Game Infliction, Author at Game Infliction

No Man’s Sky Welcomes All Xbox Players for the Omega Expedition

Over the years, we’ve seen many Xbox players on console, PC and Game Pass venture into No Man’s Sky’s universe and lose themselves in all there is to do, in some cases for hundreds of hours.

Today we’re announcing our latest No Man’s Sky expedition, Omega, and this time we’re inviting the entire Xbox community, whether they own the game or not, to try it out for themselves. The expedition runs for 2 weeks from today (Thursday, February 15) and is free to play for the first weekend until Monday, February 19.

Whether it’s crafting, building, trading, fighting, exploring or a host of other activities to indulge in, there is so much to do in No Man’s Sky. That’s why we’ve custom-designed Omega to show new players in particular all that there is to see. It’s like a fast-track sight-seeing tour of the universe.

No Man’s Sky expeditions are a chance for the entire community to convene in one area of the universe and work together to complete challenges and unlock exclusive rewards, so space and planets always feel full and bustling with activity. Moreover, there are always experienced veteran Travellers around to offer friendly advice and support.

Omega is our 12th Expedition and the rewards on offer are probably the biggest yet. The headline act is the Starborn Runner, an exclusive starship, destined to become as sought-after as the Golden Vector. A suite of unique customisations – a stylish Atlas helmet/jetpack/multi-tool staff combo – can be unlocked as souvenirs and taken back into your main save as future proof that you were there for Omega.

For new players who have yet to buy No Man’s Sky, any progress you make in the Expedition will be preserved in case you ever decide to take the plunge.

We have also overhauled how Expeditions work, and now existing players can choose which of their favourite starships from their fleet they’re going to take with them on their adventure. Expeditions can now be accessed directly in the Anomaly in addition to the main menu screen.

As most Travellers know, a No Man’s Sky Expedition normally comes with a host of new additions and features and Omega is no exception. Ever since we challenged players to take on and defeat the ominous Pirate Dreadnought last year, we have noticed a real desire to add this huge vessel to their freighter fleet. Now, when you take down the Dreadnought, it’s yours to keep.

Additionally, as you explore the universe, you will encounter alien races who will give you contextual missions specifically related to the planet where they live. Completing these tasks will earn you rewards and reputation with the locals.

We’re very excited to welcome a whole new cohort of players to the game and I know our vibrant and positive community will welcome them with open arms. Hang out in the Anomaly for long enough and you’re sure to encounter some generous Traveller who just wants to help you out.

No Man’s Sky launched on Xbox in 2018 and came to Game Pass in 2020. Our Xbox community has grown immeasurably and our tiny team at Hello continue to enjoy serving up content like Omega. 2024 is looking to be our biggest year yet.

Our journey continues.

No Man’s Sky

Hello Games

☆☆☆☆☆
917

★★★★★

$59.99

Get it now

Xbox One X Enhanced

PC Game Pass

Xbox Game Pass

No Man’s Sky comes complete with all 25 major updates up to and including Echoes.

Inspired by the adventure and imagination that we love from classic science-fiction, No Man’s Sky presents you with a galaxy to explore, filled with unique planets and lifeforms, and constant danger and action.

In No Man’s Sky, every star is the light of a distant sun, each orbited by planets filled with life, and you can go to any of them you choose. Fly smoothly from deep space to planetary surfaces, with no loading screens, and no limits. In this infinite procedurally generated universe, you’ll discover places and creatures that no other players have seen before – and perhaps never will again.

Embark on an epic voyage
At the centre of the galaxy lies a irresistible pulse which draws you on a journey towards it to learn the true nature of the cosmos. But, facing hostile creatures and fierce pirates, you’ll know that death comes at a cost, and survival will be down to the choices you make over how you upgrade your ship, your weapon and suit.

Find your own destiny
Your voyage through No Man’s Sky is up to you. Will you be a fighter, preying on the weak and taking their riches, or taking out pirates for their bounties? Power is yours if you upgrade your ship for speed and weaponry.
Or a trader? Find rich resources on forgotten worlds and exploit them for the highest prices. Invest in more cargo space and you’ll reap huge rewards.
Or perhaps an explorer? Go beyond the known frontier and discover places and things that no one has ever seen before. Upgrade your engines to jump ever farther, and strengthen your suit for survival in toxic environments that would kill the unwary.

Share your journey
The galaxy is a living, breathing place. Trade convoys travel between stars, factions vie for territory, pirates hunt the unwary, and the police are ever watching. Every other player lives in the same galaxy, and you can choose to share your discoveries with them on a map that spans known space. Perhaps you will see the results of their actions as well as your own…

The post No Man’s Sky Welcomes All Xbox Players for the Omega Expedition appeared first on Xbox Wire.

No Man’s Sky universe opens to newcomers for limited time with new Omega expedition, launching today

Hello! Last year was a busy one for the small team at Hello Games, with lots of No Man’s Sky updates and the announce of Light No Fire.

We have big plans for 2024, and we’re starting the year off with a very different kind of update. We’re calling it Omega, and for the first time No Man’s Sky will be available to play for free!

No Man’s Sky universe opens to newcomers for limited time with new Omega expedition, launching today

For the first time, we are inviting every PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, and PlayStation VR and VR2 owner into our universe to play the latest No Man’s Sky expedition, even if they don’t own the full game, no purchase necessary. There are no microtransactions, no free-to-play mechanics, just a huge universe to explore for free with your friends.

Expeditions in No Man’s Sky have become one of the most popular ways to play the game. They bring all players together to the same planet for an interstellar, shared experience. This weekend we are allowing everyone, whether you own the game or not, to join the Omega Expedition.

This represents a moment for new players to try No Man’s Sky, and existing players to welcome them into the community.

The Omega update also brings a complete overhaul of expeditions, new on-planet missions, a new pirate dreadnought to own, and much more.

Until now expeditions have been their own game mode, but we wanted to fully integrate them into our main game. Now, our new expedition system allows travellers to join expeditions with bespoke provisions, bring along their favourite starships or custom multi-tools and return to their main save with loot and exciting rewards.

We have revisited the Atlas Path, allowing players to commune with the Atlas and honor it with a new Atlas staff, jetpack and helmet.

On planets we have introduced a huge array of procedurally generated quests. Talking to alien lifeforms results in quests specific to an alien lifeforms locale, climate and personality.

For the first time, take on the universe with a fleet of frigates led by a dreadnought capital ship. If players can defeat pirate freighters in combat, travellers can board the dreadnought to demand control.

At the core of this update is the Omega Expedition, which has been built from the ground up as a thorough introduction for new players, but with some of the best rewards in any expedition to date, including a gorgeous new starship to explore the universe with.

In the almost eight years since launch, through over 25 free updates, the No Man’s Sky universe has become at times overwhelming in breadth and depth. Through a series of quick missions and milestones, the Omega expeditions will guide you through the fundamentals of base-building, trading, space combat, lore and much, much more. Any progress you make will be retained in case you choose to purchase the game and continue your journey.

The Omega Expedition runs for 2 weeks from Thursday February 15 and is free to play for the first weekend until Monday February 19.

Whether you’ve been on the journey with us for a while, or you’re a lapsed player looking for a way back in, or a newcomer who’s always wanted to take a peek at what No Man’s Sky has to offer, everyone is welcome and there’s never been a better time to join in.

Our journey continues.

PlayStation Gift Cards Get a Huge Discount in the UK

We’ve had a lot of fun with promo codes over the last few months. And now Currys are getting back in on the action PlayStation with their promo code PS15. This promo code means that you can get some free money on the PlayStation store by grabbing a gift card at a discounted price.

If you’ve been sitting on your hands waiting for some new games, now is your chance to make move.

The best deal from this offer is definitely on the £90 PlayStation Gift Card, now down to just £76.50 with code PS15 (see here). That’s a saving of £13.50 in total, quick maths, and perfectly sets you up for some cheap as chips gaming over the next few years.

So as you’ve saved on your credit for your PlayStation account, and deals you decide to jump on are immediately enhanced. Here’s a few of our favourites in the sale for you to sink your teeth into as well.

If you want some other great deals at the moment, then you might as well stay on Currys’ website. You can pre-order yourself a physical copy of Final Fantasy VII Rebirth for PS5 for just £55.99 by using another handy code – ‘rebirth20.’

If you happen to be short of the console in the first place, then the new PS5 Slim has recently had £60 knocked off its price in the UK, representing the first significant savings on the model since its release. And if you want some extra storage for all the new games you’ll be buying with your cheap gift cards, then grab yourself a fanxiang S770 1TB M.2 PS5 SSD (With Heatsink) for a very tidy £61 when you use code take20. Codes all over the place!

Robert Anderson is a deals expert and Commerce Editor for IGN. You can follow him @robertliam21 on Twitter.

Islands Of The Caliph is a colourful and cleverly condensed griddy RPG

I have never enjoyed those grid-based dungeon-crawling games. I dislike the very notion of dungeon-crawling in general, frankly, but the awkward juddery squareskipping rat-toucher games have always left me absolutely cold.

You will be shocked and aroused to learn that I preface with all this just so I can make an exception of Islands Of The Caliph. Does this mean she’s becoming more open minded, or just that she’s found a way to gripe and complain even within a recommendation? Who can say, readers.

What I can say is that I don’t merely hate it less than its genremates. I think it’s a bloody great little RPG, full of charm and detail that never drags it down.

5 Years After It Was Announced, Hollow Knight: Silksong Is Still One of the Most-Anticipated Games Around

It has been five long years since Team Cherry announced Hollow Knight: Silksong on February 14, 2019, with a launch then planned for PC, Mac, Linux, and Nintendo Switch. And still, it remains one of the most-anticipated video games around.

Not only is Hollow Knight: Silksong the third most-wishlisted game on Steam, behind only Hades 2 and Manor Lords, but it is one of the most-wanted Game Pass games following Microsoft’s deal with Team Cherry to bring it to its subscription service day-one. It’s also coming to the PlayStation Store, with a PlayStation 5 launch planned.

In June 2022, Microsoft included Hollow Knight: Silksong in its Xbox-Bethesda Showcase, and announced that everything shown would be playable in the next 12 months. Xbox then seemingly confirmed that the long-awaited follow-up would indeed be out within a year.

Then, in May last year, Team Cherry announced that Hollow Knight: Silksong had been delayed past the first half of 2023 and that more details would come as the game neared its release date. At the time, Team Cherry’s marketing and publishing lead Matthew Griffin said: “We had planned to release in the first half of 2023, but development is still continuing. We’re excited by how the game is shaping up, and it’s gotten quite big, so we want to take the time to make the game as good as we can.”

As you’d expect, Hollow Knight fans are desperate for news from Team Cherry. While the five-year anniversary of Silksong’s announcement has come and gone without fanfare, the developer has indicated it’s still hard at work on the game.

As Nintendo Life notes, Hollow Knight: Silksong joins Metroid Prime 4 in the ‘five years since announcement club’, although in Metroid Prime 4’s case it was five years since Nintendo announced it had restarted development on the Switch exclusive.

As the sequel to 2017’s critically acclaimed Hollow Knight, fans have been looking forward patiently for Silksong. In IGN’s Hollow Knight review, we said: “The world of Hallownest is compelling and rich, full of story that’s left for you to discover on your own, and built with branching paths that offer an absurd amount of choice in how you go about discovering it. With such a high density of secrets to find and fun, challenging enemies to face, it’s worth spending every moment you can in Hollow Knight.”

Perhaps Hollow Knight: Silksong will pop up at the next Nintendo Direct?

Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.

Palworld’s community manager reminds people impatient for updates that playing other games is fine

If you told me at the start of the year that Palworld would break Steam records, I would’ve done a hearty “no no” chuckle. But here we are, with the survival game exceeding 19 million players and Pocketpair probably wondering how they managed such a feat. With its success has come the inevitable slew of impatient people saying the game’s dead because it’s not received updates fast enough, or folks saying it’s lost a hefty percentage of its player base, and others saying its viewership numbers over on streaming services have plummeted. Palworld’s community manager Bucky has gently reminded folks that not only is this discourse “lazy”, but to play other games instead.

Diablo 4’s Hellish Microtransactions Go From Bad to Worse With $65 Horse Bundle That Costs More Than the Game Itself

Hot on the heels of a backlash against Diablo 4 portal reskins that cost the same as Palworld comes a new microtransaction horror: a horse bundle that costs more than Diablo 4 itself.

This week, Blizzard released the new Vitreous Scourge mount, which can only be bought as part of a $64.99 bundle that throws in 7,000 Platinum. For context, Diablo 4 itself currently costs $41.99, and there is no way to buy the Vitreous Scourge mount outside this bundle.

Here’s what you get from the Vitreous Scourge pack, per Blizzard:

Charge in atop crystal and bone

Manifest crystalline might and traverse Sanctuary with the Vitreous Scourge. The Vitreous Scourge pack includes Crystal and Bone bundle containing the Crystal-clad mount, Crystal and Bone Cage mount armor, two mount trophies, and 7,000 Platinum.

Crystal and Bone: A great many maladies plague the unfortunate inhabitants of Sanctuary. One is a spreading corruption that crystalizes both flesh and bone.

7,000 Platinum can be exchanged to customize your in-game experience with purchasable cosmetic items from the Shop, used to unlock access to the premium Battle Pass, and Battle Pass Tier Skips.

Diablo 4 players are debating the rights and wrongs of this bundle, working out its value given it includes 7,000 Platinum (7,200 Platinum costs $64.97 when bought on its own via the denominations Blizzard provides). If you’re going to buy $65-worth of Platinum anyway, some argue, then the Vitreous Scourge mount is a free add-on. Or, considered another way, the $65 bundle offers $83 of value, if we consider previous Diablo 4 mounts have cost up to $18 each. But the point remains: it is impossible to buy the mount directly, which means this bundle is yet another example of the video game industry, and Blizzard, price anchoring its microtransactions.

It’s worth noting Diablo 4 is a full-price action role-playing game and not free-to-play, and while this horse is purely cosmetic and does not affect gameplay, it joins a long list of controversial microtransactions that have hit the game since its record-breaking launch in June.

Of course, Diablo 4 developer Blizzard is now owned by Microsoft following the company’s $69 billion acquisition of Activision Blizzard last year. It was a move that some had thought would usher in a new era for Blizzard, but it got off to a troubling start after Microsoft announced nearly 2,000 staff would be let go from its gaming division, a devastating round of layoffs that have hit Blizzard hard.

Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.

Embracer have laid off 8% of their global workforce since their “restructuring” began

Embracer have released their interim financial results for Q3, October-December 2023, in which they share details of the conglomerate’s on-going efforts to “restructure” and reduce their massive debts, to the tune of hundreds of layoffs over the past year.

Amid the talk of revenues, profits and losses, we learn that Embracer have laid off 8% of their global workforce since announcing their restructuring program in June 2023. According to the report, Embracer’s total headcount has fallen from 16,243 in the period October-December 2022 to 15,218 in the period October-December 2023. The number of Embracer studio game projects in development, meanwhile, has fallen from 224 to 179.

Blasphemous 2’s Gorgeous Physical Collector’s Edition Lands May Release Date

Pre-orders are now open.

After being revealed at the end of last year, SelectaPlay has today announced that the stunning Collector’s Edition physical of Blasphemous 2 will be slashing our way on 29th May.

Pre-orders for this beefy bundle are now available through select retailers (including Amazon) for £86.99. Yes, this does seem like a pretty hefty price tag, but there are a lot of goodies included in this one.

Read the full article on nintendolife.com

Helldivers 2 Dev Says It Will ‘Never’ Add PvP Because It Wants to ‘Reduce Toxic Elements’ From the Community

Are you playing Helldivers 2 and wondering if the developers will ever add a player versus player mode? Don’t hold your breath — the boss of developer Arrowhead Game Studios has said it’s never going to happen.

Responding to a user on Twitter/X, Arrowhead CEO Johan Pilestedt said the developer will “never” add PvP to Helldivers 2 in order to reduce “toxic elements” from the community.

“Hey; We’ll ‘never’ add a PvP-mode,” Pilestedt said. “This is to reduce toxic elements from the community.

“We want an environment that’s supportive, fun and where we all are fighting on the same side!”

Helldivers 2 is a co-op third-person shooter in which players squad up to take on alien bugs and automatons across big maps packed with over-the-top action, explosions, and a generous number of epic moments.

While there is no PvP mode, players are as much a danger to each other as they are to the enemy. Helldivers 2 is a game with friendly fire, which means a stray bullet from a squadmate can be disastrous. Turrets, too, can kill your friends, or even you, if you happen to get in their way. And devastating orbital strikes can be a menace to your friends as well as enemy outposts.

One of the cool things about Helldivers 2 is that players have established an ‘unspoken’ co-op etiquette, which is useful for a game in which voice comms are rarely used when playing with randoms. From what I can tell, griefing is an unusual occurrence in Helldivers 2, but it does happen. I’ve seen some players report they’ve encountered players who’ve engaged in a spot of teamkilling. Some are even orbital-striking the entire group as soon as they spawn onto the map, only to do it again seemingly just for a laugh. And teamkilling during an extraction, or kicking a teammate during extraction after a 40-minute mission does sometimes occur.

We don’t want the toxicity that naturally comes with it. There are plenty, actually most, games that provide PvP.

Pilestedt also responded to a user who accused Arrowhead of being “scared” to add PvP to Helldivers 2, denying that was the case. “Not scared,” Pilestedt said. “Just we don’t want the toxicity that naturally comes with it. There are plenty, actually most, games that provide PvP.

“We make games for people that just want to have a challenging time with friends but in a PvE setting.”

Pilestedt then pointed players who want a PvP experience to extraction shooter Escape from Tarkov: “If you want PvP I recommend @tarkov,” Pilestedt said.

According to Pilestedt, Helldivers 2 has already sold one million copies across PlayStation 5 and PC, smashing all expectations in the process. And despite various matchmaking issues, Helldivers 2 shows no sign of slowing down. Check out IGN’s Helldivers 2 tips and tricks for getting started if you’re jumping in.

Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.