Steam's Summer Sale is almost over, but you still have a chance to buy some of the online storefront's top sellers in its closing Encore Sale.
The Encore Sale, which started this morning and will run until Monday, 10:00 AM Pacific Time, collects all the top sellers from the past 10 days and offers them again at a deep discount.
The Encore Sale includes some of , including for $5, for $20, for $8, and many more. Overall, the Encore Sale includes almost 100 deals.
Some other standout offers include for $10, for $30, and for $5.
You can find the full list of deals included in the Summer Encore Sale .
E3 2015 has drawn to a close, but how did it all turn out? We look at the best moments from the show, some of the biggest games, and a few things we think could've made everything a little better.
Check out assessment for the big three console creators in the following galleries, then come back and let us know what you thought in the comments below.
The highs and lows at E3 for:
While the features above focus on the platform holders, it's worth pointing out that we also saw great presentations from all the publishers. Feel free to also add your thoughts about what you liked about E3 as a whole, and what could've made it even better!
Dontnod, the French developer which previously released and has announced its next game at E3 2015, Vampyr, a role-playing game for , , and that will use Unreal Engine 4.
Vampyr is set in set in an early 20th century Britain, which is thrown into chaos by a lethal Spanish Flu, and vampires that haunt the streets at night. Player will take on the role of Jonathan E. Reid, a military surgeon that becomes a vampire when he returns home from the war.
During the game, players will explore London, accept missions, and eventually have to decide who they'll feed on.
"Absolutely all characters in the game are potential victims of your vampiric lust," the developer said in a release. "Carefully study the habits of your next victim, his or her relationships with other characters, and set up your strategy to feed, unnoticed: seduce them, change their daily habits, or make sure they end up alone in a dark street."
Vampyr's combat includes, melee, shooting mechanics, and supernatural vampire abilities that'll help you take on different species of vampire creatures as well as vampire hunters. Player will also be able to create their own weapons using a deep crafting system and materials looted from defeated enemies.
Vampyr will be published by Focus Home Interactive in 2017.
The , the government body which which rates movies, certain publications, and games in the same way that the Entertainment Software Board rates games in North America, has rated an Ubisoft game for called Zombi.
Given its title and Ubisoft being listed as the publisher, this might be a port of company's 2012 exclusive .
The listing on the Classification Board appears a little more than a week after , a site that has previously revealed a game and concept art for , .
According to the Classification Board's website, Zombi is rated MA 15+ for strong horror violence, blood, and gore, which also describes the adult content in the original ZombiU. The date of the classification listed is June 17, 2015.
In May of 2013, Ubisoft Montpellier's the creative director Jean-Philippe Caro said that the studio was working on a , but in July 2013, Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot told that "betting big" on the Wii U did not pay off for the company, and that there are .
After two delays, developer Rocksteady and publisher Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment are finally ready to release on June 23.
Critics already got a chance to play the game before release and publish their reviews, and so far the general consensus is that Batman: Arkham Knight is an excellent game.
The most criticized part of the game is the sections requiring players to use the Batmobile, which is a new addition to the series.
Check out a sampling of review scores and editor opinions below. And be sure to visit for even more on the game's critical reception.
Game: Batman: Arkham Knight
Developer: Rocksteady Studios
Platforms: , ,
Release Date: June 23
Price: $60
GameSpot -- 7/10
"Arkham Knight is constantly trying to justify the Batmobile's presence, forcing it upon you at nearly every opportunity." - Kevin VanOrd []
IGN -- 9.2/10
"The addition of tank combat thematically clashes with everything Batman stands for, but it is fun, and having access to the Batmobile for the first time gives us a new world of possibilities for interacting with Gotham City. Arkham Knight is an outstanding game on almost every level" - Dan Stapleton []
Polygon -- 10/10
"After Arkham Knight, Batman has been perfected — and the end result is the best game of this console generation." - Justin McElroy []
Batman: Arkham Knight -- 9.5/10
"Rocksteady built a special experience that dazzles with its cleverness, intelligence, and ability to shift from kick-ass Batman moments to emotional gut punches to scenes stripped straight from some of Batman's greatest comic book stories. Lock yourself away, avoid social media and friends, and finish this game. You won't want this one spoiled for you." - Andrew Reiner []
USGamer -- 4/5
"Rocksteady absolutely nailed the feeling of being Batman and Arkham Knight only increases the scope of the original games. Yes, I got annoyed, but the moment-to-moment play of Batman: Arkham Knight is still amazing. If you've saved the Asylum and cleaned up the City, it's worth finishing the Knight off." - Mike Williams []
GamesRadar+ -- 4/5
"An ambitious and successful end to Rocksteady’s trilogy, with a standard-setting open world you must experience. A superior main story and less Batmobile combat would’ve made a huge difference." - Sam Roberts []
Warner Bros. Interactive's has taken the top spot on the UK all formats chart for the week ending June 20.
According to UK chart monitor Chart Track, it is the first Lego title to reach No.1 since in 2014, and the seventh Lego title from Traveller's Tales to reach the position since in March 2005.
, meanwhile, drops down to No.2, with sales falling by 71 percent in its second week on the chart.
Bandai Namco's clings to No.3, ahead of at No.4, and at No.5.
's 24 percent decline in sales has translated to a drop from No.4 to No.6, while and hold their positions at No.7 and No.8, and returns to the top ten at No.9. Rounding off the top ten is .
Here's the top ten for the week ending June 20 in full.
Phil Spencer, the head of, has explained howgame emulation is being achieved on the , as well as the ethos behind the company's decision to support legacy content.
Speaking on , Spencer said the decision to support Xbox 360 games was made to "make 360 owners look at Xbox One as a safe place to play."
"Millions of people made investments in 360 content," he said. "We thought the right thing to do was to make that content go forward, but we didn't know [how difficult it would be]."
"[Emulation] is hard," admitted Spencer, explaining that the company was dealing with having to harmonise PowerPC architecture with x86.
"The approach that we've taken is to actually emulate the full Xbox 360 hardware layer. So the [operating system] for the 360 is actually running when you run the game," Spencer explained.
"If you watch the game's boot you'll see the Xbox 360 boot animation come up. From a performance standpoint it allows [emulation] to work. We're able to get frame by frame performance equivalents."
"[Xbox Live] thinks you're on a 360, so people have been asking 'hey, why are you playing Mass Effect on the 360?,' I was actually playing on the Xbox One."
Spencer continued to explain that, since the Xbox One thinks it's playing a normal game, features such as streaming and screenshots are supported.
"The 360 games think they're running on the 360 OS, which they are. And the 360 OS thinks its running on the hardware, which it's not, it's running on an emulated VM. On the other side, the Xbox One thinks it's a game. That's why things like streaming, game DVR, and screenshots all work, because it thinks there's just one big game called 360."
Delving deeper, Spencer explained exactly how the emulator packages the Xbox 360 games, and how it compares to Xbox 360's emulation of original Xbox games.
"You download a kind of manifest of wrapper for the 360 game, so we can say 'hey, this is actually Banjo, or this is Mass Effect. The emulator runs exactly the same for all the games.
"I was around when we did the original Xbox [backwards compatibility] for Xbox 360 where we had a for every game and it just didn't scale very well. This is actually the same emulator running for all of the games. Different games do different things, as we're rolling them out we'll say 'oh maybe we have to tweak the emulator.' But in the end, the emulator is emulating the 360, so it's for everybody."
Asked about whether Microsoft would require permission from game publishers to adjust game code, Spencer clarified it would not be interfering with code.
"The bits are not touched," he said. "There's some caveats, and as always I like to be as transparent as I can be on this: Kinect games won't work from the 360, because translating between the Kinect sensors is almost impossible."
Finally, the subject of multi-disc games was also addressed. According to Spencer, it's an issue engineers are looking into.
"We're still working on multi-disc," he said. " and are some of my favourites from the 360. There's actually work in packing a multi-disc into single that requires us to go back and look at the original package on the multiple discs and reconfigure that."
Microsoft announced at its E3 press conference. According to the platform holder digital Xbox 360 titles already purchased via XBLA, as well as retail discs of last-gen titles, will eventually be "natively" playable on Xbox One.
Sony has released an update for its iOS and Android PlayStation App to make code redemption much easier.
The update, which is available now on and , allows "PlayStation Network Card numbers and promotion codes to be entered within the PlayStation App."
Furthermore, codes can now be redeemed either by entering them manually using a keyboard, or scanning it using the device's camera.
Another addition introduced in the update shows "comments that you receive while broadcasting from your system can now be displayed on the second screen."
Sony recently announced it will be releasing a new capacity, offering twice the storage of the existing PS4.
The new model is also ten percent lighter, weighing a total of 2.5 kg, and uses eight percent less energy. The new model's hard drive bay cover now also has a matte finish.
At E3 2015, Sony made a number of big announcements, including the Final Fantasy 7 remake featured in the video above. Microsoft, meanwhile, revealed backwards compatibility for Xbox 360 games, and Nintendo showed of Star Fox.
creator Yu Suzuki has outlined the funding goals he needs to reach to achieve his grand vision for the elusive third game in the series, and has also discussed potential future entries.
Answering questions on a , Suzuki said that the first of his big ideas could be implemented at the $5 million milestone.
"I will say this," he said. "If we reach the $5 million mark, one of the things I really want to do with will become a reality."
According to Suzuki, Shenmue 3 will "truly have the features of an open-world" at the $10 million milestone.
Suzuki didn't elaborate on what these open-world features entail , however, he did detail some of the stretch goals, which include the much-discussed forklift gameplay, additional towns, and extra side-activities.
"There will be part time jobs that will be indicative of those you would find in China," he explained. "In the Stretch goals there will also be the old favorites."
Elsewhere in the AMA, Suzuki indicated that he has a vision for the future of the series beyond Shenmue 3, saying he'd like to complete the original 11-chapter story.
"There are a total of 11 chapters that make up the whole story," he said. "Over the past 14 years I originally planned for there to four or five games to the series. If at all possible, I would still like to realize the full story of 11 chapters."
The original Shenmue is considered to be the first chapter. The second chapter was delivered in the manga, while Shenmue 2 was chapter three, four, and five. Unless Shenmue 3 is massive in scope, it may be that at least one more game after it will be necessary to complete the narrative arc.
, when Suzuki appeared on stage beside PlayStation's Adam Boyes to launch a Kickstarter.
Suzuki said the game would be a "full-on Shenmue experience," and asked for $2 million in initial funding to start work on the project. Within a couple of hours the campaign crossed $1 million mark, and just a few hours later, its funding goal. At the time of writing this it has raised over $3,500,000, with 25 days to go.
Take a look at some of the artwork for the game in the gallery below.
Square Enix has announced the version of the port of will be available on October 16 across North America and Europe.
The re-release will be available for $16.99 (£12.99).
At E3, the PC-to-PS4 port of Square Enix's beloved role-playing game had its release date delayed until winter this year. In addition, the company confirmed that the game would be coming to iOS.
This port is completely separate from the the that was announced at E3 2015.
The remake me be more of a reimagining, if comments from Nomura suggesting it could deviate from its source material are any indication. Speaking to GameSpot, Nomura suggested he didn't see a reason to release the exact same game again.
“We’ve announced version on the PlayStation 4, and then we have the remake coming to PS4,” he said. “You’ll have this extremely, very, very pretty FFVII existing on the same plane. We feel that if that happens, it’s like, why have the same exact game?
During Square Enix's E3 press conference the company also showed off and . If you missed it, you can
The Limited Edition version of Rocksteady's has been delayed across multiple retailers.
The Limited Edition, which includes a steelbook case, an artbook, a comic book, a character skin pack, and a statue, is now listed as unavailable on . According to , GameStop Finland has also delayed delivery of the bundle.
Both retailers will reportedly send download codes for the game to those affected.
A similar issue hit he . However, this version was . Rocksteady announced the news on its, saying "unforeseen circumstances" were to blame.
"We regret to inform you that we are not able to release the Batmobile Collector's Edition of Batman: Arkham Knight due to unforeseen circumstances that greatly compromised the quality of this extremely limited run of product," Rocksteady said in a statement.
"We are deeply apologetic for this unfortunate outcome."
In GameSpot's we said "Arkham Knight is another slick and enjoyable Batman adventure. But what it brings to the series' table is not always for the best."
Gem protectors, we have our first look at Cursed Treasure 3 from IriySoft. What mysteries will this map hold? What monsters? One thing is for sure, we’re excited to start building towers! Click on the image to see the full screenshot…
Never played Cursed Treasure? Try Cursed Treasure 2!
It's a packed RuneLabs video today as Mod Luna gets the latest on waterfall fishing, the Seren quest and Halloween.
Don't forget to submit your ideas for high-level mobs over on � the more outlandish and imaginative the better � and to support your favourites.
Enjoy! You can keep up with all RuneScape's official video content by subscribing to our .
In this week's podcast, Mod Stu and Mod Matthe sit down to chat about the fearsome new RuneLabs-born monsters that recently landed in RuneScape � adamant and rune dragons.
They'll be focusing on your feedback, and how we'll be tweaking the dragons in the coming weeks in response.
, or head over to or .
Didn't catch the Developer Q&A and Beach Party Teaser on Tuesday? Never fear � it's up on YouTube now for your enjoyment:
There's plenty here to enjoy during your weekend Scaping. Check in on Monday for a big batch of updates to Artisans' Workshop!
Hey everyone! ZombiePie's been putting these community showcases together for years now, and it's well past time to get them more prominently featured. As such, we're going to be hosting them on the homepage moving forward. Although my name's on the byline, ZombiePie deserves all the credit for putting them together. Enjoy! - Rorie
Hello and welcome to the latest edition of the Giant Bomb Community Spotlight. Do not attempt to adjust your computer monitors, YES this edition of the Spotlight is indeed on the frontpage of Giant Bomb rather than being pinned to the forums. Today marks an exciting moment for myself, the Spotlight, and the Giant Bomb Community. Together we are going to experiment and explore new avenues, formats, and activities to more effectively spread the word about the best content that the Giant Bomb Community has to offer every week. However, I would first like to thank Mr. Rorie, Jeff, and all of the members of the staff for allowing this to happen, and of course all of you for continually providing me with the amazing material to justify this happening in the first place. Thank you, and this is and always has been for you.
It goes without saying that the format of the Community Spotlight will be tinkered with in future editions. on how to better present community content please feel free to present your ideas and thoughts in the comments below. For this week we will be maintaining the standard format as with previous editions, but I will be taking all of your suggestions for future editions very seriously.
As seen on the banner which you can catch over here. In regards to site related housekeeping there a few announcements worth sharing. First off the issue should be fixed now thanks to the hard efforts of the engineering team. Another issue that the engineers are actively dealing with are which have been hitting some users on the site. If you have experienced a CSFR Token Error please drop a comment here. Speaking of the engineers they would like for anyone that is to go ahead and run a special diagnostic test to help them locate potential sources to these issues.
The first video of the week comes from @turboman who has a new edition of his "Best of Giant Bomb" video series. This episode is all about Dan playing games with his father. The second video comes from the Guilty Gear Xrd Weekly Tournament Group, which you can join here, in the form of an archive of their last tournament.
The first image comes from Kyle G on Twitter who shares his best attempt to create Charlie Tunoka in Bloodborne. The next set of images come from Stochastic Gamer on Tumblr who was inspired by last year's Halloween UPF.
The community is just buzzing about Bloodborne and Pillars of Eternity this week and luckily for many users we have some nicely done wiki pages for both of them. for doing the research to figure out what Agent Alice was about last week.
, and has two massive and well written blogs not only detailing his thoughts about the game, but also an explanation as to what keeps bringing him back. which he not only enjoys playing today, but defends as being the "last true Front Mission" in North America. While they oftentimes get a bad rap . is back with avengance this week with series. M but with this edition breaks-down how you can quickly beat all of the bosses from Beatrix 1 to Beatrix 2 in FFIX. Speaking of Final Fantasy games with a detailed look at how the game sets up the Pulse Verge. under the "Grounded" difficulty setting. , but went the whole mile in writing a blog about his first impressions of the game. as part of his long running Comic Commish blog series. bobafettjm is happy to discuss this week, and always welcomes you to join him. he has ever played on his review blog. despite having some issues with how it controlled. Finally , and discusses each game in great detail.
In terms of the forums everyone is welcomed to . We also have . We also have. Another opportunity to learn about new games can be found in a . Finally can you think of a really monotonous boss fight that you had to deal with in a game you liked? Well that's the topic of debate for .
ATD88 continues his theme of examining the Final Fantasy franchise, but this week he . Doppelgamer on the other hand and added them to his "Hall of Shame" list. Finally Eder with a list of his ten favorite champions in the game.
Hey, so we'll have more to say about Guitar Hero Live on this week's podcast (which will be up later today), but here's the new game's new guitar peripheral.
I would have preferred a close-up of the fret board, but there you go. The frets are what makes this game different. It's a three-by-two configuration that represents itself with black on-screen indicators for one side and white ones for the other. This escalates into having to hit both sides of the fret board at the same time, which actually creates more realistic-feeling chord shapes with your left hand. We got a chance to play around with it (and a build of the game) recently and it's surprisingly cool.
Here's an example of what the game looks like when you're actually playing it. Yeah, Guitar Hero Live is kind of an FMV game. Can't say I saw that coming. Anyway, once you see the guitar, the white and black on-screen prompts should make a lot more sense.
Remember last summer when everyone was speculating that Google was looking to buy live streaming giant Twitch so that it could be integrated into their YouTube service, but then Amazon bought Twitch instead?
Well, today, YouTube announced their own live streaming app and website, "YouTube Gaming," that will serve as a hub for live streams, archived videos, and community interaction. YouTube Gaming will launch "later this summer," and will be at E3 showing off the platform to attendees.
The service will be organized around over 25,000 unique "game pages," each dedicated to a specific title. Users will be able to add games of interest to their "collection" in order to receive notifications whenever new content related to that game is available. Users will also be able to follow the channels of individual YouTube creators and some game companies. (Hey Jeff, just go ahead and follow Arc System now.)
The announcement emphasized a commitment to improving YouTube's live streaming experience:
On top of existing features like high frame rate streaming at 60fps, DVR, and automatically converting your stream into a YouTube video, we’re redesigning our system so that you no longer need to schedule a live event ahead of time. We’re also creating single link you can share for all your streams.
Some of this–the 60fps streams and DVR–is fantastic. The rest is... well... Honestly, it's sort of the bare minimum support necessary for a cohesive live streaming service, so it's good that the company is getting that into place. Hopefully once the foundation is locked down, YouTube Gaming will be able to introduce new features specifically built for broadcasting and archiving game video.
Twitch "welcomed" their new competitor to the field with a social media punch in the arm...
. @YouTubeGaming Welcome Player 2. Add me on Google+. #kappa
— Twitch (@Twitch) June 12, 2015
...but I suspect (and hope) that this playful rivalry will exist alongside strong competition that forces both companies to improve the services they're offering consumers. Last year, I interviewed a few folks at Twitch and it seemed like the company had a number of hurdles they needed to clear in order to expand and improve their services, and a strong alternative could help push them to take the necessary leaps. (This interview was before the Amazon acquisition, of course, so it's likely that the larger scale of the retail behemoth offered them some solutions.)
Twitch has had other competitors over the years, like Ustream and Hitbox, but none have really given Twitch a run for its money. YouTube has a few things those other services didn't though: A built in user base, established stars, and a huge backlog of content. Time will tell if that's enough for YouTube Gaming to take on Twitch and become a new destination for live streaming.
Hello and welcome to the latest edition of the Giant Bomb Community Spotlight, and I am honored to be your host once again! Last week the Giant Bomb Community Endurance Run was underway. For those that missed it, you can still donate to their cause over . Rest assured that the event did reach its ! The housekeeping this week comes from engineer @jslack. despite being a subscriber please let out a yelp over . jSlack will reset your account and do you a solid if you have been having issues. Also, have you been ? Mr. @rorie would like to inform you that the engineers are working to rectify the issue over . With that let's get on with the latest edition of the Community Spotlight!
@saik0u also made a wonderful rendition of Dr. Tracksuit on top of his Mario Party 4 banner. We also have perpetual friend of the site @fobwashed with a great pixel art rendition of .
Have you ever heard of Pokemon Rumble World? Well if you have not rest assured that we have a surprisingly detailed wiki page for the game! With the release of Grand Theft Auto V on the PC remember that we have a MASSIVE wiki page detailing all of the nuances to the game.
OK, let's start with the facts, get those out of the way, and then we can freak out and speculate a little bit.
Technos Japan is the company that brought you such hot, hot hits as the Double Dragon franchise and the Kunio-kun franchise. That, in case it isn't ringing any bells, is the Japanese franchise that came over here in such games as River City Ransom and Super Dodge Ball. They also developed Karate Champ, so in some way they're directly responsible for the fighting game genre. They're an important studio that has been long defunct. The rights to those games ended up with a company called Million, which licensed some of these games out here and there, leading to some interesting stuff... and some positively dreadful stuff.
Well, Million has dealt those properties--the entire Technos catalog, actually--to Arc System Works, the developers of the Guilty Gear franchise. When I consider how well Arc has done in the 2D space (even going so far as to make polygons look like sprites in Guilty Gear Xrd), the idea of these amazing franchises ending up there sounds like one of the best possible outcomes.
The quick and dirty page that Arc has in place to confirm the news makes it sound like they're going to put in work on a new Kunio-kun game, but that other franchises will be revived and licensed, as well. There's already been one Kunio-kun release this year, the samurai-themed Downtown Nekketsu Jidaigeki for the 3DS. Hey, maybe they'll localize that and put it out? I'd play that game.
Of course, one has to expect that another Double Dragon game will come out of this sooner or later. Maybe Arc will take its fighting game team and have them make something a little better than that weird Neo Geo game.
OK, I could sit here and speculate about things Arc might do with all of these franchises all day, but instead I'll just say that this seems like a great combination! Arc is certainly capable of making cool-looking 2D-like games and they just acquired the rights to some real classics. Now we'll just have to sit back and see what their next move will be.
Hey Giant Bomb! I'm Austin Walker. We've met in video form, I've spoken to you on a couple of episodes of the Beastcast, and maybe you've read some of my news posts over the last week. What you may or may not have seen is that over the weekend, I wrote a couple of blog posts in the community section of the site: First, one about The Witcher, Race, and Historicity, and second, a post expanding on some of the ideas in the first while simultaneously responding to some of the comments and discussions from the community.
These posts were written as sort of short, off the cuff contributions to an ongoing conversation that Tauriq Moosa really kicked off with a piece titled "Colorblind: On Witcher 3, Rust, and gaming's race problem," which netted him a lot of heat–both positive and negative. Thankfully, while there were some outliers (and there always are), most of the debate in the comment sections of my blog posts was civil and engaged. As I said in the second post, that’s really exciting to me! I love seeing people develop and clarify their thoughts–even when those thoughts aren’t ones I necessarily agree with.
But there is one line of thought that I’ve seen a lot of over the last few days which isn’t a refined argument so much as a big, club-like assault. It goes like this: “No one should be forced into changing their games just because you want them to.” I’ve seen this in the comments, in my Tumblr’s ask box, on Twitter, and in the few threads on Reddit and NeoGAF. There are variations on it that use words other than “force,” but they almost always remain words adjacent to coercion: “Make,” “demand,” “order,” “dictate.”
When I see this, something bubbles up in me that wants to immediately shout back a response: “Come. On. I’m not forcing anyone to do anything!” But I know that this sort of response doesn’t get us anywhere. It hitches itself to a binary of “forced” vs “free” while in reality things are a lot more complex than that. The knee jerk response also misses an opportunity to engage with that specific issue: What does it mean when a writer criticizes a work?
And I’m writing this here, as an article, instead of in another blog post because this isn’t just about a single game like The Witcher 3, nor is it about just a single issue, like race. This applies to the sort of work many people like me do in the sphere of games criticism, whether we’re writing about issues of representation or level design, about 200 hour RPGs or two hour #AltGame experiments. I’m also writing it for a more strategic, selfish reason: Because it’ll give me something to point at every time someone accuses me of “trying to force a developer” to do something.
A Spectrum of Influence
So, what if instead of thinking about all of this in terms of a binary relationship (either a critic forces someone to do something or they don’t), we thought about this on a spectrum. On one end of the spectrum is absolute disconnect from influence: A writer pens long form essays about how developers should always do whatever they want. On the other end of the spectrum is critical work demanding that devs actually be “forced” to do things. But most critique exists in between those two extremes.
What does “in between” look like? Well, there's a range.
Still way over on the “force” side of the spectrum, a critic could call for a sort of “prohibitive” legislation. That is, a call to make something a creator does illegal or less-legal. Whether it’s because of concern over content, an interest in addressing labor conditions or market concerns, or a desire to address de facto censorship or discrimination, media critics have definitely spent some time arguing for the need of government involvement in the entertainment industries. Any time a writer says “this game and games like this should be banned,” or “laws should be put into place to make it illegal to use these slurs in the workplace,” or “employing overseas workers should require the company to pay an additional tax,“ that's a what I'm calling prohibitive legislation. These all exist on their own spectrum too: Banning something outright is a lot different than limiting its availability or putting an extra cost on exhibition or distribution, right?
But… I don’t think this is what’s happening when writers like me write about The Witcher 3 and race, or when critics take Rockstar to task over transphobia, or when Jeff grumbles about QTEs. No one is actually calling for governmental bans, here, right?
So, a little further away from the extreme of “forcing” a dev to do something is arguing for action or incentives that would encourage them to act differently. Let's call these "incentive" legislation. Here, think about tax credits or media funds built to support to creators that meet certain requirements, like employing a diverse range of employees, working in a certain medium, or producing a work that is a “public good” because it deals with history, education, or some other interest. You’ll see critics calling for things like this sometimes, but it’s not common in our little corner of the world; I'm pretty sure it’s not a thing I’ve ever done (though I'm not fundamentally opposed).
At about this same level of “attempted influence” would be calls for community or consumer organization. This would include both boycott groups aiming to limit the purchase of a specific product, brand, or category of good, and groups organized to support a product, like the Browncoats who sent letter after letter to Fox, begging them to bring back Firefly. This isn’t the same as calling for a legal ban or incentive, since it requires retailers, exhibitors, and other consumers to respond to the consumer action. But it still happens, as was the case this year when Target Australia pulled Grand Theft Auto V from store shelves after getting pressure from consumers.
But, again, in general, this isn’t the sort of critique we see in our sphere of bloggers, critics, and reviewers. Instead, what we see is something more in the middle of the spectrum. We write about games we love with enthusiasm and joy, and maybe we hope that it sells well enough that we’ll see a sequel–but we don’t tend to organize fan-groups. We take apart broken games with careful precision so as to make our readers aware of the quality of the product–but it’s rare that you see a game reviewer organize a boycott or put together a fan group.
Finally, there's the center of the spectrum: The sort of critical writing that makes an appeal to consumers, developers, and publishers. There are lots of different sorts of appeals. Sometimes you reference the market ("The controls for other Shooters are just so much more refined...") and sometimes you address stated developer intention ("In interviews, the lead writer said that X, but maaaaan, is it ever Y"). And sometimes this writing appeals to the empathy of the reader, and to their knowledge of the larger context. This is every time we say "I totally fell apart when that Chocobo died," or "This game's depiction of sexual violence was fetishistic and uncomfortable."
For my money, this is where most of the evaluative writing about games is on the "influence" spectrum. And yes, at least some of us hope that developers will see our critiques and take them into consideration. They’ll say “God, yeah, Destiny really does need more content,” or “Damn, yeah, actually we did fumble the depiction of women in this one.” Or maybe they’ll “decide how to address the white savior trope.” That one is a real quote, from Far Cry 4 narrative director Mark Thompson, who explained what he learned from Far Cry 3 and the critical response to it in a fantastic interview with Game Informer.
Were Thompson and company “forced” to make that change? Or did they consider the critiques issued to the previous game and decide how to address them? One of the hidden flaws of the “critics try to force developers to do things” line of argument is that it ignores that developers are people who can make up their own minds. So long as there isn’t threat of ban or boycott, they can internalize the critiques they think make sense and discard the rest, just like any reader can.
And what's beyond this sort of "I hope the developer takes my advice" level of desired influence? Well... Here’s the thing: It’s actually really hard to imagine critical work that exists further towards “no influence.” After all, even the writer who says “keep doing what you’ve been doing” is “influencing” the developer, since in reaffirming the work a developer has released it may convince a wavering dev to stick to their guns. The only thing I can really imagine in this space is non-evaluative recaps and summaries–but those aren't exactly critical.
So when I look closely at the arguments that say “don’t try to influence devs,” what I end up seeing more often than not is “don’t try to influence the devs in this one way.” It's not wholly dissimilar from those who say they want government to get out of the way of business, only to then also insist that regulations be put in place to protect some corporations and to incentivize industry-wide innovation. In both cases, “freedom” is held up as sacrosanct and “intervention” is positioned as a boogeyman. In reality the two are never wholly separate, and what’s really desired is a certain sort of intervention, just one that is so aligned with the status quo that it quietly fades into the background and feels "normal."
So we're left with a lot of writing in the "middle" of the spectrum, the occasional piece that tries to exert more influence, and almost none that attempt no influence at all. Like all attempts to categorize writing, this one is bound to have flaws. That’s okay, because so long as we recognize it as a nice little analytical tool and not as a Truth From Heaven, we’ll be able to catch the problems as they come up. Still, there is one glaring issue with it that I want to address.
"Americans, Big Guns, and Strident Views"
There is very specific version of the “don’t force developers” argument that has been coming around a lot in the discussion of The Witcher 3. Here’s an example, which I got as an anonymous “ask” on Tumblr today:
Why should any culture be forced to homogenize their media in order to appease all other cultures? More tangibly, why should one of the most impoverished races in history (the Polish) pander to American cultural norms? I can't help but point out that this is why the world hates Americans in general, which is why this Witcher business is getting so much press. People are just sick of americans with their big guns and strident views pushing themselves into every corner of the world.
I’m actually fairly sympathetic to this argument, which is why I’ve attempted to discuss The Witcher’s Polish and Slavic heritage with care. I know that it comes from a culture that is not mine, and I know that lots of folks from the US–myself included–have the capacity to forget how big and varied the world outside our borders.
Part of the reason that I know that is because I just spent the last four years in Canada, which has laws made specifically to insulate itself from American cultural imperialism. One key part of this set of regulations is the Canadian Radio-Television and Telecommunications Commission's “Canadian Content” (or “CanCon”) requirements. These rules govern the required amounts of “Canadian” music and television that must be broadcast by networks and radio stations, and they go on to define what exactly “Canadian” means in terms of production, content, and distribution. These rules exist because (the argument goes), if they didn’t, then Canadian television and radio would be filled with American content, putting Canadians out of jobs and diluting the unique cultural heritage of the country.
(I don’t want to go into a deep dive on Canadian policy, because listen, that gets real dry real quick. But it is interesting to note that even with these rules in place, American companies find ways to reach Canadian audiences and duck CanCon regulations. This led to a big, weird blow up back in the fall where Google and Netflix were officially ignored during a set of major public hearings around CanCon laws and digital media. It's all super interesting if you're a weird nerd like me.)
The point is, I understand where this argument is coming from. I understand how American media sensibilities have already spread globally, influencing how folks across the world make things. I understand that this can sometimes (directly or indirectly) lead to the recession of important customs of cultures.
But in the same way that different cultures around the world aren’t homogenous (and are more beautiful for it), Americans are similarly varied and complex. And one key way in which we're different is the degree of cultural reach we have. So, let’s add another axis to that spectrum of influence, let’s call it “reach.” Some elements of American culture have lots of reach. Major media corporations, celebrities, and the very largest of large name writers reach worldwide audiences and (without ill intent) carry their aesthetic, political, and cultural ideas with them. But the output of every American creator doesn’t carry that same reach.
Said plainly: There are absolutely broad, American cultural norms that have been spread around the world through a dominant, global media industry. I’m just not sure that critical media analysis is part of that set of cultural norms.
It’s certainly not uniquely American: The greatest influences on my thinking and writing include Algerian, Australian, British, Canadian, Danish, French, Indian, and Jamaican writers, many of which tackle issues of race, culture, gender, politics, media, and play in ways distinctly non-American. And, yes, my own cultural reach as an American critic is definitely larger than it was just a year ago, but let’s be real: I do okay, but I'm no Mickey Mouse.
Waiting for "The Right Time"
Coupled with the argument that Americans should “butt out” of this topic is another argument that pops up a lot: “I agree with the call for diversity generally, but The Witcher 3 isn’t the right target for critique.” Well, as someone who has written about games and race a few times over the last few years, I’ve gotten used to that defense. As are many of the others who’ve tried to tackle difficult issues in the games they love and care about.
When we note that a game is filled with slurs and offensive caricatures, we’re told that we should be less offended because, hey, it's just satire. When we point out how a game leverages a history of racialized, coded imagery to elicit fear, people link us to wiki articles and explain the deep lore as justification. When a game made me spend a half hour of my real time every day just to keep my skin color on point, I was told that, no no, of course games have a problem with race, but why did I have to go after Animal Crossing?
You know that joke Vinny tells about having a baby? "If you wait until you're ready, you'll never have a baby." Well if we wait until the “perfect time” to tackle these issues, nothing will ever get done.
Yes, writing about diversity and The Witcher 3 is especially complicated because of the perspectives involved. Polish history is filled with outsider groups minimizing, controlling, ignoring, and erasing the nation's unique ethnic and cultural character. At the same time, people of color in white-dominant spaces have struggled to develop the vocabularies of critical race studies and post-colonialism only to then be told to mind their tone. These things mix here in an especially volatile way. But this doesn't mean that we should shy away from addressing it, afraid of stepping on toes, afraid of what we don't know. It means we step forward in good faith, with sympathy for the other perspective, and with a willingness to incorporate the complexities of someone else's view.
Real talk: I'm never kidding when I say that this stuff is complicated. Trying to unwrap this stuff is fucking brutal. And because issues like racism are systemic and cultural (and more than just some bad, violent men in white hoods), it's difficult to tackle them. The best we can do is address them honestly, actually engage with the tough stuff, and resist the urge to boil things down into simple binaries. Sometimes that means repeating ourselves, again and again: “No, I don’t think CD Projekt Red is racist; Yes, I still wish there were some people of color in the game. Yes, I still like The Witcher 3 a lot. No, those three statements do not contradict each other.”
Those of us who write about things like race, gender, class, and sexuality in games do so because we fucking love games. And you know, most of us actually spend the majority of our time in any given year writing about weapon design, death mechanics, art style, game preservation, "virtual worlds," weird little import gems, explosive and private narrative experiments, rad Japanese robots, and the billion other things that make our favorite medium so great.
And sometimes, we want to take the things we love seriously enough to offer analysis and critique that goes beyond "I like this" or "I don't like that." We want to figure out how a game might fit in a larger cultural context or try to communicate how it fit just so into our lives. We often see the faults in these games we love because we're so close to them. And sometimes, pointing out those flaws doesn't mean we love them any less. Even our most brutal critiques–the ones that come closest to head shaking and dismissal–are rooted in a broader love for the medium.
I know I'm dropping "we" a lot here, I know. And I can't speak for everyone, obviously, so I'll say it like this: I write about all of these things because...
Well, because besides wanting to engage with my readers and help them work through their own opinions, besides hoping to “influence” game makers with my critique, there is a rumbling something, an emotional drive that fuels my desire to write. I write because I cannot but write. Because when I wake up and see that someone asked me what I thought about game X, the cogs start moving all on their own. Pieces like this one drill themselves itself into my head, dragging themselves into existence through broad ideas and little phrases. I write not (only) because I want to change the world, but because I am compelled to get words on the page.
I’m grateful that so many of you here have been so supportive of the blog posts that I’ve written since joining the site. It's because of that support that I feel comfortable putting myself out there like this, right on the main page of the site. I promise I'll be doing more community-focused, quick-take blogging in the future too.
In any case I hope you'll enjoy diving into all the complicated stuff in the future. All I can do is promise to be rigorous, honest, and critical, and hope that you’ll continue doing the same.
As of 4:45 PM eastern time, Bloodstained has crossed its $500,000 funding goal. Now all that's left is 31 days of stretch goal updates.
Following a series of teases over the last few weeks, former Konami producer Koji Igarashi has finally lifted the veil on his latest project: a 2.5D action adventure game called Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night.
Igarashi is teaming with developer Inti Creates (Mega Man 9, Mighty no. 9) to develop the game, which is described as "a gothic, exploration-focused action platformer" and certainly looks very much in the spirit of Igarashi's work on the Castlevania series. Here's the story premise, as described on Bloodstained's Kickstarter page:
You are Miriam, an orphan scarred by an alchemist curse which slowly crystallizes your skin. You must battle your way through a demon-filled castle summoned by Gebel, your old friend whose body has become more crystal than flesh.
Bloodstained will need to hit $500,000 for its crowd-funding goal, though the project is already partially funded through other sources. The Kickstarter is designed to both allow the team to produce Xbox One and PlayStation 4 versions of the game (which include physical discs for backers), as well as push toward a number of stretch goals, such as a second playable character at the $700,000 mark, and adding David Hayter to the voice cast at $850,000.
You can check out Kickstarter page here, and you definitely should, if only to watch Igarashi's pitch video, which includes him torturing a man mid-conversation, and transforming into a flock of bats. We all assumed he knew how to do that, it's just good to get visual confirmation of it finally.
Hello and welcome to the latest edition of the Giant Bomb Community Spotlight, and I, @zombiepie, am honored to be your host as always. Things have returned to normal as the nacho cheese induced nightmare known only as the "Big Live Live Show Live" fades away in our collective memories. Just a few announcements and bug reports this week. Firstly, if you are a user that uses the Safari browser and have had issues with videos not loading, please drop a comment over . Our engineer @jslack is working on the case but needs your input in order to remedy the problem. The next issue that a lot of users have chimed in about relates to the audio sync on videos hosted on the site. If you have been having this issue please report offending videos that have this issue over . @questengine would like to remind users that his Taboo-style game using the Giant Bomb API has been updated, and he's looking for input on how to make it better over . With that let's get on with the latest edition of the Community Spotlight!
@twitterlegend has created another Animated Bombcast clip this week! This clip animates Brad's dog like tendencies, and The Dog House moment from the Bombcast a ways back.
During an event at the West Hollywood House of Blues last night, Starbreeze Studios unveiled StarVR, their new virtual reality headset, alongside a new Walking Dead game being developed by Overkill (developers of the Payday series.) StarVR joins an ever growing catalog of virtual reality devices.So how does Starbreeze hope to differentiate the device from Oculus Rift, Morpheus, and its other competitors?
Well, first, StarVR is angling to be a "high end" VR solution. And there's no debating the thing's power. StarVR's website is filled with comparison to "other" VR devices, and I'd be lying if I said that the headset's specs weren't impressive: 210 Vertical FOV, 130 Horizontal FOV, dual 5.5 inch LCD panels, 360 degree headtracking, and a massive 5120x1440 resolution. Now, I'm not sure that I'm in the right income bracket to be able to afford a computer that can actually run VR games at that resolution, but I know that there is a large demographic of PC users that pride themselves on having the most powerful hardware available, so I'm sure the StarVR is looking really attractive to them.
The second way that Starbreeze seeks to separate StarVR from its competitors is in terms of software:
Through the acquisition, Starbreeze becomes one of the first technology companies to publish and develop both the software and hardware components of VR, allowing for a holistic approach covering all the dimensions involved.
This isn't a bad point at all. It has been a common refrain that for VR to really catch on it's going to need games that convince consumers to drop money on expensive hardware. And, I admit, a VR sequel to Starbreeze's Syndicate could be incredible.
But Starbreeze turned to Payday developer Overkill to show off the capabilities of the new headset, demonstrating a new first person Walking Dead game. The game is an on-rail shooter (think House of the Dead), and yes, believe it or not, it does include a light gun. Over on Polygon, Phil Kollar shares his hands on impressions:
About halfway through the demo, I was handed a shotgun. Both in the game and in real life. In a moment that reminded me of the weird dual realities I was currently existing in, a Starbreeze rep places a plastic toy shotgun into my hands, just as a character handed me a virtual shotgun in the game. The "real" fake shotgun had special sensors attached to it so that the game could track it. As I aimed in the real world, I aimed in the game.
Which... Huh. The image of someone wearing a VR headset and holding a plastic shotgun sounds like something ripped out of a bad X-Files episode, but hey, maybe that works in our weird, dystopic present. It also makes a strange pairing with the high-power rhetoric of the rest of StarVR's announcement. I understand it: Making a good demo is hard enough, and making a VR demo must be even harder. But there feels like there's a disconnect here. All the power in the world, but I can't leave the rails.
Starbreeze's entry into the VR race was a bit of a surprise, but now that I've given it some thought, I suspect we'll see headsets from a lot of different companies in the coming years. If I'm being pessimistic, then it's easy to imagine VR as the new MMO or new motion controls: A pipe dream that floods the market with tons of mediocre products. But it is possible that the introduction of VR will be more like the debut of dedicated 3D graphics cards in the 90s: A real shift in the way people make and play games.
E3 2015 officially starts tomorrow, but a handful of surprises have snuck out ahead of time due to bad luck, technological unpredictability, and, uh, the German games press.
Over the past few weeks, we've ben wondering what sort of big reveal Bethesda might have up its sleeve. Well, one answer is "Maybe Dishonored 2? I guess?" Yesterday, YouTuber (YouTube Creator? YouTube Enthusiast?) Matty Schroeder noticed that Bethesda's Twitch stream went live a day ahead of time, broadcasting out a conversation between Arkane Studios president Ralph Colantonio and Harvey Smith, who co-directed the first Dishonored game. So yeah, this probably means that we'll get an announcement for some sort of followup to Dishonored tonight, but what if... what if it's Prey 2?
Yeah, I know. I know it isn't. I know. But what if? (Watch us live tonight during the Bethesda press conference so that you can see the disappointment on my face!)
Bethesda wasn't the only company caught by a leak, though. After a lot of speculation about Platinum's next project, Best Buy Canada spoiled the surprise by listing Transformers: Devastation available for pre-order. The page was taken down eventually, but not before DualShockers grabbed the page's full text. The long and short? It's the thing Platinum does, but with more robots what transform into cars:
Face off against Megatron and battle it out with the Decepticons in Transformers Devestation. Equipped with fast action capabilities, this game allows for instant robot to vehicle attacks, slam downs, counterattacks, and infinite combos for a unique master combat system.
Okay, but what if you love leaks about games where you beat the hell out of people, but hate robots? Well, first, get the hell out of here, because robots are incredible. Second, I hope you love British Street Fighter characters, because it turns out that Street Fighter V will feature Cammy and Birdie. German magazine ComputerBild.de confirmed their inclusion in a preview that has been archived here.
In another Street Fighter related leak, word got out yesterday that Ryu would be heading to Nintendo's Super Smash Brothers 4 in DLC, along with returning Fire Emblem character Roy. But that leak was short lived, as Nintendo confirmed those characters (along with a whole bunch of other Smash Brothers updates) in a video this morning. Real talk: I'm not much of a Smash guy, but goddamn did this footage ever make me wanna play some Smash.
All of these leaks come just over a week after YouTube channel The Know leaked a bevy of screenshots and a whole lot of info about a game they claim is Dark Souls III. Given the quality of the shots, it's hard to argue with them. That said, I still have a lot of questions about what that game looks like. I'm especially curious to see how FromSoftware will talk about it after spending so much time selling us on the faster, shield-free combat of Bloodborne.
It's hard to imagine that we'd get more leaks before things properly kick off, but at this rate who knows. At this point I'm just crossing my fingers and hoping for at least one big surprise.
All the cool materials, upgrades, weapons and technology featured in XCOM: Enemy Unknown's expansion - Enemy Within such as MELD and Mech Troopers will not be featured in XCOM 2. As detailed by Lead Producer at Firaxis Games, Garth DeAngelis, the now 'canon' post-Impossible Ironman outcome seemed much bleaker than we earlier imagined.
"The scenario we are looking at (when we develop XCOM 2) was that the Aliens hit hard and XCOM had no chance early on in the game. They never progressed that much to even research such technology" he explained.
"This is also the reason they are still stuck with bullets (ballistics) as opposed to plasma or laser weapons as seen in the trailers and gameplay videos." he added.
XCOM 2 is set to hit PC November this year. No news on whether it will hit other platforms as of this moment. For more news on XCOM 2 and more out of E3, stay tuned to IGN.
When a visibly nervous Martin Sahlin took to the stage during E3's press conference earlier this week, few would have anticipated he was about to announce a title so delightfully charming it would linger in the audience's minds for just as long as Mirror's Edge and Star Wars Battlefront. Yet over the following ten minutes, despite clearly being terrified, he introduced us to Unravel - a gorgeous physics-based platformer with a playable character that seems destined to become one of gaming's famous faces. Now, having spent time playing the game, I can confirm early signs suggest it's definitely set to deliver.
The demo I played opened on an exquisitely rendered cinematic of an old woman looking wistfully out her window. From there she gets up and proceeds upstairs, but not before straightening a picture of a baby on the wall and picking up her basket of yarn. It's as she does this that a lone ball falls out and rolls out of shot. From there, our adventure begins.
The first level in the game is the lush garden shown in the trailer. As Yarny stumbles into shot he stares around in wonder, his awed gaze lingering on a butterfly. It's remarkable how expressive the character is considering his lack of facial features beside eyes, as at no stage in the demo was I unclear how he felt. It's a good thing too, as the game's story will apparently be revealed through gameplay rather than cutscenes, with Yarny's reactions serving as a crucial narrative tool. As he stumbles through levels he'll collect memories and it's these that'll give us a clue of what's going on. The two I saw were of a young laughing boy and then, later, of a man being dragged away by police. Could the story perhaps focus on the baby from the photo in the beginning's troubled life? The answers will assuredly be in the game, though Sahlin was keen to emphasise it won't be forced on players - the idea is to let you come to it rather than shove it in your face.
Gameplay is similarly smart. Within moments I'd managed to pick up the simple controls, though the various puzzles meant I was constantly finding new ways to use them. R2 sees you shoot yarn like a grappling hook, while L2 enables you to hold onto the string behind you and either haul yourself up or abseil down long drops. Circle can be used to grab and drag objects while Square lets you tie off some yarn to fixed points, creating bridges or a trampoline you can use to catapult yourself to new heights.
Puzzles can be as simple as scaling trees laden with lush fruit, or more complex. In one section, I had to use yarn to make a bridge and push some apples up and into a pool to create a makeshift walkway, so Yarny could cross without getting wet. In another, I had to drag an ash try onto a bent sign in order to reach higher ground and then swing from one point to another by carefully timing the shots of my grappling thread. Yarn balls placed around the map serve as checkpoints if you die, and also points you can reset to, with Sahlin suggesting this feature will play a key role in certain puzzles. Additionally Yarny unravels as he walks, so you'll need to find these balls to replenish his little body.
I also got a chance to play another level from later in the game with a markedly different tone. Gone is the warm, autumnal vibe of before. Instead, a grim landscape peppered with mud, pine trees and rain was laid out before me, with barbed wire fencing also making an appearance. Yarny's entire demeanour changes too - his eyes shift about nervously as he hugs himself for reassurance. It's surprisingly emotive.
Sahlin wasn't able to tell me when we'll see Unravel release, but he did promise it'll be a sizeable title and levels will have branching paths, so you'll be able to choose an easier path or take a fiendishly complex one in pursuit of collectibles.
There are many great things about E3, including the chance to catch up with devs, discover how the biggest titles of the year ahead are shaping up and have your mind blown by shocking reveals. But every now and then the most special moments come when you least expect them. I didn't expect to go into EA's booth and come out in love with an anthropomorphic ball of red yarn, but there's absolutely no question that Yarny has stolen my heart.
All the cool materials, upgrades, weapons and technology featured in XCOM: Enemy Unknown's expansion - Enemy Within such as MELD and Mech Troopers will not be featured in XCOM 2. As detailed by Lead Producer at Firaxis Games, Garth DeAngelis, the now 'canon' post-Impossible Ironman outcome seemed much bleaker than we earlier imagined.
"The scenario we are looking at (when we develop XCOM 2) was that the Aliens hit hard and XCOM had no chance early on in the game. They never progressed that much to even research such technology" he explained.
"This is also the reason they are still stuck with bullets (ballistics) as opposed to plasma or laser weapons as seen in the trailers and gameplay videos." he added.
XCOM 2 is set to hit PC November this year. No news on whether it will hit other platforms as of this moment. For more news on XCOM 2 and more out of E3, stay tuned to IGN.
Nintendo's next console Metroid Prime game is not likely to see release until Nintendo launches its next-gen console, codenamed NX.
"If we started for Wii U now, it would likely take three years or so. So it would likely now be on Nintendo's NX console," said series producer Kensuke Tanabe, at E3.
"Truth be told, making HD games takes a lot of time and resources," Tanabe added when asked why Nintendo had not made a Metroid Prime for Wii U. "I haven't been able to collect a team or the resources to do it."
This means we'll probably be waiting at least a couple more years for the next proper Metroid release; Nintendo doesn't plan to reveal anything about its new NX console .
Still, Tanabe clearly has a few ideas in store, some of which has has .
Metroid Prime: Federation Force was unveiled yesterday at E3, a in 2016. It includes Blast Ball as a mini game mode, a new 3v3 multiplayer game that was revealed this week.
Be sure to stay tuned for more on Nintendo and E3 news.
Square Enix's may not be the only classic entry in the series to get a major overhaul for current-gen consoles, as series director Tetsuya Nomura has expressed interest in remaking both Final Fantasy V and VI.
"Considering that we have remakes of Final Fantasy up to IV and then we have VII — I’ve been working with Mr. [Yoshinori] Kitase since Final Fantasy V, and we’ve noticed that V and VI are missing. That bothers me," Nomura told . "How come we skipped over those two?"
Nomura also shared some new information on the Final Fantasy VII Remake, confirming that it won't just be a carbon copy of the original release with spruced up visuals.
In an interview with (via ), he said it "won’t be a simple remake," noting that "even if we were only making the graphics prettier for a next-generation machine, I don’t think it would exceed the original version."
As far as where the team is in the development process, Nomura went on to add: “We haven’t put out any screenshots yet, but we’re making considerable progress, so please look forward to it."
Additionally, the studio plans to share more information later this year, including an announcement of the game's official title.
Alex Osborn is a freelance writer for IGN. You can follow him on .
Kick-Ass director Matthew Vaughn has revealed that a Hit-Girl prequel film is in development.
Vaughn told that he's "not happily done with the [Kick-Ass] franchise." He went on to reveal the following: "We’re working on an idea for a prequel of how did Hit Girl [sic] and Big Daddy become Hit Girl and Big Daddy...If we make that, hopefully that will be the sorbet for the people that didn’t like ‘Kick-Ass 2’ and then we can go off and make ‘Kick-Ass 3’."
Addressing the mixed response to Kick-Ass 2 -- which opened to only $13.3 million stateside -- Vaughn expressed his hopes for the Hit-Girl movie to save the franchise, noting, "I think we’ve got to do this prequel to regain the love that we had with ‘Kick-Ass’."
We have heard about a Hit-Girl movie before, though it had previously seemed to be an unlikely proposition. It looks like that is no longer the case.
What are your thoughts on a Hit-Girl prequel? Can't we all admit it'd be great to see Nicolas Cage back as Big Daddy? Sounds off in the comments below!
