Innholdsfortegnelse for October 2018 i Edge

Birthdays, as our crinklier readers will understand all too well, feel less like something worth celebrating the older you get. Collating the Edge Annual 93, a compendium of work from our first year that we’re giving away for free on iOS, made us feel positively ancient. Yet it’s with no little pride that we sat down late last year and began sketching out our plans for Edge’s 25th anniversary. Our thanks to you for joining the party. Longevity is a precious commodity in videogames, but one man who’s been a constant industry presence throughout our time on shelves is Toshihiro Nagoshi. In the beginning, he was Sega’s arcade innovator; these days he’s its chief creative officer. Oh, and most importantly, he wrote an Edge column for several years. In Collected…

Jesper Kyd has been scoring videogames since the 1990s, emerging from the demoscene to become one of the industry’s leading composers. Born in Denmark but based in Los Angeles, he’s returning home in August with Copenhagen’s Gaming In Symphony concerts, where the Danish National Symphony Orchestra will perform music Kyd has created for Hitman II: Silent Assassin, Assassin’s Creed II, Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood and more. Which came first for you: music, or games? Wherever I went with my family, there were always pianos around, I don’t know why. When things got a bit boring, I would always sit down and try to figure this instrument out. I didn’t really have much interest in learning how to perform on it, it was more like, ‘How does composing work?’ Then I got…

Illustration kaeru.com.ar Alot has changed in 25 years. Dating apps, the Docklands Light Railway, drill music, Google Maps, an entrepreneur blasting one of his own cars into space, the resurgence of the far right, five-pound pints. It is truly a technological utopia we live in, apart from the annoying lack of tricorders and flying cars. On the other hand, some things haven’t changed. Extremely good videogames still have the words ‘Mario’ and ‘Zelda’ in their titles, for one thing. And for another thing, commentators still employ the hoary old line that some cultural product they don’t like is “like a videogame”, even as videogames themselves (titles aside) have vastly changed. During the World Cup, for example, David Runciman, writing in the London Review of Books, considered the prospect of the…

Mastery, or the promise of it, is central to videogames’ appeal. When we first sit down with a new game we fumble around, dying to low-level enemies, bumping off scenery and mis-timing our jumps. By the end, we are in full control of our avatar, blasting through the hardest challenges the game has to offer with grace and class. Yet even during our early struggles, protagonists are perfect. We just don’t know how to use them. So it goes in Marvel’s Spider-Man (p34), which kicks off eight years after Peter Parker got his powers. Our hero is fully formed, yet he’s only as capable as we are; we’re given a leg up by familiarity with similar games, but only later do we become the hero New York needs. Things are…

Developer Remedy Entertainment Publisher 505 Games Format PC, PS4, Xbox One Origin Finland Release 2019 Remedy expects the unexpected of itself. Its latest game, Control, represents the studio’s continued determination to shift its own goalposts. For starters, it debuted at Sony’s E3 conference this year. “We worked with Microsoft Studios on exclusive titles for many years,” creative director Sam Lake tells us. “We wanted to try out new things with Control, and explore new possibilities. Sony saw what we were working on and wanted to include us in their briefing. Being there already makes that statement that we are doing something in a different way.” In other words, the apron strings have been cut. While previous releases such as Alan Wake were bolstered by Microsoft’s influence, the relationship had its…

Developer/publisher Sega Format PS4 Origin Japan Release Out now (Japan), October 2 (UK) You might think this a no-brainer. Tetsuo Hara’s Fist Of The North Star is all about explosive, brutal combat. So is the Yakuza series. So this is a marriage made in heaven, perfect fodder for a quick copyand-paste job. Certainly, there’s enough of the Yakuza games in Lost Paradise to back that theory up. Yet this has been a far more complex project than you might think. Perhaps the biggest problem, producer Daisuke Sato admits, has been the one thing you’d expect to be straightforward: combat. Fist Of The North Star’s Kenshiro may have plenty in common with Yakuza’s Kazuma Kiryu – both are kind-hearted, cold-blooded souls with fists like trucks. But while Kiryu has to work…

Davide Soliani Creative director, Mario + Rabbids: Kingdom Battle Grant Kirkhope’s soundtrack is a key feature. Did you involve him because of his ties with Nintendo from his Rare days? Basically it was because we grew up playing Nintendo 64 games – we all loved Donkey Kong 64, GoldenEye, Banjo Kazooie – that we thought about having Grant on board. From a creative point of view, what I wanted from Grant was to create a fable. I wanted the player to believe that these beautiful worlds were alive and kicking, and also wanted to trigger a little bit of nostalgia for the golden age of videogames. At the beginning of the project, I was a little bit shy with him because for me he was a legend – so important…

For years now, publishers have obsessed over how to keep the disc in your tray and off your trade-in pile, expanding and tinkering with their games long after release in the hope that you’ll stick around forever. That, however, is a difficult thing to get right, and a very expensive business. A far more cost-effective solution, as this month’s Play crop proves, is to simply dump you back at the start of the game as often as humanly possible. In the old days, this was simply how things worked. You got as far as your skills could take you, then when you ran out of lives or credits, you had to start over. We see this ethos in Dead Cells (p112), a game that makes clear its Roguelike structure within…

Developer Dreamworks Interactive Publisher Electronic Arts Format PC Release 1998 They didn’t know it at the time, but when two former Looking Glass employees Seamus Blackley and Austin Grossman decided to create a game about InGen Corporation’s disastrous dinosaur endeavours to tie in with an upcoming Jurassic Park sequel, they set forth an irony that would echo through the ages. Jurassic Park: Trespasser is, perhaps harshly, remembered as one of PC gaming’s great failed experiments, like its subject matter a wildly ambitious project that ultimately ended in catastrophe and saw much of its innovations abandoned. If Sir Dickie Attenborough’s voice wasn’t so synonymous with John Parker Hammond, you could almost believe that the sombre diary entries he reads throughout the game come from the developers themselves, rather than the InGen…

BOOK Sega Arcade: Pop-Up History bit.ly/popupsega Read-Only Memory continues its streak of high-quality videogame history books. Lift the cover, and Yu Suzuki’s most iconic arcade cabinets blossom from within the centrefold, neatly arranging themselves into 3D paper form. From the gaudy graphics splashed across the Space Harrier cab, to the industrial lines of Thunder Blade’s skeletal chopper and the self-contained loop of After Burner, every model is exquisitely recreated and accompanied by original schematics, game artwork and historical context. Funded via Kickstarter, the backer edition features an exclusive silver foil case with the sleek form of Hang-On’s arcade bike deepembossed into it; for those who missed out, the book will be available for online purchase later, although it will feature a printed cover design. VIDEO Uncharted Live Action Fan Film…

Illustration kaeru.com.ar During the almost eight years I’ve been working on Edge, Japan trips have been a rare commodity. I joined the team at the peak of the 360 era, when western developers ruled the roost, and big Japanese publishers were struggling to catch up. So, if there was a trip overseas, it was almost always taking you to the US, and mostly the west coast. Yes, there’d be the odd bit of Canada, and a fair bit of Nordic action. But in my first six years on Edge, I went to Japan once. I just got back from my fourth trip in 18 months. Japanese game development is back. Thank god. When I fell in love with Edge in the early 2000s it wasn’t the reportage on western games…

Yakuza Kiwami 2 PS4 Despite our best efforts, we weren’t able to secure review code for this remake of Kiryu’s second outing in the Yakuza 6 engine in time for this issue’s deadline. Indeed, code finally turned up 24 hours before we were due at the printers, making this an even more agonising final push than usual. Review next month. Forza Horizon 4 PC, Xbox One With the school summer holidays in full swing, the UK’s roads are quiet, and the Edge commute is a rare delight. Yet there’s always a bus, a tractor or a learner-driver around to spoil the fun. FH4’s promise of twisting, barren English country lanes is, as such, irresistible. Life Is Strange 2 PC, PS4, Xbox One With spinoff adventure Captain Spirit hinting at two…

Developer Moon Studios Publisher Microsoft Studios Format PC, Xbox One Origin Austria Release 2019 Moon Studios makes a point of sweating the small stuff. Its debut, Ori And The Blind Forest, proved this admirably: every hand-drawn mushroom and tree unique, every button press delivering total control over the titular guardian spirit. Alongside a heart-wrenching story, the Metroidvania platformer’s detail-oriented approach made it a critical and commercial hit. But a perfectionist’s work is never done. So when, at a hotel during The Game Awards 2015, producer Mark Coates bemoaned the lack of a sequel to play with his young children, the idea niggled at game director Thomas Mahler. “He brought up the whole idea that it would be so great to finish the story, and look at it from a perspective…

Developer Bild Und Tonfabrik Publisher Headup Games Format PC, PS4, Xbox One, Switch Origin Germany Release 2018 U p close, Bild Und Tonfabrik’s miniature world is a marvel. Well, town – the rural locale of Trüberbrook is small but exquisitely formed, every tree, rock and building hand-crafted from real materials and scanned into digital existence. The result is a wonderfully uncanny setting that looks halfreal, 3D models made to look almost 2D with flat compositions cast in limpid, golden light. If Wes Anderson made a videogame, it’d probably look something like this. Twin Peaks is the other obvious point of reference for this point-and-click adventure, which casts you as a young American physicist who’s won a mini-break in the strange town of Trüberbrook (despite his inability to recall ever entering…

David Braben says that Elite Dangerous tells one big lie, the lie that faster than light travel is possible. “When you start looking at the equations, how on Earth can something as fragile as a human not get ripped to shreds by the process of going through hyperspace? But hyperspace isn’t ruled out by physics!” he quickly adds, revealing his discomfort with the fact that Elite Dangerous has to interfere with the veracity of its 1:1 recreation of the Milky Way, which was closely based on the latest astronomical data and modelling when it was being made. But it had to function as a game, even if Braben wanted to complete the dream he started to realise on a BBC Micro in the form of 1984’s original Elite. After all,…

Developer Acquire Publisher Square Enix Format Switch Release Out now Each of Octopath Traveler’s eight playable characters seems, in some way, to reflect the JRPG maker’s dilemma. They’re either caught between the comforts of home and the allure of what lies beyond, or otherwise held captive by their past. Take happy-golucky merchant Tressa, blissfully content in her idyllic coastal village before a chance encounter encourages her to seek her fortune outside its boundaries. Or Olberic, a nomadic mercenary, who has finally found a place to settle down, until an echo of his former life sets him back on the road again. Then there’s dancer Primrose, demeaning herself for an abusive boss to track down the tattooed men responsible for her father’s death. It’s not hard to see something of the…

This year marks Gamescom’s tenth anniversary. In Cologne’s Koelnmesse, the conference brings together industry professionals and gaming enthusiasts from all over the world. It continues to grow: 100,000 square metres in 2009 more than doubled to 210,000 in 2017. The exhibitor count is now nearly 1,000, and last year 355,000 visitors attended the show. A decade of successful business and community building is no mean feat, considering some publishers are now moving away from trade shows to put on separate events. But Gamescom’s magic is in its melting pot. Here, project director Tim Endres explains how to create a space that represents everyone – and that is, by extension, something all the big players will still want a slice of for years to come. How did you come up with…

Over in Japan, the barcade scene is in trouble. A swathe of venues have been closed down, or have dropped shutters voluntarily, after rights holders invoked longstanding licensing laws that prevent games being used for commercial purposes. Whether that will come west is unclear, but if it does, enter Arcade1up. This US start-up is launching a series of three-quarter-scale arcade cabinets that are aimed primarily at the home but, thanks to being officially licensed, could help barcade owners skirt the copyright lawyers too. Until now, having proper arcade hardware in your house has been a pain: cabinets are hard to find, transport and maintain. The company’s five-strong launch lineup each retail for a reasonable $399, contain a 17” LCD screen, and can be assembled from replaceable parts in minutes using…

Crosseyed and painless I deliver a lecture as part of a public health module each year on the relationship between violence and videogames. One of the exercises I give the students involves splitting the group in half, giving one half Flappy Bird to play, the other survival horror Dead Trigger 2, and then seeing which group subsequently feels het up enough to want to strangle the person sitting next to them (spoiler alert: it’s not the group who’ve just gorged a zombie’s eyes out in their game). So I’m basically an advocate of the wealth of evidence which now exists that videogames in themselves don’t cause players to have a predilection for violence any more than having to endure Piers Morgan first thing in the morning. Personally I’ve veered towards…

Illustration kaeru.com.ar So we have finalised our publisher, and therefore our budget and our rough release date, which means we are hiring a community manager – and I am conflicted about it. These days, having someone on board full-time who can communicate with players, bring news back from the battlefield of complaints and issues and bugs, or help your latest trailer find its audience, is crucial. More and more, however, I find the role and its impact on games troubling. Interfacing too much with your audience during development can make the act of creation an attempt to satisfy a moving, poorly defined series of requests from a possible audience instead of a focused, planned execution of a (hopefully) fresh and coherent idea. Interacting too much with them after release has,…

Developer Insomniac Games Publisher SIE Format PS4 Origin US Release September 7 The promise of inhabiting Spider-Man’s body – a long-limbed figure imbued with unlikely grace, tracing arabesques through the Manhattan skyline – is an easy sell. Filling the more earthbound shoes of Peter Parker, though, a man who is constantly behind on his rent and late to social occasions? That’s not so much amazing fantasy as it is lived experience. But Insomniac Games is insistent about pushing Spidey’s all-too-human alter ego into the spotlight. This becomes apparent in the very first moments of the game, as Peter wakes up in his apartment and we pan across an assortment of characterful domestic items: abandoned takeaway cartons, Nerf darts, a homemade smart toaster and – of course – an empty savings…

Developer/publisher Tigertron Format PS4, PSVR Origin US Release 2018 Most days, we’re sat between the same four walls, working within familiar limits; today, we find ourselves suspended just below the surface of the ocean. A deep, dark expanse falls away beneath our feet. Our stomach follows suit. VR adventure Jupiter & Mars is set in the ocean of an apocalyptic future Earth that probably isn’t far off, when you think about it. And the point is to think about it. Environmentally-focused studio Tigertron’s first game attempts to reconnect us both with nature, and our relationship to it. It’s a story about two dolphins – the titular Jupiter and Mars – working together to navigate the mess left behind by mankind. Creative director James Mielke had his own moment of reconnection…

Format Switch Developer/publisher Ubisoft (Milan, Paris) Origin France, Italy Release 2017 There is, even now, a note of disbelief in Davide Soliani’s voice. As he talks about the game that has consumed the last four years of his life, he can’t stop referring to it as “a dream”. Indeed, you sense the creative director of Mario + Rabbids: Kingdom Battle is still pinching himself, having spent so much quality time lately with a bona fide videogame icon, a character who had been part of his life “even before he had a name”. Yet it was in the N64 era where Soliani’s love affair with Mario began in earnest. “I remember arriving at the videogame shop in Milan by motorcycle, dropping it on the floor without even caring about parking it,…

Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker Switch Nintendo’s pint-sized adventurer and his compact stages are a snug fit for Switch, particularly in handheld mode: the original’s forced tilt controls are absent, thankfully, and the hakoniwa-style levels look brighter and crisper than they ever did on the GamePad. An omnipresent cursor in docked mode is annoying, but the Odyssey-themed courses are this re-release’s only real disappointment. Not because they’re bad – quite the opposite – but because Nintendo has only included a miserly four. Mario + Rabbids: Kingdom Battle Switch This is immaculate DLC making, expanding on the base game’s mechanics while simultaneously turning them on their head. Donkey Kong is a revelation in this generous, ten-hour expansion, his ability to pick up and throw objects – including not just scenery, but enemies…

Developer Stoic Publisher Versus Evil Format PC (tested), PS4, Switch Release Out now Throughout Stoic’s gruelling adventure, death has always been in close proximity. Until now, it’s been forever at our heroes’ backs, its looming shadow getting inexorably closer as they’ve desperately tried – and occasionally failed – to stay one step ahead of it. Now, in the besieged city of Arberrang, it’s all around them. Its walls are just about holding together under the assault of those trying to get inside as darkness threatens to engulf the land; instead, it’s collapsing from within, the dire circumstances forcing old animosities to resurface, prejudices to come spilling out, and lawlessness to reign. It’s a bold choice to confine half the game to a single location, even if the place is big…