trailer features the opening cutscene of the game providing a look at its rich cast on top of featuring the theme song.

The song is titled “Katsubou no Dilemma” (The Dilemma of Craving) and is performed by the idol trio Earphones, from the album Theory of Evolution.

You can check it out below.

We also get to take a look at two new characters, Michiru and Chiyaki, and at an enemy, Babymare, on top of the key artwork.

Among the numerous projects that EA has in development for PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X is a new Battlefield game that is due to launch in 2021. While the game has yet to be properly unveiled, EA's top studios boss, Laura Miele, shared some of the first details about the game recently.

During EA Play Live 2020, Miele said she looks forward to seeing developer DICE once again raise the bar, adding that the team is making the new Battlefield something that's never been seen before.

"Our studios are taking their crazy ambitious ideas and making them real," she said. "Every console generation DICE sets the bar for excellence in audio and visual presentation. We are creating epic battles at a scale and fidelity unlike anything you've experienced before."

Pokemon Sword & Shield recently released the first of its two DLC packs, the Isle of Armor, introducing new and returning monsters alongside a new Wild Area for players to explore. But some players have run into a snag when purchasing the Season Pass that will let them access this new area--Sword and Shield have separate store pages, and it's possible to buy the DLC for the version of the game that you don't have.

This is an issue, as Nintendo of America's support page specifies that the company is "unable to provide refunds or exchanges for mistaken purchases." However, this seems to have been a common enough issue with Pokemon that Nintendo might be taking a different approach.

In a tweet, Nintendo of America encouraged players who have purchased the wrong DLC pass to reach out. "If you mistakenly purchased the incorrect pass, please contact customer support," the tweet reads.

This week marks the return of Brigandine, Mr. Driller, and Summer Pockets in Japan.

The post This Week in Imports: Brigandine and Mr. Driller Return appeared first on Siliconera.

Ninjala is coming to Switch as a free-to-play title on June 24, and the game's launch trailer shows off some of the frantic action you can expect in its eight-player battles. It also, for some reason, opens with a strange little homage to West Side Story.

The musical, which was adapted into a film in 1961 and is getting remade by Steven Spielberg, is about a clash between two teenage street gangs, and a love affair between members of opposing sides. While Ninjala also has warring gangs, it's not clear whether the game's Story mode will deal with any of the complex themes of the musical--although it seems unlikely.

The trailer also shows plenty of gameplay footage, so you can check out some examples of the unique powers each character will possess, and witness some intense brawls. Despite an aesthetic that looks like it's inspired by Splatoon, the gameplay is clearly very different.

Today’s selection of articles from Kotaku’s reader-run community: Tabletop Stories • Pokemon Presents: What Could Next Week’s Announcements Be? • Chasing The Dramon • TAY Retro: Nintendo Entertainment System - Crystalis [TV Commercial, NA]

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Andrew Hamilton is an artist who has worked on games like Battlefront II and Battlefield V.

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Onion Games' English version of Moon is now finally at its final debugging stage, after which it will head to final approval and release.

The post Onion Games’ Moon’s English Version Is at the Final Debugging Stage appeared first on Siliconera.

Police cars have been removed from Epic's hugely popular battle royale game Fortnite, players have noticed following the release of the Chapter 2, Season 3 update.

A source connected to the game told The Wall Street Journal that the removal of the cop cars was in response to the murder of George Floyd by police officers in Minnesota. However, the source said Epic Games was not trying to make a "political statement" but was instead attempting to be "sensitive about the issues" going on the world today.

Earlier this year, Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney spoke about politics in gaming. "If a game tackles politics (or: weighty social issues), it should come from the heart of designers through the game, and not from marketing departments seeking to profit from division," he said.

Is there golf on Mars? There is now. Desert Golfing, one of the best mobile games of the last decade, has just received a sequel, and it's called Golf On Mars. The game is available now, and costs $3 on iOS and Android. It's also coming to Steam on June 29, if you'd rather play with a mouse.

Developer Captain Games returns for the sequel, which once again serves up literally millions of holes, all pseudo-randomly generated--meaning that while every player will encounter the same holes, they've all been designed by the same algorithm.

You play with simple swipe aim controls, and the goal is, essentially, to go as far as you can with as few strokes as possible. Most players will aim to get their average down, but there's no end goal--you can theoretically keep playing forever. The game is set in the year 2866 when Mars has been 35% terraformed, but don't expect much of a narrative.

Hillcrest Collectibles Overview

• Artifacts: 10
• Trading Cards: 5
• Journal Entries: 1
• Workbenches: 2
• Safes: 1

Trading Card - Wachumero

As soon as you leave the theater and end up outside Hillcrest, turn around to look back at a sinkhole with a muddy truck stuck in the ditch. Break the rear window and reach in to find a trading card.

Artifact - Join the WLF

Go through the window of the Majestic laundromat. In the back office, you’ll find another artifact: a Join the WLF note.

Hard Lads is an adaptation of the now-famous internet video British lads hit each other with chair, in which...well, the title says it all really.

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EA's Chief Studios boss Laura Miele has shared some new insight on the company's first next-generation games, one of which is EA Sports' Madden NFL 21. Miele said the game will not only look better and load faster thanks to the power of the PS5 and Xbox Series X, but it will also contain some under-the-hood improvements to make the game more authentic to the NFL experience.

She told GI.biz that Madden NFL 21 will make use of "next-gen stats" that will seemingly include updated player stats in real time. Here's how she described the feature: "In Madden we will be using the NFL's next gen stats so every athlete in the game will play how they do in real life, with the data being updated in real-time."

Player ratings are a huge part of the Madden series--it's always a big deal each year when the ratings are revealed and players react to them. Changes are made regularly in previous games, based on real-world performance, but it sounds like Madden NFL 21 will take things even further by updating them in "real time."

The Grandia Memorial Soundtrack release date, previously listed by Wayo Records as a Summer 2020 window, may have been updated via Amazon.

The post Grandia Memorial Soundtrack Release Date Possibly Revealed via Amazon appeared first on Siliconera.

Here is the most pleasant of surprises: a full-blooded sequel to mobile time-annihilator Desert Golfing, one of the finest mobile games ever made, has been quietly released on both iOS and Android over the weekend.

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The Last of Us Part II has broken sales records in the UK. The PlayStation 4-exclusive is now the UK's top-selling title of all time over its first week in terms of boxed sales alone.

The game beat out another Naughty Dog exclusive--2016's Uncharted 4: A Thief's End--by 1 percent to claim the record, according to sales charts obtained by GI.biz.

The charts cover physical game sales exclusively, so this only captures one element of The Last of Us Part II's launch results. Digital game sales have been growing over the years for Sony and other companies. For Sony's latest period, it sold 66 percent of its games digitally.

On June 19, 1999, Minh Le and Jess Cliffe released a humble little mod for the original Half-Life called “Counter-Strike”. In 2020, 21 years later, it is still one of the most popular video games on the planet.

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Following the reopening of Universal Studios Japan, more Super Nintendo World area footage appeared showing off a moving Yoshi and coins.

The post Super Nintendo World Will Have Moving Coins and a Walking Yoshi appeared first on Siliconera.

Following the announcement of the rebirth of MicroProse, the publisher and related developers have been publishing new assets of their naval strategy simulation games. 

First of all, we get new images from Sea Power: Naval Combat in the Missile Age by Triassic Games.

This time around, they focus on helicopters operating from ships and lighting.