Innholdsfortegnelse for August 2020 i PLAY

“IT’S SUCH AN INTENSE AND INCREDIBLE CHALLENGE.” ”There is a really strange and fun and extremely challenging mission that we unlock after you finish the game,” says Iron Man VR director Ryan Payton. He’s revealing this for the first time. “[This] is only for the hardcore, and I’m very curious to see what happens with the community once they find it and see if they can overcome it because I don’t think that more than 85% of our of the actual playerbase will finish that mission. Wow.” Payton reveals he’s yet to finish this super-secret post-game mission himself. “I don’t know if I ever will do as it requires a level of mastery, that the controls do offer, that even after years of playing I still don’t have,” laughs the…

The sequel to Bomber Crew has its sights set on the final frontier. Brighton-based dev Runner Duck has evolved its plate-spinning strategy game, this time challenging you with keeping your spaceship flying while repelling aliens. You control the individual crew members, making sure they carry out the tasks necessary to keep your spaceship going. You don’t spend all your time staring at the inside of your ship, however: you must actually pilot it through space as you explore and scan to complete missions, in addition to dealing with invaders. Space offers even more unpredictable dangers than the sky. As well as alien boarding parties you need to make sure you’ve got enough oxygen for your crew to keep breathing, that fires are promptly dealt with, and all systems remain online.…

SEGA’S NOT KIDDING Following Streets Of Rage 4 and Sonic Mania, Sega’s next retro revival is former mascot Alex Kidd, with Alex Kidd In Miracle World DX. The 1986 Master System platfomer is getting a visual upgrade, new levels, and added Classic mode for fans who just want to play the original 8-bit game. WARHAMMERING IT HOME Tactical shooter Necromunda: Underhive Wars puts you in close contact with the weird inhabitants of the tunnels of Games Workshop’s world of Necromunda. Create your own gang and send them into the tunnels, customising specialised skills to exploit against AI and human rival gangs alike. WE RE-RECKON IT’S GOOD Kingdoms Of Amalur: Re-Reckoning continues THQ Nordic’s recent tradition of bringing back cult hits with a silly name thrown in. A team-up between The…

“I think people are underestimating the impact that the almost zero loading time is going to have.” Mortal Kombat creator Ed Boon on next gen’s use of SSD. “We’re working on many exciting new projects we cannot talk about yet, but there’s a lot going on at the studio,” teased David Cage in a livestream on Quantic Dream’s new Twitch channel. “Recognising a great idea is a skill that so many have, but creating them is [a] dark art that far fewer have mastered.” Cory Barlog dwells on the creative process.…

Format PS5 ETA Late 2020 Pub Bloober Team Dev Bloober Team, Anshar Studios Rutger Hauer returns posthumously to one of his best-known videogame roles. Set in a future when people are often as much machine as man, this title is heavily influenced by one of Hauer’s most renowned film appearances. Hauer stars as Daniel Lazarski, a detective trained to tackle a particular type of crime. If you don’t want to – or can’t – remember, that’s not a problem for an Observer. Drawn by a message from his estranged son, Lazarski heads to a block of flats only to find himself trapped in the building with a slasher. Every augmented body left in the killer’s wake is a valuable witness, though. Thanks to Lazarski’s own augments, he can plug into…

Format PS4 ETA 28 Aug Pub Deep Silver Dev 5 Lives Studios Caught on the wrong side of a stormy sea, you are a young woman named Kara who’s become separated from your tribe, adrift, and then ultimately shipwrecked on the appropriately named Forbidden Islands. With only the clothes on your back and the will to survive, you have to explore the islands, making use of whatever you can get your hands on. How The Forbidden Islands got their name isn’t immediately obvious, but in fairness you have other priorities. Slowly you discover that the islands’ mystery is interwoven with your quest to reunite with your community. But we’re getting ahead of ourselves. The islands are home to a variety of creatures – both food and foe. But before you…

Format PS4, PS5 ETA 3 Sep (PS5 TBC) Pub Nacon Dev KT Racing Though Codemasters makes the best rally sims on console, we have a soft spot for KT Racing’s fully-licensed FIA World Rally Championship series. There’s a no-frills approach to the sport that, regardless of flaws, always raises a smile. Now it’s coming to PlayStation 5 we’re more excited for this series returning than usual. “DUALSENSE’S HAPTIC FEATURE COULD MEAN WE’LL FEEL RAIN HITTING THE CAR.” The real-world rallies of New Zealand, Kenya, and Japan are heading to PlayStation 5 at the end of this year. (The standard PS4 edition is planned for 3 September.) The gameplay demo reveals the detail you’d expect from a racer with realism on its pacenotes – in-car views reveal lifelike dashboards based on…

Format PS4 ETA Winter 2020 Pub Huya Dev Surgical Scalpels Playing Surgical Scalpels’ impressive zero-G multiplayer tactical FPS feels familiar yet oh-so-different. It’s doing the game a disservice to say it’s simply ‘Call Of Duty in space’ because we’ve been there, and look how that turned out. Boundary is that concept refined, its iron-sighted shooting built around a playful respect for gravity rather than treating it as a gimmick to hang a set-piece from. The controls are responsive, and the game even makes use of the DualShock’s motion sensor to enable us to smoothly tighten our aim over a floating target. It works better than you’d think and feels second nature. You don’t think about adjusting your aim, your hand-to-eye co-ordination just lets it happen. It’s just one of the…

Format PS4 ETA 8 Sep Pub Sega, Atlus Dev Vanillaware Busty fantasy is out and science fiction is in for cult developer Vanillaware, best known for Dragon’s Crown. Painterly visuals and a fresh mix of genre styles persist, however. Focusing on a group of 13 high-school students in a fictionalised version of 1980s Japan, the game takes place during a war between humans and a legion of gigantic, hostile kaiju. Each of the characters is playable, and you’ll learn about them during side-scrolling adventure segments where you can explore and talk to other characters. As you progress you discover keywords that are added to a cloud sync, meaning you can use them to prompt discussion elsewhere. A flowchart helps you keep track of what characters are doing, and hop around…

Format PS4 ETA Summer Pub Bandai Namco Entertainment Dev Slightly Mad Studios The racing toybox of the previous games in this all-encompassing series is becoming a little more accessible – and face it, while some of us love Meccano, often Lego can be more fun. In a bid to open up its box of car joys for all, Slightly Mad Studios is refining and adding features to make all players, of all skill levels, feel part of the club. But don’t worry, petrolheads, if you love an esports-level challenge you’re still covered. It means Project Cars 3 retains its simcade, esports-pro edge and attention to detail while enabling newcomers to feel like they have a place on the grid. “We’ve taken huge strides to make the game more accessible than…

Format PS4 ETA TBC Pub Square Enix Dev Toylogic Inc This is more than a remaster or remake of the first Nier game. For starters, it’s based on the Japanese-only version that starred a handsome anime lad instead of a gruff dad (that one was Nier: Gestalt). The number after the title shows this is a revision that takes it beyond its base number (it is, in fact, the square root of 1.5, so think of it as a halfway step). The game looks gorgeous, the environments remade to match some of the stunning vistas we loved in Nier: Automata. ToyLogic is developing, but with oversight from Yoko Taro. PlatinumGames is also collaborating, bringing tight combat to the game (which we’ll admit was a bit clunky the first time around).…

Format PS4, PS5 ETA TBC Pub Bandai Namco Entertainment Dev Bandai Namco Studios The city of New Himuka is under siege from mysterious creatures known as the Others. As they’re impervious to most forms of damage, citizens have to stay away from where they prowl. However, in Scarlet Nexus’ world – described as “brain punk”, where technology and psychic powers have collided to create an environment with sci-fi and supernatural elements – humanity is not totally defenceless. Yuito Sumeragi is a fresh recruit to the OSF (Other Suppression Force), a new unit whose members use their psychic powers to take on the Others – it’s the only weapon that works. Yuito’s ability is psychokinesis, the power to move things with his mind, and he wants to become an elite psionic…

Format PS4 ETA 2020 Pub Playstack Dev Cold Symmetry Some games allow you to open up new avenues of gameplay by speccing up a skill tree or acquiring new weapons. In Mortal Shell, in contrast, you evolve your combat by taking control of new bodies – the Mortal Shells of the title. In a ruined world where humanity has been pushed to the brink of extinction, you have to explore what remains in an attempt to find out the truth behind your own strange body-hopping existence. The rot that pervades the world has given birth to fanatical worshippers of strange gods, making every wrong turn a dangerous one. The brutal world isn’t just trying to claim your life, but those of many others, ensuring there are plenty of corpses littering…

Format PS5 ETA TBC Pub Sony Dev Insomniac Games Making a new PlayStation feel like the home we grew up in is a brand-new Ratchet & Clank adventure. It’s a full game, built from the ground up for PS5, and while it’s loaded with classic cartoony charm, it could only take place on the latest hardware. The new tech means that robo-buddy Clank is extra-shiny and the alien planets more beautiful than ever before – but the real stars of the show are the dimensional rifts. We see a chase sequence that has the twosome running away from a robot force hunting them down (it seems Dr Nefarious is the returning villain), instantaneously dropping through rifts past impressive scenery and completely different planets. “PURPLE RIFTS PULL YOU INTO A VOID…

“THE POWER OF PS5 ALSO MEANS THAT WE WILL HAVE AN OPTION FOR 120FPS.” Format PS4, PS5 ETA Oct Pub Codemasters Dev Codemasters There are few better ways to experience a new console than with a racing game. Testing the visual performance of a console, they can look photo-mode-ready while the simulations running behind the chaos showcase the hardware’s processing power. On PS5, it looks likely that Dirt 5 will be the racer you need to make your new console shine. “The DualSense is great,” says Rob Karp, Dirt 5’s development director. He goes on to detail how Codemasters’ new racer performs on next-gen hardware: “When we got the tech demo up and running the whole studio came around and everyone wanted a go. It offers something new and unique…

Format PS4 ETA 4 Sep Pub Square Enix Dev Crystal Dynamics This first foray into a whole new Marvel game universe starts with a bang – literally. The prologue chapter introduces us to the starting roster of Avengers heroes (Captain America, Iron Man, Hulk, Thor, and Black Widow) and how they’ll play differently to one another, all while they take on terrorists hijacking a helicarrier. They fail, Captain America dies (apparently), and San Francisco is rocked by a massive explosion. The Avengers are disbanded and Advanced Idea Mechanics takes over looking after humanity, superheroes outlawed in favour of robot justice. Led by the big-brained Modok (a classic Marvel supervillain), behind a facade of justice AIM captures, experiments on, and gains extra powers from the new Inhumans created by the explosion.…

INFO FORMAT PS4 ETA OUT NOW PUB WHITETHORN DIGITAL DEV MAITAN69 STUDIOS Boy genius Evan has gone missing, and in a mysterious letter he asks for one particular young lady, Dysis, to travel to an unexplored island to find him. Nobody knows why he needs her, or where on the island he might be. Cue running from left to right across gorgeous pixelated beaches. You won’t spend all your time admiring the beautiful reflections in the crystal-blue water, however, because strewn along your path are numerous murals. These are platforming puzzles, and to solve each one and progress you need to jump over the pillar at the end.1 Some platforms on the mural stick out, while others are retracted, and generally a puzzle revolves around switching the platforms between the…

STAT PACK 30 DLC packs have been remastered and included in this rerelease. Get those Genki Girl vehicles! 10+ Characters to recruit as homies, who follow you and back you up in combat. 5 Main districts to explore or otherwise wreak havoc in, from Stanfield to Carver Island. 3 Different gangs (Morningstar, the Deckers, and the Luchadores) to claw the city back from. HOMIES & HATERS The stoner has evolved into a career woman. Her trade? Kicking arse. Leader of the oldest gang on the block, Morningstar. A chronically underrated soda salesman, he’s one of your lieutenants. THE FIRST FIVE HOURS… 1 We’ve got to look presentable for our first confrontation with Loren. 2 Our first Brute clone nearly sends us back to Stilwater with our tail between our legs,…

Make no bones about it, being undead isn’t as bleak as those hunters will have you believe. In the subterranean town of Aftervale, protagonist Skully is about to undergo a rite of passage among his fellow anatomical models and remember who he once was in life when his dungeon home is raided and the town Elder is kidnapped. It’s up to you and your wisecracking bat buddy, Imber, to save him and your home. What follows is an action platformer with a few metroidvania trappings. Exploration remains the name of the game but it’s in service to uncovering smaller plot threads that reward you with new abilities. Overall, it’s a brief, Saturday morning cartoon-style romp through the underground – but that doesn’t make it a gentle, whistling breeze through your…

DUALSENSE Packing haptic feedback, adaptive triggers, a battery rechargeable via USB-C for fast charging, a new lightbar, and built-in mic, PS5’s controller is a thing of beauty. PLAYSTATION 5 STAND The console’s stand has been shown propping up PS5 vertically, demonstrating the hardware’s curvy design. Naturally, the new console can also be placed flat on its side. PS5 DIGITAL EDITION This is the same console in terms of power and performance, it just lacks the Ultra HD Blu-ray for those of us who have embraced digi-downloads. It means this edition is slightly slimmer. PULSE 3D WIRELESS HEADSET Delivering stunning 3D audio and dual noise-cancelling microphones, the Pulse 3D headset could be an essential purchase. The sleek, curvy design just heightens our tech-lust. MEDIA REMOTE PS5’s media remote comes with voice…

SOLAR ASH Gravity-rushing up our most-wanted list Format PS5 ETA 2021 Pub Annapurna Interactive Dev Heart Machine The team behind indie legend Hyper Light Drifter is back with a surreal visual spectacle and gameplay built around gravity-defying leaps and skate-like gliding. The camera twists and spins, the ground becomes the sky, and a vast vista of purple-grassed fields and spiral mountains lies before us. Wielding an oversized needle and thread our hero can lasso and pin to platforms as they spin past and hook and swing about the world. It’s Gravity Rush meets Willy Wonka and we’re lacing up our skates for all that entails. SACKBOY: A BIG ADVENTURE Fits PS5 like a woolly glove Format PS5 ETA TBC Pub Sony Dev Sumo Digital We’re entering a new era of…

The developer behind the sensational Project Cars racing series is cracking its knuckles, flexing its arcade muscles, and bringing the car-nage of the Fast & Furious films to PS4 on 7 August. “A BURNOUT-LIKE CHASE IS A DESTRUCTION DERBY WE NEED MORE OF.” In action, Fast & Furious Crossroads features cinematic chases that resemble a cut-and-shut of Burnout and PS2 cult classic Spy Hunter. Sequences mix fire-and-forget shooting with takedown gameplay to deliver something familiar but slickly made. The gameplay demo opens on Dom, Letty, and Roman taking down a massive armoured hovercraft. The ability to jump between the three characters’ cars on the D-pad ensures we can make use of each hero’s unique weapons to chip away armoured sections to ultimately bring the machine to a halt. It’s an…

Frontier Developments is planning a double dose of rollercoaster fun, releasing Planet Coaster: Console Edition this winter for bith PlayStation 5 and PlayStation 4. The acclaimed theme park simulator enables you to create and share elaborate rollercoasters, but with one eye on ensuring your theme park turns a profit. The game’s controls are being reworked for PlayStation. Lead designer Andy Fletcher explains: “We’ve introduced some new control options that allow console players to build more efficiently. There is a radial menu that offers a handy shortcut to the more advanced features, we’ve added a Movement Snap option for lining things up and creating symmetrical arrangements, and there’s an updated Free Camera mode that makes it easier to build interiors and underground areas.” TICKET TO RIDE The team is working to…

Let your pilot stretch their legs, won’t you? Since Elite Dangerous released you’ve been cooped up in your spaceship. Now, with the massive Odyssey expansion, you’ll be able to touch down on planets and explore in first person. “TOUCH DOWN ON PLANETS AND EXPLORE IN FIRST-PERSON.” Elite Dangerous is all about crossing the vastness of space, and what happens on the journey. Switching things up to focus on the minutiae of individual planets from a first-person view while retaining the essence of Elite Dangerous is quite the undertaking, but the devs at Frontier Developments are keen to bring the concepts that have made Elite successful into these planet-trekking journeys. Planetside activities are varied, ranging from combat missions to diplomatic ones. Whether you use stealth or go in guns blazing, combat…

Even as overall representation in games is making strides, in large part thanks to indie studios, it’s still as difficult as ever for me to find a black character I can identify with, due to stereotypes hard-coded into the representation of black people. It’s a cross-genre problem developers need to become aware of to do black characters justice. Stereotyping is often visual: the black characters in most fighting games in particular, with their big lips, giant bodies, and overall threatening demeanour, are racial caricatures so embedded in a large part of the public consciousness many people don’t recognise them as such. That’s where the problem starts, because once you get used to seeing a stereotype devolved from the context in which it was created, you see it as normal. The…

Format PS4 ETA 2020 Pub Crytek Dev Crytek, Saber Interactive Your chuntering PC gaming friends probably asked, “But can it run Crysis?” in the late noughties, when Crytek’s shooter was at the cutting edge of graphics. It was a showcase and set a benchmark for all studios to match up to. As Steffen Halbig, project lead for Crysis Remastered at Crytek reflects: “Crysis set the industry standard for first-person shooters with stunning visuals, highly evolved gameplay, and an enormous sandbox world.” “THE FOCUS IS LESS ON CHANGING GAMEPLAY, MORE ON VISUAL IMPROVEMENTS.” The game spawned countless imitators, though itself shared much with Crytek’s previous game, Far Cry. It had a zeitgeist tick-sheet of features for 2007 (the PS3 version arrived in 2011) that included an open world map and open-ended…

Format PS5 ETA Summer 2021 Pub Everything Is Full Of Gods Dev Everything Is Full Of Gods Shiny, surreal environments are the backdrop for this soulsborne. You play as a golem created by a godlike being, sent on a quest to destroy the cult which has imprisoned your maker. Your surroundings almost pulse as you explore, with things like strange faces looming out of the colours. Developed for PS5, the bizarre geometry makes use of the cutting-edge graphics tech – all those reflections will put its ray tracing abilities to the test. The creatures inhabiting It-Ao wield massive weapons, requiring you to parry and dodge before striking out with heavy and light blows. A hyperblaster allows you to deal ranged damage before closing in for the kill (a little like…

Format PS4 ETA Autumn Pub NCSoft Dev Harmonix On our deck we’ve got pop songstresses Lady Gaga, Lizzo, and Billie Eilish vying for supremacy with a vocal-only interlude. This is the latest game from the creator of Rock Band, and with over 100 well-known tracks to choose from at launch, you can combine a variety of instrumental and vocal riffs to create a mix that’s wholly your own. Rather than feeling disjointed, the three vocalists’ dulcet tones weave together thanks to the impressive music tech bubbling away under the hood. Things like tempo are matched automatically, but more advanced options allow you to fine-tune your mix. However, our next trick really takes the main stage by storm: we spin in Lil’ Nas X, getting the crowd going with a chorus…

Format PS4, PS5 ETA Late 2020 Pub Grinding Gear Games Dev Grinding Gear Games The original Path Of Exile has quietly become one of the best free-to-play games on PS4, a Diablo-like with layers of complexity and customisation, packed with heaps of content, and not shouldered with the weight of intrusive monetisation. It’s simply a great time. “THE ARMOUR AND WEAPON PROGRESSION SYSTEMS HAVE BEEN COMPLETELY REDONE.” The sequel is more of an evolution of the first game than a full-on replacement. Its seven-act story will be playable alongside the old campaign, ending with the familiar Atlas endgame. The new story takes place 20 years after the original campaign, dealing with the power vacuum now that the God Of Corruption, Kitava, has been slain. Expansion content will also be retained.…

Format PS4 ETA 2020 Pub Ion Lands Dev Merge Games Nivalis is a city that goes on as far as the eye can see. Extending for miles in absolutely every direction – including vertically – you cannot escape from this urban sprawl. Protagonist Rania is a young woman who’s just started work as a delivery driver, desperate to make an impression on this never-ending city. You follow her on her first night on the job, zipping round Nivalis in her hovercar, dropping off dodgy wares while asking as few questions as possible. Along for the ride is her eager-to-please AI companion, Camus. Rania’s trying to earn enough dosh not only to survive but also to replace his original hardware. The pair tour the towering city, the dull anxiety at being…

Format PS4, PS5 ETA 17 Nov (PS5 TBC) Pub Modus Games Dev Dreams Uncorporated, SYCK This visually arresting 2.5D world wears its classic JRPG influences on its sleeve. Let’s start at the beginning: your travelling companions are boy-with-a-great-big-shield Chris and fellow time mage Willhelm. Leading the party as Crisbell through turn-based fights, you can send foes into the past or future, manipulating the flow of time to deal massive amounts of damage. In one fight, we send a slimy boss into the future, ageing and weakening their defences so that our blows land that much harder. But be on your guard as not all monsters are sitting ducks in the face of your temporal powers. You encounter friendly faces too. Their fates are in your hands as you can peek…

Format PS4, PS5 ETA 2021 Pub Keelworks Dev Keelworks Created by former Pixar artists, this explosively beautiful old-school shooter looks like being the game that’ll get our trigger fingers flexing on PS5, just as Resogun did on PS4. As a member of the remaining forces camped in the ruins of the planet Cygni’s lost civilisation, you’re the last chance the planet has to repel an alien invasion. Best go out all guns blazing, then. “WE ARE HOPING TO HAVE MORE UNITS WITH THEIR OWN UNIQUE CHARACTERISTICS.” “Nostalgia at first, as we grew up playing shmups since the days of Atari and Amiga,” says Keelworks’ co-founder Meher Kalenderian, when we ask what inspired the shooter’s development. “Followed by the thought of introducing a cinematic approach to the genre – because of…

Format PS4 ETA TBC Pub Raw Fury Dev Art In Heart One of the most charming roguelikes we’ve played is spawning a just-as-lovely sequel, throwing the misunderstood Ikk into another adventure. This time it’s Death herself who needs his help, a mysterious presence having taken over her lair. You need to clear the interloper out for her. The procedurally generated levels are strange and mysterious, though they look gorgeous thanks to Gonner’s hand-painted style. However, each one’s a toughie. This is a game designed to get you used to the idea of dying a lot. It’s only by making those mistakes that you start to learn exactly how the world is constructed, and those generated pieces can fit together. Part platformer, part shooter, you need to protect Ikk’s head from…

“EVERYTHING FEELS CHUNKIER AND MORE GROUNDED, MAKING IT EASIER TO UNDERSTAND.” Format PS4 ETA Early 2021 Pub Bandai Namco Entertainment Dev Arc System Works Since the PS1 days Guilty Gear has been the punk cousin to the likes of Street Fighter: endlessly creative, prickly to get to grips with, and gorgeous – whether the graphics were luscious pixel art or the ‘anime in motion’ style that followed the transition to 3D. With Strive, the developer has taken lessons from past entries, but has transferred everything learned straight to the drawing board to sketch out a fresh approach. What results is something that really does feel new, a blessing in a genre full of minute iterations. The endless anime combos have been retired, and the focus now is on shorter back-and-forths…

“NO LOADING TIMES ENSURES THIS SHOOTER WILL HAVE A RELENTLESS PACE.” Format PS5 ETA 2020 Pub Sony Dev Housemarque The developer of Resogun and Matterfall hasn’t totally forgotten its love of retro shooters in its PS5 exclusive. The game updates the roguelike template and welds it to a fraught shooter set on an alien world that adapts to how you play. A female astronaut crashes on an alien world and is caught in a time loop, every death taking her closer to discovering the planet’s secrets. But every resurrection also changes her and the hostile planet, which alters to fit how you play. There’s a clear Dark Souls feel to the setup but the action appears rooted in bullet hell, from a third-person view, which builds on the developer’s history…

Format PS5 ETA 2020 Pub Bethesda Dev Arkane Studios The prospect of a neverending party will send introverts scurrying up the stairs under the best of circumstances, but Arkane’s imagining an especially nightmarish scenario where even death is not an escape. Colt the assassin has a list of eight targets that he needs to cross off by midnight. His search for each mark is restricted to Black Reef, the aforementioned 24/7 party island. But this party isn’t unceasing due to an inhuman amount of stamina but rather a time loop, with the day resetting at midnight. Colt isn’t just hoping to off his eight marks, he’s also desperate to end the loop. “COLT THE ASSASSIN HAS A LIST OF TARGETS THAT HE NEEDS TO CROSS OFF BY MIDNIGHT.” Rival assassin…

“WE’VE SEEN MORALES SWINGING THROUGH A SNOWY NEW YORK.” Format PS5 ETA 2020 Pub Sony Dev Insomniac Games There was a little confusion the day after this game was revealed, when it was suggested that it would be “an expansion and an enhancement to the previous game.” However, Sony later clarified that this will indeed be a standalone game. This is a game designed to showcase everything PS5 can do. Making use of the new hardware’s ultra-fast SSD we’re promised near-instantaneous load times during fast travel. The DualSense’s haptic feedback will be used to let us feel the tension in every web-swing, and the impact of each punch, web shot, and electrical venom blast. Naturally, Spider-Man Miles Morales will look spectacular in motion. As for the story, we know this…

01 The vista as we enter Downtown is truly impressive, showing even a world ravaged by a deadly fungus can be beautiful and colourful. But where will we find some gasoline? 02 One of our leads first takes us to a synagogue. After we sneak past some Infected, Ellie’s girlfriend Dina takes a moment to reflect on her faith in these difficult, ultra-violent times. 03 However, there’s no gas. So we look for the courthouse. Along the way we pass a checkpoint, finding goodies and a tip-off to a nearby cache that Ellie marks on the map. 04 Before we set off to the courthouse we spy a ruined music shop. Heading inside we find vinyl and instruments, including an acoustic guitar we can use to strum Take On Me.…

INFO FORMAT PS4 ETA OUT NOW PUB FLASHBULB GAMES DEV FLASHBULB GAMES Constructing vehicles out of totally-not-Lego and then driving/flying/sailing them around sounds like a great idea. And that’s because it is. While there are plenty of premade vehicle templates (which you can follow step-by-step or have built automatically) in Trailmakers, this is very much a game that is designed with creativity in mind. If you can think of it, you can build and use it! In theory. Physically putting pieces together, while a bit fiddly, is very simple. Push two blocks together, and bam! They’re joined. You have to unlock some elements (mainly decoration) with coins earned in-game, but from the first second of play you have access to a wide variety of blocks, connectors, engines, wheels, and more.…

WHAT YOU DO IN… THE WONDERFUL 101: RM 10% Wrangling with the third-person controls. 5% Deciding which upgrades to buy between missions. 5% Shoving heroes into doorways and toilets to find hidden secrets. 11% Taking on challenging secret missions until you emerge victorious! 9% Wondering why Wonder-Blue makes you swoon. Oh wait, it’s Apex’s Mirage’s actor! 60% Creating Unite Morphs and whacking countless aliens into the sky. STAT PACK 100 The maximum number of heroes you can employ in each level to create gigantic morphs. 9 Operations for your squad of heroes to battle through, each divided into three missions. 5 Platinum coins to find, deviously hidden in each level, if you like an extra challenge. 18 Hours to finish the game, and that’s without taking time to find…

Retro has become an increasingly big mood in games. Feeling very much like it stepped straight out of a long-forgotten game cabinet and on to modern day consoles, this effort from solo developer Emilie Coyo is a worthy pre-tender. Playing solo or co-op as one of two badass gals, it’s you against evil Queen Evangelyn and her army in this retro side-scroller. While you have a limited range of attacks, punching out waves of military personnel is tight and responsive. Dodging and dashing through stages makes for slick, satisfying action. Mercifully, each stage is broken up into smaller areas, on the whole being relatively brief, mitigating frustration upon defeat and beckoning you back for more. That said, you can easily pelt through everything in an afternoon on easy difficulty thanks…

PlayStation 5 has emerged from the shadow of the DualSense controller. This console is a work of art, it’s no block of unwieldy, ill-shaped hardware that will struggle to squeeze under your TV. This is a fluid, elegant box of tricks deserving pride of place. The console features a glossy black, vented inner wrapped in a curvaceous white shell that draws the eye up and out, hiding the bulk of the machine. Size-wise, PlayStation 5 is slightly fatter than a PS4 Pro but taller when on its vertical stand. The form and flow of the console is even clearer when we get in close to the hardware. The white internal ‘lapels’ of the machine are textured to the touch; the black engine of the console is smooth and glossy. The…

“PLAYSTATION 5 IS A MASTERPIECE OF SYSTEMS DESIGN […] UNLOCKING NEW KINDS OF GAMES AND EXPERIENCES.” Last issue we brought you the first details of Epic Games’ Unreal Engine 5, and its playable demo, Lumen In The Land Of Nanite, running on PlayStation 5. This issue we catch up with the team behind that demo and discover what’s in store for next-gen videogames and PlayStation 5. “The PlayStation 5 is a masterpiece of systems design,” expresses Epic Games’ VP of engineering Nick Penwarden. “Not only is it driving a huge leap in computing and graphics performance, but it is also revolutionary in terms of storage and data compression technology, unlocking new kinds of games and experiences for players to enjoy.” The message is clear: Epic Games loves PlayStation 5. It’s…

For the last two years, Italian survival horror series Remothered has been raising eyebrows. Wearing its influences on its fringed sleeve, it sets itself apart with a pronounced commitment to realism. Yes, there be monsters but you’re unlikely to be grabbed by any fanciful ghoulies – the worst of the lot are human. “PLAYERS HAVE TO TAKE ADVANTAGE OF WHAT THEY FIND [TO] SURVIVE.” Broken Porcelain protagonist Jennifer has already lived a life of hard knocks, but things are about to get far worse. With only her wits and a new, mysterious ability called the ‘Moth Eye’, she must survive long enough to escape the series’ new setting, twisted hotel the Ashmann Inn. As she’s nursing a broken arm, it’s often a better idea for her to hide or run…

Drawing inspiration from EA Big’s highs on PS3 – games such as FIFA Street and SSX Tricky –Maximum Games is bringing super-moves and arcade style back with Street Power Soccer. Set for release later this summer, Street Power Soccer is throwing out the rule book. “Forget everything you know about the sport. No regulation size field, smaller teams, and no match officials – this is no-holds-barred soccer in its rawest form,” says Shawn Cotter, communications associate at Maximum Games. It’s not about the number of goals you score but how you hit the back of the net. Your customised player can master new moves as they rise through the street soccer league, making the most of teleport, reversal, and aerial shots to win. Street Power Soccer is about bragging rights,…

We need politics in our games. There, I’ve said it. Death Stranding is the poster child for this social-commentary-as-entertainment. Its slow drag of delivering one parcel after another across a barren landscape under a ceaselessly grey sky had me reaching for my receipt and the phone number of the nearest CEX. I feel my eyelids drooping just thinking about Koj’s Amazon sim. It’s no surprise then, that it’s taken me some time to finally play it. What I found is a game with something to say. Its plodding gameplay sheltered a political message, and the more I delivered, the closer I came to understanding Koj’s world view: teamwork makes the dream work and staying together is favoured over isolation. Those 60 hours spent delivering packages didn’t seem so daunting any…

Format PS5 ETA Q1 2021 Pub Modus Games Dev We Create Stuff Perception is key to this mind-bending horror thriller. We awaken in the basement of an apartment building, a strange, eerie light flooding in, and when we peek outside a bizarre sea rocks the structure. Darkness pools in the corridors as we search for a flashlight and a way out, and we keep catching sight of something strange out of the corner of our eye. “LISTENING TO TAPES ALLOWS US TO TRANSPORT OURSELVES INSIDE THOSE MEMORIES.” As we progress to the upper floors we finally notice that our mind is playing tricks on us. We look at an apartment; its number is 999… then when we look back it’s suddenly 42. It feels like things keep shifting around on…

Format PS5 ETA TBC Pub THQ Nordic Dev THQ Nordic Barcelona This offbeat RPG originally debuted on PC more than two decades ago. Initially it didn’t find much of an audience outside Germany, but it has since steadily fostered a die-hard fanbase – and now publisher THQ Nordic is going to give those fans what they want: a full remake, coming to next-gen consoles. Known for its morally murky world, Gothic puts you at the bottom of the heap of humanity and demands you dig your way up. Trapped within a magical barrier and tasked with mining precious ore for an overly ambitious monarch, everyone – including the guards that remain – is out for themselves. As such, you’re presented with slightly more complicated choices than simply ‘Do the right…

Format PS4 ETA Summer Pub Hello Games Dev Hello Games Described by the developer as a “short”, this is the story of a lost ember trying to find its way home through a dark forest and ancient ruins full of taxing puzzles, past strange beasts and exotic vegetation. You need to collect flames on your journey so you can light that last campfire, though why you want to light it, and just what makes it the “last” remain a mystery. As you progress through the stages you make your way past embers that have come the same way before, some turned to stone and others decayed into sad-looking little skeletons. (Colourful The Last Campfire may be, but this is a tale with more than a few sombre tones.) However, if…

“HE’S EVIL WITH A THIN STRAIN OF GOODNESS HIDDEN WITHIN, OFTEN FOR SELFISH REASONS.” Format PS5 ETA 2021 Pub Daedalic Dev Daedalic We’ve now had our first look at German developer Daedalic’s take on Gollum. The studio’s interpretation of the warped ring bearer has ended up looking a little closer to the Peter Jackson incarnation than early interviews suggested, but that’s not to say that there’ll be no surprises in store with this version of Tolkien’s iconic, jewellery-obsessed character. Senior producer Kai Fiebig has previously said the team doesn’t want to disappoint those who’ve only seen the films. However, this developer is approaching things from a different angle, referencing the many complex storytelling opportunities presented by games compared to films. As a character Gollum is uniquely complex and demanding for…

Format PS4 ETA 2020 Pub Team17 Digital Dev Aggro Crab Your new internship’s a real doozy. Multi-conglomerate Cubicle is asking those taking part in the Impoverished Intern Initiative to go below and beyond, cleaning out the ruined dungeons of failed start-ups beneath their currently operating businesses. This means running from room to room, clearing them of enemies (such as Joblins and the Caffiend) by using anything you can get your hands on to give them a good whack. Going Under’s a roguelike so you’ll mostly be delving in with a fresh slate of powerups and weapons, picking up new ones as you go, weighing up the risk of finding what you need against how dangerous those areas might be. Weapons break easily too, so you’ll always need to be on…

“EVERSPACE 2 IS AN RPG AKIN TO THE WITCHER 3. INSTEAD OF REALMS WE HAVE STAR SYSTEMS.” Format PS4 ETA 2021 Pub Rockfish Games Dev Rockfish Games Everyone loves a character creator, and fine-tuning all the little details of their protagonist. This space-based game is looking to channel all of that tender loving care into your ship. Using a detailed modular ship-building system, Everspace 2 hopes to avoid a generic-looking fleet of player craft. Every component is designed not only to look appealing but also so that you can tell at a glance what class a ship belongs to. Talk about exploring the the depths of the galaxy in style! Speaking of style, Everspace 2 stands out as it won’t be using procedural generation to bring its planetary system to…

Format PS4 ETA 2020 Pub Enhance Games Dev Tha Ltd Let’s be real here, humans are an odd lot – and we’re not just saying that because we spent our formative years with videogame characters instead of real people. Equally quirky is this game project from design company Tha Ltd. While this isn’t the firm’s first interactive experiment, game development is far from its only wheelhouse as it’s created a variety of visually-led projects. Company head Yugo Nakamura explains, “Loosely speaking, we’re a group of designers and engineers creating a wide range of computer media, including web content, applications, installations, and video.” Talk about a unique perspective. Inspired by the flight patterns of birds and humans’ attempts to understand them, this puzzler was initially pitched as a human behaviour simulator.…

“TONY WAS EXTREMELY PASSIONATE ABOUT KEEPING SKATE CULTURE AT THE FOREFRONT.” Format PS4 ETA 4 Sep Pub Activision Dev Vicarious Visions For a gaming generation and then some we’ve been lacking genuinely great Tony Hawk’s games. But with all the flair of taking some big air to do a perfect 900 flip, the Birdman’s looking to stick a massive landing as the first two games are remastered and updated for modern systems. “The team wants to deliver the game Tony Hawk and the fans out there deserve,” says lead designer Leo Zuniga. “From day one, Tony Hawk has been involved in the game. As soon as we had the game up and running in its early days, he had hands-on time and provided some initial feedback. It was great to…

Format PS4, PS5 ETA TBC Pub Paradox Interactive Dev Hardsuit Labs You may well have stuck with this magazine through various incarnations and console generations, perhaps even going all the way back to the very first PlayStation. To say ‘a lot has changed’ in that time seems like an understatement. Or maybe you took a break from games, only recently dipping your toe back in. If that’s the case, you’re restarting at an exciting time. We sit down with some of the devs behind Bloodlines 2 to discuss Sony’s next console, and their next game. PlayStation 5 presents an exciting future. Hardsuit Labs’ lead creative designer, Rachel Leiker, gives us the developer perspective on using the hardware: “We kind of weren’t expecting it to go as smoothly as it has…

Format PS5 ETA 2020 Pub Sony Dev Bluepoint Games For too long Demon’s Souls (and its enduring fanbase) have been confined to PlayStation 3. Even more unfortunate, they’ve been confined in solitude – and so stuck with teeth-grinding difficulty – because the multiplayer servers were shut down more than two years ago. As any FromSoftware fan will tell you, these games are designed to be explored with a little help from your friends, so that was truly a cursed fate. Even without servers, PS3 is still the best way to experience the original – however, the remake experts over at Bluepoint have been quietly working away on a reimagining. That is to say, this is so much more than a simple remaster. This is a ground-up reconstruction, not a mere…

“SCRATCHES BENEATH THE SURFACE OF THE AMERICAN DREAM.” Format PS4 ETA TBC Pub Hangar 13 Dev Hangar 13 The original Mafia was developed in tandem with Grand Theft Auto III, at a time when open world games weren’t prolific. There were no established rules to follow, and just as Rockstar North set about reinventing how we play games so too did Hangar 13, but with a focus unique to this team. With Mafia, the aim was to tell a cinematic story within a large open city, with the player free to explore but never distracted by a GTA-style sandbox. This was a game that wanted to steer you down its own bloody paths. “It set a new standard for cinematic storytelling at the time. It made quite a statement about…

“IT’S A HOOT – SOLID AND HEFTY, BUT WITH A STAGGERING TURN OF PACE.” Format PS4, PS5 ETA TBC Pub Square Enix Dev People Can Fly, Square Enix External Studios Like a blast from the past, People Can Fly’s PS4- and PS5-destined loot-shooter showcases what the developer is best at: colourful, often gloriously gory, shooting. Having played it we can say confidently it’s a hoot. Solid and hefty but with a staggering turn of pace, and a roster of elemental powers to deliver flexibility when needed, Outriders is old-fashioned fun. For all the game’s comic-book violence and colourful alien vistas, People Can Fly has approached creating the world of Enoch and the game’s setup in a surprisingly detailed way, with realism at the bleeding heart of the story. “Polish culture…

“WE GET TO SHINE A SPOTLIGHT ON THE MURDER IN THE LAND, THE BLOOD.” Format PS4, PS5 ETA Oct Pub Ubisoft Dev Ubisoft Montreal Best keep a bar of soap handy when you play this latest entry in Ubisoft’s history-hopping stealth sim, because it’s going: “To get dirty, it’s going to get grubby, we get to get to shine a spotlight on the murder in the land, the blood and the sweat,” in the words of narrative director Darby McDevitt. “It’s not like the old Hollywood biopics and historical epics of the ’50s and ’60s, which are very, very romantic. We try to bring it more down to earth.” McDevitt has worked on Assassin’s Creed for over a decade, having played a hand in two games that changed the course…

25% Holding our breath as we creep though Infected areas. 5% Jumping out of our skin as a rogue Stalker peels off a wall. 10% Wanting to just hang out with these characters in a non-violent situation. 25% Keeping our heads down as bullets and arrows whizz overhead. 5% Reading Ellie’s journal. She’s no Drakey scribbler, but it adds a lot. 30% Exploring the ruins of Seattle and shoving rags and pills into our pockets. 21 Hours: the time it took us to complete our journey – that’s even longer than TLOU 1! 14 Safes to find and crack if you want to get your mitts on some of the game’s best goodies. 4 Years have passed since the end of the first game. An awful lot has happened in…

INFO FORMAT PS4 ETA OUT NOW PUB LIGHTNING ROD GAMES DEV LIGHTNING ROD GAMES Ever been in a long-distance relationship? Or had to balance one with moving for a job? Then get out the hankies and prepare for the ugly tears because A Fold Apart doesn’t hold back from grappling with the difficulties of matters of the heart. It handles the subject with a massive amount of maturity to create a concoction that’ll have your heart in a whirl, eyes getting watery, even as you solve the blocky puzzles that punctuate the dialogue. It’s designed to be personal from the off, giving you the option to choose from (inclusive) two-character options to represent your in-game relationship – one character has gone to the big city to work as an architect…

WHAT YOU DO IN… MAFIA II: DEFINITIVE EDITION 14% Admiring the details of Empire Bay… 11% …but wishing there was more to do between missions. 15% Feeling relieved as that’s what the included DLC is for; side-quests and more Joe. Perfect. 7% Our eyes! The framerate really chugs in certain scenes. 14% Cruising through the city listening to Buddy Holly and feeling the urge for a burger. 39% Holding the trigger and tearing up the scenery. STAT PACK 50 Retro Playboy Playmate centrefolds to find hidden around Empire Bay. Mature. 3 Radio stations featuring classic jazz, rock ‘n’ roll, and standards to boogie to while you murder. 159 Wanted posters to find. Each features a mug shot of original devs from 2K Czech. 50 Realistic but not licensed vehicles,…