Review: LEGO Animal Crossing – Bunnie’s Outdoor Activities – Is It Any Good?

New Horizons on the block.

Nintendo’s latest collaboration with Lego has resulted in a handful of Animal Crossing sets, a crossover that fans have been begging for ever since the firms’ first collaboration, the LEGO Super Mario sets, were announced back in March 2020 — coincidentally Animal Crossing: New Horizons‘ launch month.

In the years since, we’ve seen a bunch of Nintendo-themed Lego sets encompassing the more play-focused Super Mario series to the grander, more expensive sets like the Nintendo Entertainment System, the Mario 64 ‘?’ Block, and the mighty Bowser, which are aimed at older gamers.

Read the full article on nintendolife.com

Ghost of Tsushima Director’s Cut is coming to PC on May 16

Ghost of Tsushima Director’s Cut is coming to PC! We at Nixxes are thrilled to collaborate with the talented team at Sucker Punch Productions who created this critically acclaimed open-world action adventure. We are excited to bring Jin’s story to a new audience and to bring a Sucker Punch title to PC for the first time.

The PC version of Ghost of Tsushima Director’s Cut includes the full game, the Iki Island expansion, and the cooperative online multiplayer Legends mode. For the past year, the team at Nixxes has been working hard to bring the Sucker Punch in-house engine technology to PC and implement PC features such as unlocked frame rates, a variety of graphics settings and presets, and customizable mouse and keyboard controls. 


Ghost of Tsushima Director’s Cut is coming to PC on May 16

With ultrawide monitor support, you can take in the expansive terrain and ancient landmarks with a cinematic field of view. Ghost of Tsushima Director’s Cut on PC is fully optimized for 21:9 and 32:9 resolutions and even supports 48:9 resolutions for triple monitor setups.  

Ghost of Tsushima Director’s Cut on PC features the latest performance-enhancing technologies. NVIDIA DLSS 3 and AMD FSR 3 are available with both upscaling and frame generation options. Intel XeSS upscaling is also supported and if your hardware has headroom to spare, you can use NVIDIA DLAA or FSR 3 Native AA to further boost image quality.   

The game on PC also offers extensive controller support. Use Steam Input to remap and customize the peripheral of your choice to your preference. For a more immersive experience, use a PlayStation DualSense controller with haptic feedback and adaptive triggers, so you can feel the tension of drawing a bow and the strikes of your sword.  

You can wishlist and pre-purchase Ghost of Tsushima Director’s Cut now on Steam and the Epic Games Store. If you pre-purchase the game, you’ll get access to the following early in-game unlocks when the game releases on 16 May: 

  • New Game+ Horse  
  • Traveler’s Attire  
  • Broken Armor dyes from Baku’s shop 

 

We asked Sucker Punch co-founder Brian Fleming for his thoughts on the upcoming PC version, here is what he had to say: 


“We’re proud to announce that our friends and partners over at Nixxes are bringing Ghost of Tsushima to PC! This is a first for Sucker Punch – all our previous work is console-exclusive, so we are excited about all this and Nixxes was the right team to do this project. With them on board, we knew the results would be nothing short of amazing! Now excuse me as I go order a Super Ultra Wide monitor!”

– Brian Fleming, Co-Founder, Sucker Punch


For PC players who are new to the game, here’s an overview of everything that is included: 

Ghost of Tsushima Director’s Cut is an action-adventure game set in feudal Japan. Protagonist Jin Sakai was raised and trained in the ways of the samurai. His world is shattered when a Mongol invasion defeats the samurai army of his home on Tsushima island, and he is faced with a difficult decision: honor the tradition and customs of his upbringing and maintain a fight he cannot win, or deviate from his samurai path to protect the island and its people by any means necessary.  

In his quest to reclaim Tsushima, Jin seeks the guidance and support of old friends and new unlikely allies. He must break away from tradition, become a new kind of warrior, and protect what’s left of his home at all costs. 

Iki Island Expansion In this story expansion, Jin discovers new locations, characters, and enemies on a mysterious island. The island of Iki is a wild, lawless land of raiders and criminals. Jin will have to bring all his skills to defeat the enemy and save Iki. 

Legends – Inspired by Japanese folk tales and mythology, this cooperative multiplayer experience consists of two-player story missions and four-player wave-based survival missions, as well as the competitive two-versus-two Rivals mode. Choose one of four classes: Samurai, Ronin, Hunter or Assassin and play with friends or via online matchmaking. 

Kurosawa Mode – Experience the game in black and white with film grain effects, as well as Japanese dialogue and English subtitles. This mode is inspired by the movies of legendary filmmaker Akira Kurosawa. 

On behalf of everyone at Nixxes Software and Sucker Punch Productions, we can’t wait to bring Ghost of Tsushima Director’s Cut to PC. We will have more information to share, such as system requirements, as we get closer to launch on May 16. 


One of the Best Power Banks for Steam Deck and ASUS ROG Ally Is on Sale Today

Today, Amazon is offering the powerful and high capacity Anker Prime 20,000mAh USB Power Bank for only $89.98, a hefty 31% price drop from its original $130 MSRP. This is the successor to the Anker 737 that we deemed the best Steam Deck and ASUS ROG Ally charger. It boasts an absolutely massive 200W of USB power delivery to charge all of your mobile devices simultaneously.

Anker Prime 20,000mAh Power Bank for $90

with 200W of USB Type-C Power Delivery

The Anker Prime can be used like any other power bank; it does a fine job of charging any of your standard mobile electronics. However, its main purpose is to charge more power hungry devices like laptops, portable gaming systems, and high end phones. It has two USB Type-C ports and one USB Type-A port. Each USB Type C port supports up to 100W of Power Delivery. In fact, both ports can charge 100W at the same time. If you want to charge using all three ports simultaneously, then the power distribution will be 100W (Type C), 60W (Type-C) and 40W (Type-A). The 20,000mAh is under the TSA’s 27,000mAh limit so it can be brought onto airplanes; it can charge a Nintendo Switch OLED about 4 times, iPhone 15 Pro Max about 4 times, Steam Deck about 3 times, and an ASUS ROG Ally about 7 times.

What makes the Prime unique compared to most other power banks is the LCD digital readout which displays a lot of useful real-time information like remaining battery capacity, power input, and power output from each port. The power bank measures 5″x2″x2″ and weighs in at 1.2 pounds.

The Anker Prime is an excellent Steam Deck / ASUS ROG Ally charger

The Anker Prime is an outstanding charger for the Steam Deck and ASUS ROG Ally portable gaming handhelds. The Steam Deck accepts up to 38W of USB Power Delivery and the ASUS ROG Ally accepts up to 65W. That means the Prime can charge three Steam Decks or two ASUS ROG Allys simultaneously at their maximum charging rate. Both the ROG Ally and Steam Deck suffer from a short battery life when gaming on the go. For instance, when playing most games at 60 FPS, you’re likely looking at four hours of battery life for the Steam Deck and far less with the ASUS ROG Ally, which is equipped with a measly 2600mAh battery. During our Steam Deck review, we even found games like God of War or Spider-Man would tap out in under 2-hours as well. At the end of the day, you’ll never get the full potential out of your Steam Deck or ROG Ally if you’re not equipped with a decent portable charger.

Ghost of Tsushima Director’s Cut comes to PC in May

Fans of curly wind FX and striking from a sheathed stance rejoice – open world samurai action game Ghost of Tsushima is coming to PC on May 16th via Steam and Epic Games Store. This is the Director’s Cut edition of the game, which includes the Iki Island story expansion and the co-op multiplayer Legends mode. It’s being developed by PC port specialists Nixxes, the studio behind the PC version of Horizon Forbidden West – Complete Edition, and features customisable mouse and keyboard controls plus unlocked frame rates and assorted graphical whizbangs. I’ve got a trailer for you below.

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Remedy Lowers Minimum System Requirements for Alan Wake 2 on PC

Alan Wake 2‘s hefty system requirements shocked many PC gamers when they were announced last year. The requirements noted that you needed at least an Nvidia GeForce RTX 2060 or an AMD Radeon RX 6600 GPU to run the game at 1080p / 30 frames per second (FPS), with no support for older GPUs such as Nvidia’s GTX 10-series. Roughly four months after its release, Remedy has released a new patch that lowers the minimum PC system requirements and allows older PC gaming rigs to run the game.

Remedy posted the new system requirements, which you can check out below, to X/Twitter alongside the release of update 1.0.16.1.

The minimum requirements now call for at least a GTX 1070 or an RX 5600 XT graphics card. As previously noted by Remedy, if you have either GPU, in addition to the other minimum specs that remain unchanged, you can run the game at 1080p / 30FPS.

As Remedy mentioned in the patch notes for Alan Wake 2 update 1.0.16.1, the developer has “optimized rendering for GPUs that don’t support mesh shaders.” The GTX-10 series lacks mesh shader support, which is a type of code that allows game developers to process polygons with more power and control, enabling things such as greater detail. This results in a detail-rich in-game environment but leaves older PC gaming rigs in the dust.

Yet, even if you don’t have an RTX 1070 and are rocking an RTX 1060, which is still one of the top five most-popular GPUs PC users are using as of a Steam February 2024 hardware survey, you will get a slightly better performance than you did at release, as Digital Foundry’s Alex Battaglia pointed out in his recent retesting of Alan Wake 2 running GTX-10 series cards. While the GTX 1060 still failed to run 30FPS, Battaglia discovered that the GTX 1060 got a performance improvement, with some demanding areas now putting out 26FPS instead of 18FPS.

In IGN’s Alan Wake 2 review, we said: “Alan Wake II is a superb survival horror sequel that makes the cult-classic original seem like little more than a rough first draft by comparison.”

Taylor is a Reporter at IGN. You can follow her on Twitter @TayNixster.

Nightingale early access review: a numbers grind disguised as a gaslamp survival game

Not long ago, a few of us from the RPS Treehouse wandered through first-person survival ’em up Nightingale with its boss Aaryn Flynn, and then had it out about the game’s crafting menus. I was one of the folks who wasn’t so hot on what we’d played, and I’d hoped that the early access version would prove me wrong.

Alas, I am sad to report that I still do not like Nightingale. From what I’ve played so far, the game is an awkward marriage of survival game and live service loot grind, which makes you feel divorced from the very world you inhabit.

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Project Tower: Copy Your Enemies’ Skills in New Unreal Engine 5 Shooter

Developer Yummy Games has officially announced Project Tower, a new third-person bullet hell shooter powered by Unreal Engine 5. It’s in development for PC and PS5. Take a look at at the story-focused gameplay announcement trailer above as well as the first screenshots in the gallery below.

Yummy describes Tower as such: “In this third-person shooter that combines bullet hell and transformation abilities, use your powers to copy your enemies’ skills and solve puzzles to escape the alien tower that’s holding you prisoner.”

As you can see from the trailer, in addition to the bullet hell gameplay, there’s also a heavy focus on Project Tower’s “last of humankind” narrative here, which will hopefully make for a compelling time between the copious amounts of shooting that you’ll be doing. Wishlist it on Steam if you’d like to follow its development progress.

Ryan McCaffrey is IGN’s executive editor of previews and host of both IGN’s weekly Xbox show, Podcast Unlocked, as well as our monthly(-ish) interview show, IGN Unfiltered. He’s a North Jersey guy, so it’s “Taylor ham,” not “pork roll.” Debate it with him on Twitter at @DMC_Ryan.

Review: New Star GP (Switch) – A Stylish, Moreish Homage To The Likes Of Virtua Racing

We’ve certainly Senna lot worse.

Every now and then you get an indie developer who you can rely on to deliver a banger pretty much every time. New Star Games is one such developer, having already scored healthy scores on Nintendo Life in the past for New Star Manager (which scored 8), Retro Bowl (9), and Retro Goal (8).

Alongside its Switch releases, it’s also been responsible for a bunch of fantastic mobile games, including the likes of the New Star Soccer series, New Star Cricket, and New Star Baseball. Essentially, everything New Star touches turns to gold, but it’s also fair to say it has a style of game it’s best known for: retro-style sports games.

Read the full article on nintendolife.com

Turbo Golf Racing tees off April 4 on PS5

Are you ready for the ultimate fusion of racing and golf? Well warm up your engines and polish your golf balls because Hugecalf Studios is proud to announce that Turbo Golf Racing hits PS5 on April 4!


Turbo Golf Racing tees off April 4 on PS5

Turbo Golf Racing revolutionizes the traditional sport of golf by introducing turbo-charged cars as the means to putt the ball. Compete in golf or race game modes across over 80 fantastical levels, unlocking a selection of more than 500 cosmetics as you progress.

Race mode brings adrenaline-inducing speed to the fairways. Compete against seven opponents in a race to putt your ball first. Equip unique Power Cores, which grant special abilities or passive effects, such as a Magnet that can pull your ball closer or Hyper Glider which increases your cars gliding speed. Collect pick-ups such as Air Strike or Frost Beam to hinder the progress of your rivals in your bid to become the ultimate Turbo Golf Racer.

For those who favor a traditional golfing experience, take a moment to unwind in Golf mode, where accuracy outweighs speed. Victory is awarded to the player who putts in the fewest shots, so make every shot count, there’s little room for error.

Feel like practicing? Take on Time Trials, a way to learn the maps, refine your skills, and compete in the online leaderboards.

Hang out with your friends and play at your own pace in Custom Games. You can line up your favorite maps and customize the cores and pick-ups available.

Launch party

We’ll celebrate Turbo Golf Racing’s launch with a season full of party rewards! For a limited time after launch players can earn our 2 new car bodies: Jester, our clown car, and Bassline, a car equipped with DJ decks and speakers. Other goodies include party shades, musical boosters, and pork pie wheels, totaling over 35 seasonal rewards.

New Golf mode

Alongside a season of content, Turbo Golf Racing will feature a new game mode, allowing players to compete in Golf mode with up to seven opponents. This new fast-paced take on golf is only for the most skillful of players. Out of bounds will trigger penalties, so if you want to score an eagle, albatross, or the infamous hole-in-one, you’ll need to be precise with every shot!

We’re excited to see you all on the starting line, so mark the 4th of April on your calendar, let the launch party commence!