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Studio Sai has announced that it has raised $7 million in a seed funding round.
Leading the funding round was PUBG publisher Krafton, while Hypergryph also contributed.
Cyberpunk 2077’s first and only expansion, Phantom Liberty, introduces a new ending to CD Projekt Red’s sci-fi RPG, and it’s one I have a hard time reconciling with the game as it already exists. Sure, it’s certainly definitive and ends the story in a pretty profound, subversive way, but it also reflects so directly…
Redwall, the setting of Brian Jacques' brilliant children's fantasy books, is making its way onto curren-gen consoles with The Lost Legends of Redwall: The Scout Anthology.
The popular series is known for its anthropomorphic animals, including mice, moles and various other woodland animals. The series is centred on Redwall Abbey, where the animals live together.
The game is a linear action-adventure and story-rich title comprised of three acts. The world includes locations from the book including Redwall Abbey and Mossflower Wood. Players will take on the role of young mice Sophia and Liam as they fight against vicious sea rats to protect their home. As an animal, players will be able to use a scent mechanic to explore the world via smell and find clues.
Developer Kumi Souls Games announced its gothic Soulslike metroidvania, The Last Faith, years ago, and last summer, we got a new trailer that indulged in the game's pixelated violence. We knew the game was coming late this year, but now it's official: The Last Faith hits PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Switch, and PC on November 15.
Kumi Souls Games announced this release date with a new gameplay trailer that you can watch below:
If you don't want to wait until November 15 to jump into The Last Faith, you can check it out early with a new extended demo that's available right now on Steam. Kumi Souls Games says that in it, you can get a taste of Mythringal's brutal environment.
"Often brutal, but always empowering, The Last Faith thrives on merciless and precise combat, with a huge range of custom executions to perform," a press release reads. "Players will unearth a formidable variety of melee weapons, arcane spells, and long-range firearms, allowing them to carve a path in their own style.
Toho Towa announced that a 4D version of The Super Mario Bros Movie will be available throughout select theaters in Japan between October 13-19, 2023. Additionally, a special clear file bearing the Super Mario Bros Plumbing logo seen in the movie will be offered as a bonus gift for those attending the newMX4D and 4DX version of the film. [Thanks, 4Gamer!]
The new version will be an MX4D and 4DX theatrical release. This rerun of the movie will be held in response to many requests for this version, and to express gratitude to fans of the movie. Furthermore, a video message from Mamoru Miyano, the Japanese voice of Mario in the movie, was released to commemorate the 4D rerun of the film, and he briefly showed the special clear file.
You can also check out the Super Mario Bros Plumbing special clear file bonus gift here:
Sombra, Overwatch 2’s hacking, harassing, stealthy damage hero, has been one of my favorite characters on the hero shooter’s roster since I started playing in 2019. Her cloaking and hack-based kit is distinct, and even after her rework leading into Overwatch 2, I’ve still had a lot of fun with her hit-and-run style.…
Hero shooter Gigantic may have shut down five years ago but Gearbox Software is bringing it back for one weekend only in a limited time throwback event.
A Reddit post from TemptedTemplar shared an email asking players to the event, while the game's subreddit is also full of others who received the invite. "You're invited to play Gigantic (again) during our limited time throwback event," read the email, sent to Reddit user HeirOfRhoads.
The event will take place from October 5 at 12noon Pacific / 3pm Eastern / 8pm UK to October 6 at 9pm Pacific / 12midnight Eastern, so October 7 at 5am UK. It's unclear if players other than those who received the email will be able to play.
Players will even get to enjoy "never before seen features" according to the email, including a Rush mode, new loadout system, and "revamped content". The classic Gigantic gameplay and features will be present too, of course, bringing back the team-based competitive action in teams of five heroes.
Gigantic shut down all the way back in July 2018, a few months after developer Motiga was shut down in November 2017. "The current state of the game has restricted options for further progress and relevant content updates, and delivering basic features while also fixing long-standing issues was more complicated than expected," the closure announcement read.
Last time, you decided that improvised environmental weapons are better than skipping across a timeline flowchart. I can't say I'm too surprised, considering that timeline flowcharts are rare and that I did illustrate t'other with multiple screenshots of Kazuma Kiryu smashing men with bicycles. Now if Kiryu had been jumping between timelines... ah, we can't speculate, that's not scientific. This week, I ask you to choose between cutting something unnecessary and adding something unnecessary. What's better: quick restarts, or a diegetic HUD?
Nintendo will discontinue online service for 3DS and Wii U consoles in April 2024, the company announced in a recent blog. After this point, the 3DS Pokémon storage app Pokémon Bank will be the only software accessible online.
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Sad Cat Studios has announced that it has secured a $5 million investment.
With the GEM Capital investment, the game studio said it aims to use the funding to develop future projects.
While the rerelease of Red Dead Redemption via a new port on August 17 of 2023 was great news for fans of the original and those who missed out when the game originally shipped 13 years ago, it was missing some desirable features. At $50 bucks with no option to run at a more modern 60 frames per second, the rerelease…
The new Spy x Family opening and song for season 2 is now available on YouTube via the official TOHO Animation channel. The show will resume airing from October 7, 2023. Ado sang the new track, which is titled “Kura Kura.”
You can watch the Spy x Family season 2 opening and hear its theme song here:
It’s a colorful and upbeat opening, showing both sides of the Forger family. In between fun scenes of Loid, Yor, and Anya’s daily life together, it shows what their real jobs are behind closed doors. As a reminder, Yor works as an assassin and Loid works as a spy. Meanwhile, Anya is a telepath and Bond, the family dog, can see the future.
As for the singer of “Kura Kura,” Ado is a popular singer who debuted in 2020 when she was 17 years old. Her first song was “Usseewa,” which hit number 1 on multiple charts in Japan.She was also the singing voice of Uta in One Piece Film: Red.
Many are the horror games that haunt the dark, but it takes a real gift for creepy-crawlies to pull off a horror game that's set in the light. I'm not sure The Fabulous Fear Machine - devised by Fictiorama Studios in partnership with AMC and Shudder - is quite that horrifying, but it's certainly chewing on my nerve endings in an engrossing way.
It's a top-down management sim, which might not sound very scary, but just look at those colours - irradiated and unwholesome shades of purple and yellow, spreading over chunky, HyperCard continents emblazoned with pulp comic fonts. The visuals wear away at you like the stink of hydrochloric acid. And then there's that red-eyed, turbaned figure, gazing at you in top left. This is the face of the Fabulous Fear Machine. Its offer: to enable your character's world-toppling ambitions. Its price: that your story will become part of its story. The game is out today, and I've got some thoughts ahead of a possible review.
A group of former BioWare staff members has launched a lawsuit to seek better severance pay from the maker of Mass Effect and Dragon Age.
50 staff were let go in August, as part of a move the company said would make the studio "more agile and more focused". Several veteran team members were included in the cuts, including two writers who had each worked at the studio for over 20 years.
Now, a group of seven people - with an average of 14 years at BioWare between them - have requested further compensation from the company, with a payout calculated to take their years of service into consideration.
Get your trigger fingers at the ready. Feral Interactive, the team behind the recent Lara Croft Switch ports, has announced Hitman: Blood Money - Reprisal will be coming to iOS, Android and Nintendo Switch.
This release will be a souped up version of IO's 2006 release Hitman: Blood Money, promising a "suite of improvements" across the new platforms. This will include new features such as "Instinct Mode, an ever-present minimap, and a wide array of gameplay improvements inspired by later games in the series".
Here is a little trailer for it all, showing off some of 47's shenanigans across the globe, from Paris to New Orleans (you know what, assassinations aside, 47 has quite a peachy job. I would love such opportunities to see the world).
Humble Choice is going big on scares and spooks this month, just in time for Halloween.
Titles being offered from Humble Choice in October include The Quarry Deluxe Edition, Metal: Hellsinger, The Dark Pictures Anthology: House of Ashes. If you've been waiting for a decent price slash on any of those or are looking for some horror and thrills, subscribing to get this month's bundle may be worth it.
Also up for keeps are Rebel Inc.: Escalation, Lords and Villeins, A Juggler’s Tale, Spirit of the Island, and Mr. Prepper.
Square Enix went over the company’s New York Comic Con 2023 plans, and they include a NYCC panel with some Final Fantasy VII Rebirth voice actors. It will be held on October 14, 2023. Five actors from the game, all folks reprising their roles from FFVII Rebirth, will be there. In addition, Matthew Mercer, who supplied some additional voices for the first remake and was Cor Leonis in FFXV, will be the panel’s host.
Both people who are at NYCC 2023 and aren’t will be able to see the presentation. It will be held on October 14, 2023 at 12:30pm PT/3:30pm ET/9:30pm CET. People at the Javits Center can head to the Main Stage to watch it. Those at home can tune in Twitch and YouTube. People at the event will get a poster. Some can get it signed, as a limited number of attendees will get that option.
As for the Final Fantasy VII Rebirth voice actors appearing, people will see the following folks talking about the game at the event:
Ubisoft’s Assassin’s Creed franchise has covered a lot of ground in its 16 years. The Assassin-Templar conflict has taken players across five continents, from Ancient Greece to Victorian London, spanning 2,300 years of history over the course of 13 mainline games.
With new AC games still on the horizon, and Assassin's Creed Mirage nearly here, we’ve put together this chronology of the Assassin’s Creed timeline so far. This chronology only includes mainline Assassin’s Creed games; spinoff games aren’t included on this list given their lack of importance to the ongoing Assassin’s Creed narrative.
Jump to:
There are currently 13 Assasin's Creed games in the main series and 17 additinoal spinoff games. Outside of video games, there is also an Assassin's Creed board game and an Assassin's Creed TV series coming to Netflix at some point.
Six years and five days have passed since the release of Forza Motorsport 7, and Turn 10 Studios have been hard at work on a new entry in the beloved racing series. The simply-titled Forza Motorsport is an advanced track-based racer developed for PC and current-gen console hardware, emphasising advanced detail and sophisticated ray tracing effects.
It's an impressive effort, as John has detailed in his preview, but with the full version in hand, how do the game's 20 tracks hold up? How have the graphics been enhanced since the last series entry? And have we seen any notable improvements over the preview code?
Right from the opening, it's clear that Forza Motorsport is an impressive-looking racing game. There are intricate car models, detailed and well-lit tracks, with ray-traced reflections. There are a lot of great-looking track-based racing titles out there, and this is definitely one of the better-looking racing titles released in the current generation.
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Krafton India has launched a new program to support domestic talent.
As reported by Tech Crunch, the Krafton India Gaming Incubator aims to aid six to ten game development teams annually. The period will range from six months to a year.
The PlayStation 5 has its first two-disc video game three years after the console launched: Horizon: Forbidden West Complete Edition.
The Complete Edition includes the Horizon: Forbidden West base game and Horizon: Forbidden West: Burning Shores DLC, and costs $69.99 / €59.99 / ¥7,980 on PS5. Here’s the complete list of contents for Horizon: Forbidden West: Complete Edition on PS5:
The storage capacity of Ultra HD Blu-ray discs is up to 100GB. Horizon: Forbidden West Complete Edition weighs in at a maximum of 121GB, according to the game box revealed by the Does it play? Twitter account. (People are already having fun with the PS5 two-disc symbol, which looks like it's already seen too much.)
When you see it...#HorizonForbiddenWest https://t.co/ktGlqX6Nyb pic.twitter.com/3jKwJMMLtb
Spike Chunsoft announced that an English version of Shiren the Wanderer: The Mystery Dungeon of Serpentcoil Island will come out in North America and Europe. Its release date is February 27, 2024. There is also a new key visual and trailer out for Shiren the Wanderer.
First, here's the key art for the upcoming game:
You can watch the announcement trailer here:
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When you play Resident Evil Village on an iPad Pro, it's flabbergasting to believe that this is Capcom's latest mainline entry running natively on a mobile device, looking every bit as good as its home console counterparts.
It feels like alchemy when considering the most recent port of the game to a handheld device was the cloud version on Nintendo Switch. Factor in the rise of cloud-dedicated devices like Logitech G Cloud and Razer Edge, plus cloud gaming services like Xbox Game Pass Ultimate and GeForce Now, and the assumption would be that the only practical way to experience the most bleeding edge titles portably is via streaming.
Twitch has seen another round of layoffs, though full details are unknown.
The news comes from streaming insider Zack Bussey and has since been corroborated by GamesIndustry.biz. The layoffs are said to be limited to the customer experience team as the company shifts to outsourced vendors.
The layoffs are also fewer than the 400 employees who lost their jobs during Amazon cuts in March.
Three years after allegations of sexual misconduct inside Assassin’s Creed publisher Ubisoft first surfaced, French authorities are moving ahead with a criminal investigation. Five former executives were detained for questioning on October 3, including former VP Tommy Francois, and CEO Yves Guillemot’s former…
Rockstar has quietly added a 60fps toggle to Red Dead Redemption on PlayStation 5.
The version 1.03 update is now available and it's a small update that adds a new framerate option to the menu.
The game was released in August across PS4 and Switch, and is available on PS5 through backwards compatibility.
There's not much longer to wait for Super Mario Bros. Wonder, but that hasn't stopped fans from having their fun early.
Presenting Elephant Mario 64, a combination of work between a group of modders, known as SM64ex-coop, to add Elephant Mario to Super Mario 64. He's fully playable, minus any Elephant form abilities, and is complete with a tiny tail sticking out from his overalls.
The model was made by modder Koop the Koopa, with some alterations from YouTuber Unreal (no, not that one) to allow for colour customisation. The bottom of Elephant Mario's feet are pink and can't be changed due to how the model is structured, Unreal notes, but I rather like it. It makes it look like he's got a bunch of toe beans on his soles.
Detective Pikachu Returns is the long-awaited sequel to the Nintendo 3DS classic Detective Pikachu, which was originally released worldwide in 2018. The mystery spin-off was so beloved that it got a Hollywood live-action Pokemon movie adaptation just a year later in 2019. However, after years of anticipation for part two to come out, is the Pokemon franchise's return to Ryme City worth the wait? Thankfully, the answer is a resounding yes! Detective Pikachu Returns delivers a charming story that is not only a satisfying resolution to Tim Goodman's saga but is also a heartwarming adventure that lets players see a new side to many of their favorite Pokemon.
What would a world shared by humans and Pokémon really be like? It's something I imagine every Pokéfan has pondered, and yet it's also something the series' main games typically do a poor job of showing. Red and Blue, Gold and Silver, all the way to Scarlet and Violet - the story never really changes. You play as the 10-year-old version of an RPG murder hobo, storming about capturing monsters to defeat enemies, then storing said creatures inside a computer when they're no longer of use. I've always held a softer spot for the Pokémon anime, which offers a more slice-of-life take on the traditional Pokémon game story, and better features the other kinds of people who exist in the series' world. It's been interesting to see, over the years, the wider Pokémon franchise include more of the anime's elements elsewhere - for example, leaning more heavily towards the concept of people having one special 'partner' Pokémon, as is the case here.
This is why I think I enjoyed the original Detective Pikachu game, which launched for Nintendo 3DS in Japan all the way back in 2016. (The movie adaptation was fine too.) A serviceable crime-solving adventure for a younger audience, its strengths lay in its world and characters, and the relationship it built between Pikachu and young human hero Tim Goodman, who share a unique and mysterious bond. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the same strengths can be found again in Detective Pikachu Returns, a belated sequel for Nintendo Switch, where the same connection between its main characters goes a long way towards balancing its fussy mechanics and an at-times frustratingly obvious plot.
11 Bit Studios, the developer behind This War of Mine, Frostpunk, and Children of Morta, unveiled The Alters last year. It called it a sci-fi adventure where one man is trying to survive, and hopefully get home, after a space mission goes wrong. To do so, he must rely on both himself and various copies of himself.
What exactly is The Alters? It's a question I've been itching to get answers to ever since Frostpunk and This War Of Mine developers 11 bit Studios first announced their strange new game at notE3 last year. Until now, all we've had to go on is a cryptic CG announcement trailer that showed a gaggle of identical clone-looking men in bright pink medical gowns, all of whom seemingly live inside a giant wheel full of shipping containers. It didn't really tell us anything about what the game actually is, or how it plays, and we've heard precious little about it since.
Happily, I've now seen about an hour of The Alters in action at this year's Gamescom, and first impressions are very promising. This is indeed a game about sort-of clones living in a big wheely shipping container, but these containers are actually modules you'll be building in XCOM/Fallout Shelter-style chunks to advance the capabilities of your big wheel base as you work to escape the broiling heatdeath that's slowly enveloping the planet. You'll also be venturing out onto the planet's surface to gather resources, all while managing your crew of clo- sorry, alternate selves - as you assign their daily work tasks, and then there's the fact that, well, you're all chuffing different versions of the same person and the literal embodiment of what your life might have been like if you'd done X instead of Y, or Y instead of Z. It's a fascinating blend of ideas, and if 11 bit can stick the landing, I reckon it could end up being something really quite special. Here's everything I learned.
When Detective Pikachu hit the 3DS in 2016, we’d never seen anything quite like it in the vast collection of Pokemon games. Its casual whodunit story was an easy solve, but it was cute, colorful, and most importantly, different. And yet, now that Detective Pikachu and his tiny herringbone hat have returned, it doesn’t feel as exciting as its predecessor. In fact, there’s a lot about the mystery solving that’s arguably a step backwards. It’s somehow easier than the first one, which makes a lot of the moment-to-moment play feel long-winded and a bit frustrating, especially if you’re more than 10 years old. It’s still a pleasing, colorful, sweet adventure, and the story comes to a mostly satisfying conclusion of the Detective Pikachu saga, but its greatest mystery is what went on behind the scenes that resulted in some of these baffling decisions in the story and mechanics.
Since it’s been a good while, it was wise for this sequel to be written so that you didn’t need to play the first Detective Pikachu (or seen the movie, for that matter) to hop into Returns – Pikachu recaps the first game in the very beginning with his trusty cup of coffee by his side. The world is still feeling the effects of the events from the first game, where Tim Goodman and the titular detective helped stop the spread of R, a drug that caused Pokemon to go berserk. However, things seem to be ramping up again in Ryme City, where Pokemon are once again acting strangely and a mystery is brewing in the background as you solve other cases. Plus, there’s the matter of figuring out what happened to Tim’s father and Pikachu’s partner, Harry.
The video game industry’s love affair with science fiction is as old as the medium itself, so it’s no minor statement when I say that 11 Bit Studios’ The Alters is perhaps the weirdest sci-fi game I’ve ever seen. This bizarre survival game is packed with weighty building mechanics and social links, and every time I thought the 40-minute demo couldn’t get any wilder, it defied my expectations by throwing yet another curveball. Whether it’s the planet’s rising sun that threatens to burn you into oblivion or the giant wheel-shaped base that serves as your home, the Rapidium miracle element that’s Earth’s only chance at survival or the alternate reality clones of the protagonist that serve as your companions, The Alters is perhaps the most high-concept science fiction game of all time – and maybe that’s not such a bad thing. I quite enjoy weird science fiction stories myself, and there’s something about The Alters’ extreme weirdness that gives it a neat dreamlike quality that’s unlike anything I’ve seen before. That’s definitely something to get excited about.
In the Alters, you play one version of Jan Dolski, a space-faring captain on an expedition to a remote world that’s gone horribly wrong, seeing you stranded on a planet with a slowly rising sun that will kill you if you let it. While waiting for help to arrive, you’ll need to pilot your mobile command base across the surface of a hostile world, and that can’t happen on your own. To assist you, you’ll need to gather resources to build alternative versions of yourself called Alters, who are pulled from the multiverse where Jan made different life choices and became a different person. This way, you can find a version of yourself who became a miner to help with gathering raw materials and another version who became a scientist to assist with research and development of new technologies.
You’re reading the final chapter of my eight-day travelog recounting my unbelievable trip to Japan to cover the 2023 Pokémon World Championships.
If you already haven't, be sure to check out the other chapters:
8:36 am - Pokémon Worlds is over and now it’s time to fly home. When I use the elevator down to the hotel lobby I’m surprised and delighted that pushing the close button actually closes the door. Will the wonders of Japan never end?
8:40 am - I hit up the breakfast buffet and have my final piece of early morning lasagna. I already know I’m going to miss it when I wake up tomorrow and three steaming layers of pasta, tomato sauce, and meat aren’t there to greet me.
The final episode of Ahsoka’s first season presents the blooming flowers from the seeds showrunner Dave Filoni has been planting and cultivating since 2008. Now, whether or not you think that’s a good thing depends entirely on how much you like your Star Wars stories to be an ouroboros of self-recognition, or if you’d…
A new report has alleged that Hyenas, the recently cancelled space-set loot shooter from Creative Assembly, was Sega's "biggest budget game ever".
YouTube channel Volound shared an eye-opening video on the recent cancellation, with claims from anonymous developers detailing a "total lack of direction" around the game, with one contributor stating many members of the leadership team were "asleep at the wheel but they never seemed to lose their jobs". The same source noted an engine change and "not committing to doing anything adventurous with the game" were all part of Hyenas' ultimate demise.
Another contributor said that internal feedback on the game was poor, adding it was felt that Hyenas would "melt into the background of an already saturated multiplayer shooter market". These claims have since also been corroborated by VGC.
The UK's Advertising Standards Authority has upheld two claims against Hutch Games for violating loot box disclosure rules.
The regulator found that ads for F1 Clash: Car Racing Manager on the App Store and Rebel Racing on Google Play were misleading because they neglected to include mention of paid loot boxes in the game.
Hutch argued that because players could progress through the game without spending money, such disclosure was unnecessary. It pointed to guidance from the ASA's sister organization the Committee of Advertising Practices that said such an arrangement would put in-game storefronts outside the scope of advertising standards.
Five former Ubisoft employees, including former chief creative officer Serge Hascoët and former editoral head Tommy François, have been taken into custody by French police with regard to allegations of sexual misconduct during their time at the publisher. That's according to an article in French newspaper Libération (via Eurogamer) which echoes allegations from French videogame union Solidaires Informatique Jeu Vidéo, posted on Xitter just this morning.
Square Enix shared a social media post explaining the symbolism behind the wings that some characters like Sephiroth in Crisis Core FFVII and FFVII Remake have. To be more specific, the post explains the meaning behind Sephiroth, Genesis, and Angeal’s wings, which includes the positioning on the side of the character’s back and the different colors.
Both Angeal and Sephiroth have wings on the same side because of both characters’ unique connection to the Buster Sword. Angeal is the original owner of the sword and passed it down to Zack, who would eventually pass it down to Cloud, Sephiroth’s nemesis and rival.
Meanwhile, Genesis’ wing is on the opposite side of Sephiroth’s wing to symbolize them being different beings. They were created by Project G and Project S, respectively. Angeal’s white wing symbolizes the character not falling down the wrong path, with Sephiroth and Genesis’ indicating the opposite.
