ARK Survival Evolved is Coming to Switch

PlayStation

• Developer Sony Santa Monica has revealed that it’d love to add a photo mode to the gorgeous upcoming God of War title.

• The clock is ticking on your ability to earn $65 from the original PS3 class-action lawsuit. It was originally $55 but few people actually signed up. If you bought an original PS3, knew about and used the Other OS feature, and felt like the PS3 lost value after it’s removal, you can sign up for the settlement here.

Nintendo

• Nintendo had their Nindie Showcase for 2018. Here was everything announced:

  • Mark of the Ninja remastered fall 2018
    • Fantasy Strike is a new fighting game summer 2018
    • Just Shapes and Beats summer 2018
    • Garage is a top down horror shooter summer 2018
    • Pool Panic system exclusive 2018
    • Bomb Chicken launches first on switch in summer 2018
    • Lumines remastered spring 2018
    • Reigns Kngs and Queens spring 2018
    • Light Fall announced and includes speed run mode. Releases first on switch spring 2018
    • West of Loathing console exclusive on switch 2018
    • Poode launches spring 2018
    • The Messenger changes between 8-bit platform and 16-bit summer. Releases 2018
    • Bad North launches first on switch in summer 2018
    • Banner Saga 3 is releasing on Switch in summer 2018. First two games coming soon to switch with progress from first two games coming to switch
• Nintendo has also shared the top ten selling indie games to date
  • SteamWorld Dig 2
    • Stardew Valley
      • Kamiko
      • Celeste
      • Fast RMX
      • Golf Story
      • Enter the Gungeon
      • Overcooked Special Edition
      • NBA Playgrounds (ew)
      • Shovel Knight: Treasure Trove
• Sneakeer brand Fila is teaming up with Pokémon in South Korea for “limited collaboration” Court Deluxe shoes. The designs are inspired by Pikachu, Charmander, Squirtle, Bulbasaur and Jigglypuff. These are South Korea only, apparently, and there’s no word yet of an international release.

• It seems L.A Noire on the Switch has received an update. But it isn’t just any update– users are reporting that the entire game had to be redownloaded, and the file size went from 14GB to 19GB

• Just as I predicted, ARK: Survival Evolved has been announced for Switch! I was worried it’d look like the the mobile version, but as you can see below, it looks surprisingly equivalent to the PS4 and Xbox One versions.

Xbox

• When asked if he’s still willing to let Banjo —as well as Kazooie —show up in the new Smash Bros game, Phil Spencer shared a simple “Yep” on Twitter.

• Good news for console PUBG players The Xbox One version of PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds launched with a heavily revised interface and some issues with its performance.

• Sea of Thieves has launched but, as is unfortunately common with online games, the servers buckled under load with many players unable to connect.

Industry News

• Fortnite mobile players have spent $1.5M in the first 72 hours of launch

• The Witcher developer CD Projekt Red has announced it’s opened a new studio in south-western Poland called CD Projekt Red Wrocław, the team consists of 18 “talented industry veterans” at its core. Previously, the outfit was known as Strange New Things.

• Ubisoft appears to have avoided the hostile takeover the company’s bosses and workers have been fearing from the conglomerate Vivendi for the past three years .The publisher announced Vivendi will sell off all its existing shares in Ubisoft and agreed to not acquire any more for the next five years. In another twist, China’s biggest game company and Ontario’s teachers will now have a stake in the maker of Assassin’s Creed, Splinter Cell and Tom Clancy games. In order to purchase Vivendi’s 27.3% stake, Ubisoft has enlisted investment from Tencent, the Chinese company that owns League of Legends studio Riot and Fortnite studio Epic Games. It also has buy-in from the Ontario Teachers’ pension fund, which represents more than 300,000 active and retired teachers

• Atari has changed the name of the Ataribox to Atari VCS (Video Computer System). We still have scant details, but the company said the console will be available for pre-order soon. We aren’t sure if it will facilitate this through Indie Go Go like previously, or if it will be officially through an Atari site.

• Far Cry 5’s executive producer Dan Hay is speaking up on a few key elements ahead of the game’s launch by saying the story will be roughly 25 hours minimum and that the multiplayer could support a Battle Royale mode.

• Brigitte is now live in Overwatch alongside bug fixes and a Sombra nerf

• THQ Nordic has announced that it is partnering Nickelodeon to revive some of the popular licensed games released during the “old” THQ era.

• Epic’s Paragon may be shutting down in April, but the developer is giving away millions of dollars worth of Paragon game assets for free so that Unreal Engine developers can use them for their own projects. Twelve million dollars worth to be exact! According to a post on the Unreal Engine website, “20 AAA-quality characters, with their respective skins, animations, VFX and dialogue, along with over 1,500 environment components from Paragon” are now available for free in the Unreal Engine Marketplace. Epic said developers can “use them in your own UE4 projects, with no strings attached.”.

• EA has unlocked all heroes and hero ships for everyone in Battlefront II.

Word on the Street

• The Assassin’s Creed series is headed to Greece in 2019

Media