September 2020

Marvel's Avengers will launch for everyone on September 4, but many players have already had a chance to experience the game thanks to its beta program, culminating in an open weekend beta in late August. As it turns out, this was a big success--the biggest in the history of the PS4, in fact.

Square Enix has announced that the Marvel's Avengers beta was the biggest ever on PS4. Or, more specifically, it was the "most downloaded," meaning that a lot of people installed it onto their system.

Microsoft has already stated the Xbox Series X will support all third-party Xbox One accessories, but as far as the PS5 goes, it's been a little unclear which ones will be compatible. Thankfully, one company has cleared up the confusion for its gaming headset line. Astro Gaming announced that all of its headsets will be compatible with PS5 and Xbox Series X as well as PS4 and Xbox One, though some may require a firmware update to work with the next-gen consoles.

Both the PS5 and Xbox Series X will work with Astro's A10, A20 Wireless, A40, A40 TR, and A50 Wireless gaming headsets. As for pre-amps, the MixAmp Pro TR will work with both PS5 and Xbox Series X, while the Xbox Series X will also support the MixAmp M60 and MixAmp M80--the latter two MixAmps are designed specifically for the Xbox One controller.

While Astro's C40 TR is one of the best PS4 controllers you can buy, it won't be compatible with PS5 games. It will, however, work with any PS4 games on the new console, thanks to backward compatibility. The best Xbox One controllers, on the other hand, will be fully compatible with the Xbox Series X.

September is another busy month for Pokemon Go players. Niantic has a variety of events and activities lined up for the game over the next few weeks, from the Mega Evolution-themed Mega September event to a new Victini Special Research. There's also September's Community Day, which takes place on Sunday, September 20. To help you prepare for the event, we've rounded up everything you need to know about September's Community Day below.

September's Featured Pokemon: Porygon

The Virtual Pokemon Porygon is the featured Pokemon for September's Community Day. Throughout the event, Porygon will spawn in the wild much more frequently than normal, making this a good opportunity to stock up on Porygon Candy. On top of that, you'll be able to catch a Shiny Porygon in the game for the first time during the event.

Developer Pysonix has confirmed that once its soccar game Rocket League goes free-to-play later this summer it won't require online memberships on Nintendo Switch and PlayStation 4 systems.

A patch for Rocket League will be arriving "around mid-September," with the free-to-play update following "shortly after." While an exact date for when Rocket League will go free-to-play has not been disclosed yet, Psyonix made it clear that Nintendo Switch and PlayStation 4 players will not need active NSO and PS Plus subscriptions in order to participate in online matches against other competitors. This is just one of the many changes coming to Rocket League once it's free-to-play.

Some other adjustments include the addition of a new difficulty for bots, the removal of the Solo Standard Playlist following Competitive Season 14's conclusion, Heatseeker being playable in private matches, tweaks to Rocket ID friends and Quick Chats, and more.

Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 1 + 2 releases this Friday, September 4, and if you want to preorder it ahead of time, you can do so for cheaper than its regular price. Amazon and Walmart have Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 1 + 2 for $33.88, down from its regular price of $40. Both retailers offer free shipping and can deliver the game as early as its release date, though this depends on where you live and when you order it.

If you're interested in the collector's edition, you'll be happy to hear that GameStop currently has it in stock with release-day delivery. Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 1 + 2's Collector's edition costs $100 and comes with the game, Digital Deluxe content, and a limited-edition Birdhouse deck.

September is here, and a lot is happening in Pokemon Go this month. On top of all the September events taking place over the next few weeks, new Field Research tasks are now live in the game, along with a new Research Breakthrough encounter: Alolan Raichu.

Each time you achieve a Research Breakthrough in September 2020, you'll get a chance to catch Alolan Raichu. There's a possibility this Raichu could be Shiny as well, giving you another incentive to complete as much Field Research as you can this month.

While you'll receive one bonus Field Research task in the game each day, Field Research is typically obtained from PokeStops. There's no limit to how many tasks you can do daily, but you'll receive one stamp for the first task that you complete each day. Once you amass seven stamps, you'll achieve a Research Breakthrough, leading to the aforementioned encounter with Alolan Raichu.

It's been a busy year or so for the Kingdom Hearts franchise, with the long-awaited Kingdom Hearts 3 finally releasing in 2019 and a follow-up expansion arriving earlier this year. The story will continue with Kingdom Hearts: Melody of Memory on November 13 for PS4, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch. The rhythm-action game is available to preorder now at multiple retailers.

Kingdom Hearts is essentially getting the Theatrhythm Final Fantasy treatment in Melody of Memory. You move along an on-rails track and execute timing-based moves to the rhythm of beloved Kingdom Hearts and Disney tunes. All told, there will be more than 140 songs from the series, and gameplay takes place across Disney worlds such as Agrabah and Atlantica as well notable series locales like Twilight Town.

Today Netflix revealed another trailer for the brand new anime series based on Capcom’s beloved Dragon’s Dogma franchise.

It provides a deeper look at the characters that we’ll meet during the series ahead of its debut, which will be on September 17.

You can check out the trailer below. You can also check out a few earlier screenshots and another trailer from a few days ago.

I included the trailer with both English and Japanese voice-overs, so you can hear the difference. 

Atlus has released a new trailer of its upcoming JRPG Shin Megami Tensei III Nocturne HD Remaster.

The trailer, showcasing the unsettling atmosphere of the game, provides a look at the characters and environments that we’ll witness, alongside some story cutscene and even gameplay. 

We even get to see some gameplay of the “Maniax Pack” DLC, which includes Dante from Devil May Cry.

You can check it out below.

Shin Megami Tensei III Nocturne HD Remaster will be released in spring 2021 in North America and Europe. Japanese gamers will be able to enjoy the game earlier, on October 29, for both PS4 and Nintendo Switch.

The remaster will add voices to event cutscenes and improve the graphics and will also add a difficulty level on top of the original “normal” and “hard.” You can choose a “Merciful” level that will be available as free DLC to let you enjoy the story without sweating the details of the gameplay too much.

A new SMT III Nocturne HD Remaster trailer is here, and this second PV offers looks at the Demi-fiend, the Vortex World, and the demons in it.

The post New SMT III Nocturne HD Trailer Shows More of the Demi-fiend and Vortex World appeared first on Siliconera.

One of the most common criticisms of The Division 2—at least in terms of its game design—is its lack of a repeatable but varied endgame mode. That would be something that players of the urban third-person shooter could keep returning to for a fresh experience. The first Division had been expanded to offer two of them:…

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What am I thinking? Of course you’ve played Don’t Starve. Some days it feels like the ratio of “people who have played Don’t Starve at least once” to “people on planet Earth” is somehow greater than one. So you can imagine my shock when I found out that no one has written a HYP on Don’t Starve before now.

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There is so much energy in Teenage Blob that even the on-screen text seems to shake and shudder and tremble. Why wouldn't it? This is such a weird and brilliant project - half EP, half mini-game collection. The Superweaks (a band) recorded six new songs. Team Lazerbeam (a development team) made six new games. Then everything got flung together in a sketchy celebration of punk and the brilliant/terrible lost years between 16 and 19. Rotten jobs. Gigs. Set lists. The energy of it!

In a way it strikes me as a game/album about the similarities between games and albums. I'm guessing music gets pretty hard to pick apart in the studio - hard to know where an idea comes from and who exactly did what. There's a similar hectic sketchiness to the games here, a sense that loads of stuff was thrown in and the muddle sorts itself out only when you're playing.

There's a throughline - you're off to buy some new shoes and make it to a gig - but it's the thinnest of threads. Instead this is just a wonderful mass of chaos to mash through in half an hour, and emerge blinking on the other side.

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This special Death Stranding PC case will be available in Fall 2020.

The post Death Stranding PC Case by TSUKUMO and Kojima Productions to Release This Fall appeared first on Siliconera.

One of the most iconic symbols of Osaka is the fugu (blowfish) paper lantern that hangs over the city’s Shinsekai area. This week, the lantern was taken down as the restaurant it advertises will close.

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Typically, parts of Tokyo are overrun with tourists. These are not typical times.

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Developed by Crystal Dynamics and published by Square Enix, the long awaited Marvel’s Avengers will finally be releasing for consoles and PC this week. Before you jump in, though, the Hulk has a few words for new players. You can check out the video for yourself down below.

It’s a cute little seminar video where the Hulk basically teaches the basics of how to be a superhero, cut in with footage of actual gameplay and combat. From what we’ve played so far, the game’s combat is fairly simple, but satisfying as you get to barrel your way through hordes of enemies and really feel like a superhero.

The same can be said for the Hulk, who has the ability to grab individual enemies and throw them around like ragdolls. Which, y’know, is always a fun time.

Marvel’s Avengers is set to be released for PC and consoles on Sept. 4.

The post Get Ready for Marvel’s Avengers With a Superhero Seminar from the Hulk appeared first on Twinfinite.

If you’re planning on upgrading your graphics card to one of the new [cms-block] RTX 3000 cards over the next couple of months you might find it rather difficult to get hold of one until early next year. According to a new report from Tweaktown, industry sources have said the first wave of RTX 3080, RTX 3090 and RTX 3070 GPUs will be much smaller than Nvidia’s previous launches, and that post-launch “no stock will be available till the end of the year.”

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Good news for anyone who’s had trouble installing Microsoft Flight Simulator: a new patch has fixed a number of bugs which interfered with installation. Bad news if you are one of those people: to benefit from these fixes, it’s recommended that you uninstall MSFS and reinstall from scratch. Oh no.

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Tom Clancy's The Division 2 is getting a new endgame mode set in a 100-story skyscraper.

Summit will task players with clearing all 100 floors of the building from the ground up. Levels will vary each time you play, and be punctuated by a boss fight on every 10th floor.

The mode was revealed in developer Massive's latest State of the Game livestream, below, (thanks Kotaku) and should roll out to PC test servers tomorrow, before other platforms in the near future, for all players with this year's Warlords of New York expansion.

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Plans are being made for a return to an in-person Gamescom show in Cologne for 2021.

The enormous games show last year squeezed 373,000 people into Cologne's cramped convention centre. Social distance, you could not.

2020's physical event was scrapped, and effectively replaced with a miasma of online announcements lead by Geoff Keighley's Opening Night Live show last Friday. Two million people tuned in to watch that from the comfort of their own homes.

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North American fans of SINoALICE can now get their hands on this inspired line of necklaces.

The post SINoALICE Hansel & Gretel Snow White Necklaces Available to Pre-Order in North America appeared first on Siliconera.

Today’s selection of articles from Kotaku’s reader-run community: The Outer Worlds From Kreia’s Perspective - Traditions • Late TAY Retro: Sega Master System - Sonic The Hedgehog [TV Commercial (BR)] • TAY Retro: Nintendo Entertainment System - Smash T.V [TV Commercial (NA)]

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Libratone Zipp Mini 2 Bluetooth Speaker | $99 | Meh

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Welcome to Morning Music, Kotaku’s new, daily hangout for folks who love video games and the cool-ass sounds they make. VVVVVV was one of the top indie games of 2010, and its tremendous soundtrack played no small part in elevating the already-great material.

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Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout made quite the splash when it released a few weeks back, and fans have wasted no time in creating cool fan-made content for the game. For instance, this Shrek skin actually looks like it’d be totally perfect for the game’s aesthetic. You can check it out in action down below.

Created with Media Molecule’s Dreams editing tool, the Shrek skin looks incredibly adorable. We even get an idea of what the skin would look like in action in Fall Guys itself, and it’s probably safe to say that it would fit right in.

Mediatonic has been releasing crossover skins for the game since its initial launch, including a Bulletkin skin from Enter the Gungeon, so we can probably expect more cosmetic releases down the line.

Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout is now available on PS4 and PC.

The post This Fan-Made Shrek Skin for Fall Guys Is Actually Perfect appeared first on Twinfinite.

Next week we’ll be invited to visit a particularly dirty corner of the Warhammer 40,000 universe in Necromunda: Underhive Wars, a turn-based tactical squad game from the studio behind Mordheim: City Of The Damned. Based vaguely on the Games Workshop tabletop wargame Necromunda, Underhive Wars is set in the bowels of a vast city on an industrial planet, where wacky gangs brawl over the dregs of the dregs. It’s a far cry from the usual world-saving heroism of Space Marines (though crotchskulls are still worn). A new 10-minute narrated trailer shows and explains a whole lot of how the game works, so come see.

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We’ve known that crossplay is coming to Apex Legends for quite some time, but as its release draws ever-nearer, we thought it would be good to go over everything we know about how crossplay will work. Which platforms are supported? What will this mean for Apex console players? Can you opt-out? Is cross-progress and cross-purchasing supported? You’ll find the answers to all these and other questions below in our Apex Legends crossplay guide.
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I would love to know how The Last Campfire was made. Not the coding or the art, which I'll happily admit I would not understand even if I had a lifetime of education ahead of me. But the thinking behind the design. This is a puzzle game in which puzzles are everywhere - puzzles of different types, of different approaches, puzzles operating at different levels of the construction. Somewhere I imagine a huge wall filled with paper and bits of string - one of those evidence walls from the kind of shows you get on the Alibi channel. Every idea, every gimmick, every buried connection between one part and another. Beautiful!

The Last Campfire is a game about puzzles and lost hope, I think. It's also a follow up of sorts to the Lost Winds games from yesteryear. There's the same core team, but also the same preoccupations - lonely rock warmed by the sun, unruly patches of grass, a faith, deep down, in the noble aspects of game design at its most rigorous. This time you are cast as Ember, a sort of flour-sack character who's off on a dangerous and difficult journey. Along the way Ember meets various other flour-sack characters called Forlorn, who had all lapsed into various strains of despair. How does Ember pull them out of it? Puzzles.

Promising open-world bird combat game The Falconeer will hold a brief PC beta next month which you can sign-up for right now.

You can apply for a key via The Falconeer's Discord, ahead of the test being held via Steam in October.

Developed almost entirely solo by former Skyrim modder Tomas Sala, The Falconeer features aerial avian combat in a beautiful fantasy world. The full release will launch for Xbox One, Series X and PC in November.

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Recently-released indie game Spiritfarer came under fire yesterday after some players said it contained ableist writing within one of its storylines - and now developer Thunder Lotus has issued an apology.

The criticism was focused on a particular storyline that suggested a wheelchair-using character could only be free in death, which critics said perpetuated the idea that "being dead is better than disabled".

Thunder Lotus has now said it agreed with the points made, and issued a statement to address the problems with the writing.

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Nintendo’s going all out for Mario’s 35th anniversary

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An impossible game in 2020

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‘If we don’t do this ... there’ll be nothing left to save.’

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Super Mario 3D World is coming to Nintendo Switch at long last. The game, which can be played in co-op, has long seemed like a perfect fit for the system thanks to the ease of multiplayer gaming with the Joy-Cons, and now players have that chance through Super Mario 3D World + Bowser's Fury.

Players can enjoy this 3D platformer in single-player, local co-op, or online co-op. In addition to the base game, players will also be able to go through something called "Bowser's Fury." Nintendo promises additional reveals of bonus content prior to launch.

Bowser's Fury

Super Mario 3D World + Bowser's Fury comes to Switch on February 12. For our review of the Wii U game, head here. Nintendo will also be releasing Amiibos for Cat Mario and Cat Peach alongside Super Mario 3D World + Bowser's Fury.

You're likely seeing several Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 1 + 2 reviews right now, but I'm not quite ready to deliver my final verdict. Before publishing our scored review, I want to spend a bit more time in the shoes of the legendary skater in these remakes.

While I'm not ready to finalize my review just yet, I'm very much enjoying this stroll (skate?) down memory lane. The overhauled visuals look good in action, and the gameplay feels smooth and intuitive; it's just as easy to pick up and play today as it was in 1999. I was pleasantly surprised how several of the park designs from the first two Tony Hawk games still hold up to this day. I also like the online multiplayer suite, even if it's a bit bare-bones, and being able to play created parks from other players around the world is awesome.

Be sure to return to GameInformer.com for our review in the coming days!

Tony Hawk's Pro Skater left its mark on history...I want to say...within minutes of its release in 1999.

It didn't matter if you skated or not, it was a cultural touchstone, a sign that skating had arrived. While it's faltered through the years (Tony Hawk himself dates it around 2006, when Project 8 was released), it's back now: for real this time.

While Streets of Rage 4 fans might have quite the wait ahead when it comes to fresh content, it seems that the excellent  multiplayer brawler will at least be receiving a new update at some point in the near future.

An incoming patch has been teased on Twitter by co-developer DotEmu, before being reaffirmed as a "gameplay balancing patch" by Lizardcube. While no details have been revealed, the new update is suspected to bring a few tweaks to the SoR 4 roster and rogue's gallery, perhaps tweaking damage and frames in much the same way an update for Street Fighter or BlazBlue would. So I wouldn't expect any new characters or stages.