Video Games | Page 1044 of 1060

System Shock remakers Nightdive Studios are remastering The Thing

Computer Artworks’ 2002 videogame adaptation of 1982 movie The Thing was a ghoulish and gripping third-person shooter with some terrific mechanics that weren’t quite fleshed out, flesh being the operative word. For instance: you can enlist surviving soldiers as squadmates, but are they really surviving soldiers, or are they human-shaped warrens of teeth and mandibles waiting to shower you in digestive juices? You have a limited supply of blood tests with which to determine whether any people you rescue are Things in waiting – and even as you’re worrying about them, they’re casting suspicious eyes at you, care of some embryonic “trust” and “fear” systems.

Sadly, much of this acute paranoia could be easily gamed out in practice – back in 2002, I deduced that contact with enemies increased the odds of infection, and adopted a policy of shooting anyone who’d been in my squad for too long. But it’s the kind of system an intelligent remake could pounce upon and have fun with. Sadly, Nightdive are not working on a remake, like their previous System Shock remakes. They’ve just announced that they’re making a remaster, due later this year. Still, I will take a Thing remaster and thus, the opportunity to write more about The Thing, over no remaster at all.

Devolver Direct 2024: Everything Announced

Happy Volvy’s birthday, I guess? Devolver Digital just wrapped its annual Devolver Direct which, among plenty of weirdness, included a number of big game announcements. We got two new game reveals, including one from the devs of Hyper Light Drifter, new DLC for games like Cult of the Lamb, and release dates for The Crush House and Anger Foot.

A time was certainly had by all, but if you missed the show and don’t want to go back and watch a 30-minute video of a lonely man trying to prepare for a birthday party, here’s a quick recap of the announcements:

Tenjutsu

The first of two brand new games announced during the event, Tenjutsu comes from Dead Cells designer Sébastien Benard. It’s a “rogue-jutsu” game set in a crumbling city, where you play as a renegade yakuza taking down her former colleagues. Tenjutsu looks to be something like a combination of Dead Cells, Streets of Rage, and Sifu — your goal is to take down four crime syndicates, which you can tackle in any order as you slowly improve your skills at a complex brawler fighting system. You can also use resources you collect to build up the city with shops and restaurants, but spending too much time preparing will result in stronger enemies. Tenjutsu is coming to PC and consoles, but no release date just yet.

Possessor(s)

In Devolver’s second game announcement of the evening, we took a look at Possessor(s). Art style look familiar? Yup, this is from Hyper Light Drifter and Solar Ash developer Heart Machine. It’s a side-scroller action game with sci-fi horror elements where you play as Luca and her counterpart Rehm. The two explore a city wrecked by an interdimensional catastrophe. Possessor(s) has an open-ended world structure with multiple possible paths available at any given time, and focuses on tight combat, challenging bosses, and exploration. Possessor(s) is coming to PC and console in 2025.

The Crush House

I’ve been obsessed with The Crush House since it was first revealed earlier this year. It’s a novel premise for a game: you’re a producer on the titular reality TV show set at a Malibu mansion. Every week, you select a four-person cast from 12 total actors and let them loose in The Crush House, filming spicy moments over several days to satisfy your drama-loving audience. When you’re not filming, you’ll likely spend your time obsessing over details like decorations, props, or other ways you can capture different audience segments…though you’ll also quickly realize there’s a deeper mystery going on beneath the brightly color veneer of the house. During today’s Devolver Direct, we saw a new trailer for The Crush House capped with a release date: it’s coming out on August 9 on PC, with a Steam demo available now.

Anger Foot

Free Lives, developers of Broforce, Gorn, and Terra Nil, were also at the Devolver Direct with their upcoming game, Anger Foot. We actually went hands-on with Anger Foot not long ago, and really enjoyed its compelling take on the stylings of Hotline Miami, but with a lot more kicking. It’s a first-person…shooter? More like kicker. You kick your way through a place literally called Shit City, bringing down enemies, replaying levels with different types of kickers, and upgrading your weapons and sneakers as you go. Anger Foot is coming soon — it’ll be out on PC on July 11.

The Talos Principle 2 – Road to Elysium

The Talos Principle 2 came out late last year, and we praised its simultaneous exploration of both puzzling and philosophy in our 8/10 review. But Croteam showed up to the Devolver Direct to expand on what it established in the base game with the Road to Elysium DLC, now with a release date of June 14. Road to Elysium takes place after the events of The Talos Principle 2, bringing back familiar characters and expanding on certain major moments from the game. It takes place over three distinct chapters, each with a different vibe and a different character perspective.

Cult of the Lamb – Unholy Alliance

Finally, Cult of the Lamb stopped into the birthday party to share some news about an upcoming free update, Unholy Alliance. Unholy Alliance brings a new playable character, the Goat, to the game for the addition of local co-op. Local co-op brings with it certain new challenges, such as twists on existing minigames, the ability to swap weapons between the two characters, deal extra damage if fighting back to back, and plenty more. There are also new rewards being added to the game for solo players, so don’t worry if you don’t have a Goat buddy. Unholy Alliance will release on August 12 for PC, PlayStation, Xbox, and Switch.

That’s it for ~~Volvy’s Birthday~~ the Devolver Direct! You can catch up on everything from Summer Game Fest and Day of the Devs earlier today with our round-ups here and here, and stick with IGN for everything else Summer of Gaming all month long.

Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. Got a story tip? Send it to rvalentine@ign.com.

Monster Hunter Wilds’ new trailer shows sick cutscenes and lizard-worms that are gonna make even sicker pants

Capcom’s series about big beasts and the clothes you can skin/steal from them continues in Monster Hunter Wilds, which looked as great as ever in its newest trailer from tonight’s Summer Game Fest show. We get new peeks at some lovely dunes, reptile-chicken mounts and bulky weapons. Oh, and some monsters ripe for huntin’, presumably.

Black Myth Wukong’s Physical Editions Will Not Come With a Disc

Black Myth: Wukong is now up for pre-order, including its planned physical and collector’s editions. But it looks like none of the physical editions will actually include a physical edition. It’s just a code in a box.

Today, alongside a new trailer shown at Summer Game Fest, developer Game Science put Black Myth: Wukong up for preorder and shared some details about how those preorders and physical editions will work. According to the developer, both the physical Deluxe and Collector’s Editions will come with digital activation codes for the Digital Deluxe edition of the game, but will not have a disc.

In an FAQ, Game Science explained that this was due to limitations on resources, but said it was looking into releasing discs in the future.

It is the first time for Game Science to release a console game globally, and we are currently facing limitations in offline resources required for the import, export, transportation, distribution, and sales of physical discs. These factors have made it difficult for us to sell physical discs simultaneously with the official release of the game.

Our publishing team is actively working on resolving these issues and exploring options to offer physical discs.

In the same FAQ, Game Science also announced its Xbox edition of the game would be released sometime after the PlayStation and PC editions, as the studio is “currently optimizing the Xbox Series X|S version to meet our quality standards.”

Last year, IGN wrote an extensive report examining a number of sexist remarks and attitudes made by Game Science founders and members over the last decade. These comments have sparked criticism from a number of Chinese gamers, especially women and their allies, though others have stepped up to defend Game Science. Game Science has yet to respond to our request for comment on the subject, either at the time or since.

Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. Got a story tip? Send it to rvalentine@ign.com.

Petal Runner is a slice-of-life Gameboy Advance style RPG about being a digital pet courier

Are Tamagotchis a thing now again? I’m getting a sense they might be, but I’ll always associate them with the nineties. Ah, to return to a simpler time, where kids tripped each other up in the school hallways to steal toys , before Pokémon cards came along and everyone leveled up to stabbings. Sorry, Petal Runner devs, for opening a news article about your lovely wholesome game talking about stabbings. This gorgeous, fuschia-splashed, slice-of-life RPG is, if anything, the antidote to stabbings. In terms of game fatigue, anyway. It won’t cure tetanus, at least I don’t think so.

Sonic X Shadow Generations Speeds Onto Switch This October

Sprinting out of Summer Game Fest.

Well, we thought that it might appear in tonight’s Summer Game Fest Opening Night Showcase and there it was! SEGA has graced us with a new Sonic X Shadow Generations trailer and it came with a 25th October release date.

While we were very excited to see when this one will be coming our way, the real star of this new trailer is a better look at the all-new Shadow campaign. This fresh story will see you speeding through iconic locations from the Hedgehog’s history to take on the Black Doom. Ooooo.

Read the full article on nintendolife.com

Five Ways to Make Your Mark in Democracy 4: Console Edition

Democracy 4: Console Edition is a political simulation game where you take control of a country and run it as you see fit. While in a position of power, you will be able to implement new laws, and take actions which will appease a group of voters, while angering another. The ultimate goal is to gain more votes than your opposition in an election and continue running the country in your vision.

Picking a Country to Lead

When starting out in Democracy 4: Console Edition, the first decision you must make is which country to lead. You are able to become the President/Prime Minister of USA, UK, Japan, France, Canada, Australia, Spain, Germany, Italy, and South Korea. Each country has a difficulty rating out of 5, and it would help on earlier playthroughs if you were to stick to countries such as Canada, USA, South Korea, Australia, or Germany, who are all rated 2 stars and below. This will help you learn the game and be able to effectively lead 5-star difficulty countries such as the UK and Japan.

Surrounding Yourself with Cabinet Ministers who Share Your Intentions

As you begin leading a country, you will inherit the cabinet ministers who were there from the previous regime. These individuals will have their own thoughts and biases towards the direction of the government. It will be up to you to bring in new cabinet ministers which align with your values, should you choose, or you could try implementing policy changes with the existing cabinet and see how things go.

There are seven cabinet ministers in office and their departments are law & order, public services, tax, economy, welfare, foreign policy, and transport. How you deal with your cabinet ministers and policy directions can define your time in office.

Introducing New Policies and Changing Existing Ones

Much like inheriting cabinet ministers from your country’s previous leader, the country you are leading will have existing laws and policies you can tweak and new ones you can introduce, depending on the direction you wish to take your leadership in. You can spend Political Capital, which you gain via your cabinet ministers. How much your ministers get behind your decisions has a big impact on how many changes you can make at any given time.

Should you decide to make a lot of changes from the start and your cabinet members not be fully behind them, then you may not be able to make the necessary changes as you may have intended to. Having your cabinet be behind your decisions is only part of the way of making your reign as leader a success, however. The key part of staying in power is to get people to vote for you and you need to keep them on your side.

Keeping Most of your Constituents Satisfied

While you may not have been voted in when your term first started, public opinion is the biggest barometer for success in Democracy 4: Console Edition. Each decision you make will positively impact one type of constituent, while negatively affecting another. It’s impossible to keep everyone happy all the time, but some opinions may be more impactful than others.

To ensure your campaign and time in office are a success, there will be financial backers who will try to influence your decisions by endorsing you further if your leadership is to their liking or threatening to remove their backing if they aren’t behind you. Those won’t be the only threats you’ll have to deal with, however.

As your direction for the country takes shape, there may be people inside or outside the nation you’re governing who wish to have you removed permanently. This could mean threats of disruption or even against your life. Between these and random events cropping up, such as headline news topics and discussions, there’s no shortage of ways for the public to support or oppose you.

Being Re-elected and the Future of Your Country

If you make it to the end of your first term, it will then be time for elections. Your public perception up until this point will be pivotal in getting re-elected. The public aren’t only interested in what you’ve done so far, however.

As the election approaches on the horizon, you will be asked to confirm your manifesto. How you meet these targets can be the difference between winning or losing the election. Promise too little and it could make no difference but promise too much and not reach it could spell disaster in the polls.

Democracy 4: Console Edition will let you play out your ideas for a perfect government. Play in any way you wish. But will you be able to see your campaign through to the end and beyond? The polls are now open for Democracy 4: Console Edition on Xbox consoles. We wish you great success in your political future!

Democracy 4: Console Edition

Auroch Digital

☆☆☆☆☆
10

★★★★★

$26.99

Get it now

Democracy 4: Console Edition lets you take the role of President or Prime Minister in one of ten countries. You will then govern the country as you see fit, while trying to retain enough popularity to get re-elected.

• Choose to lead one of the following countries: USA, UK, Japan, France, Canada, Australia, Spain, Germany, Italy, or South Korea
• Select cabinet ministers that align with your vision for the future of the country
• Introduce new laws or tweak existing ones to carry out your plans for change
• How you deal with random events can either increase or decrease your favourability with the public
• As election time approaches, lay out your manifesto and aim to deliver a campaign that will take you to victory!

Democracy 4: Console Edition is the ultimate sandbox for testing out your political ideas. We all think that we could do a better job ourselves in running a country compared to politicians, but is that really true? With one eye on the budget, the other on the polls, and somehow finding time to watch out for terrorist attacks at the same time, you will find that staying in power while changing society for the better is a tougher job than you ever imagined.

This is a strategy game, where the outcome of your policies and laws reflects on your success. If you want to abolish all public spending and all taxes, you can do that. It might work, it might not, depending on how you handle it.

On the other hand, if you want to nationalise the railways, energy and water companies, cap CEO pay, ban second-home ownership, and put universal income in place, you can do that too. Democracy 4: Console Edition models the likely effects, short and long-term, of any action you take so you can see what kind of country you can run.

Built on a custom-built neural network designed to model the opinions, beliefs, thoughts and biases of thousands of virtual citizens, Democracy 4: Console Edition is the state-of-the-art in political simulation games.

Ultimately, Democracy 4: Console Edition is not a game about simply winning an election, but about running the country. Losing an election is just the endgame (unless you get assassinated). The real challenge is whether you can create a country you are proud of.

The post Five Ways to Make Your Mark in Democracy 4: Console Edition appeared first on Xbox Wire.

Embark on the Hunter’s Journey with a new look at Monster Hunter Wilds

PlayStation fans! We’re back again with another exciting look at Monster Hunter Wilds, coming to PlayStation 5 in 2025. In the trailer just revealed at Summer Game Fest 2024, we’re sharing how we’ve evolved the hunting experience to seamlessly connect the tense storyline and gameplay, resulting in the most immersive and cinematic hunting experience in the series.

If you haven’t yet, take a look at our latest trailer below, which we’re calling “The Hunter’s Journey.” It shares a peek at an intense narrative-driven hunt through the Windward Plains and introduces brand new monsters making their debut in Monster Hunter Wilds.

Embark on the Hunter’s Journey with a new look at Monster Hunter Wilds

New Doshaguma artwork revealed

Take a look at our newly released artwork! Here we see a hunter encountering a fearsome pack of Doshaguma in the vast Windward Plains, providing a taste of the harsh environments and ferocious monsters you’ll be confronted with in the world of Monster Hunter Wilds.

A new Leviathan slithers into Monster Hunter Wilds

Balahara
Leviathan

The Balahara, a leviathan-type monster found in the Windward Plains, makes its debut in Monster Hunter Wilds.

This leviathan uses its serpentine body to slither through the normally impassible jagged landscape with ease. The Balahara secretes a slick substance that allows it to greet any creature unfortunate enough to wander into its territory with a salvo slung from afar.

Ever the cunning predator, the Balahara will often burrow into the smooth desert sand and coil itself in wait, using its flexible body to create a pit of quicksand that will ensnare its prey.

Monstrous Turf Wars

The Forbidden Lands are an unforgiving region–Sparse in resources and plentiful in those competing for them. Violent clashes over territory are an everyday occurrence in the desert and not just between the titans that inhabit it.

In the released footage, a pack of Balahara can be seen attacking a large Doshaguma, and we can see a Chatacabra under attack from a group of small monsters. Yes, even small monsters can be observed defending themselves against larger predators if they feel threatened. Knowledge of this type of behavior can be used to your advantage. Be sure to keep a keen eye on your surroundings so you can act appropriately when the time comes.

Immersive, seamless connection between story and gameplay

The development team is working to craft a story unlike anything seen before in the Monster Hunter series, blending a compelling and intriguing narrative with interesting characters to meet during your journey.

Here’s a glimpse of the story told through a few cutscenes and gameplay segments.

You’ll enter the role of a hunter appointed to the Forbidden Lands Research Commission.

Members of the research commission, including the mysterious boy Nata, embark on an expedition into the Forbidden Lands.

Upon entering the Windward Plains, the research commission encounters a pack of Balahara that call the sandy soil of the Windward Plains home.

In the next shot, we see the Hunter joining up with an unknown man under attack from the Balahara.

As the Balahara attack, we see the action seamlessly flow from cutscenes to gameplay.

Hunters can brandish their weapons while mounted atop their Seikret to deter an approaching pack of predators, or the Seikret can be directed to avoid monsters automatically.

A hunter swallowed by quicksand.

The Balahara tracks down the hunter and the battle begins.

A mysterious large monster approaches…

The Windward Plains is a locale that showcases a rich and vibrant ecosystem full of monsters, contrasted by the harshness of nature. During your adventures, you’ll discover the mysteries of this land and the monsters that inhabit it.

Amongst these harsh conditions, you’ll need to be wary of the Sandtide, a violent sandstorm rife with lightning. Also in the trailer, there was a scene where a large mysterious monster was attacking a Doshaguma with lightning.

Monster Hunter Wilds promises to deliver the most cinematic and immersive story in the series’s history, where story and gameplay are seamlessly connected. We’ll have plenty more to share with you in the future, so we hope you stay tuned ahead of the game’s launch on PS5 in 2025.

Palworld Is Getting a Brand New Island, New Pals and More in Major Update

Monster capturing, gun shooting, crafting survival game Palworld made an appearance at Summer Game Fest today with news about an update, and it’s a big one. On June 27, Palworld will see the Sakurajima update add a higher level cap, new Pals, a new raid, a new faction and boss, a whole new island, and more.

The Sakurajima update sounds like one heck of a doozy. In a new trailer, we got a look at a brand new island being added to Palworld with a distinctly Japanese theme. We see cherry blossoms, something that looks like a bath house, and plenty of architecture and nature pointing toward that theme.

The island comes complete with new Pals, new subspecies, new buildings, a new raid, a new stronghold called the Oil Rig, an arena, a new faction, a new boss, and a raised level cap. This update will also come with Xbox-dedicated servers, something the game had conspicuously lacked up to this point. A number of the new Pals hearken back to the game’s heavy Pokemon inspirations – there’s one that looks a lot like a Dusclops, and another that reminds me of Golisopod.

Palworld has seen a flood of regular updates since its early access release earlier this year, including new raid battles and new Pals. Developer Pocket Pair previously unveiled Arena Pal PvP back in April, and more updates are planned throughout the year. Our early access review of the game called it “amusingly irreverent” and “absurdly difficult to put down.”

Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. Got a story tip? Send it to rvalentine@ign.com.

Digital Eclipse are making a new Power Rangers game with extreme Sonic Mania energy

In what is only the third ever piece of videogame-related media to make me weep at my keyboard, Volgar the Viking devs and retro specialists Digital Eclipse have announced a Power Ranger videogame – Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: Rita’s Rewind. It’s a 90s-ass side-scrolling arcade brawler for up to five players, involves “time twisting”, and has mode-7-style arcade shooter bits together with the original TV show’s climactic mecha transformation sequences.