December 2023

A slide allegedly taken from a Sony presentation has revealed how many units some of the company's biggest first-party games have sold.

The slide – which notably excludes other Sony first-party titles, including Naughty Dog's The Last of Us series and Horizon Zero Dawn's sequel, Horizon Forbidden West – reveals the sale figures for several games released since 2017, including Marvel's Spider-Man (2018), God of War (2018), and Marvel's Spider-Man: Miles Morales (2020), which have sold 18.9 million, 15.9 million, and 12.6 million copies in their first two years, respectively.

The same table, if true, also reveals that Horizon Zero Dawn (2017) sold 11 million copies, Gran Turismo Sport (2017) 7.8 million, Days Gone (2019) 7 million, Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart (2021) 3.9 million, and "Ghost Dir Cut" – Ghost of Tsushima Director's Cut (2021) – 3.3 million copies.

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The first volume of the manga retelling of the light novel Bungo Stray Dogs: Dazai, Chuuya, Age 15 is out now, courtesy of Yen Press, and it’s a fascinating exploration of Osamu Dazai and Chuuya Nakahara’s routes. Which means, fittingly enough, the best parts of this first volume are when we get to see these two Bungo Stray Dogs characters play off of each other.

Bungo Stray Dogs: Dazai, Chuuya, Age 15 starts with both characters at their very beginnings. Despite their ages, both are established individuals and known for their power Chuuya is head of a gang called Sheep. Dazai is a member of Port Mafia on his first assignment to investigate rumors regarding a reappearance of the former, deceased leader of the organization by the new leader Ogai Mori. (Mori happens to also be the man who killed him.) 

Everyone's saying 2023 has been a stonking year for video games. To be honest dear reader, I don't think it's been my year. That might be because I've not had a huge amount of time to play loads outside of review duties and general life things, but there's only been, like, less than a handful of games that have truly commanded my attention.

One of said games comes backflipping in right at the tailend of this year: Astral Ascent. It's a 2D roguelike in the vein of Dead Cells, where you battle through stages, power-up, try and get as far as you can, inevitably die, reinvest your winnings, power-up permanently, then go again. It saddens me that I've not seen much excitement for the game elsewhere, so here I am with a little pudding for you. A little treat. Here comes the plane, nyaaaooownnn.

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Fans and accessibility advocates alike have reached out to Tekken 8 director Katsuhiro Harada in a bid to have its colourblind options revised ahead of the game's release next month.

After videos and screenshots showcasing the fighting game's accessibility modes went viral over the festive period, colourblind players and accessibility advisers reached out to the Tekken team on social media alleging they fell ill with vertigo and migraines after testing the alternative modes.

The video below illustrates the issue but please refrain from watching if you know or suspect you may have epilepsy, as some accessibility advisers believe it may cause Sudden Unexpected Death in Epilepsy (SUDEP):

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The ESRB has rated Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door remake.

As spotted by the Gaming Leaks and Rumours subreddit community, the RPG has secured an E for Everyone rating from the North American rating board for its mild fantasy violence and mild suggestive themes, and there are "no interactive elements".

"This is an adventure role-playing game in which players help Mario rescue Princess Peach from an alien group," the website says. "As players traverse whimsical worlds, they interact with characters and engage in turn-/puzzle-based combat against paper creatures. Players use various attacks (e.g., boot stomp, hammer strike, fire balls) against cartoony enemies that disappear into stars and coins.

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More details about an MMO based on Guerrilla's Horizon franchise have popped up online via two new job listings.

Video game researcher Kurakasis took to Twitter/X earlier today to detail "everything" they know to date about the upcoming game, including a rumour that it will be an "MMORPG to be precise". They also shared details of job listings that seem to confirm the game in development may be called "Land of Salvation".

"The game is now essentially confirmed to be in development, as an NCSoft employee posted a job listing on LinkedIn with a codename logo stylised similarly to the logo of Horizon games," Kurakasis said. "It's developed under the codename Project Skyline, with the initial codename being Project H."

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On paper, 2024 is already gearing up to be one of the best years gaming has seen in a long time. From Persona 3 Reload to Final Fantasy VII Rebirth, players have a wealth of potential future classics to choose from. We wanted to discuss what our most anticipated games of 2024 are.

2024 is already shaping up to be a year that will hurt my wallet. But out of all of the releases, I'm most looking forward to Final Fantasy VII Rebirth. I need to know more about what's going on with Zack and those seemingly alternate timelines, and I need to know immediately. Persona 3 Reload coming out just a few weeks prior will help with the wait, but it might also bloat my backlog if I'm not fast enough! -- Daniel

My answer is a little biased since I got to play a preview of Final Fantasy VII Rebirth back in September 2023, and I was floored by it. However, the sequel remake is, without a doubt, my most anticipated game of 2024. Rebirth is not only shaping up to be another excellent reimagining of Final Fantasy 7 but it's also looking to be one of the best open-world games released in years. However, I couldn't call myself a true Atlus fan if I didn't also mention Persona 3 Reload as the runner-up to my most anticipated release next year.

Type-Moon and ufotable published the second teaser trailer for the upcoming movie anime adaptation of Witch on the Holy Night. As previously promised, the studios aired the trailer right after the Fate Project New Year's Eve TV program had concluded in Japan.

When ufotable published the first trailer in December 2021, it only showed a simple scene of Aoko Aozaki and Alice Kuonji gazing through a starry night sky on a field of flowers. The new second trailer features more locations and action scenes. It concludes by showing Aoko unleashing a powerful magic attack.

However, ufotable has still yet to announce a release window for this movie. The large Japanese text at the end of this trailer simply informs that the movie anime's production is still in progress.

The new teaser trailer for the Witch on the Holy Night movie is also available to watch below, via Aniplex's YouTube channel:

The Dynasty Warriors series' development team from Koei Tecmo's Omega Force published its 2024 New Year's Card. The team has been known for sharing a new card with a Chinese zodiac animal theme every New Year's Day. As 2024 is also the Year of the Dragon, it features characters closely related to the mythical creature.

Two of the most closely related characters are Zhao Yun, whose courtesy name "Zilong" includes the "Long" hanzi letter meaning "Dragon," and Zhuge Liang, who is also known as the "Sleeping Dragon." Omega Force also put Guan Yu and Ma Chao into the picture, since the team used the Dragon as a motif for both characters' outfits. All four characters in this card are affiliated with Liu Bei's kingdom of Shu.

Koei Tecmo and Omega Force released a trailer for the upcoming first DLC pack for Fate/Samurai Remnant. The DLC will be called Record's Fragment: Keian Command Championship and is set to release sometime in February 2024.

The trailer features Gilgamesh, King of Heroes and textile wholesaler, announcing that he "seized control over [the] fates" of various masters and servants from the game. Details are sparse but he seems to be holding a kind of formal tournament variation on the Waxing Moon ritual. We will also have to wait and see whether this DLC story will be set concurrently with the main Fate/Samurai Remnant story or exist as separate, alternate timeline-type situation.

Gilgamesh is a recurring servant in the Fate franchise based on the historical Babyolonian king of the same name, appearing in the original Fate/Stay Night visual novel as a potential antagonist. In Fate/Samurai Remnant he appears as a rogue Ruler class servant running a shop in Edo called 'Babyloni-ya".

You can watch the trailer via Youtube below: