Shown off at this year's Summer Game Fest showcase, Sand Land is an upcoming RPG from the folks over at Ilca Inc, the developers of One Piece Odyssey, and the creator of Dragon Ball, Akira Toriyama. It's an adaptation on one of Toriyama's lesser-known mangas, which features a band of misfits who aim to right the wrongs of a king who's hogged the desert's vital water supply. I got to play it for all of 20 minutes, in a demo that was as stripped back as a grated cactus. Still, I got to sample a bit of roaming about in a tank, one brief stop at a town, an opening of one (1) chest, and some fighting. It seemed okay, I guess? But my main worry is whether its desert is interesting enough to hold people's attention.
]]>When Geoff Keighley announced in 2020 that he would be filling the space left by the recently cancelled E3 with his own gaming festival, none of us suspected that from that point on we would be doomed to an endless stream of livestreams from now until the heat death of the universe. Did 2020's summer of gaming ever end? It did not. It is a constant. Like the stars in the sky or the ocean blue. Geoff is here. He has a game to show you. It's probably a horror game set in space. Doesn't that look great? Now let's take a look at the first game by a new studio comprised of ex-Bioware devs.
Yep, that's right. Not-E3 2023 is over (I think?) and once again I've commanded team RPS to dig their microphones out of storage before forcing them to tell me about their favourite game from the cavalcade of directs, showcases and presentations that have replaced my once beloved E3 weekend.
]]>Summer Game Fest, Not-E3, Keigh3... whatever you want to call this festival of hype, its annual takeover of the game industry’s collective headspace meant there was only ever going to be one topic for the Electronic Wireless Show podcast this week. Alice even made up for her recording absence by pre-emptively tying Nate to a chair and forcibly making him watch trailers, like that bit in A Clockwork Orange but with "WORLD EXCLUSIVE" flashing up every thirty seconds. Still, we keep it light by focusing on the games we actually like the look of, from The Lord of the Rings: Return to Moria to Starfield, Nova Roma to Dungeons of Hinterberg.
]]>I've said it once, and I'll say it several times again. I'm exceedingly pumped for Prince Of Persia: The Lost Crown - and so is Prince Of Persia creator, Jordan Mechner. When I visited Ubisoft Montpellier at the end of May, one of things game director Mounir Radi told me about during my visit was how relieved he felt after showing Mechner a very early prototype. And in speaking to Mechner earlier this week about how he feels about The Lost Crown now, he tells me that "what I've seen so far of their modern 2D Metroidvania take on [Prince Of Persia] has got me excited and very eager to play."
]]>At every single video game thing I've flown out to, there's been a Sonic game. The speedy hog is forever occupying a booth and starring in some new-fangled thing, which oscillates between a 2D sidescroller laser-targeted at old-school fans, or 3D ones like Frontiers that try their utmost to push the series forwards.
So, I've gone and played another Sonic haven't I? This time I spent around 15-minutes with Sonic Superstars at this year's Summer Game Fest, a new 2.5D sidescroller that seems to successfully combine the feel of Sonic Mania with a modern art style and some new tricks. If you like old Sonic games, there's no doubt in my mind you'll love it. If you don't, there's no doubt in my mind you'll think it's agony.
]]>When Avowed was announced three years ago, the comparisons to The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim were everywhere and inevitable. Skip forward three years to its latest gameplay trailer at this year's Xbox Games Showcase, and Obsidian CEO Feargus Urquhart has confirmed the game was initially supposed to be the studio's attempt at making their own version of Skyrim.
]]>Following its reveal during Xbox Games Showcase, Capcom have given us a few details on their upcoming game Kunitsu-Gami: Path Of The Goddess. When it was first announced on Sunday, we knew very little about the game other than it looks very pretty, and we've been eager to know more ever since. The game also opened Capcom's own showcase the next day, where the same trailer was shown and we didn't get any new information on it. Very enlightening. But luckily, some more details have dripped through, which we've summarised below.
]]>LA is an amazing, if tremendously grey place. Everywhere you go, there are grey skyscrapers touching the clouds, so they all look like the concrete's puffing on numerous cigarettes. More often than not, cracked paving gives way to an empty lot or a vacuous car park, often with one guy slumped in a little booth ensuring it stays as grey as possible. So, what better way to commemorate grey than with a look at its president, Armored Core 6: Fires Of Rubicon?
Having seen a 20 minute presentation of the game at this year's Summer Game Fest, I'd say it struck me as an action game through and through, with the most recognisable bits of Souls soldered onto it when it came to, say, tough battles set to erratic rhythms. Honestly, I would say the hands-off demo is exactly what I expected it to be: lots of fast bits of metal slamming into each other in what was, perhaps, the least surprising FromSoftware reveal I've seen. Here's a piecemeal, slightly chaotic breakdown of the whole experience, coming to you from the frazzled mind of a jetlagged man sitting at a wobbly table.
]]>Capcom had a decent showing at their Showcase presentation last night, though it did also deliver the news that the mysterious Pragmata has been delayed once again. The news came in the form of a short trailer that did show off some very brief snippets of gameplay, opening up with an honestly quite fun sequence showing the young girl we've seen in previous trailers making a cute drawing apologising for the indefinite delay.
]]>There is one good dog in video games and his name is Missile the Pomeranian. Fight me. On second thought, maybe don't fight me. My wrists are quite dainty truth be told, and I'd almost certainly end up pegging it in an actual fist fight. If that happened, I might turn into a ghost that's forever doomed to manipulate objects within arm's reach that may or may not change the course of people's history. Actually, maybe you should fight me on this, because a) that sounds pretty rad actually, and b) I've been playing an early version of the freshly announced Steam demo for the excellent Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective this week, and it's reminded me all over again just how good it is to muck about your environment as a disemodied spirit.
]]>Three more Ace Attorney games are heading to PC. During this evening's Capcom Showcase, they announced the Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney Trilogy, including 2007's Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney, 2013's Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney - Dual Destinies and 2016's Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney - Spirit Of Justice. It'll arrive early 2024 and there's a trailer below.
]]>The Crew Motorfest looks a lot like a Forza Horizon game. It's an open world racer set in O'ahu, Hawaii with street, track and off-road races structured around a festival. Given how good Forza Horizon games are, I am fine with all of these similarities. At tonight's Ubisoft Forward, the third game in The Crew series got a couple of trailers and a relese date: September 14th.
]]>Star Wars: Outlaws, Ubisoft's open world take on the far, far away galaxy, had its cinematic reveal just yesterday. Today during Ubisoft's press conference it got a first, 10-minute gameplay trailer, showing some cover shooting, a speeder bike chase, and spaceship combat. Find it below.
]]>After announcing they'd be bringing a bunch of their games to virtual reality back in the mists of 2020, it looks like Assassin's Creed Nexus is the first and only Ubisoft VR project to have made it to fruition (RIP Splinter Cell VR). Coming to Zuck's Meta Quest 2 headset later this year, Assassin's Creed Nexus will see you slip into the virtual skins of Ezio, Kassandra and Connor in a new story set across Renaissance Italy, Ancient Greece and colonial America. Come and watch the reveal trailer below. Honestly, why does every VR living room look the same in these game reveals?
]]>I may not have seen Avatar or its sequel, but I like to think that means I'm numb to any preconceptions or bias. I am a man who understands only that there are lanky Smurfs who live in a world you'd get if you mashed Halo and Viva Piñata together. So, having seen roughly 30 minutes of Avatar: Frontiers Of Pandora, I can give you the unfettered lowdown of a person who's analysed it with a cold, hard stare. In brief, the game looks rather lovely! If… too lovely. I worry there's a big catch somewhere and I can't put my finger on it.
]]>After its big reveal at Summer Game Fest on Thursday, the internet has not taken kindly to Ubisoft's new Prince Of Persia game. There have been reports that The Lost Crown's gameplay reveal trailer (which currently sits across five separate YouTube channels) is continuing to rack up significantly higher dislikes than likes since it got announced, and many seem to have taken issue with the trailer's accompanying rap song and that it doesn't look like a "true" Prince Of Persia game, whatever the heck that means. It's disappointing to see a game instantly dismissed like this, not least because, as someone who's actually been to Ubisoft Montpellier to play the damn thing, this is arguably the most exciting Prince Of Persia game in years - and certainly more interesting than the troubled Sands Of Time Remake.
]]>After several years missing in action, Ubisoft have put a date on their open world first-person Avatar game. Avatar: Frontiers Of Pandora will arrive on PC on December 7th later this year, tonight's Ubisoft Forward showcase confirmed, and cor, it sure is cribbing hard on a lot of scenes from the first film, isn't it? Come have a watch of the new six-minute gameplay trailer below.
]]>Sometimes all you need from a video game is a bit of bloodshed with your pals. And sometimes, all you need from a sequel is the first one, but a bit bigger and bit better. Having spent a few hours with third-person co-op shooter Remnant 2, I reckon it's shaping up to be exactly those two things. It remains unconcerned with telling groundbreaking stories or delivering breathtaking cinema in its fights - it doesn't care. From what I've played, it's more about being the looter shooter for those who care about fine-tuning the consistency of the numbers they're able to extract from their foes.
]]>Let me tell you, being at an Xbox Games Showcase in-person is quite the experience. I'd got my pass, got seated in the theatre and finally had a chance to take in my surroundings. There were lots of folks, obviously, either excitedly chatting or awkwardly swivelling their legs to let people pass. Many wore Xbox jerseys. One man had an Xbox logo shaved into his head. A photographer asked our section to smile, so I managed the pained grin of a British person who encounters a stranger on a walk, the bunching of my cheeks pulling my lips into a curl. Meanwhile, those dressed in their Microsoft jerseys crossed their forearms and hollered.
The countdown flashed up on screen and the crowd started chanting, "five, four, three!", and for a second it felt like I was the only one who hadn't supped from a bowl of green liquid or beat my chest to the rhythm of "Play it day one on Xbox Game Pass". The crowd was on another plane of existence and, for brief moments, I was there with them. At other times I felt the physical fatigue of the trailer train more acutely than ever.
]]>If you're like me and thought that Starfield was just gonna be a shooty shooty space cowboy game, then think again. Revealed during the Starfield Direct that happened just after the Xbox Games Showcase, Bethesda highlighted a number of different playstyles that Starfield will be able to facilitate when it launches this September, including everything from being gung-ho all lasers blazing to a stealthy assassin.
]]>Frank Herbert's weirdo sci-fi epic is a great shout for a survival game and an MMO in many ways. You've got warring factions, you've got a hostile desert planet, you've got canonical giant monsters that can form regular events for players. You got yourself a video game, baybeeeee! Or at least, Funcom do, them being the devs what are making Dune Awakening. In a little spotlight feature at the PC Gaming Show they talked a bit more about the game, and boy, sure seems like a lot of cool stuff is possible in theory.
]]>One big mystery in tonight's Xbox Games Showcase was the announcement of Kunitsu-Gami: Path Of The Goddess, a new game from Capcom. It's some sort of action game seemingly steeped in Japanese mythology and it has monsters and an awful lot of masks and that's about all we can say for certain right now. But it is very pretty! It looks neat! See for yourself in the trailer below.
]]>I'd rather just saunter around space looking at pretty planets in Starfield, but I guess in a game as big as Bethesda's sci-fi behemoth they want fighty fighty spaceship battles. During the Starfield Direct that ran just after tonight's Xbox Game Showcase, the folks over at Bethesda explained just how ship combat works, and it's more than just holding down the trigger and aiming in the right direction.
]]>Who would have thought a bathtub would make a great little tugboat, but after seeing Critter Cove's protagonist toot his way around a sunny archipelago, it makes perfect sense. Announced during the PC Gaming Show, Critter Cove is an upcoming life-sim where making strange contraptions is all part of the fun. Check out the trailer below.
]]>RPS' coveted game of the year 2022, Vampire Survivors, is getting another update, which means there are now even more reasons why you should play this game if you haven't already. Like, seriously. The big 1.5 Overwhelming Update brings with it new brain-overloading shenanigans which you can see in the trailer below, first revealed at the PC Gaming Show. Oh yeah, and the update is available today (June 11th)!
]]>Of the many Starfield elements deep-dove into during the Xbox Games Showcase's Starfield Direct, the ship building was one that we’d previously seen a decent amount of. Yet it also cemented, in quite gleeful fashion, the design tool’s potential as a foundry for some truly wretched space boats. Just, awful. Consider my interest renewed as a result.
]]>Cheery RPS fanzine PC Gamer has their own NotE3 show, don't you know, which this year was packed with almost two and a half hours of fresh(ish) PC gaming announcements. There sure was a lot to get into - and many of the games we saw didn't actually tell us anything new about them. So we've done the hard work for you and rounded up all the biggest and best announcements that caught our eye. So whether you're in need of a quick refresher or you missed it altogether, here are all the most exciting reveals from the PC Gaming Show 2023 that are worth knowing about.
]]>Atlus have become a Persona factory in recent years, producing not only the mainline urban fantasy RPGs but spin-offs like Persona 5 Strikers and the recently announced Persona 5 Tactica. Thankfully they're working on something entirely new, too.
During tonight's Xbox Games Showcase, Atlus announced Metaphor: ReFantazio, a new "high fantasy" RPG from Persona 5's director and character designer.
]]>Okay, so you're not being chased by an army of murderous robots that are only seconds behind you, but you're still jumping around trying to find a new home for the last of humanity who managed to escape a doomed planet. Earthless is a roguelike deckbuilder from Blackbird Interactive, although you wouldn't know it from the cinematic teaser trailer shown at the PC Gaming Show tonight, which was heavy on the dramatic yet hopeful voiceover. As the captain of the fleet, your job is to lead everyone to a safe harbour.
]]>I honestly thought that 11 Bit Studios would have a tough time making Frostpunk 2 stand out from the original game, but from the looks of the sequel's new trailer, it certainly stands out all right. It looks like a very mean game, and I'm sure I'm going to love every second of it when it comes out, which was confirmed as 2024 during the PC Gaming Show. You can check out the trailer below.
]]>If owning forty thousand hammers sounds ludicrous to you, come have a peek at the new trailer for Warhammer Age Of Sigmar: Realms Of Ruin. This accompanies news that the fantasy RTS will run a multiplayer open beta test over the weekend of July 7-10. That will let every orrible scrote in to play 1v1 matches as either the Orruk Kruleboyz or Stormcast Eternals. That's basically Orks vs. Space Marines except their swords aren't chainsaws, okay.
]]>Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty got a new trailer and release date earlier this evening. Developers CD Projekt Red then followed up by sharing the expansion's system requirements, which includes a GeForce GTX1060 6GB or Radeon RX 580 8GB in order to hit 1080p at 30fps as minimum spec.
CDPR also say they're amending the system requirements to the base game and will no longer supporting hard disk drives.
]]>When Mimimi Games announced their latest stealth strategy game Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew back in January, I was pretty darn stoked. You can also imagine my excitement when they said it would be out later this year, too. Not in 2024, or several years down the line, but in the next 12 months. Absolutely my favourite thing in the world, reveals like that. Can't get enough of them. So picture how I must be feeling right now, having just heard Shadow Gambit's actual release date at tonight's PC Gaming Show. Time to mark your calendars, folks. We'll be stealth murdering our way around its Lost Caribbean on August 17th.
]]>The studio behind Don't Starve and Oxygen Not Included today announced their next survival game, a sandbox spaceship game named Dread Pilots. Klei Entertainment this time will send us into a hostile pocket dimension known as the Dread, aimed with only our wits and our wee ship. It's on you to explore, trade, steal, upgrade, avoid, befriend, ally, and murder your way to survival. The game is due to enter early access next year so for now, content yourself with the announcement trailer below.
]]>If you ever became Grand Champion in the combat arena in The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, then you will recognise the little cone-headed gimp who made a surprise cameo in tonight's Starfield deep dive, streamed as part of the Xbox Games Showcase for not-E3. In the case of the upcoming space-themed mega-RPG, he'll attach to your character if you choose the trait Hero Worshipped. He still has stupid hair in Starfield, too.
]]>When solo developer Gareth Damian Martin started teasing they were working on another project together with Citizen Sleeper's composer Amos Roddy and character artist Guillaume Singelin last month, I didn't even dare to hope that it might be another Citizen Sleeper game. I adored the first one - and even picked it for May's RPS Game Club - but the prospect of a sequel seemed almost too good to be true. Happily, tonight's PC Gaming Show brought the news I was waiting for. After a dramatic animated trailer reveal, I'm happy to report that Citizen Sleeper 2: Starward Vector is indeed a real thing, and I spoke to Damian Martin earlier this week to find out all about it.
]]>The Roman Empire may have fallen long ago but Rome has stood for almost three millenia. Think you can do better? Newly announced citybuilder Nova Roma will challenge you to start your own new Roman city away from the crumbling Empire, trying to not just survive but thrive, pleasing both your citizens and the gods. It's made by Lion Shield, the studio behind 2017's lovely medieval fantasy citybuilder Kingdoms And Castles. Check out Nova Roma's announcement trailer below!
]]>Though Baldur's Gate 3 has been in early access for almost three years, it hasn't yet given us, uh, Baldur's Gate. The city which gave the series its name will be a big location in the full game when it launches in August, and today developers Larian showed off its fancy new modern form. It's come a long way since the days of BioWare making Baldur's Gate games in the Infinity Engine. See for yourself in the trailer below.
]]>As promised, Bethesda gave us an extended look at Starfield this evening as part of a dedicated presentation attatched to Microsoft's larger not-E3 showcase. Alongside a fresh look at the game's 1000 planets, combat and skill trees, we were given a closer peek at arguably the most important part of the whole game: its character creator.
Described as the "simplest character creator" the team have ever made, Starfield will let you dig into the finer details of your space captain's face, right down to their teeth for reasons I can't quite work out yet. An improvement on the creators found in previous Bethesda games, there's nothing here that looks particularly innovative compared to other open-world games of this ilk. What's interesting is that this time around, the team have used the in-game tool to create every last one of Starfield's NPCs.
]]>What happens when some folks who previously worked at Blizzard on games including Warcraft 3 and StarCraft 2 go independent with a new studio to make a new real-time strategy game? They make a game which looks quite a lot like 'Warcraft 3 meets StarCraft 2'. That's Stormgate, and you can see that for yourself in the first gameplay trailer, below.
]]>The gang behind Exo One, a game about drinking in dramatic sci-fi vistas while flying and rolling a strange craft across alien planets, have announced a spin-off. It is not a spin-off I would have expected. Exo Rally Championship is an off-road rally racing game where you'll zoom across exoplanets in a six-wheeled car with manoeuvring thrusters. Soar over low-gravity worlds! Dodge through a meteor shower! Gasp at the pretty landscapes! Have a look in the trailer below.
]]>Looks like I won't be regretting every in-game decision I've ever made with Stoic's new game Towerborne. It's an action RPG that looks much more light-hearted than the studio's previous Viking-ish trilogy The Banner Saga, where I killed every character I loved and made a host of bad choices. Announced during the Xbox Game Showcase at this year's not-E3, Towerborne looks much more family-friendly. Which is lucky because you'll be wanting to grab family members, as it's also a co-op adventure. Check out the trailer below.
]]>You'll be meeting lots of NPCs on your jaunt around space in Starfield, but during the dedicated Starfield presentation as part of not-E3, we got a look at one group of rag-tag space folks in more detail - Constellation.
Described in the showcase as a team that's sort of a "mythical group" and "the last true explorers in the galaxy." Their whole deal is that they're trying to grapple with humanity's biggest questions and are on big ol' space quest to find answers. They're concerned with weird artifacts, ancient alien intelligence, and a bunch of other space anthropological happenings.
]]>A new Yakuza 8 trailer reveals its full official name, Like A Dragon: Infinite Wealth, as well as a surprising new location. Seems our boy Ichiban is off to the USA, without his pants. Even he didn't expect that. Watch the trailer below for careful object placement to hide his shame.
]]>"So why go this big with Starfield?" asks Bethesda Softworks' lead landscape artist Matt Carofano at the beginning of a segment in tonight's Starfield Direct. "Because we want to give you freedom on a galactic level," is the unsatisfying response.
Starfield features over 1000 planets to visit, each procedurally generated upon your approach but populated with handcrafted elements. Your "freedom" upon landing on these planets - many of which seem near-barren - is whether you spend your time doing some quests, 'surveying' the local flora and fauna, or shooting rocks with your space laser.
]]>What's a captain without a crew? At the combined Xbox Games Showcase slash Starfield Direct tonight, Bethesda did a deep dive on a few aspects of their upcoming space RPG Starfield - including the companion system. Although, given that you assign them to different tasks on your ship and various outposts, it might be more appropriate to call them "employees". Although again, you can romance some of them, which is definitely an HR issue.
]]>I've been itching to get my hands on League Of Geeks' new roguelike colony sim ever since I first clapped eyes on its 70s anime-infused visuals back in November last year. The good news is that you'll soon be able to do exactly that, as tonight's PC Gaming Show confirmed that Jumplight Odyssey will be getting a Steam Next Fest demo on June 19th. That's just over a week away at time of writing, and having played an early version of that demo myself, I'm pleased to report that it's shaping up very nicely indeed - even if my first attempt ended in catastrophic disaster after I was boarded by half a dozen crews of angry green alien lads.
]]>I do love me a game from The Chinese Room, and Still Wakes The Deep looks to be a right old trip. Announced during the Xbox Games Showcase at this year's not-E3, this first-person horror adventure casts you as a worker on an off-shore industrial oil rig and something seems to have slithered aboard from the depths. Check out the trailer below for some major chills.
]]>Don't Nod are really out here publishing games aren't they? They've already got their ghost-hunting RPG Banishers: Ghosts Of New Eden on the go, and there's also the recently released Harmony: The Fall Of Reverie, and now they've announced dizzying climbing adventure Jusant. You can watch the trailer below, but if you're scared of heights then maybe give this one a miss. Hey, I'm just looking out for you.
]]>I love magical realist Southern Gothics. Kentucky Route Zero, Norco, and Where The Water Tastes Like Wine are some of my favourite games, so Compulsion Games' South Of Midnight immediately has my attention. Announced during the Xbox Games Showcase 2023 as part of not-E3, this new action-adventure looks like it's got major bite and you can check out the trailer below.
]]>Arguably the main event of this year's NotE3 and Summer Game Fest season, tonight's Xbox Games Showcase had more fresh game announcements than you can shake a Series X at. If you missed it or just want a handy recap of every new trailer that went down, we've got you covered. Here's everything that was announced at the Xbox Games Showcase 2023.
]]>2017's Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice did well critically and commercially, and it wasn't a huge surprise when Senua's Saga: Hellblade II was revealed three years back. It's been a little while since we heard more from it, but a cinematic trailer cropped up at tonight's Xbox Games Showcase, and wouldn't you know it, but we got a release window for 2024.
]]>Avowed was announced back in 2020 when a brief teaser trailer made it look like Obsidian's take on Skyrim. A gameplay trailer shown during this evening's Xbox Games Showcase did little to contradict that notion, aside from the non-snowy setting, I suppose, making it seem like Obsidian's take on Oblivion instead.
]]>When Clockwork Revolution's announcement trailer started playing in the Xbox Games Showcase today, I almost thought was a follow-up to BioShock Infinite. An opulent oversaturated city with a hanging railway, heaps of gadgets, a taunting antagonist, a protagonist with reality-altering powers, and a giant baddy with a gunarm? Surely BioShock? Nope! It's a new first-person steampunk RPG from InXile Entertainment, the makers of Torment: Tides Of Numenera. And two of its lead developers worked at Troika on their steampunk RPG, Arcanum: Of Steamworks & Magick Obscura. Come have a watch.
]]>I've spent around an hour with Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty, the one and only expansion for Cyberpunk 2077 starring your boy Idris Elba. Yes, I saw him in the game, and yes, he fits in great. But what really struck me about the new DLC was how it had morphed the overall combat into a chunkier, more flavoursome affair. Whereas before your guns had about as much impact as the buzz of your phone in silent mode, they now feel like they've got some real weight behind each trigger pull. The new area of Dogtown is pretty sweet, too.
]]>It's probably quite difficult, after you've mapped more or less the entire planet, to work out what to add to a Microsoft Flight Simulator sequel. The answer turns out to be: jobs.
Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 was revealed at tonight's Xbox Showcase and it'll include the ability to not only fly all sorts of aerial vehicles, but to fly them with purpose - whether an air ambulance, aerial firefighting, crop dusting, hot air ballooning, or about a dozen other roles.
]]>I'm a fan of Monkey Island, as many of you know, and so hearing the opening bars of the Monkey Island theme during the Xbox Games Showcase tonight was an instant little serotonin booster. Turns out Sea Of Thieves is finally doing the most obvious pirate crossover ever with a free three-part Tall Tale expansion called The Legend Of Monkey Island. Featuring many of your favourite Monkey Island characters (including Murray the demonic talking skull), the first part of The Legend Of Monkey Island will arrive on July 20th - and will be on Game Pass on day one.
]]>A new trailer for Cyberpunk 2077's Phantom Liberty announces a release date of September 26th. It also gives a glimpse of what's waiting for V as she ventures into the brand new district of Dogtown to rescue the president. I hope so much for a gang of wild skateboarders. The trailer also introduces us to the new character played by Idris Elba (Stringer Bell in The Wire, Luther in Luther, Knuckles in Sonic The Hedgehog 2).
]]>Cities: Skylines 2 was revealed a few months ago, but with only a CG trailer and not many details. Now there's a new in-game trailer and at least a vague sense of what the citybuilding sequel will do differently than its venerable, many DLC'd predecessor. Mainly: bigger cities, more simulated cities, prettier cities.
It also brought news of a release date: October 24th.
]]>MMO raids can be some of the most satisfying experiences in multiplayer gaming, so it's a shame that they're so often one of the last things you gain access to after a whole lot of time and grinding. That makes me very interested in 33 Immortals, the newly announced next game from Jotun and Spiritfarer studio Thunder Lotus. It's a 33-player cooperative action roguelikelike which they say offers "ultra-fast runs through a streamlined distillation of the MMO raid experience," with "pick-up and raid" matchmaking. Huh!
]]>At tonight's Xbox showcase, there was a first proper look at upcoming heist 'em up sequel Payday 3. To skip to the end: it looks a lot like past Paydays, inasmuch as it's a co-op first-person shooter that's less about clever breaking and entering and more about mowing down waves of cops.
The trailer also came with a release date: September 21st.
]]>It is still weird that Microsoft started making a new Fable only a few short years after closing the studio which created the fantasy RPG series, Lionhead. But they are, a new trailer from NotE3 reminds us. The trailer doesn't show much of the Fable reboot being made by Forza Horizon studio Playground Games, but it does star a digtal Richard Ayoade, so I'm not complaining. He's nice, that Richard Ayoade. Come meet his digidouble in the new trailer.
]]>Tonight yet another Star Wars game was revealed, this time coming from Lucasfilm (but they all come from them, technically) and Ubisoft. Star Wars Outlaws is, being an Ubi game, an open world adventure where you play as Kay Vess - the Han-Solo-but-a-girl I reference in my headline - and Kay's best alien pal Nix "as they attempt one of the greatest heists the Outer Rim has ever seen." Outlaws was revealed tonight at the Xbox Games Showcase with a trailer that had an extended opening metaphor bit about gambling that was trite enough for me to assume it was a trailer for the Quantic Dream Star Wars game. BUT. I do like the look of Outlaws (currently slated for 2024).
]]>Welcome to our PC Gaming Show liveblog, where we’ll be bringing you some extremely live coverage of PC Gamer’s contribution to the current NotE3/Summer Game Fest proceedings. If it’s anything like last year’s, the 2023 PC Gaming Show will be a breathless barrage of PC-focused game announcements, reveals, and trailers – and myself and Liam will be on hand to relay them all, one or two lines at a time.
]]>We’re rolling out the liveblog widget once again for today’s Xbox Games Showcase, as well as the Starfield-focused Starfield Direct, which will follow immediately after. And will be about Starfield. Come join us – we’ll be up and running just before Microsoft’s main showcase begins at 6pm BST / 1pm EDT / 10am PDT.
]]>Mortal Kombat 1 is surely going to delight fans of fighting games and fans of Mortal Kombat. Having given it a whirl for around 45 minutes at Summer Game Fest, I'm convinced it's gorgeous, gory, and guaranteed to please a demanding electronic sports audience who can actually memorise inputs and string together combos. Yet, the entirety of my time with Mortal Kombat 1 had me desperate for an equivalent to Street Fighter 6's modern control scheme: a simplified remap of the buttons which enables anyone to hop in and do cool moves.
]]>Behind an ominous door next to a pizza joint, I bore witness to 30 minutes of Alan Wake 2 in an extended presentation based on the trailer you might have seen at the sumSummer Game Fest showcase. I didn't get to see any of Alan himself, but I did get to see a slice of horror, investigation, and action as the other playable character Saga Anderson. And without a doubt, Remedy are making a big push for this to be a detective game alongside a survival horror one. My first impressions? Yeah, strong.
]]>Right folks, listen up: from just 30 minutes of Cocoon, I'm already convinced it's one of the best games here at Summer Game Fest 2023. It's the Annapurna one masterminded by Jeppe Carlsen, the lead gameplay designer for Playdead's Inside. And in the 30 minutes I spent with it, I actually sat up on the sofa and did a colossal goblin lean towards the telly in full view of everyone. I needed to commune properly with the mighty insect lad, who hoists orbs that contain entire worlds onto his back in the game's wonderful mix of puzzler and top-down action. He commanded my full attention and he got it all.
]]>I've never been a Sonic fan, but I thought Sonic Superstars looked pretty good at Geoff Fest earlier this week. It's an old-fashioned sidescrolling platformer rendered in a 3D art style faithful to the original games, and it's playable in co-op.
Now there's ten minutes of gameplay footage to let you watch a couple of levels played through in nearly their entirety.
]]>Airborne Kingdom was about constructing a floating city in the sky; you figuratively and literally balanced your construction of homes and industry as you floated around and interacted with settlements on the ground to gather resources. Nate called it an "absolute delight" two years ago.
Now there's a sequel on the way. Airborne Empire starts with the same basics of citybuiilding, but now your constructions will be under siege from sky pirates.
]]>Resistor is a narrative racing game. That alone is enough to intrigue me, but it's also got vehicular combat, a slick art style, and it's from a new games studio founded by the creator of some really excellent Team Fortress 2 shorts. You'll find the announcement trailer below.
]]>Wholesome Direct is my favourite showcase from not-E3, because I feel like it's a show directly catered to my interests. Cats, cooking, seaside towns, pretty landscapes, magical girls - Wholesome Direct has it all. This year we from the RPS Indiescovery Podcast watched the show and have plucked out a handful of games that we're looking forward to the most, which was pretty difficult. There were a lot of great games this year.
There were around 70 games spotlighted during the showcase, so there was no way we could possibly list them all, but we've done our best and here are our bestest best picks. If you're after more gaming news and announcements from this year's not-E3 check out our coverage of not-E3 2023, Summer Game Fest round-up, and Day Of The Devs round-up. For now though, have a pleasant scroll through which wholesome games we have our eyes on.
]]>Adorable exploration and platformer game Smushi Come Home has just been shadow-dropped as part of this year's Wholesome Direct, meaning you can play it right now. The game follows the titular Smushi, a small mushroom, as it makes its way out of a forest to get back home. Along the way, it'll meet and help out many of the forest's inhabitants. If the combination of tiny shroom guy, chill exploration, and light puzzling hasn't convinced you, take a look at the game's launch trailer below.
]]>I'm sad to say that I've long passed the stage where covering a trailer show like Summer Game Fest makes me feel almost nothing, because for me it's a work event where I have to stay up to 1am drinking emergency Fanta, writing posts while I try to remember the name of yer man, you know, from the first game, the guy with the hair. But you know what makes me feel something? An established film and TV actor only bothering to fix his hair a minimal amount before he films a front facing phone camera video to intro a clearly terrible TV based on a game. Goddamn, that's the stuff.
]]>A game of Paradox's sci-fi strategy Stellaris can take so long that, in all honesty, I've never finished it. I always lose interest at some point and start a new civilisation because I mostly want to try out new weird ideas for a new weird empire, not actually rule that empire and fight its endgame wars. That makes me mighty interested in Stellaris Nexus, an upcoming turn-based spin-off which aims to offer a full multiplayer 4X experience in under an hour.
]]>Final Fantasy VII: Rebirth - the second part of the FFVII remake - has finally been shown. Its first trailer popped up at the end of this evening's Summer Game Fest, alongside the news that it'll launch early 2024 on PlayStation 5 and that it will come on two discs. There's no mention of a PC release yet.
]]>Summer is when you do guilty sinful things, right? You wear clothes that expose your unchristian knees and you eat a lot of ice cream, for which you should self-flagellate, and so on. Fittingly, sequel to unabashedly Catholic-y Metroidvania Blasphemous is out on August 24th, as revealed in a trailer at tonight's Summer Game Fest. Blasphemous 2, which was only revealed back in April, looks to be similar to the fist game, i.e. it's a side-scrolling Soulslike drenched in the most bloody and grim Christian imagery you can think of. Category is: Holy See.
]]>If you and your pals have had enough of your usual MMO haunts, why not try something new like Wayfainder? Developed by the folks behind Darksiders Genesis and Ruined King: A League Of Legends Story, Wayfinder casts you as either a rogue, a knight, a berserker, or shooty-shooty person on a quest to stop the evil Gloom from consuming the world. Early access starts this summer and you can check out the trailer from this year's Summer Game Fest for more information below.
]]>Update: Yup, it's official, obvs. More info and better-quality trailers added below.
In this week of oh so many announcements, you can't blame anyone for getting carried away and jumping the gun. Unfortunately for Persona developers Atlus, it seems they accidentally announced two games earlier than intended. Eagle-eyed fans say Atlus's Instagram today posted trailers for Persona 3 Reload, a remake of the 2006 RPG, and grid-based tactics spin-off Persona 5 Tactica. While they're no longer on the Insta, folks say they've saved the trailers so you can see them too.
]]>Day Of The Devs and its indie game festivities returned for this year's Summer Game Fest, once again proving that indie games are good and cool. Quite frankly, it was an hour or so of straight bangers ranging from mind-bending puzzlers to Pokémon-likes to emotionally charged shepherders.
While there's some familiar names in the pack like Hyper Light Drifter and Cocoon, there's a whole host of surprises in there. And that's thanks to the folks over at Double Fine Productions, iam8bit, and PlayStation's indie champion Greg Rice who put all of this together for us to enjoy each year. Below, I've rounded up all the announcements so you can absorb them through your eyeballs and let them rattle around your head until launch.
]]>For lovers of fun co-op puzzle games to have a laugh with friends, here's some great news. Chaotic puzzler Human: Fall Flat is getting a sequel and it looks to be just as much of a riot as the first one. Aptly named Human Fall Flat 2 (minus the colon), it looks like this follow-up will take place on different construction sites - the safest of places on Earth for slapstick and silliness to run free. There's not much we can glean from the short trailer that debuted during the Devolver Showcase at this year's Summer Game Fest, but you can have a watch for yourself below.
]]>Tonight's Summer Game Fest was absolutely stacked with new game announcements and shiny new trailers, so in case you missed it or you just want to recap the biggest reveals from the show, we've gathered them all here below for your viewing pleasure. Here's everything that was announced at the 2023 Summer Game Fest.
]]>For no particular reason, I decided to give Getting Over It With Bennett Foddy another go yesterday. I was then raving about how good it is to anyone who would listen in the RPS treehouse just a few hours ago.
I had no idea that its creator Bennett Foddy was going to reveal a new game tonight. That game is called Baby Steps, it's being made with the makers of Ape Out, and it looks like a mixture of QWOP and Getting Over It set in a beautiful 3D world. There's an excellent trailer below.
]]>I've not played Yes, Your Grace but I hear it's brutal. The idea of being the sovereign of a kingdom and having to make difficult decisions makes me crumble quicker than a piece of shortbread in a cup of tea. But for those looking for the same power-hungry trip they felt in the first game, you'll be happy to know that it looks like developers Brave The Night have really upped the drama in the sequel, Yes Your Grace: Snowfall.
Announced during this year's Summer Game Fest, this follow-up looks equally as tense and you can feast your eyes (or cover them in horror) on the trailer below.
]]>Over the last 18 months or so I have found myself asking, "how often must we play a new co-op zombie shooter?" and the answer has always been "at least once more". It seems to have been one of those things where a few years back a bunch of devs all noticed that there hadn't been one for a while, but didn't realise they weren't the only ones to have noticed until the games all started coming out. Anyway, Saber Interactive revealed John Carpenter's Toxic Commando, to be published by Focus Entertainment, at tonight's Summer Game Fest. It's an 80s-inspired FPS for up to four players, and you shoot a bunch of zombs.
]]>There are still too few video games that feature non-transactional romance. Hopefully Banishers: Ghosts Of New Eden can help change that. It's a third-person action RPG from the makers of Vampyr and Life Is Strange that's about smashing monsters, but its pair of ghost-hunting protagonists are also lovers. A new trailer was shown during tonight's Geoff Fest.
]]>Paradox beamed down into Geoff Keighley's Level Up Pool Party today to announce Star Trek: Infinite, a new grand strategy game arriving this autumn. Stinfinte will let you take command of the Federation, Romulan Star Empire, Cardassian Union, or Klingon Empire. Beyond that, we don't know much. Oh, but the Borg are on the loose. See 'em in the trailer below.
]]>Okay, so he's not (I don't think) going to be in the full game, and if he is it won't be loads, but hearing John Rhys-Davies doing his Gimli voice over the trailer for Dwarf mining survival sim The Lord Of The Rings: Return To Moria is enough to warm the cockles of your 2001 self's heart, isn't it? Coming in that old favourite release window of "fall 2023", Free Range Games' Dwarf 'em up brought its first gameplay trailer to Summer Game Fest tonight, and we saw not only some examples of the building you can do on your quest to - hear me out - Return To Moria, but also the monsters that can emerge from the deep to stop you doing it.
]]>Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 was announced at The Game Awards in 2021, and it resurfaced tonight at The Geoffer's other event, Summer Game Fest. The third-person boltgunner still doesn't have a precise release date, but a new trailer did reveal a full co-op campaign.
]]>For the past three months, I've been gasping to tell someone about the next game from the makers of Mutazione. I got to see a sneak peak of it back in March at GDC, but I've been sworn to secrecy ever since. But at long last, Saltsea Chronicles has made its debut at tonight's Day Of The Devs stream, and I can finally unburden myself and let out 90 days' worth of fizz pop excitement for this gorgeous new adventure game.
Set on a flooded, post-apocalyptic Earth, creative director Hannah Nicklin described it to me like this: "What if you were watching Star Trek, but you get to choose where they go, who's on the adventure and what they get to say?" It's a tantalising premise, especially when it's all packaged up in the same crisp, pastel colour palette as the perpetually stunning Mutazione. The Star Trek reference isn't just for show, either. You might only be visiting different islands rather than whole planets during the course of Saltsea Chronicles, but it does have a natty, Alexander Courage-grade theme tune that plays between its chapters. The most exciting thing about this oceanic trek, however, is its incredibly cool save system that lets you dip in and out of different story branches to explore different paths and opportunities as you see fit. Let me tell you all about it.
]]>Do I want to play another game where someone isolates themselves in hopes of getting over their sadness? Apparently, I do, because I quite like the look of Quantic Dream's Under The Waves. We were first introduced to this underwater sci-fi adventure during Geoffcom's Opening Night Live showcase last year, and now we get to see a little bit more in the new trailer revealed during this year's Summer Game Fest. Take a look at the trailer below, but if you're afraid of the ocean then maybe give this one a miss, yeah?
]]>Kazuma Kiryu is one of my favourite dads. From his humble beginnings as a young man hitting punks with bicycles in Yakuza 0, through his brief time leading a crime family after hitting punks with bicycles, all the way through to hitting a punk with a bicycle for the apparent final time in Yakuza 6, I've loved watching him take half of Tokyo under his wing, and loved watching him hit punks with bicycles. Seeing him back in action in a new trailer for the upcoming Like A Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name, aw, I wish Sega had let Kiryu retire. My poor dad earned it.
]]>Seems like there'll be plenty more bloodthirsty creatures and god-like monsters to get a'brawling with in Remnant 2 - that's the case from the looks of the new trailer revealed during this year's Summer Game Fest, at least. We've already seen a teaser of Gearbox Publishing's upcoming action-survival sequel, but this one seriously pulls out all the stops. You can cast your peepers over the new trailer below.
]]>Some time back I made fun of the preview for Immortals Of Aveum because a) it was quite a silly hands-off preview and b) Immortals Of Aveum is very clearly a game that needs to be played to properly get to grips with it. It's out on July 20th, so not too far away. Have I played it yet? No! Of course not! But we're getting closer to a hands on, and after a six-minute video of the magic FPS in action last month, tonight's Summer Game Fest threw us a big, bombastic boss fight on top of a steampunk Jaeger, or something. I dunno, it was hard to tell over the light show. Those sure are a lot of magical fireworks going off. I like it. Jangle some more keys in front of me, games man.
]]>The devs behind endless runners Alto's Adventure and Alto's Odyssey have just unveiled their next game, under new studio Land & Sea. Titled Summerhill, the game is a story-driven puzzle adventure in which you play as a shepherd and their dog. Summerhill was one of the many announcements in the Day Of The Devs showcase of this year's Summer Game Fest. Take a look at the teaser trailer below.
]]>After yet another wonky adventure into 3D land, Sonic the prickly-pig returns to his native perspective this autumn with Sonic Superstars. It's a side-on platforming adventure with 3D art, and four-player drop-in, drop-out local cooperative multiplayer too. Four! Do you even have that many siblings you need to hand controllers and play Tails so they can pretend they're helping and your mum doesn't tell you off for excluding them?
]]>Today at the Summer Game Fest Max Payne Sam Lake from Remedy came on stage to talk a bit about the studio's second most famous son Alan Wake (2). After 13 years the sort of Twin Peaksy, sort of Stephen Kingy action adventure game is getting a much-requested sequel this October 17th, although this time it's a survival horror, and Alan is sharing screen time equally with an FBI agent co-protagonist. Lake told us a little bit more about said agent Saga Anderson, leading into a first glimpse of "raw gameplay" (as opposed to cooked?) that showed her in action. I have to say, my first impression is that Saga is a terrible FBI agent who is going to ruin the chain of evidence if this ever goes to court because this woman will not put on gloves to handle a goddamn thing.
We've been writing about Palworld for a couple of years, but soon we'll be able to play its unusual combination of Pokémon-like creature taming with machinegun combat. There's a new trailer below that reveals it'll launch in early access in January 2024.
]]>Get ready to bam, biff, and snikt through a new form of ritual combat, as Marvel Snap's new Conquest mode will launch next Tuesday, the 13th of June. That's hot news today fresh from Geoff Keighley's Level Up Pool Party. Conquest is a single-elimination tournament challenging you to climb tiers of the competition to win prizes, including a shot at a prestigious cosmetic at the end of the season.
]]>Black Desert Online, that Korean MMORPG you might remember for having a really detailed character creator that everyone lost their minds over a few years ago, debuted a new trailer for its upcoming expansion Land Of The Morning Light at Summer Game Fest tonight. Said expansion, which is out on Wednesday June 14th (hey, that's soon!) is Black Desert's biggest expansion yet, taking players to a new region inspired by Korea's medieval Joseon era. Do I know anything about Black Desert? Hell no. But can I appreciate a boss fight with a many-tailed fox spirit? Hell yes. Always.
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