PLAY June 2019

“WE REVEAL THE FIRST DETAILS OF SONY’S NEXT PLAYSTATION. THE FUTURE’S GOING TO BE EXCITING.” GAME OF THE MONTH Days Gone FAVE GAME DUO Joel & Ellie Far from being a lazy spin-off, this issue’s cover game, Wolfenstein: Youngblood, looks set to reshape how we play in BJ Blazkowicz’s alt-history. Co-developed by MachineGames and Arkane Studios it marries the gunplay of the former with the open-ended sprawl of the latter. Read why this matters on p48. We also catch up with Respawn at Star Wars Celebration and discover how Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order (p6) is cherry-picking from the Batman Arkham series, God Of War, and Uncharted; this could be the Force-powered game you crave. Reviews this issue leads on Days Gone (p74), and Dreams (p84) becomes our first 10/10…

Oscar Taylor-Kent GAMES EDITOR Oscar flew to Chicago to cover the Fallen Order reveal, and eat original deep dish pizza. He was in his doughmain. GAME OF THE MONTH Ghost Giant FAVE GAME DUO Junko & Mukuro Jess Kinghorn STAFF WRITER After playing Blood & Truth Jess put her new SAS training to use, disarming Oscar of his biscuit treat. She’s such a nice person. GAME OF THE MONTH Far: Lone Sails FAVE GAME DUO Ico & Yorda Miriam McDonald OPERATIONS EDITOR Dreams is a highlight for Mim this issue. She’s planning an interactive garden. It’ll dreamatically change gaming. GAME OF THE MONTH Dreams FAVE GAME DUO Ratchet & Clank Milford Coppock MANAGING ART EDITOR A huge Wolfenstein fan Milf’s already planning his way around MachineGames’ ’80s Paris. It’s what…

Editorial Editor Ian Dean @IanDean4 ian.dean@futurenet.com 01225 442244 Managing Art Editor Milford Coppock @milfcoppock Operations Editor Miriam McDonald @crinolinerobot Games Editor Oscar Taylor-Kent @MrOscarTK Staff Writer Jessica Kinghorn @KoeniginKatze Editorial Director, Games Tony Mott Brand Director Matthew Pierce Content Director, Games & Film Daniel Dawkins Senior Art Editor Warren Brown Contributors Vikki Blake, Sarah Connock, Jordan Farley, Laura Francis, Malindy Hetfeld, Ford James, Luke Kemp, David Meikleham, Dom Peppiatt, Alex Spencer, Robin Valentine, Ben Wilson Advertising Media packs are available on request Commercial Director Clare Dove clare.dove@futurenet.com Account Director Kevin Stoddart kevin.stoddart@futurenet.com 01225 442244 Subscriptions Head of subscriptions Sharon Todd Circulation Head of Newstrade Tim Mathers Production Head of Production Mark Constance Production Project Manager Clare Scott Advertising Production Manager Joanne Crosby Digital Editions Controller Jason Hudson Production Manager Vivienne Calvert…

“THIS IS A STORY GAME. NO MULTIPLAYER. NO MICROTRANSACTIONS.” As exciting as game reveals are, nothing can quite top experiencing one alongside a hyped-up fanbase, hearing a muffled gasp of awe from a nearby Darth Vader. The long-awaited announcement that Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order was in development was a highlight for many at the annual Star Wars Celebration, held this year in Chicago. Story will be a huge focus for Fallen Order, without the lootboxes and microtransactions that have been prominent features in a lot of recent EA releases. “This is a Jedi fantasy story game,” Vince Zampella, Respawn’s CEO, told Celebration’s audience to uproarious applause, fans waving lightsabers in the air. Respawn is known for being a master of online multiplayer – Titanfall 2 and Apex Legends are…

You might know Mark Cerny as the lead system architect for PlayStation 4, and he’s working his magic again for its successor, which for now is only being referred to as the “next-gen console”. “OUR VISION IS TO MAKE LOADING SCREENS A THING OF THE PAST.” Make no mistake, the next-gen PlayStation is very much a brand-new machine that’s going to move gaming forward. It contains an eight-core CPU – a custom variant of AMD’s Ryzen line of CPUs (if you love nitty-gritty, the cores are a 7nm Zen 2 microarchitecture). That’s coupled with a custom variant Radeon Navi GPU for the graphics. To cut a long story short, these hardware foundations make the next-gen PlayStation a real powerhouse. Ray tracing, which has been key in creating big Hollywood visual…

The next-gen PlayStation’s hardware development is being headed up by Mark Cerny, but that’s not the only thing it has in common with PlayStation 4. While it will be much more powerful, the console’s easy-to-understand and clean system architecture is going to be quite similar. “SOME GAMES WILL HAVE A CROSS-GEN RELEASE ON PS4 AND NEXT-GEN.” This is great news, as it means the next-gen console will be backwards-compatible with PS4. It also means that it will be a platform developers quickly feel familiar with, and one that is relatively easy to develop for. It’ll be a physical box that accepts discs, but it’s unclear quite how that will factor in with backwards compatibility just yet – but with similar architecture, it’s quite possible you’ll be able to play your…