Innholdsfortegnelse for No. 185 i GamesTM

It wasn’t all that long ago that I was talking up Arkane in the context of Dishonored 2 and its long wait for recognition. The connecting threads between the studio’s supernatural stealth series and its upcoming sci-fi reboot are many, but the one that is standing out to me at the moment is worldbuilding. Arkane has proven itself to be particularly adept in this field, creating a context and environment for its stories that feels lived in, organic and full of history. In the case of Dishonored it’s a history of class divisions, and a world torn apart by the power politics of the elites. The story of this place is written in the posters on the exposed brick walls, in the puddles on the street, the rubbish piling up…

One of the biggest revelations out of GDC came with the news that Facebook-owned Oculus was to begin slashing prices on its virtual reality Rift headset and accompanying Touch controller. The news follows a rough few weeks for the tech firm, after analysts had suggested that sales are slowing and – of course – the court loss to ZeniMax over a broken non-disclosure agreement, which has lead to Oculus being ordered to pay damages of $500 million dollars (a case that may well rumble on as the decision is fairly recent). The Rift and Touch combination will see an imminent price drop from $799 to $598 in an effort to make the hardware look more attractive to consumers, many of whom are wrestling with a purchasing decision between the powerful…

“ Fans can enjoy the definitive version of Mario Kart 8 anywhere, anytime, even with up to eight friends in local wireless multiplayer ”PRESS RELEASE NINTENDO CONCEPT • It’s Mario Kart 8… again. But more than that, it’s the perfect game to show off how much easier and more communal Switch can be. INFORMATION Details Format: Switch Origin: Japan Publisher: Nintendo Developer: Nintendo EPD Release: 28 April Players: 1-8 Developer Profile Nintendo’s Entertainment Planning & Development division was only created in 2015 after two of the largest sectors of its business, Entertainment Analysis and Software Development, were brought together as one team. This is the team that are launching Nintendo onto mobile and diversifying its licensing arrangements. Developer History The Legend Of Zelda: Tri-Force Heroes 2015 [3DS] Miitomo 2016 [iOS,…

CONCEPT • Project Cars 2 is aiming to be the most realistic, progressive and impressive racing game ever released, pushing boundaries in graphical fidelity, handling and dynamic simulation. INFORMATION Details Format: PC, Xbox One, PS4 Origin: UK Publisher: Bandai Namco Entertainment Developer: Slightly Mad Studios Release: Q4 TBC Players: 1-32 Developer Profile Founded in 2008, Slightly Mad Studios is the UK-based studio behind Need For Speed: Shift and community-funded racing simulation Project Cars. The studio has become a respected force in the industry thanks to its realistic physics system and innovative weather system, all fuelled by rampant fan interest and communication. High Point Project Cars was a true achievement in a genre that had long grown stagnant between the duelling of Forza and Gran Turismo. Developer History Need For Speed:…

“Will everyone agree with all of our decisions? Probably not, but I hope everyone sees that the goal is to make a great Dawn Of War.”PHILIPPE BOULE, RELIC ENTERTAINMENT CONCEPT • Set in Games Workshop’s Warhammer 40,000 universe, Dawn Of War III is a real-time strategy game with a focus on interpreting the abilities of different factions. It is the first release in the series since 2011. INFORMATION Details Format: PC Origin: Canada Publisher: Sega Developer: Relic Entertainment Release: 27 April 2017 Players: 1 (2- 6 online) Developer Profile Relic made its reputation with 1999’s Homeworld and has been one of the premier names in real-time strategy ever since. For the past decade it has concentrated the entirety of its efforts on the Dawn Of War and Company Of Heroes…

Contact with Talos I has been lost. Set securely in lunar orbit, a menace – the likes of which we have never before encountered – is threatening to break free and change humanity’s course forever. Talos I was always designed to contain, but this, it seems, is simply too much for the ageing Russian space station to bear. What is the true cost of curiosity? Humanity is about to find out. A vicious and unexplainable alien is running rampant, rebelling after years of experimentation at the hands of various corporations and government agencies. There are some things we were never meant to meddle in; extracting technological secrets from vastly powerful, mutating non-terrestrial lifeforms is one of them – though that knowledge is of little comfort now. Alone you must fight…

Damien Wayne is on the business end of a professional beating. Born into a life of assassins, raised in an environment of heroism, punished with a batarang to the abdomen; it sure is difficult being a child of Gotham. An intricate web of blows break his bones, his limp body ricocheting heavily off of the walls of Arkham Asylum; his screams may echo in its chambers, but through it all you’ll swear you can hear the faint hint of muted cheers and manic button bashing worlds away. This beat down is provided courtesy of a Batman that has been forced far from the realms of reasonable discourse. If the Justice League Of America siding with an authoritarian Superman wasn’t enough of an injustice for Bruce, Robin slitting the throat of…

ATTENTION TO DETAIL IS AMAZING THROUGHOUT, EVEN EXTENDING TO DIALOGUE BASED ON APPEARANCE AND PREVIOUS ACTIONS DETAILS FORMAT: Switch OTHER FORMATS: Wii U ORIGIN: Japan PUBLISHER: Nintendo DEVELOPER: In-house PRICE: £49.99 RELEASE: Out now PLAYERS: 1 ONLINE REVIEWED: N/A Cartography is a pretty tough gig. Or rather, it was, before satellite imagery was everywhere and cameras became a staple part of more or less any gadget. We’re basically cheating today, whereas the mapmakers of old had to do everything by eye and by hand. It’s not just the tech that has been making our lives easy in this regard either. Games are just as guilty, as anyone who has played a Ubisoft open world game will tell you – climb a tower and boom, instant awareness of every relevant…

DETAILS FORMAT: Switch ORIGIN: Japan PUBLISHER: Konami DEVELOPER: In-house/ HexaDrive PRICE: £49.99 RELEASE: Out now PLAYERS: 1-8 ONLINE REVIEWED: Yes There’s really nothing quite like a round or ten of Bomberman . Run around a maze, plant bombs, blow up your friends and attempt to avoid getting fried yourself. It’s a simplicity that’s granted the classic Konami series a healthy dose of immortality, but when an Nintendo Switch launch title is asking 50 hard earned pounds for the privilege of replaying the same concept you’ve played on every platform ever, that nostalgia comes with a bitter aftertaste. This being the 33rd anniversary of the original Bomberman, you’d hope Super Bomberman R would come bundled with a rip-roaring swagger down a three-decades-long memory lane. Instead, you get a…

DETAILS FORMAT: PC OTHER FORMATS: PS4 ORIGIN: Germany PUBLISHER: Spaces of Play DEVELOPER: In-house PRICE: £TBC RELEASE: Out now PLAYERS: 1 MINIMUM SPEC: Windows 7 (64-bit), 2.4GHz Intel Core i5, 4GB RAM, Intel Iris Graphics, 300MB available storage ONLINE REVIEWED: N/A Future Unfolding tells you nothing. Spawning you into a bright and beautiful natural landscape, it gives you no indication of where to go, no instruction on what the buttons on your controller do, no hint about your ultimate goal. Experimentation and exploration represent your only options. In that sense, it is reminiscent of The Witness, a game designed with an intricacy that allows it to guide the player without tutorials: every path carefully drawn, every puzzle panel deliberately placed, every tree planted exactly where it needs to…

DETAILS FORMAT: PS4 OTHER FORMATS: PC, Xbox One ORIGIN: US PUBLISHER: Techland Publishing DEVELOPER: InXile Entertainment PRICE: £39.99 RELEASE: Out now PLAYERS: 1 ONLINE REVIEWED: N/A It’s in playing Torment: Tides Of Numenera that you’ll be reminded of a forgotten age of gaming. Not because it’s birthed from the cult classic Torment: Planescape, nor that its gameplay favours the more archaic, text-heavy form of gaming. Instead it’s because - for the first time in an era - Tides Of Numenera is not just an RPG, but a role-playing game. It’s not a game solely about raising stats and unlocking abilities, though that does still remain a key part of the experience. It’s not a game about numbers, though everything you do is tied to the underlying…

It’s tough to talk about how significant some of the features of The Hobbit truly were – partly due to the fact that a modern audience might find it easy to overlook the archaic visuals and many of the faults that older gamers would recognise of having to deal with machines like the ZX Spectrum. One diehard fan, however, has released an emulated version of The Hobbit named Wilderland that highlighted precisely how those complex systems that made the game so innovative worked. 1 PLAYING ITSELF One of the interesting changes in The Hobbit was that the game would play out by itself. Even doing nothing was doing something, and while that would never solve the puzzle, it was possible to wait and use the game’s characters – who would…

“ Fans called out streaming issues due to intermittent internet connectivity as the top pain point for game streaming services ” For years Microsoft has been telling us that digital distribution is the future of media and with the reveal and rollout of Xbox Game Pass, we can pretty confidently now call it the present. This is not the first subscription program for gaming to have been announced and it is highly unlikely to be the last, but it may well be the best we’ve seen to date. What makes us say that? Because Microsoft has smartly listened to everything subscribers have been saying about other services out there and built something that addresses the number one complaints. “Our fans cited that the right balance of selection, quality, and value…

“As you cling to what remains of your humanity, your decisions will ultimately shape the fate of your hero”DONTNOD PRESS RELEASE CONCEPT • Dontnod brings its special brand of self-contemplation and decision making to England in the early 1900s, casting you as a vampire struggling with his duty as a London doctor INFORMATION Details Format: Xbox One, PS4, PC Origin: France Publisher: Focus Home Interactive Developer: Dontnod Entertainment Release: Q4 2017 Players: 1 Developer Profile Founded in 2008, Dontnod has swelled in size despite its incredibly small portfolio of work. Remember Me released in 2013 to little fanfare, although Life Is Strange immediately put the studio on the map. The episodic adventure was a welcomed departure from the Telltale style, and its success has given Dontnod the opportunity to pursue…

“Each attempt to save the world presents a new randomly generated challenge in this turn-based strategy game”PRESS RELEASE SUBSET GAMES CONCEPT • The FTL team turns its attention to turn-based strategy with a similar level of granular detail and procedurally generated originality. INFORMATION Details Format: PC Origin: USA Publisher: Subset Games Developer: In-house Release: TBC 2017 Players: 1 Developer Profile Subset Games was formed by Justin Ma and Matthew Davis who act as the artist and programmer on the studio’s projects respectively. They formed the studio having both worked at 2K Shanghai with their first project successfully getting funding on Kickstarter. That game was FTL. Developer History FTL 2012 [Multi] High Point FTL is the only title Subset Games has produced so far, but it has been a tremendous…

“ Cyanide has been wanting to make a Call of Cthulhu adaptation for years ”CÉDRIC LAGARRIGUE FOCUS HOME INTERACTIVE CONCEPT • While Sherlock Holmes developer FrogWares was once at the helm of Call Of Cthulhu, development is now being fronted and re-focused by Cyanide Studio. INFORMATION Details Format: PS4, Xbox One, PC Origin: Paris Publisher: Focus Home Interactive Developer: Cyanide Studio Release: 2017 Players: 1 Developer Profile Formed in 2000 by seven ex-Ubisoft employees, the studio was known for its annualised Pro Cycling games, but rose to prominence in 2009 after it took on the classic Warhammer property, Blood Bowl, with Focus Home. Developer History Blood Bowl 2009 [Multi] Styx: Masters Of Shadows 2014 [Multi] Space Hulk: Deathwing 2016 [Multi] Styx: Shards Of Darkness 2017 [Multi]…

Thimbleweed Park feels like a game out of time – never has that statement been made with more love or affection. It’s brilliant and bold; a faithful homage to days gone by and a wondrous return to form for a style of game much loved but long forgotten. Thimbleweed Park is truly the 8-bit LucasArts adventure game that you’ve never played. It arrives with an infectious blend of quirky characters, an expertly crafted narrative structure and all of the witty and sarcastic dialogue Gilbert has been known to produce; the casual pace, ever-ushering you into deeper, weirder corners of the world, and the superbly twisted puzzle design helping to build an undeniable sense of place with this surprising, impressive and reactive adventure game. The game does, of course, lean quite…

FOR HONOR UNLEASHES ONE OF THE MOST CREATIVE MELEE COMBAT SYSTEMS WE’VE SEEN IN YEARS DETAILS FORMAT: Xbox One ORIGIN: Canada PUBLISHER: Ubisoft DEVELOPER: Ubisoft Montreal PRICE: £49.99 RELEASE: Out now PLAYERS: 1-8 ONLINE REVIEWED: Yes A startling trend is quickly becoming apparent when it comes to Ubisoft. While the publisher is known for its sprawling, heavily iterative open worlds – bloated with collectibles, familiar content and cartoon caricatures of whatever period it is brazenly attempting to depict – its finest titles are the polar opposite. Smaller, succinct games with an eye on careful innovation and the unique execution of bold ideas; Child Of Light, Valiant Hearts: The Great War and, of course, Rainbow Six Siege are the key examples. And then there is For Honor, a game quite unlike…

HALO WARS 2 MIGHT NOT BE A SHOOTER, BUT IT FEELS AS ACCESSIBLE AS ANY TITLE WITH A SPARTAN IN IT DETAILS FORMAT: Xbox One OTHER FORMATS: PC ORIGIN: United Kingdom PUBLISHER: Microsoft DEVELOPER: Creative Assembly/343 Industries PRICE: £49.99 RELEASE: Out now PLAYERS: 1-4 ONLINE REVIEWED: Yes It’s no secret real-time strategy remains one of the few genres yet to properly seed on consoles, but what better way to cross-pollinate than one of the most recognisable franchises on the planet? The incredibly talented (and now long defunct) Ensemble Studios tried it with the original Halo Wars and ultimately failed to start an RTS landslide away from PC. So, eight years on, can Creative Assembly work its Total War- flavoured magic and make Halo and real-time strategy co-exist in science…

DETAILS FORMAT: PS4 ORIGIN: Japan PUBLISHER: Sony Interactive Entertainment DEVELOPER: Team Ninja PRICE: £49.99 RELEASE: Out now PLAYERS: 1-2 ONLINE REVIEWED: Yes Nioh opens with a pastiche of Dark Souls’ opening level, with knights and longswords in tow, but after these opening moments the game evolves into something completely its own. The colourful setting of Feudal Japan explores a side of history that we don’t often get to see in big-budget games, save for Samurai Warriors from Omega Force. This unique art-style and area is what gives Nioh its own identity. The levels we find ourselves in are incredibly well thought out, with a level of detail that is scarcely found in many other games. However, Nioh doesn’t adopt the open interconnected world of…

Released: 5 October 1987 Publisher: Lucasfilm Games Developer: In-house System: Commodore 64, Apple II MANIAC MANSION may not have been the first adventure game to grace videogaming, but it was arguably the first adventure game that was actually playable. Conceived in 1985 by up-and-coming Lucasfilm Games designers Ron Gilbert and Gary Winnick, Maniac Mansion was the answer to a problem many developers refused to acknowledge the existence of: that for all of their creativity and potential, many adventure games were simply more frustrating than they were fun to play. In essence, Maniac Mansion became the direct antithesis to every other genre game of the era. Adventure games were, of course, popularised by Sierra On-Line, a studio that found a great deal of success through the likes of Mystery House [1980,…

GRIM FANDANGO • In many respects, Grim Fandango should never have worked. Not only was it the first adventure game from LucasArts to use 3D graphics overlaid across static prerendered backgrounds, but it was also a strange blend of ideas – mixing film noir staples and a Day Of The Dead aesthetic. Grim Fandango was both an overwhelming success and a colossal failure; despite being one of the most critically-acclaimed games of the Nineties, it was a commercial failure that pushed LucasArts to terminate its involvement in the genre. LEISURE SUIT LARRY: LOVE FOR SAIL! • Look, we know what you’re thinking and, no, we aren’t smut lords – we just like to celebrate good gaming! Leisure Suit Larry got himself one hell of bad reputation over the years, but…

“ Another World is timeless – you can play it today and it will still look beautiful ” RAÚL RUBIO, TEQUILA WORKS “My favourite game ever is Another World . I still remember the first time I played the game; I was obsessed with the introduction. I spent weeks just looking through the first few minutes of it. I was familiar with rotoscoped animations before, but to me this was just perfect. Another World is timeless – you can play it today and it will still look beautiful. That was the first game that made me question how video games are made. The further I got through it, the more I was convinced that it was a masterpiece. I always…

“There is a real upscaling of our catalogue and The Plague will undoubtedly be one of the highlights of the next year of Focus”CEDRIC LAGARRIGUE FOCUS HOME INTERACTIVE CONCEPT • A Plague Tale: Innocence sees two siblings trying to escape the horrors of persecution, isolation and swarms of horrific, diseased rats in this intriguing new IP from Asobo Studio. INFORMATION Details Format: PC Origin: France Publisher: Focus Home Interactive Developer: Asobo Studio Release: Q4 2018 Players: 1 Developer Profile There is the Asobo you know and the Asobo you don’t. The former is that of a studio known for its successful licensed titles, while the later is one working off in the shadows and playing with new technology. The studio has a habit of collaborating with other studios to assist…

CONCEPT • Six finds herself trapped in The Maw a tower-like structure full of horrors and creeping threats. Your only mission is to escape. INFORMATION Details Format: PS4, Xbox One, PC Origin: Sweden Publisher: Bandai Namco Developer: Tarsier Studios Release: 28 April Players: 1 Developer Profile Tarsier Studios has been supporting Media Molecule for a number of years now working on DLC and ports of its key releases like LittleBigPlanet and Tearaway. In the mean time it has continued to pursue solo projects, but Little Nightmares will be its first since Rag Doll Kung Fu to get a release. High Point Being lead developer on the PS4 port of Tearaway Unfolded is probably the studios biggest credit to date, but the release of Little Nightmares could well top it. Developer…

1 YONDER: THE CLOUD CATCHER CHRONICLES Format: PS4, PC Publisher: Prideful Sloth Developer: In-house ETA: Q2 2017 This is looking like a bit of classic adventuring to us with a nice mix of cute, cartoonish character design and large, open spaces to explore. The lighting and foliage models alone for this game make it stand out as something a little bit special. The tale itself is about a child seemingly left on an island and suddenly faced with an encroaching darkness that only you can stop. You can interact with other islanders, farm, cook, craft, and brew your way into their lives and go off and explore the environments. With some former Activision and Rockstar experience at the helm of Prideful Sloth, expect some reasonable polish. 2 DEATH’S GAMBIT Format:…

MIMIC The first Typhon that you make contact with, the Mimics are small creatures capable of transforming themselves into various shapes, imitating objects. They ensure the first few hours of the game are riddled with jump scares, giving Preyaninteresting association to The Thing. WEAVER If a Mimic gets ahold of a living human host, it will drain the Psi energy from it by shoving a tentacle down its throat. This leaves the deformed human a husk, which a Weaver is later able to seize control of and transform into a Phantom. PHANTOM God damn these things are hard to take down. Phantoms are the main body of the Typhon’s army, bipedal creatures that can move with great speed and utilise vastly powerful thermal attacks. Load up on shotgun ammo before…

“I SEE GAMES LIKE FIREWATCH AND GONE HOME AS AN EXTENSION OF THE LUCASFILM ADVENTURE GAMES” MANIAC MANSION [1987] The game that kick-started Ron Gilbert’s career and drove an overhaul of the adventure game genre after Sierra’s reign of tyranny, Maniac Mansion is still a classic to this day; remembered for its smart puzzle design, loveable game world and unmistakable, unique sense of humour. THE SECRET OF MONKEY ISLAND [1990] Perhaps Ron Gilbert’s most famous creation, The Secret Of Monkey Island was a revelation when it landed in 1990. Its strange and loveable characters, all inhabiting a sublime world just begging to be explored, the game set a benchmark that others would struggle to match for decades to follow. MONKEY ISLAND 2: LECHUCK’S REVENGE [1991] Ron Gilbert himself credits…

THE TACTICAL DEPTH OF YOUR COMBAT APPROACH SPEAKS TO A DEVELOPER NOT BOGGED DOWN IN THE LINEAGE OF RPG DESIGN DETAILS FORMAT: PS4 ORIGIN: Netherlands PUBLISHER: Sony Interactive Entertainment DEVELOPER: Guerrilla Games PRICE: £49.99 RELEASE: Out now PLAYERS: 1 ONLINE REVIEWED: N/A The fact that Guerrilla has never made a role-playing game before is really the source of Horizon Zero Dawn’s greatest strengths and greatest weaknesses. The Dutch studio has been able to shed decades of accumulated baggage from the genre, striking out in interesting and engaging new directions, but it has also shown its lack of experience and full depth of understanding. The result is a game that is gorgeous and superbly made in many areas, but which lacks a few of the finer…

DETAILS FORMAT: Nintendo Switch ORIGIN: Japan PUBLISHER: Nintendo DEVELOPER: In-house PRICE: £39.99 RELEASE: Out now PLAYERS: 2 ONLINE REVIEWED: N/A Nintendo has a solid history of launching consoles alongside games that truly show off the new trifecta of hardware, software and control method. Mario 64, with the N64 pad analog stick allowing you to have unprecedented control over the portly plumber, all rendered in what was at the time, mind-blowing 3D. The Wii’s motion controllers were shown off perfectly by Wii Sports. Remember that first time you returned a ball on Tennis, while the magic was still intact, and it all felt like complete witchcraft? The genius behind 1-2-Switch is how it is so reliant on the new features of Nintendo’s Joy-Con controllers, which clip onto the side of…

DETAILS FORMAT: Switch ORIGIN: Japan PUBLISHER: Nintendo DEVELOPER: SFB Games PRICE: £19.99 RELEASE: Out now PLAYERS: 1-8 ONLINE REVIEWED: N/A On paper, Snipperclips seems like just another puzzle game. With the Nintendo Switch’s relatively limited launch line-up, a local co-op puzzle game that utilises all the unique features of the Nintendo Switch is incredibly welcome, even if the game itself might seem a little bit lacking. The concept of Snipperclips is that you have to cut shapes into yourself in order to solve physics-based puzzles in addition to working with a co-op partner to unlock new challenges. However, we found that the single-player elements of the game remove half of the fun that Snipperclips offers. Alongside a partner, puzzles become more fun and dynamic as you…

DETAILS FORMAT: PS4 OTHER FORMATS: PC,Xbox One ORIGIN: United Kingdom PUBLISHER: Rebellion Developments DEVELOPER: In-house PRICE: £39.99 RELEASE: Out now PLAYERS: 1-12 ONLINE REVIEWED: Yes Say what you will about Rebellion’s premiere franchise, but there’s nothing quite like finding the perfect sniping nest and systematically headshotting Nazis with a flash of X-rays and a burst of viscera. It may be a world away from the faux historical legitimacy of Medal Of Honor’s glory days, but Sniper Elite has never claimed real world poignancy. It’s a sniper’s playground, plain and simple, and its fourth outing embraces this mantra to the max. The studio’s decision not to embrace an open-world setup initially feels reductive, but it doesn’t take long to get lost in the sheer scope of SE4’s maps. Gone are the…

“It’s a game that I’ve certainly played more than any other ” RON GILBERT, CO-FOUNDER, TERRIBLE TOYBOX “ I really love World Of Warcraft , it’s a game that I’ve certainly played more than any other. It gets back to this sense of place; the reason I fell in love with the World Of Warcraft when I first started playing it – and this was something Blizzard did very differently from EverQuest and some of the other MMOs – was that it was this giant, continuous world. There were no loading screens, and I was just marvelled at the time by my ability to walk from one end of this massive continent to the other and just…

RAZER BLADE PRO MANUFACTURER: RAZER PRICE: £3,499 WE KNOW WHAT you’re thinking… you’re looking at that price tag up there and almost skipping straight over this section entirely to look at the Pac-Man lamp. Well hold your flipping horses, because this might just be the best gaming laptop ever made. The Pro is the big sibling of Razer’s more affordable Blade, and there’s a good reason for that frankly astronomical price – it gives users what can genuinely be called a desktop-level gaming experience in a laptop. Nvidia GeForce GTX 1080 graphics with 8GB of GDDR5X VRAM. An Intel quad-core i7 processor. An insane 32GB of RAM. All of this is condensed into an incredible aluminium body that still only manages to be 2.3cm thick. Add to all that the…