Hitman 3's free update has added a brand new map to completely ransack- Ambrose Island
- By Ash
- in News
After a brief round of teasers, IO Interactive have now unleashed a sizable new update for Hitman 3. It brings with it a variety of fixes and enhancements, including stability improvements across all platforms, as well as a brand new map to explore and most likely ransack - Ambrose Island. Best of all, the whole thing is entirely free!
What this looks like in actual gameplay, as well as what the new storyline is all about, that you can find out through two of the previews below. Have a gander, starting with the cinematic intro:
Four years later, Evolve: Stage 2's multiplayer servers have suddenly turned back on
- By Ash
- in News
Turtle Rock Studios, developers of Left 4 Dead and Back 4 Blood, originally launched their 4v1 shooter Evolve back in 2015. Unfortunately, due to some gameplay and monetization issues, Evolve never managed to catch on and secure itself a sizable playerbase. As a last ditch effort Turtle Rock Studios released Evolve: Stage 2 as a free-to-play game, though once again, things didn't go well and the servers were ultimately shut down in 2018.
This is usually where the story would end, but in a refreshing little twist, Evolve: Stage 2 has now been given another chance! Thanks to a recent update, peer-to-peer servers and parts of the matchmaking system have now been restored, thus enabling players to jump into matches without too much hassle.
Obsidian's miniaturized survival game Grounded is leaving Early Access on September 27th
- By Ash
- in News
[Update]: After two years of updates, Grounded has now finally been unleashed from Early Access!
After two years in Early Access and a whole bunch of updates, Obsidian's backyard survival game Grounded is finally getting ready to be released in full. You can expect to see Version 1.0 arrive on September 27th for PC and Xbox alongside a sizable update.
The exact details are still few and far between, but the launch version will bring with it the upper yard as a brand new region to explore, along with the usual batch of new armor and weapon recipes to play around with. There will also be numerous new secrets to uncover, one which will be a seemingly nasty endgame boss - the Mantis.
Guild Wars 2's August 2nd update will fix the recently introduced Warrior and Mesmer problems
- By Ash
- in News
[Update #2]: The August 23rd patch will buff up many of the long-forgotten builds and specializations. Additionally, the August 23rd patch will see Guild Wars 2 launch onto Steam alongside a brand new set of achievement-based armor.
[Update]: The balance changes have now arrived alongside the Festival of the Four Winds.
As a part of the June update, Guild Wars 2 brought in a whole bunch of balance changes to pretty much every aspect of gameplay. While some of these ended up working out well and created more viable builds for certain classes to play around with, others were a complete failure and only ended up making the affected specializations almost undesirable in endgame content.
So in order to fix some of these problems, ArenaNet is planning a new balance update for August 2nd. This one will be focused primarily on getting the Mesmer's Chronomancer specialization back up to par, both in terms of damage and support options, as well as reworking the incredibly tedious Warrior banners.
Team based platform fighter MultiVersus has now launched alongside an impressive player count
- By Ash
- in News
[Update #2]: MultiVersus' Season 1 update has just added the first Battle Pass, while Rick & Morty will be coming soon.
Unlike recent platform fighters like Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl that have fizzled out almost immediately after launch, Warner Bros.' freshly released cross-over madhouse MultiVersus is currently booming. It's only been a couple of days since it first arrived, and already it's quite comfortably breaking the 100,000 concurrent players mark during peak hours.
Besides the much greater level of polish, I'd say the biggest reason MultiVersus has found so much success is that it's a free-to-play game. After all, fighting games tend to high barrier to entry, especially for newer players, so letting people jump in for free (and with the option for co-op with their friends) is definitely a great idea.
Vermintide studio's Warhammer 40,000: Darktide has been delayed until late November
- By Ash
- in News
[Update #2]: My review for Darktide is now live and, long story short, it's as rough and fascinating as the world it takes place in!
[Update]: I have a few bits of good news to share! First of all, Fatshark has released a fancy new cinematic trailer for Darktide showing off the world and the fate of the fan-favorite Guardsmen squad. Furthermore, there's going to be a pre-launch beta starting on November 17th, and last but not least, Vermintide veterans will be getting a small cosmetic DLC as a gift.
If you were hoping to get your hands on Warhammer 40,000: Darktide this September, I'm afraid I bring some bad news. According to the newest developer update, Darktide has now been delayed until November 30th for PC, while the Xbox version will follow shortly after.
"Delaying a game is perhaps one of the most difficult decisions a developer faces and one we are not excited about making," explains the announcement. "While we have been humbled by the great feedback on the game so far, we also need more time to improve stability, performance and to mature key systems. Each is critical to making sure we have the best possible experience for you, the players."
MTG Arena's Explorer Anthology 1 and Historic Anthology 6 are launching today
- By Ash
- in News
[Update #2]: MTG Arena will be getting Shadows over Innistrad Remastered in 2023 and a second Explorer Anthology in 2022.
[Update]: Both anthologies are now live.
In order to give players a true-to-paper eternal format, the MTG Arena team recently launched Explorer with the aim to eventually transform it into Pioneer proper. While this process is likely going to take quite a while, the good news is that the first batch of Pioneer-legal cards will be coming to MTG Arena later today as a part of Explorer Anthology 1. The Historic format won't be going home emptyhanded either, as the update will also add the long-awaited Historic Anthology 6.
Each anthologies will set you back 25,000 gold or 4,000 gems and will contain twenty cards. Much like before, buying the anthology will give you four copies of each card, though you can also craft your favorites using wildcards if the whole bundle doesn't interest you.