Month: August 2020

Command and Conquer Remastered Collection has received a major new patch, adding a much-requested feature to the game. From today, the game supports LAN play, so you can gather together with friends and all play together in one location. This is a feature from the original Command and Conquer games, so it’s good to have it back.

Of course, if you’re planning a LAN party, you’ll want to make sure that you practice social distancing and adhere to local laws and common-sense rules regarding gatherings.

The officially implemented LAN play feature lets you use mods in multiplayer, and will allow fans to enjoy the game’s multiplayer in the future should the online play ever shut down. “Given the variety of ways people could play over VPN and with mods, we expect there still to be some quirks in the system,” the patch post on Reddit explains.. “Please continue to provide feedback so we can make any refinements going forward.”

This follows the recent addition of private lobbies, meaning that since release it’s gotten much easier to play with friends.

The update also includes adjustments to balance, and a few changes have been made to Community maps. The devs warn that previous mods may need to be updated to make them work with the latest version of the game, although it’s not too complicated a process to do so.

The Reddit post contains the full and detailed patch notes, and they’re worth a look if you want to know every single balance change made.

Command and Conquer originally launched in 1995.

It’s a strange year for sports games, with the COVID-19 pandemic shifting or shutting down seasons, and the latest NBA 2K21 trailer exists in the shadow of the current crisis. The trailer, which showcases the PS4/Xbox One versions of the game, is full of on-the-court action, and a general mission statement for this year’s entry.

The slogan for NBA 2K21 seems to be “everything is game”–not just the matches themselves, but everything around the culture of basketball. There’s been a big focus on the soundtrack in the marketing for this year’s entry, too, which continues in this trailer.

There’s only a little bit of proper gameplay footage to watch, with a lot of the video focusing on what it feels like to be in a busy stadium full of cheering fans, and how exciting that was before 2020 happened.

NBA 2K21 is also coming to Switch, PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X. If you want to get the current-gen version at launch and then upgrade, you’ll want the expensive Mamba Forever edition.

NBA 2K21 is looking very visually impressive on current systems, so it’ll be very interesting to see how the next-gen versions differ.

Rogue One: A Star Wars Story writer Gary Whitta’s Animal Crossing talk show, Animal Talking, continues to be a goldmine. The show, which is set inside Animal Crossing: New Horizons, opened its most recent episode with a performance from Selena Gomez and Trevor Daniel of their new song, Past Life.

The song, which debuted in July, was performed here as an acoustic arrangement by the two quarantined musicians on the show. Meanwhile, their two Animal Crossing avatars adorably sang along to it.

You can watch the performance below.

Gomez stayed on and hung out with the guests, who included God of War’s Cory Barlog, developer Adam Nickerson, and voice actors Laura Bailey and Ashley Johnson.

If you’re a fan of Gomez, you might also enjoy the string of bad jokes she delivered on the show. And if you want to see a different kind of celebrity on the show, here’s Danny Trejo giving Whitta a tour of his island. Brie Larson also recently visited, showing off her love of all things Nintendo.

Animal Crossing: New Horizons has been an extraordinary hit for Nintendo, selling 22.4 million copies since March 2020–it’s the second best-selling game on Switch already.

On Thursday Sony aired an all-new PlayStation State of Play highlighting PS4 and PSVR games, with “a few” updates on previously announced PS5 titles. Below is our complete recap of everything that was shown:

Crash Bandicoot 4: New Mode, Playable Character Announced

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Crash 4 developer Toys for Bob showed off a fresh look at the upcoming 3D platformer and announced N. Verted mode, which adds a “totally new and dynamic look and feel” to each level. The developer also revealed Dingodile will be a playable character.

For more, you can check out our hands-on preview of Crash 4.

Hitman Trilogy to Be Playable in PSVR

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IO’s Hitman trilogy, including the forthcoming Hitman 3, will be fully playable in PSVR. PSVR support will be available for Hitman 3 when it launches in January 2021.

Braid: Anniversary Edition Announced

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An upgraded version of Braid, the acclaimed 2008 puzzle-platformer, will be released for PS4 and PS5 in early 2021. The new edition has been “hand repainted for modern high resolutions” with nine pixels to every one in the original. It also features new animations, improved sound and music, and hours of developer commentary.

Spelunky 2 Release Date Announced

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The long-awaited Spelunky 2 is coming to PS4 on September 15.

Vader Immortal PSVR Release Date Announced

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Star Wars: Vader Immortal is coming to PSVR on August 25, Sony announced during its State of Play broadcast. The canon Star Wars adventure was previously exclusive to Oculus.

Control: AWE Expansion Dated

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The second expansion for Control, AWE, will be released on August 27. The new trailer featured a glimpse of Alan Wake, confirming AWE as Remedy’s suspected Control-Alan Wake crossover.

Temtem Is Coming to PS5

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Temtem, the Pokemon-like MMO, is coming to PS5, after launching on Steam Early Access earlier this year. “As we look forward and as we expand our plans for the future of Temtem, we knew we had to embrace the next-gen,” Temtem director Guillermo Andrades told IGN. “Sony has been very receptive and helpful with us in this decision, so the PS5 is the perfect fit to start our journey.”

Hood: Outlaws and Legends Announced for PS5

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Hood: Outlaws and Legends has been announced for PS5. Set during Britain’s Dark Ages, Hood is a third-person, 4v4 multiplayer heist game that developer Sumo Newcastle calls a “dark and gritty reimagining of the Robin Hood legend.”

New Trailers and Gameplay: Bugsnax, Godfall, and More

Thursday’s State of Play featured several new trailers and gameplay videos from previously announced games, including fan favorite Bugsnax and PS5’s Godfall. Check them out below:

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Jordan is a freelance writer for IGN.

Destiny 2‘s summer event, the Solstice of Heroes, kicks off with the next weekly reset on August 11. Like last year, it’s bringing new armor for players to earn by venturing into the European Aerial Zone, an area specific to the event where you’ll fight waves of enemies for a chance to earn a bunch of rewards.

Bungie detailed this year’s Solstice event on its blog with a new trailer. The thing that drivers the Solstice of Heroes is a special Majestic armor set you can earn for your characters, which is unique to the event and will require you to put in some effort to earn. When Solstice begins, you’ll start with a new, “rare” version of the armor. Participating in Solstice gives you an opportunity to amp up the armor to a “legendary” version with better stats and a cooler look.

We’re not sure yet what it’ll take to upgrade the Solstice armor to Majestic status, but it’ll probably involve venturing into the EAZ, an area we saw last year. It’s a section of Earth’s EDZ location that floats in the air, giving it more of a platforming vibe than other locations. When you venture into the EAZ, you fight waves of enemies to earn keys, which you’ll then use to open chests to get rewards. You can get different roles on your Majestic armor in the EAZ as well.

Once you get your Majestic armor, you’ll start spiffing it up even more. You can then upgrade it to Magnificent armor, which adds a white armor glow. Doing that requires you to complete a bunch of other objectives:

• Complete a Nightfall Ordeal on the Master difficulty.
• Complete a Nightmare Hunt.
• Complete Pit of Heresy.
• Win seven Trials of Osiris matches. (Not on a single Passage)
• Complete a Tier 5 Altar of Sorrow three times.

The good news is, you can knock out those objectives even after the Solstice of Heroes event ends. Doing so will unlock the ability to buy armor Magnificent armor glows from the Eververse Store that will change color based on your subclass. That’s a change from last year, when you had to buy each individual color separately. Even better, the armor glow will function as a Universal Ornament–meaning you can apply them to any piece of armor you want once you purchase them.

There’s more coming to the Eververse Store as part of the summer event as well. Check out the image below for a preview of what you’ll be able to buy and earn during the Solstice of Heroes.

The third-person “looter-slasher” Godfall was featured during Sony’s State of Play, and we got an in-depth look at many of the game’s systems. This was accompanied by PS5 footage that showed the game in action. Game director Keith Lee outlined gameplay details, and specifically how the weapon class system works.

Lee reiterated that there will be no microtransactions in Godfall and that the game features co-op with up to two other players. The game is both gear-driven and skill-based, and has an armor upgrade system that revolves around what are called Valor Plates.

The State of Play presentation had specifics on how the weapons system works in Godfall, which centers around five weapon types: Longswords, Dual Blades, Polearms, two-handed Warhammers, and two-handed Greatswords. Each type of weapon represents a class that has its own set of skills and abilities that cater to a certain playstyle. The in-depth details focused on Dual Blades and Longswords, which you can catch in the video above.

Regardless of weapon, Godfall is said to emphasize offense and aggressive play. Consistent with that design philosophy is that across the different classes, a shield will be important and available to all. They’re not just for defense, either–shields have their own unique skillset, with abilities like a wave attack, a Captain America-style throwing move, and an area-of-effect ground pound.

Lee mentioned that further details will come at later date, specifically covering the progression system and the rest of the weapon classes. Godfall is set to launch during Holiday 2020 as PlayStation 5 console exclusive and on PC.

As promised, Sony showcased a ton of upcoming PS4 and PS5 games during its latest State of Play. During the stream, we also got a brief new look at the second DLC for Remedy’s mind-bending, critically acclaimed Control: the AWE expansion, which arrives later this month.

In true Control fashion, the new AWE expansion trailer–which you can watch below–featured some cryptic imagery that was hard to make sense of, but it further hinted at a connection to Remedy’s Alan Wake series. In a post on the PlayStation Blog, Remedy shed more light on the expansion and what players can expect from it.

According to Remedy, AWE stands for Altered World Event. These “occur when paranatural forces breach our world.” As the studio explains:

“Sometimes, AWEs are minor and go unnoticed. However, sometimes AWEs cause catastrophic events. Historically, the Investigations Sector was where the Federal Bureau of Control’s dangerous work of searching for AWE cases was coordinated from, and where evidence was stored… until things went horribly, horribly wrong, and the sector was sealed off years ago.”

It falls on Control protagonist Jesse Faden to enter this sector and reclaim it from the mysterious creature that has taken it over. As part of her mission, she’ll need to explore the AWE cases that were investigated here, and she’ll be able to use a new Service Weapon form called Surge, which Remedy describes as “in essence a sticky grenade launcher.”

This ability will particularly come in handy when battling the Hiss Airborne Ranger, a new enemy type being introduced in the AWE expansion. The foe is able to fly and attack Jesse from afar using a shotgun.

On top of that, the AWE expansion is introducing a new Altered Item that will let players replay four boss fights from the campaign as well as the beloved Ashtray Maze. The item sits in the Investigations Sector and resembles an arcade machine. Remedy is also adding a new horde mode and “a few other surprises” to the game.

The AWE expansion releases on August 27. It’s the second and final piece of DLC for Control, following the Foundation expansion, which recently hit Xbox One back in June (following its PS4/PC release earlier this year). Remedy has also confirmed that Control is coming to PS5 and Xbox Series X.

Revealed during the State of Play livestream, the online Pokemon-like, Temtem, will be coming to PlayStation 5 in 2021. Coming from developer Crema and publisher Humble Games, the massively-multiplayer online game that pays tribute to the Pokemon series first saw a release back in early 2020 on PC as an early access game. Focusing on young adventurers exploring an archipelago of floating islands filled with magical creatures, this will mark the first time we have confirmation that the online game will arrive on next-gen platforms.

Given first life as a Kickstarter game, it was eventually picked up by Humble Games and has seen a steady community of players since its release. Though the developers stated that there were plans to release the game on PS4 and Xbox One, Temtem is so far only playable on PC. Before the reveal during the State of Play stream, GameSpot spoke with game director Guillermo Andrades about its launch earlier this year.

“We’re incredibly excited [about Temtem’s success]. Back when we started thinking about developing Temtem we were nervous about how players would receive it,” said the director. “We knew that people have always longed for a new and more modern take on the creature collection genre, but we, of course, questioned whether or not we had the right approach.”

Since its release, the online game has added more Temtem to collect and locations to explore. During our talk, Andrades stated that it was still too early to talk about any plans for cross-play or cross-save features for the different platforms Temtem will be on. Still, he did state that Crema is looking forward to taking advantage of the PS5’s capabilities for the game.

“While Temtem is not a technical beast, we’re looking forward to maxing out our engine and seeing Temtem at its full visual capacity,” he said. “We’re also really looking forward to the new gameplay-related features and possibilities that the next generation of hardware brings, such as haptic feedback.”

For more on the reveals and news from State of Play, be sure to check out roundup of the games shown off during the stream.