PlayStation
- Sony has has re-introduced it’s PlayStation Hits line for PS4. If you’re unaware, the Hits line includes popular titles for $20 including a game DLC. Here’s the starting list:
- Battlefield 4
- Bloodborne
- DOOM
- Metal Gear Solid V: The Definitive Experience
- Ratchet & Clank
- Street Fighter V
- Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End
- Yakuza 0
Nintendo
- Nintendo and Disney are teaming up to create a TV show centered around the Switch. The show will be called “Nintendo Switch Family Showdown Contest” and will feature families competing against each other in games like Super Mario Odyssey, Mario Tennis Aces, and Just Dance 2018. The show is set to debut this cummerbund on Disney Channel and Disney XD.
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Pokémon GO is going to finally let players trade their ‘mons—a mere two years after release. The game has been updated this week to include the Friend System with trading mechanics said to go live ‘soon’. Here’s how it all works:
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To trade with someone, you must be their in-game friend and within 100 meters (320 ft.) of them
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To become friends, you exchange your unique Trainer Codes
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Once friends, you’ll get in-game perks for playing together. Your Pokémon will get attack bonuses when battling gyms together, for example – and when you raid together, you’ll get extra Pokéballs.
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The more you play together (raiding, battling gyms, etc), the higher your relationship level will be.
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Certain Pokémon (Legendaries, Shinies, and any Pokémon you don’t already have) are considered “special trades”. You can only make special trades with players with whom you’ve reached the higher tiers of friendship. In other words, they mostly want you trading with the people you play with somewhat regularly – not rando spoofers selling Pokémon on eBay.
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You can only make one special trade per day.
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Trades cost stardust (the in-game resource otherwise required for powering up a Pokémon). The rarer the Pokémon, the more it’ll cost to trade. Having a higher friendship level, though, will offset that a bit
You’ll also receive a gift when visiting a Pokéstop which you can keep for yourself or give to a friend.
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The new version of Minecraft is out now for Switch and is free for those who bought the original Switch Edition. Simply go to the eShop and it will be 100% off. This will be the only version available for purchase and brings with it a ton of new features like being based on the bedrock engine, including Xbox Live Achievements (you read that right), and allowing cross-play between PC, Xbox, and mobile. Sorry PlayStation fans, Sony is being Sony.
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Be careful when buying second hand games because if it was used to dump a ROM of the game online, you’re gonna have yourself a bad time. Reason being is that Nintendo is banning anyone playing games under multiple copies of the same certificate, something that is specific to each game card. So before you spend money on that game, make sure it works and can be played online. Most retailers offer a warranty anyway. I imagine it being a pain to explain to Nintendo……so definitely keep the receipt.
Xbox
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Microsoft has launched its revamped Xbox Avatar Editor to those in the Insider Program. The new update includes many changes like gender neutral clothes, new props, and various other cosmetic choices to represent people with disabilities such as wheelchairs and prosthetic limbs.
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Back when the Xbox One was still Project Scorpio, Phil Spencer said the company would bring VR to the Xbox, but only on that device. Well it turns out that Microsoft has abandoned those plans—at least for now.
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When Crackdown 3 was announced in 2014, Microsoft emphasized the return of series creator Dave Jones and his new company Cloudgine, which provided a cloud computing service to help power in-game destruction that would otherwise be impossible on a baseline Xbox One. The thing is, Fortnite creator Epic Games bought Cloudgine earlier this year and at E3 this year, Microsoft confirmed they aren’t working with Jones or Reagent games. It’ll be interesting to see how this once much hyped exclusive title crumbles—without Cloudgine.
Industry News
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PUBG has reached 400M worldwide players with 50M between PC and Xbox One and the other 350M spread across mobile other platforms.
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Final Fantasy XIV’s producer, Naoki Yoshida, told gaming outlet VGR that he’d like fans to have “as many ways to play as possible” and that “discussions are still ongoing with all three publishers (Microsoft, Sony, and Nintendo) to see if the game can come to Xbox One and Switch with cross-play with the PC and PS4 versions.” Yoshida noted he “hopes to announce something as soon as we can.”
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GameStop sucks. Let’s get that right (I’ve been watching a lot of Master Chef lately). It’s no secret the company has been struggling to make money thanks in part to digital distribution, better alternatives like Amazon, and their habit of offering laughably low value for trade ins. Now, according to Reuters, GameStop has secured a financial advisor to help talk buyout options. While we no doubt loathe some things about GS, having a dedicated gaming brick and mortar chain has it’s benefits—it just needs to be run right and modernized.
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YouTube has officially taken on Twitch by offering creators of 100K or more subs an alternative payment method through a $4.99 channel membership that grants subscribers access to exclusive contend, subscriber specific badges, along with special emojis. So it’s basically become Twitch.
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Three Fields Entertainment, a studio headed up by the guys responsible for the Burnout series, revealed they’re making two new car-based titles. The first is Danger Zone 2, a bigger, more feature-packed sequel to last year’s slight but fun crash-em-up that I felt lukewarm about. However, the bigger news is that the studio is also making Dangerous Driving, a closed circuit arcade racer that sounds an awful lot like an old-school Burnout game. It’s set to feature boosting, crashing, and exploding when it launches on PS4 at the end of 2018.
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PayPal has blocked the sale of Active Shooter, an appalling and disgraceful video game about nothing more than shooting up schools. I’m all for freedoms of speech and whatnot, but with the school shooting epidemic here in the States, it’s the last thing the games industry needs.
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Square Enix just announced (like literally after this article went live) that Life is Strange 2 will release September 27, 2018 and will be five episodes in length. WOOOOO!!!
