Innholdsfortegnelse for September 2020 i PLAY

“PRECISION PLATFORMING GIVEN A TIMEYWIMEY TWIST.” Has it really been more than two decades since Crash Bandicoot 3: Warped first released? The recent N.Sane Trilogy made 1998 feel just like yesterday but you won’t need to keep looking back in time for your furry orange fix – turn your eyes to the future, because Crash Bandicoot 4: It’s About Time has been announced. You won’t have to wait too long to play it, either: Crash will return in his fourth mainline game this October. The original trilogy’s three baddies (Dr Neo Cortex, Dr N Tropy, and Uka Uka) have broken out of their prison, a cage created when the Time Twisting Machine imploded at the end of Warped. Their escape rips along the seams of space-time, exposing the raw edges…

Made up of team members who’ve worked on Dying Light 1 and 2, Dead Island, and Divinity: Original Sin and its sequel, new studio Far From Home has the credentials to make us take notice. The studio’s first game will be Project Oxygen, an ambitious first-person adventure set in a future when humanity has failed, storms plague the Earth, and life on the planet’s surface has evolved into something… new. As the concept art here shows, you explore the world in a customised zeppelin. This mobile airbase will be central to everything you do in the game, it’s your transport, life support, storage, research laboratory, shelter, and escape route. Sounding like Subnautica meets Metro Exodus by way of Dying Light, the game has a survival loop at its core, as…

“We’re seeing confusion about [micro-transactions] in Crash Bandicoot 4 and want to be [crystal emoji] clear: There are NO MICRO TRANSACTIONS in Crash 4.” Toys For Bob clarifies. “Bugsnax,” tweeted Philip Tibitoski, president of developer Young Horses… in 2014. Turns out they’ve been talking about Bugsnax this whole time. “I can confirm that while our art team did continue to polish Pyramid Head, his butt remained untouched.” Dead By Daylight director Mathieu Cote responds to furore over Silent Hill DLC.…

“WEST OF DEAD IS ONE OF THE MOST STRIKING ROGUELIKES WE’VE PLAYED.” FORMAT PS4 / ETA AUG / PUB RAW FURY / DEV UPSTREAM ARCADE Ron Perlman voicing the inner monologue of our dead, flaming-skulled western hero William Mason isn’t the only thing reminiscent of Hellboy in West Of Dead. Heavy use of solid blacks and bold slabs of colour create a comic-book look that draws on Hellboy creator Mike Mignola’s style. Visually, West Of Dead is one of the most striking roguelikes we’ve played, and one of the slickest. The game’s set in 1888, when Mason finds himself without memory in Purgatory, a maze of halls that shape themselves around the cultures and beliefs of those who pass through. Presumably in life Mason was something of a cowboy, as…

“OVER 20 CHARACTERS FROM THE FRANCHISE FINGERSNAPPING THEIR WAY THROUGH OVER 120 SONGS.” FORMAT PS4 / ETA AUTUMN PUB SQUARE ENIX / DEV SQUARE ENIX Unfortunately for Kingdom Hearts fans nothing in this series is ever optional, and it’s always bizarre. For any other franchise this rhythm game would be nothing more than a cute side-diversion. Melody Of Memory is that, but also promises to “hold the secret of his final plan” (possibly referring to baddy Xemnas) and connection to Kairi, so expect some franchise-wide lore to get your teeth into. But if you are just here for the songs, you can expect a lot on that front. Melody Of Memory has over 20 characters from the franchise fingersnapping their way through over 120 songs. So far we’ve seen Sora,…

1 Both Empire and New Republic sides choose from a roster of four classes of starfighter. Parts are unlocked in-game and there’s no DLC planned. 2 Custom parts can change how a ship handles, and they go from simple buffs to meaty weapons inspired by all of Star Wars, from Rebels to recent films. 3 Your pilot can be customised too from head to toe, and this part of the game acually takes place in a prologue set after the destruction of Alderaan. 4 Teams playing online are encouraged to fly as a squadron and plan a mission ahead of launch. You can play with AI replacing other players, too.…

With the Avengers having been disbanded for five years following the A-Day disaster, it’s up to the newly  superpowered Kamala Khan (AKA Ms. Marvel) to get them back together, uncovering the nefarious schemes of Advanced Idea Mechanics (AIM), which filled the vacuum of power with science. Led by the villainous Modok, AIM’s plan to steal the Inhuman superpowers created on A-Day is hidden beneath a PR spiel that claims the organisation provides an alternate way to protect humanity. Marvel’s Avengers’ campaign promises a lengthy adventure where you get to play as Kamala, Thor, Hulk, Iron Man, Captain America, and Black Widow to bring AIM down. But it’s also just the start. As you customise your heroes with lootdropped gear you team up with your friends to tackle War Zone missions…

“THE STORY, AND PARTICULARLY THE OPTIONAL MULTI-CHAPTER CHARACTER ‘TALES’, CAN OFTEN SHOCK AND SURPRISE.” Breathtaking’ is a word often overused with videogames. As we crest a hill and see acres of bright red equinox flowers flooding out ahead of us, white mountains framing the horizon, and a crisp blue sky brightening the screen, this is one game that genuinely leaves us in awe. While Sony’s latest blockbuster has some minor flaws, art direction is not one of them. Based on real events and inspired by movies such as Akira Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai, Ghost Of Tsushima goes light on historical fact and heavy on visual sophistication to ensure its fiction lands its emotional punches. The Mongol invasion of the island of Tsushima is one step away from a full invasion of…

WHAT YOU DO IN… IRON MAN VR FRIENDS & ENEMIES STAT PACK 12 Chapters to the story, with a twist at the end you’ll only half see coming. It’s a chunky VR game. 1 Super-difficult challenge unlocked after the campaign. It’s absolutely rock hard. 2 Iron suit loadout slots, allowing you to choose between setups before setting off on a mission. 5 Research points (used to unlock suit upgrades) awarded for getting a top mission score. HOW TO… UPGRADE THE IRON MAN ARMOUR 1 Take a close look at the armour in the garage. Pick a piece of the suit to tinker with, and hit the Move button. 2 On the next screen, choose which upgrade you’d like (you can preview pros and cons before purchase). You’ll need…

After four games, our belly-dancing half-genie protector Shantae deserves a vacation – what a great excuse for taking part in the Half-Genie Festival on Paradise Island for her fifth. Late for dress rehearsal after chatting with her fellow mystical kind, she narrowly avoids being kidnapped along with her new pals. It’s up to her to investigate the island’s sunken ruins and rescue her four half-genie friends, fusing with their powers along the way. Whereas the last game in the series, Half-Genie Hero, had a more level-based structure, Seven Sirens returns to the freer style of the prior three. Paradise Island is pretty open-ended, and the way you explore and progress is straight out of Castlevania: Symphony Of The Night, from how the map is presented right through to the way…

WHAT YOU DO IN… DISINTEGRATION STAT PACK 9 Hours to play through the campaign. But believe us, it’ll feel like it takes much longer 3 Multiplayer modes to hop into online, all pitting five players against another five. 0 The number of times we actually cared about Romer and co. They’re not exactly likeable. 9 Multiplayer crews to select, each with unique loadouts. You can swap crew mid-match. HOW TO… STAGGER ENEMIES Stagger enemies and you open them up to taking masses more damage. Hitting them with concussion grenades works, as does using ground slam, and catching them in explosions. Dealing damage from behind staggers in Campaign. THE FIRST FIVE HOURS… 1 Escaping from the Iron Cloud, Romer finds an old gravcycle and has to use it to…

With dialogue by Black Library and Warhammer 40k author Ben Counter this is a turn-based tactics game that pulls no punches. Ben doesn’t care if you’ve heard of The Adeptus Mechanicus, or that they’re the weird, tech-worshipping Borg-like pocket of Warhammer 40k’s universe. As your Tech-Priest1 command units bicker in the background like distant relatives at a funeral, you get sucked into the game’s story, a mission to explore the newly-discovered planet Silva Tenebris. Combat is XCOM-inspired: you shuffle units around small arenas, spending Cognition points on abilities – more can be harvested from the environment and Nekron enemies. Unlocked weapons and gear spice up attacks, and character levelling enables you to cross-pollinate classes. Between battles your unit explores a tomb’s rooms from a simple map; choice-led situations arise enabling…

Even though Dying Light 2 is on the horizon, Techland has continued to support the first game with updates, including a fresh piece of DLC, Hellraid, due to be released this summer. It’s a crossover with the studio’s unreleased game of the same name that was put on hold in 2015, and gives fans a taste of that game’s universe as it adds some final challenges to Dying Light. A game within a game, in it The Tower’s inhabitants’ problems begin when they discover a mysterious arcade cabinet, which seems to have appeared out of nowhere, in their basement. (Perhaps that’s the real-life fate of Hellraid too?) Not only does this result in a new area for you to parkour around, the Dungeon, it gives you some hellish weapons to…

Thought Modern Warfare’s free-to-play battle royale companion was big at 150 players? For the new season the player count in the Verdansk map was expanded to a cool 200 in the Battle Royale Quads mode, pitting 50 four-player squads against each other in one of the biggest and most chaotic battle royales we’ve experienced to date. Supply run contracts gave discounts to squads who could reach Buy Stations first, so everyone rushed for those early on, and the new spotter scope helped us keep track of rival teams. More players meant more distractions, so we used the chaos to our advantage. “FOR THE NEW SEASON THE PLAYER COUNT IN THE VERDANSK MAP WAS EXPANDED TO 200.” It wasn’t only Warzone that got new content. The Rytec AMR .50 Caliber, a…

1 “THIS EARLY BIRD SEIZES MORE THAN JUST EARWORMS. A PERFECT ALL-AGES ADVENTURE.” 2 “THE FILM-REFERENCING CUTSCENES AND AUDIO CUES HELP SELL EVERY MOMENT – THERE’S EVEN A BICEP-TESTING BRO-SHAKE.” 3 “DELIVERS YOU STRAIGHT INTO A WORLD OF FIERY MUSIC AND PSYCHEDELIC BRIMSTONE, WHERE A LONELY, FRAGILE CHROME BEETLE’S FORCED TO RACE.” 4 “ A SERIES THAT ONCE DEFINED FPS THRILLS, THE HOTCHPOTCH […] IS A MUDDLED MISFIRE.”…

1 UNCHARTED 4: A THIEF’S END Nathan Drake’s swan song is a daring evolution. It combines series-defining set-pieces, quietly devastating storytelling beats, and sprawling levels that make you feel like a real-life explorer. This franchise finale retains its signature charm, with the wisecracks firing as fast as the bullets, while the new characters each justify their inclusion. With an astonishing attention to detail, it’s Naughty Dog’s best yet. 2 RED DEAD REDEMPTION 2 There are a lot of open world games, but none that make you feel like you’re a part of a world in quite the same way as Arthur Morgan’s wild west adventure. Tremendously physical, an epic story, and some of the most satisfying headshots you’ll ever find. 3 GRAND THEFT AUTO V Laughing in the face of…

Announced at Sony’s Future Of Gaming event in June, Marvel’s Spider-Man Miles Morales confused many: is it a sequel? An expansion? A spin-off? Brian Horton, Insomniac’s creative director on the game, confirmed it’s a standalone entry, and has since shared more details of Miles’ adventure. “SET BEFORE CHRISTMAS, GOOD CHEER IS REPLACED BY FEAR.” Set after the events of the first game, this Miles Morales-focused romp is similar in length to Uncharted: The Lost Legacy, which puts it at around eight to ten hours. SCARY TALE OF NEW YORK The developer clarified the game is set just before Christmas, as snow falls across New York and good cheer is replaced by fear. Designed to expand PlayStation’s Marvel’s Spider-Man universe, it introduces Miles in full alongside new villians delivered with Insomniac…

Former Sony top brass Shuhei Yoshida recently announced PlayStation’s new indie initiative. A self-described long-time fan of the indie scene, Yoshida stated, “Our goal is to make PlayStation the best place to develop, find, and play great indie games.” Along with the initiative, nine new titles were also announced. Check out everything new on PS5 in our rundown starting on p26, and read on for the titles coming to PS4, which prove there’s still plenty of life in the system yet. WHERE THE HEART IS We’ve all got an inner world, but this adventure makes it literal. For example, when protagonist Whit realises he’s lost, memories of his father influence the scene and create a new area to explore. Game director Todd Keller explained, “This reflects how we live through…

Due for release next year for PS4, Zoink’s latest game is a dark fairytale inspired by board games, where everything and everyone is ruled by the roll of a die. At the age of 12 everyone in the land of Random must roll an ‘evil’ die to decide who they are and where they’ll live. Hero Even isn’t too keen on chancing her life to a die, and after her sister does so and vanishes, she has had enough. “DICE ROLLS FORCE RESIDENTS TO SWITCH IDENTITIES.” Lost In Random is a blend of platforming, puzzles, melee combat, and light RPGing, with a visual style reminiscent of Laika and Tim Burton. Even dives into this mix of gaming styles as she explores the six districts of Random (geddit), aided by a…

Pile of win I’m a pretty late bloomer when it comes to PS4 so I’m playing as many great classics as I can. Not in any specific order but just catching up. In the past three weeks since I’ve been home I finished Detroit: Become Human, Until Dawn, and now playing Red Dead Redemption. So I hope everyone is doing well so we can get back to normal life as quickly as possible. Charles Barry via email Yes, we’ve been working through our piles of shame as well – if we’ve got to stay at home, at least that means some quality gaming time. Or in Mim’s case, time watching Nathan Drake die repeatedly. Game on, and stay safe! Scroll down I didn’t think it was possible, but a combination…

1 Horizon Forbidden West We all hoped we’d get a new adventure for Aloy on PS5 – and what a stunner this one looks. It’s straight in at number one. FORMAT PS5 ETA TBC 2 Tales Of Arise It surprised us to see this on your list – but veteran devs working in a darker aesthetic is a tasty combo. FORMAT PS4 ETA TBC 3 Marvel’s Spider-Man Miles Morales Miles Morales slips into the spandex, and onto the third place in your list. We’re all spider-fans now. FORMAT PS5 ETA 2020 4 Marvel’s Avengers Team work, as they say, makes the dream work. And oh, are we dreaming of playing this one! FORMAT PS4 ETA 4 SEP 5 Bugsnax “Kinda bug and kinda snack…” We may not know much about…

“THE MORE ROT YOU CAN GATHER TOGETHER, THE MORE OPTIONS YOU HAVE IN COMBAT.” FORMAT PS4, PS5 / ETA HOLIDAY 2020 / PUB EMBER LAB / DEV EMBER LAB What do you get if you cross arty adventure Concrete Genie with a Studio Ghibli film? Perhaps a little something like this – after all, we can’t be the only ones who thinks the spirits in it look like a mix of the soot sprites and the small Totoro as rendered by your favourite 3D animation studio. The fluffy little guys in question are known as the Rot, and they’re central both to maintaining balance in their forest home and to young spirit guide Kena’s journey. Nothing new can grow if nothing returns to the earth. The Rot decompose whatever is…

WHAT YOU DO IN… GHOST OF TSUSHIMA 8% Thinking: samurai or ninja? Both? 12% Collecting and upgrading every piece of armour. Then visiting the secret dye masters. 4% Wondering if the dialogue choices actually change the story. 57% Stabbing enemies in so many different ways. 16% Enjoying riding around one of the most beautifully art directed worlds on PS4. 3% Go on Jin, kiss the girl you lovable *blorp*. Will they/won’t they finally get together? STAT PACK 59 Character-led side-quests to complete to experience the full story of Tsushima. 7 Mythic Tales to complete in order to track down or unlock rare armour and fighting styles. 16 Shinto shrines to discover. Each one is a large puzzle-platform event to navigate around. 10 Pieces of armour to collect and upgrade.…

Here’s a game you can lose yourself in. You play as Lea, a spheromancerclass avatar, who has lost her memory and can only remain conscious inside the MMO CrossWorlds (which takes place on a real terraformed distant moon – players remotely control avatars using VR-like tech). Her carers in the “real world” hope that by playing the game she can restore her memories. Along the way she makes friends with other players, joins a guild, and, of course, uncovers a nefarious scheme lurking behind the MMO’s gamey veneer. It’s a unique setting that captures the vibe of social PC MMOs like RuneScape or MapleStory. The pixel art is gorgeous and clean, and there’s plenty to the action. Combat has you mixing elemental attacks, combining long-range ball-throwing with close-quarters spins. Each…

Do robot fish dream of electric worms? It’s a question this collection of classic shooters doesn’t care to answer. It’s too busy blasting them back to the factory. There’s no place for narrative in these retro shooters from a time when Paperboy could make headlines, and deliver them. Darius Cozmic Collection Arcade is one of two historical packages released for PS4,1 and this one collects the original coin-op shooters: Darius (Original, New, and Extra versions), Darius II, SAGAIA (two editions), and Darius Gaiden. The 1987 game broke the mould by spreading its action across three screens (transferred here by narrowing the screen to show the full width), non-linear level design,2 and multiple endings. As classic games go this Darius collection feels incredibly modern. The first two games in the series…

After zipping through Warborn’s single-player campaign, it’d be understandable if your giant robot craving weren’t sated. However, the online modes may not be what you’re after. We’ve been unable to match up with anyone on Quickmatch. If you and a bud both have a copy of the game you can deploy into a two-player lobby – however, with very real intelligence on both sides battles become knock-down, drag-out fights. This is less of a problem on maps with fewer points of interest but on a more standard one stalemates quickly sap the life from matches. If fighting a war of attrition sounds like your cup of tea, go for it – but be warned, you’re in it for the long haul as there’s no way to pause things to come…

PREDATOR: HUNTING GROUNDS – SAMURAI PREDATOR Alongside the free update for the month, the legendary samurai Predator, once hailed as a demon oni in feudal Japan, is the second piece of paid DLC content. ZOMBIE ARMY 4 – DEEPER THAN HELL The third and final part of the Hell Cult mission series has the zombie-hunting gang exploring an ancient underground city, battling ancient evil as they work their way through the sacred grounds and surrounding dig site. SAMURAI SHODOWN – WARDEN It’s a surprising mashup at first glance, but SNK coming together with Ubisoft to include For Honor’s Warden makes perfect sense when you think about it. After all, the multiplayer game’s knights are at constant war with the samurai. This is just a new battlefield.…

1 TETRIS EFFECT Tetris, yeah? It might be a great game, but it’s easy to understand why you’d brush this off as just more Tetris at a glance. Yet Tetsuya Mizuguchi’s trippy, transcendent take on the block-based puzzler is nothing short of a masterpiece. Sure, you can play it without PS VR, but in the virtual space it really becomes next level, transforming one of the tightest puzzle games ever made into an emotional ride. 2 THE PERSISTENCE This first-person horror roguelike offers perfectly sized chunks of survival bursts. It’s everything you’d expect from a full PS4 release, but in PS VR it’s filled with clever ideas, unique weapons, genuine jump scares, and fab looks – plus great couchplay. 3 REZ INFINITE Tetsuya Mizuguchi’s vision becomes reality in PS VR.…

FORMAT PS4 / PUB SEGA / DEV RYU GA GOTOKU STUDIO / RELEASED 2017 / SCORE 9/10 This Yakuza prequel is set amid the glowing neon of 1980s Japan, drenched in cash thanks to the booming economy of the period. After about six hours we’re introduced to the game’s second protagonist, Goro Majima, an antagonist in the first game and a bit of an antihero in later entries. Exiled to Osaka by his clan, he’s ended up becoming the manager of Sotenbori’s number one hostess club. Emerging from his office as a drunk customer harasses his staff, this Majima is quite different from the familiar self-titled ‘Mad Dog Of Shimano’. He even has a shirt on (not to mention a fancy tux). Reserved, he calmly asks the customer to stop…

“CASTILLO PROMISES TO BE ONE OF FAR CRY’S GREATEST VILLAINS..” There weren’t too many revelations at Ubisoft’s July Forward online event, but we did take our first look at Far Cry 6, got bloody with Assassin’s Creed Valhalla, and caught up on how Brexit may turn the nation into a bunch of mask-wearing loonies… oh. Let’s start with Ubisoft’s premier open world shooter, Far Cry 6. The fictional island of Yara is lost in time, a place that’s been left behind as the world marched on. It’s not much of a leap to guess the new Caribbean location is based loosely on Cuba, but given the series’ open relationship with reality Yara is more than beaches and colonial architecture. We’re told by an Ubisoft rep that the island features the…

As part of the recent Nacon (formerly Bigben Interactive) digital press conference, French studio Spiders announced its latest project, Steelrising. As with many of Spiders’ offerings, its premise is a wild ride, so buckle up. “EDITOR IAN SAYS IT’S NIER: AUTOMATA MEETS LES MISÉRABLES.” You are an automaton named Aegis, sworn to protect Queen Marie Antoinette. She commands you to seek out the one who built you in order to try to put a stop to the violent machinations of King Louis XVI. The last king of France in our timeline, in Steelrising his response to early revolutionary action is to develop a murderous mechanised army. His robots have since spun wildly out of control, overrunning this version of 18th-century Paris, and the king himself is apparently too drunk on…

As of 22 July, Media Molecule’s Dreams has had PS VR functionality. That doesn’t just mean you can dream a little dream in virtual reality, but that you can create in PS VR as well. The best part? This new functionality is completely free for all existing Dreamers… and you won’t even need a PS VR headset to get stuck in. Once you’ve installed the latest update, you’re able to dive straight into the slew of new PS VR tutorials and Media-Molecule-made creations showcasing what’s on offer. You’ll obviously need a PS VR headset to check out VR dreams but you don’t need one if all you want to do is make a level that’s playable in VR. If you’ve already got all the kit plus some PlayStation Move controllers,…

A Rat’s Quest: The Way Back Home ETA 2021 / PUB HANDY GAMES / DEV THE DREAMERIANS Experience our world as a rat in this narrative-focused platform adventure. Stuart Little’s grubby cousin? Assassin’s Creed Valhalla ETA 2020 / PUB UBISOFT / DEV UBISOFT MONTREAL Live out your Viking fantasy without the need to grow a beard, as the famed sci-fi series heads to Dark Ages England. Astro’s Playroom ETA 2020 / PUB SONY / DEV JAPAN STUDIO Designed to showcase everything Sony’s new console and DualSense can do, this platformer will come preloaded. Battlefield 6 ETA 2021 / PUB EA / DEV DICE The latest iteration of DICE’s sublime shooter series has been confirmed for PS5, and early demo footage looks photoreal. Bugsnax ETA ‘HOLIDAY’ / PUB YOUNG HORSES /…

01 RECOMPILE ETA 2020 / PUB DEAR VILLAGERS / DEV PHIGAMES You’re a virus inside the bit-world of The Mainframe on a mission to achieve sapience and bring about the first technological singularity. Recompile is a metroidvania with touches of Control as you decide how to accomplish your goal: platforming, third-person combat, and environmental hacking puzzles merge to form an elegant approach to narrative adventuring. Oh, and it reminds us of Tron. Whether you choose to go in phasers blazing or embrace your hacking skills to turn enemies on one another, the choices you make matter. As it’s set within a code-world, the entire environment is hackable too. How your AI character develops comes down to your play style, and will ultimately define the game’s ending. 02 WORMS RUMBLE ETA…

1 Judy at Lizzie’s Bar uses Brain Dance cyberware to turn sexual encounters into virtual reality smut, but her videos can show you so much more… 2 Guiding you through editing a Brain Dance, she shows you a snuff movie where you relive the adrenaline high of a store robber until he gets shot in the head. 3 Hopping between layers of audio, video, and even things like infrared you can find out more about the surroundings than the original viewer could. 4 By viewing the tech at the scene, we spot what our robber didn’t: that his buddy shot him in order to make a snuff Brain Dance. Grim.…

“IT’S INCREDIBLY SATISFYING TO SPIN MIXES THAT FEEL LIKE YOUR OWN.” FORMAT PS4 / ETA AUTUMN 2020 / PUB NCSOFT / DEV HARMONIX Few gaming experiences have been more punishing than the toughest tracks in (the Harmonix-developed) Guitar Hero and Rock Band, but in Fuser even when the stage is tricky, the vibes are much more positive and celebratory. As a DJ taking to a festival stage under the guidance of one of a number of promoters (the career mode has you progress through each one in turn), your goal is simple: throw down discs to please an audience. The full game will feature over 100 songs, but you can only take so many records from your trunk into a set, a portion of which is fixed for certain missions.…

“FINALLY WE HAVE A STAR WARS DOGFIGHTER WE CAN CELEBRATE.” FORMAT PS4, PS VR / ETA 2 OCT PUB EA / DEV EA MOTIVE The Death Star II is falling into the atmosphere of Endor, the Ewok rave is raging below, and above the remnants of the Empire are looking for revenge. Setting a Star Wars dogfighting shooter in a post-Return-Of-The-Jedi universe is mana from a galaxy far, far away for many fans of a certain age. Calling back to the heady days of the mid-’90s when PlayStation owners would look forlornly at their PC-owning pals as games built around the X-wing and TIE fighter fantasy topped the charts, Star Wars Squadrons updates that idea, brings it to PS4, and enables us to play the entire thing in PS VR.…

owering above us, the grandiose Dubai skyscraper isn’t just our introduction to Hitman 3, it will be yours too as it’s the opening level. And if your first thought was the same as ours, creative director Mattias Engström is happy to confirm you’ll be able to push someone off the top of it. “[The level] was built intentionally to introduce you to some of our new features for the first time,” he shares. Offering six dense levels at launch, all packed with possible methods of assassinating your targets, Hitman 3 is coming to both PS4 and PS5, and plays host to all previous stages from the trilogy as an assassination hub. “Hitman is in our blood at IO, so there is never any shortage of ideas,” says Engström when we…

Since its reveal at Sony’s Future Of Gaming showcase we’ve learned more about Horizon Forbidden West, enough to know this is going to be an old-fashioned system seller. Set after the events of the first game, Aloy is venturing west into the unknown and mysterious region known in-game as Daunt. Many people from the Carja clan have tried to tame this wild region, and vanished without trace. It’s the Bermuda Triangle of Guerrilla Games’ robo-neolithic world, one filled with new creatures, vast environments, and lost tribes. The teaser trailer released in June revealed a world of epic storms, Jurassic mechanised monsters, and new dangers. Game director Mathijs De Jonge has since shared more details of what we can expect from Aloy’s next-gen debut… I BRAVE NEW WORLD The game’s…

The movie itself might have been a load of guff, but two great things came out of The Phantom Menace. First, John Williams’ Duel Of The Fates (most memorably used in the Darth Maul fight scene),1 and the CG-fest that was the high-speed antigravity podracing on Tatooine. Pleasingly, both of these things feature in Star Wars Episode I: Racer, originally released in 1999 on N64. An arcade-style racer, this is a bare-bones WipEout-style affair. Despite the graphics’ smoothness, they haven’t aged all that well, and there’s an annoyingly small draw distance and occasional distracting environment pop-in. Each of the four tournaments is geared around a different difficulty challenge; three of them have seven tracks, and the final bonus one has four. Each of the 25 tracks is unique, though tracks…

WHAT YOU DO IN… TESO: GREYMOOR HOW TO… START SEARCHING FOR ANTIQUITIES Before you can search for antiquities, you must become an Antiquarian in order to receive the scrying tool. Enter the Antiquarian Circle – it’s next to the Bards College in Solitude – and speak to Verita Numida. After chats and a tutorial, you’re good to go! THE FIRST FIVE HOURS… 1 One of the first vampires we meet… is a friendly one. Hi Fenn! 2 Our first boss. With no house to drop on her head, we kill the witch with blades and magic. 3 We unlock a new pet. DOGGO! Well, wolfo, but you know what we mean. 4 Underground we go. We end up helping some werewolves escape a hairy situation. 5 A gargoyle…

Perhaps a remaster that nobody was asking for, but anyone yearning for a colourful platformer will find that there’s a lot of fun to be found in Bikini Bottom. Spongebob, Patrick, and Sandy1 fight to protect Bikini Bottom from Plankton’s robots, which are terrorising the town, although Mrs Puff is still focused on keeping a driver’s licence away from our sponge at all costs. Priorities, Mrs Puff! The platforming and collectathon nature of the game makes it hard to put down, with spatulas and socks to find, and unique objectives in each level to complete. Whacking Tiki boxes to collect Shiny Objects quickly becomes an addictive task. The three characters share some basic mechanics, but you have to switch between all of them if you want to 100% the game.…

Two objective points per map. One team attacking, trying to plant a bomb; the other team trying to stop them. It’s a setup with all the imagination of ready salted crisps, but wait! Against all the odds, this is not the cookie-cutter experience you’d expect. Thanks to each match consisting of either 14 or 22 rounds, Breakout has both speed and tension. No matter how well you know Warface, put all thoughts of the daddy game out of your mind. Breakout is an entirely different cabinet of guns. It’s a 5v5 objective game with no respawns or revives, so you could be forgiven for expecting a game of careful creeping around and plenty of camping. Although these things do happen, the number of rounds per match (22 for ranked) generally…

As the saying goes: carpe diem. Kill the carp. What’s that? Oh. Right. Er, bit late now. Because ‘kill the carp’ (and many other gilly lake-farers) is kind of a theme here, and a pleasant one at that. You fish for critters in five genuinely idyllic locations, with online play taking one of two forms: two- to four-player matches judged on criteria such as ‘heaviest catch’; or the Dovetail Fishing League, which is split into four series: Hunter, Carp, Predator, and Coarse. Competing online is mostly relaxing, and easy on the eye, but it can become surprisingly intense when a weighty black pacu latches on and you have to constantly adjust your line to tease it home… often while dropping F-words far stronger than ‘fishing’. VERDICT Relaxation slips into boredom…

While Grand Theft Auto III reinvented how we were able to explore a contemporary setting in-game, it wasn’t until Assassin’s Creed II that we got a proper taste of what this would be like within a historical period. Sure, the first entry in Ubisoft’s flagship stealth series gave us the illusion of being able to roam the Holy Land during the Third Crusade as we pleased, but walled-off cities, samey environments, and repetitive mission design left Altaïr’s original adventure feeling small, less ‘open world’ and more ‘city block’. That changed in 2009 when the French publisher’s second attempt at immersing us within a living version of a time gone by launched on PS3. The time period? Renaissance Italy. The setting? Florence, Venice, and other beautiful cities. Throw in a highly…