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Microsoft’s xCloud service has started getting Xbox Series X hardware upgrades for some games. As reported by Tom Warren from The Verge, some games on the cloud streaming service like Rainbow Six Siege and Yakuza: Like a Dragon now load faster and have options for Xbox Series X enhancements like improved graphics and frame rates.

GameSpot has confirmed that Rainbow Six Siege has an option for improved frame rates–up to 120Hz–and Yakuza Like a Dragon has an improved graphics option as well on the cloud service. Gears 5 also has improved loading times, with it taking less than 10 seconds to load into a campaign mission on the xCloud version.

It is not immediately clear how many games are now running off Xbox Series X hardware for cloud streaming, although Microsoft said that it is planning to transition the entire service over. Microsoft said less than two weeks ago that it was in the final stages of adding Xbox Series X server racks to its data centers. Microsoft has not made any official announcements about Xbox Series X servers being live for xCloud at this time.

During that same announcement, Microsoft said it was working on getting the service built into TVs and planning to bring the service to new regions, like Australia, Mexico, Brazil, and Japan later this year.

Pokemon Go‘s July Community Day is set for Saturday, July 3, Niantic has announced. The featured Pokemon this time around will be Tepig, the Fire-type starter from Pokemon Black and White, and there will be a few other bonuses to take advantage of during the event. Here’s everything you need to know about July’s Community Day.

July 2021 Featured Pokemon: Tepig

The featured Pokemon for July’s Community Day is Tepig, the Fire-type pig Pokemon from the series’ Gen 5 installments, Pokemon Black and White. Like other starter Pokemon, Tepig is fairly uncommon in Pokemon Go, but it will appear in the wild much more frequently than usual during the event.

On top of the increased Tepig spawns, you’ll have a better chance to encounter a Shiny Tepig during the event. Shiny Pokemon are generally quite rare in Pokemon Go, but you’ll increase your chances of finding a Shiny Tepig if you use an Incense.

July’s Community Day Move: Blast Burn

This month’s special Community Day-exclusive move is the Fire-type Charged Attack Blast Burn. If you can evolve a Pignite (Tepig’s first evolution) into Emboar either during the Community Day or up to two hours afterward, it will automatically know Blast Burn. This is currently the only way Emboar can learn this move in Pokemon Go, so if you’re hoping to add it to your moveset, you’ll need to catch plenty of Tepig during the event to stock up on enough candy to evolve it.

July’s Community Day Hours

As usual, July’s Community Day will run for six hours, from 11 AM to 5 PM local time. This means you’ll have until 7 PM local time to evolve Pignite into an Emboar that knows Blast Burn.

July Community Day Bonuses

Beyond increased Tepig spawns, Niantic is offering a few other bonuses during July’s Community Day. First, the developer will roll out a paid Tepig-themed Special Research story during the event called Roasted Berries. To gain access to the story, you’ll need to purchase a virtual ticket from the in-game shop for $1 USD.

On top of that, Niantic will sell another special Community Day item bundle during the event. The bundle will be available to purchase in Pokemon Go’s in-game shop for 1,280 PokeCoins and comes with the following:

• 50 Ultra Balls
• 5 Incense
• 5 Star Pieces
• 1 Elite Charged TM

Finally, any Incense and Lure Modules that you use during July’s Community Day will remain active for three hours rather than the usual 60 minutes, and you’ll earn triple the usual amount of Stardust when you capture Pokemon. You can read more details about the event on the official Pokemon Go blog.

By far the worst part of PC gaming is running out of space to store your games, but thanks to this Prime Day 2021 deal, those problems may be a thing of the past. Amazon currently has a sale on Samsung 870 QVO SATA SSDs, including their 4TB SKU, which is currently at a historically low price. This is a Prime-exclusive discount that ends tonight alongside the sale.

A massive 4TB of SATA SSD storage will cost you just $322 today instead of $430, making for a total discount of 25%. If a drive that large isn’t what you’re looking for, other sizes are on sale as well. The two terabyte model is currently on sale for $180, down from $220, while the one terabyte version will only cost $90 instead of $120. If you really, really need a ton of storage, you can also get the eight terabyte model of Samsung’s 870 QVO SSD for $100 off right now, although that still leaves its price at a whopping $750.

You may be looking for extra drive space during this year’s Prime Day and noticed that hard drives are much cheaper per gigabyte than these SSDs. However, there’s a good reason for that. Hard drives are, first and foremost, much slower than SSDs, whether they’re SATA or NVME. Hard drives also have a tendency to fail if they’re moved around too much, whereas digital drives simply don’t have that issue. If you’re storing things en masse, absolutely purchase a hard disc drive. But if you want your game to load quickly, there’s no better option than an SSD. Regardless of what you need, there are plenty of Prime Day storage deals to look through.

A ton of other computer gear, including headsets, microphones, and monitors, are on sale today as part of Prime Day 2021. If you’re looking for something to pick up, we have an updated list of the best Prime Day deals still available on Tuesday.

Nier Replicant, an upgraded remaster of the original 2010 game, released back in April, and it has already managed to sell over 1 million copies. This performance is astronomically better than the original version, and points to the series’ continued strength over the last few years.

The official Nier Twitter account shared the news on June 22, less than two months after the game released. In addition to its 1 million unit total for Replicant, 2017’s sequel Nier: Automata has sold more than 6 million units. Automata’s success was somewhat unexpected, as the game was released seven years after the first Nier, which was itself only a very modest success that failed to impress reviewers.

That failure was largely because of the gameplay, however, which received a big overhaul for Nier Replicant. Combat now feels as weighty and satisfying as it did in Automata, with re-recorded voice acting, improved music, and, of course, much-better visuals. For those who haven’t played Nier yet, it’s a great place to start, though you may also want to read up on a certain other game called Drakengard in order to understand why Earth is in such a desolate state.

In addition to Automata and Replicant, a third Nier game called Nier Reincarnation will be coming to iOS and Android soon. It uses gacha mechanics and a different combat system, but it retains the series’ signature visual style, music, and existential dread.

The Sea of Thieves team at Rare had to really adjust its workflow in order to keep the new Pirates of the Caribbean-themed expansion, A Pirate’s Life, a secret. In an interview with Gamesindustry.biz, Sea of Thieves executive producer Joe Neate said that the team had to adjust its work processes to avoid any information leaking out about the crossover with Disney’s Pirates of the Caribbean.

“We changed everything in terms of how we worked and shared information internally,” Neate said. “We send a team update each week. It’s just a PDF about what all the different teams are working on. We codenamed everything, and we didn’t include any imagery that was related to the IP in those.”

Sea of Thieves’ A Pirate’s Life update was announced during the Xbox and Bethesda Gameshow case on June 13 and released today, a little over a week later. The announcement came as a surprise, without any notable leaks ahead of time. Neate said that Disney and Rare first discussed the crossover at E3 2019, where Disney approached them looking to do a crossover with the multiplayer pirate game, with Pirates of the Caribbean as the leading IP. Neate and the development team had to consider how a crossover would fit into the game, since Sea of Thieves itself drew influence from Pirates of the Caribbean.

Ultimately, Rare chose to move forward with Disney, gaining access to key members of the film teams and the Disneyland park teams. Rare worked directly with those teams to integrate characters, locations, and music into the expansion, even getting the music directly from the ride the movies were based on.

As for keeping the project a secret, Neate said that despite developing a strong relationship with Disney, adding each other on Twitter and Linkedin, the team had to be careful with what posts they were liking and sharing. Neate said he was afraid of even congratulating John Drake, the VP of Games at Disney, on the birth of his child because a Sea of Thieves fan posted the eyeballs emoji the last time he tweeted at Drake.

The Sea of Thieves’ A Pirate’s Life expansion is live now on Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, and PC. The massive update includes new story missions, characters, enemies, and places to explore.

Prime Day 2021 has brought another opportunity to pick up some of the best Xbox games for dirt cheap. Amazon has slashed the price of the Xbox Digital Game Bundle to $40. It comes with Forza Horizon 4, Halo: The Master Chief Collection, and Halo 5: Guardians. It normally goes for $95, but if you’re a Prime member, you’ll get the bundle for only $40 at checkout. But make sure you hurry, as the deal ends tonight at 12 AM PT / 3 AM ET. You can also get this bundle with the Xbox Series S for $340 (the Series S is available at Amazon by itself for $300, too).

$40 (was $95)

This deal essentially matches the prices we saw during Xbox’s Deals Unlocked sale at major retailers–both Halo games were $10, while Forza Horizon 4 was $20. If you missed out on those deals, now’s your chance to stock up for cheap. You’re getting the entire Halo saga thus far (six games total) as well as one of the best racing games on Xbox One and Xbox Series X.

It should be noted that all three of these games are available on Xbox Game Pass. Instead of buying digital copies of these games, you could subscribe to Xbox Game Pass Ultimate and gain access to them and hundreds of other games. Right now, Microsoft is offering three-month subscriptions for $1 to new subscribers. If you’ve already subscribed in the past, you can pick up a three-month Game Pass Ultimate subscription at Amazon for $30, down from $45, until the end of the day.

It’s a great time to check out Forza Horizon 4 and the Halo series. New entries in both franchises are releasing later this year. Forza Horizon 5 launches November 9, while Halo Infinite releases this holiday. For more details on both highly anticipated titles, check out our Forza Horizon 5 preorder guide and Halo Infinite preorder guide.

Cliff Bleszinski, the veteran designer behind the first three Gears of War games and projects from his now-defunct studio Boss Key Productions, is working on a brand-new, unannounced IP, he confirmed on Twitter.

Bleszinski gave no other details about the project, including potential platforms, release window, or genre. Bleszinski confirmed he has recruited writer Alex de Campi and artist Sandy Jarrell for the IP.

Bleszinski, colloquially known as CliffyB, has had a rough go in the games industry since re-entering in 2014, having previously retired from Epic Games in 2012. He founded Boss Key Productions in April 2014 and launched two titles: 2017’s gravity-defying first-person hero shooter Lawbreakers and 2018’s ’80s-themed battle royale shooter Radical Heights. Both games failed commercially (despite Lawbreakers receiving a warm critical reception), which led to Boss Key shuttering in 2018. This came just one month after Radical Heights launched, effectively killing support for both titles.

Bleszinski is also known for his work on Unreal and Unreal Tournament, the two ’90s shooters that put Epic Games on the map and were responsible for the birth of the Unreal Engine. He also had a hand in other well-known Epic Games projects, including the aforementioned Gears of War series, 2009’s Shadow Complex, and 2011’s Bulletstorm. Bleszinski also co-designed a Superhot level.

Publisher EA has recruited Twitch streamer, G4 TV host, and professional wrestler Austin “Xavier Woods” Watson to host the upcoming EA Play livestream slated for July 22 at 10 AM PT / 1 PM ET.

EA tweeted the news, confirming that a pre-show will take place before the main livestream. Watson also hopped on Twitter to confirm the announcement, saying he’s “excited” to host the presentation.

Watson, who is currently an overall 11-time Tag Team Champion in the WWE, was added to the revived gaming network G4 in November 2020 with a special Thanksgiving episode. He joins original hosts like Adam Sessler, as well as new hires Alex “Goldenboy” Mendez and Ovilee May.

EA Play should draw a lot of attention, what with Battlefield 2042 launching October 22 and Dragon Age 4 currently in development. We might even see Skate 4, which was revealed during last year’s EA Play. But what we’re looking for from the annual event is the revival of a fan-favorite IP. Reports suggest it could be a reimagining of Dead Space developed by Motive Studios, the Montreal-based co-developer behind Star Wars Battlefront 2 and the team in charge of Star Wars Squadrons.

Bigger player counts, potentially all the way up to 60 players, could be coming to Halo: The Master Chief Collection multiplayer in the future, according to a 343 Industries producer.

On a segment of an official Xbox Twitch stream in which Master Chief Collection was being played (and clipped by Halo content creator Mint Blitz), 343 Industries producer Sean Swidersky says the team is currently investigating whether it would be possible to bring higher player count matches to the collection of classic Halo games.

“Halo’s epic, if we can add more people, which you can, but obviously performance on some of the other consoles…if we can add that kind of stuff to go higher than 16 players in these classic games, hell get up to 40, 60, that’d be wild,” Swidersky says.

Halo multiplayer traditionally has a max player count of 16, something that will actually be changing with Halo Infinite, which will increase the max player count to 24 on certain maps. It’s unclear if an increased max player count for Master Chief Collection would be relegated to only custom games, or if it would become its own matchmaking playlist players could opt into.

Master Chief Collection is still going strong, with the game regularly receiving new seasons that add new challenges, new cosmetics, and even new maps, to games like Halo 3 and Halo: Reach. Master Chief Collection, which is now available across Xbox platforms, Game Pass, and on PC, has been a bit of a comeback story for 343 Industries. The game’s original launch in 2014 was plagued by matchmaking issues and various bugs. Since then, 343 Industries has put considerable time and effort into improving the experience, as recently highlighted by improving the visuals of Halo: Combat Evolved to more closely match the original Xbox version of the game.

Halo Infinite multiplayer will be 343 Industries’ next big step for the franchise when it arrives this holiday. For the first time in the series, Halo Infinite multiplayer will be free-to-play, and will include a number of never-before-seen in Halo features like an in-depth training mode, AI bots, and never-expiring battle passes.

The next installment in the Transformers movie franchise is getting prehistoric. During a media event, it was revealed the next film’s title is Transformers: Rise of the Beasts, and yes, they are finally diving into Beast Wars mythos. And there are a lot of familiar faces coming to the movie.

Directed by Steven Caple Jr. (Creed II) and produced by Lorenzo Di Bonaventura (Bumblebee), the movie is set in 1994, seven years after the events of Bumblebee. The movie will partly take place in New York City, largely in Brooklyn. “I don’t think we’ve ever seen the Autobots roll through New York,” Caple Jr. said during a media event.

The film’s main characters hail from that borough, but it won’t stick to just the city that doesn’t sleep. The film will also take place at Machu Picchu in Peru as well. But since these Transformers films have covered the Autobots and Decepticons quite a bit, it was time for some new ingrediants to be added. Cue the Predacons and Maximals.

“We had somewhat exhausted I would say the battle between Decepticons and Autobots, and certainly, we have explored it in a lot of different ways,” explained Di Bonaventura. “How do we find a new set of villains? How do we find a new set of priorities for the villains? And again, saving the world of course is left to the Autobots, and in this case, the Maximals. If you’ve seen and been a fan of the other movies, you’re going to see villains you’ve never seen before and you’re going to see Autobots you’ve never seen before. You’re going to see a lot of elements that we’ve never done before, and it’s one of the driving decisions that we are making along the way. Have we done that before? Whether that’s an action scene or whether that’s a character, and fortunately for us, Transformers has a lot of tribes. And there’s a really large base of characters and there’s also a large base of fans that relate to different tribes. And so, this movie is bringing a lot of those tribes together.”

The main robot hero for this movie will be Optimus Prime–which will be voiced by Peter Cullen once again–and you’ll see more returning favorites like Bumblebee, except this time he transforms into a Camaro Z28. From the classic cartoon, Mirage pops up, except it won’t be a Formula 1 racecar. Mirage will be transforming into a Porsche 911. Arcee returns from the Bumblebee movie as well, and she’ll be transforming into a Ducati.

As for the Maximals, the robotic bird Airrazor, the rhinoceros Rhinox, and the leader of the Maximals Optimus Primal–who turns into an ape–will be introduced in the film. The villain of the movie will be the Terrorcon Scourge, who transformed into a locust in the Beast Wars comic–although he never made it onto the cartoon–and a boat in G1. Scourge’s right hand Nightbird will also appear in the movie, with the ability to transform into a Nissan GT-R. During the event, none of the Predacons were named for the film.

The film will also feature Anthony Ramos (In the Heights) as Brooklyn native Noah with a keen eye for fixing electronics and Dominique Fishback (Judas and the Black Messiah) as Elena, an artifact researcher.

Tranformers: Rise of the Beasts is expected to release on June 24, 2022.