Electronic Arts Completes Acquisition of Codemasters
Electronic Arts has announced its official acquisition of Codemasters for $1.2 billion. The latter was originally slated to be acquired by Take Two Interactive before the FIFA and Need for Speed publisher swooped in. EA CEO Andrew Wilson called this the "beginning of an exciting new era for racing games and content."
"Racing fandom continues to grow worldwide, and the franchises in our combined portfolio will enable us to create innovative new experiences and bring more players into the excitement of cars and motorsport. Our teams will be a global powerhouse in racing entertainment, with amazing games for players on every platform, and we can't wait to get started."
Codemasters CEO Frank Sagnier said this was a "landmark" in the studio's history and "an exciting day for our employees and players. The partnership with EA will enable our teams to take our highly-acclaimed franchises to new heights and reach a huge global audience through their player network. Together we can redefine the landscape of racing games to create even more compelling experiences for racing fans around the world."
Codemasters has been known for a variety of racing titles including the F1 series, DiRT, GRID and Project CARS. Last year alone it published three big racing titles – F1 2020, Project CARS 3 and DiRT 5 – along with Fast and Furious: Crossroads. EA believed that Codemasters' expertise with its racing titles would allow its own teams to "innovate further." It also discussed "accelerating" the latter's performance, providing resources like art and motion captures, localization, global publishing and marketing and much more.
While Codemasters racing titles will be published under EA, the latter isn't necessarily slouching off. It currently has a new Need for Speed in development at Criterion which should receive more details this year. In the meantime, we'll have to wait and see how its strategy for that title fares especially given the hits and misses for the franchise over the years.
Hitman 3 PC Players Can Now Import Locations from Hitman 1 and 2
Hitman 3 has already been a major success for IO Interactive, but it didn't launch without hiccups. On PC, owing to the game's Epic Games Store exclusivity, importing of locations from the first two games was proving to be a bit of a challenge, but IO Interactive recently confirmed that a location importing solution would be coming soon.
And now, it's here. IO Interactive have confirmed on Twitter that Hitman 3 PC players can now import locations from Hitman 1 and 2, at no additional cost of course. The developer has also set up an importing guide for PC players to make use of, which you can head to through the link in the tweet below.
Hitman 3 is available on PS5, Xbox Series X/S, PS4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, and PC. You can read our review of the game through here.
IO Interactive have already kicked off their post-launch plans for the stealth game, and they've got more sizeable DLC coming up as well. Read more on that through here.
We're pleased to share that HITMAN 3 PC players can now import locations from HITMAN 1 and HITMAN 2 at no additional cost.
Follow the official 3-step guide here: https://t.co/NBq08j7C9J pic.twitter.com/1vbG5dpSIq
— IO Interactive (@IOInteractive) February 18, 2021
Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout is Coming to Xbox Series X/S and Xbox One This Summer
Mediatonic and Devolver Digital's Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout has been an absolute revelation since it launched last year, and the developers have said in the months since then that they have every intention of bringing the game to more platforms– which is going to be happening very time soon. Hot on the heels of the announcement that the game will be coming to the Nintendo Switch, they have now announced that Fall Guys is also coming to Xbox.
The multiplayer battle royale title will be releasing for Xbox Series X/S and Xbox One this Summer, around the same time as the Nintendo Switch. No details have been confirmed about any platform-specific enhancements, or about when exactly the game will be releasing, but that information will doubtless be shared soon.
Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout is currently available on PS4 and PC. As of December 1, the game has sold 11 million copies on PC, and 8 million on PS4 as of August- both of those figures are likely higher at this point, and the playerbase is clearly going to expand even further with the upcoming Xbox and Switch ports.
SaGa Frontier Remastered Releases on April 15th
Though initially slated for this Summer, Square Enix announced in the latest Nintendo Direct that SaGa Frontier Remastered will launch on April 15th. It will be available for Nintendo Switch, PS4, PC, iOS and Android. The remaster offers enhancements to the characters and backgrounds while also adding Fuse as a playable character.
This brings the total number up to eight, though you need to finish the game first to unlock him. Asellus is also receiving some new story events which is nice. Other quality of life changes and improvements include user interface changes and an option to speed up the action by 2x.
SaGa Frontier was noteworthy at the time for being the first title in the series to release outside of Japan with the SaGa branding. Its "Free Scenario System" allows players to partake in different stories and travel to different regions without restrictions, altering the world based on their interactions. Stay tuned for more details on the remaster in the coming months.
MotoGP 21 Announced, Launching in April
Milestone have announced MotoGP 21, the next instalment in their yearly bike racing sim franchise, and it seems this year's game is going to come with plenty of major improvements. The first and biggest of these looks to be the new Managerial Career mode, which will task players with building and managing their own teams whilst customizing their bikes.
The experience boasts several elements that promise to provide an engaging managing experience, including the Personal Manager, who will lead the staff and help riders look for new contracts; the Data Analyst, who will be crucial in identifying the key areas for further research and development; and the Chief Engineer, who will help earn Research Points either weekly or during Free Practice sessions. Players will be responsible for making the right recruitments on all levels, from promising young riders to a Team Manager to a Technical Director, while also engaging with establishing a Junior Team and customizing and upgrading bikes.
Several gameplay improvements have also been confirmed, including revisions made to the bike suspension system to make it more realistic, long lap penalties, keeping an eye on brake temperatures, and perhaps the most intriguing of all, a bike retrieval mechanic- which means you will now manually have to retrieve your bike every time you fall off, rather than automatically respawning on the track.
And of course, Milestone are also promising further improvements to their machine learning AI system, dubbed ANNA, which will supposedly make for "faster, smarter and more accurate opponents than ever." Meanwhile, the developer also has plans for several post-launch updates. "MotoGP 21 will only get bigger and better over the months thanks to some new content that will be introduced through patches," the developer writes in the announcement press release. "Day one is only the beginning of the race!"
As you'd expect, MotoGP 21 is going to be a cross-gen release, and on the newer consoles, it will sport various enhancements. On both the PS5 and Xbox Series X, the game will run at a dynamic 4K resolution at 60 frames per second, in addition to featuring faster load times and enhanced lighting. Meanwhile, on the PS5, support for the DualSense's haptic feedback and adaptive triggers has also been confirmed
MotoGP 21 is out on April 22 for PS5, Xbox Series X/S, PS4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, and PC.
Last year saw the announcement of Final Fantasy 16, the next mainline entry from Square Enix's legendary RPG series. It was a different looking type of game than we're used to from the series, but it's topping the most anticipated charts all the same. Overall, Square and those involved have been pretty quiet since that unveiling, and there's a good reason for that.
In an interview with The Washington Post, Producer Naoki Yoshida spoke briefly about the relative silence on the game. He said that they didn't want to say anything "half-baked" about the game at this point, because Square didn't want to set some kind of expectation too early for fans. They prefer to reveal things in a manner that allows them to give the best idea of what the game will be.
"Each person will probably have their own sort of idea or image of what the next Final Fantasy should be," he said. "Saying something half baked is definitely very high risk. If something gets spoken about, someone will pick it up on social and it starts to spread around and people will form expectations. So with 'Final Fantasy 16,' whenever we do reveal more information on it, we hope to show what kind of game it's going to bring, and what kind of excitement we can bring."
We do know that announcements for the game are planned for this year, but sounds like they are keeping it close to the vest for the time being. Final Fantasy 16 is set to come to PS5 at some point.
Baldur's Gate 3 – Druid Gameplay Showcases Polar Bear Antics
The next big patch for Baldur's Gate 3, which hits early access "soon", adds the highly anticipated Druid class. Along with a new trailer showcasing the same, Larian's recent Panel From Hell showcased some new gameplay with it in action. Check it out below courtesy of GameSpot.
With over 30 spells and abilities, the Druid is quite the versatile class. It can heal poison, buff allies, utilize all kinds of powerful nature spells – including a vine whip to pull enemies closer – and transform into different animals. You can use the raw power of a Polar Bear, turn into a giant badger or sneak around as a cat. Druids have two Circles that determine their abilities – Circle of the Moon for transforming into more powerful animal forms and Circle of the Land for utilizing the surrounding environment.
Of course, along with the Druid, Patch 4 also brings numerous quality of life improvements and fixes. These include a proper flee button, a torch button for more easily handling the same, improved visuals for numerous narrative scenes and much more. Stay tuned for proper patch notes in the coming weeks.
Nioh 2 Adds DLSS, Dragon Ninja Transformation, And Bug Fixes In New Update
The Nioh series seems to have reached its end, at least for the time being, as developer Team Ninja looks to move on to new things. However, it had quite the ending point with Nioh 2. The game came to PS4 last year and just recently released for PS5 and PC, though the latter has had some issues that the developer has tried to address. Now it's getting even more, including a little extra.
The latest update, 1.26, includes multiple new things. It will have the Dragon Ninja Transformation from the Ninja Gaiden series, which you can access in the Shrine boons. There's also DLSS added to graphical options for those with GeForce RTX Series graphics boards on PC. There's also a laundry list of bug fixes, mostly for the PC version, that addresses issues with item drops, multiplayer, sound issues and much more. The PS4 and PS5 also receive some minor updates about stances and multiplayer crossplay issues. You can see the full patch notes below.
Nioh 2 – The Complete Edition is available now on PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4 and PC. The 1.26 update is rolling out now.
Nioh 2 Update Ver. 1.26 is now rolling out and patch notes are now available below! Please update your game as it becomes available in your region and enjoy the new transformation as the Dragon Ninja! #Nioh2 #Nioh2CE #RyuHayabusa pic.twitter.com/AGAAbAVGDj
— Team NINJA (@TeamNINJAStudio) February 18, 2021
The King Of Fighters 15 – Kyo Kusanagi Revealed In Latest Trailer
Sometime this year we will get the next entry in the long running The King of Fighters franchise with the fifteenth installment. Steadily SNK has been releasing trailers for the game's roster such as the recent reveals of Joe Higashi and Iori Yagami. Now it's time for another classic character to make his debut.
A new trailer was released for Kyo Kusanagi. The fighter has been in multiple entries in the franchise before. He's the heir of the ancestral arts of the Kusanagi clan and uses pyrotechnic skills in battle. You can see a few of his skills alongside those fiery strikes in the trailer. He also has an eternal rivalry with Iori Yagami that seems like it will continue on here.
Despite being officially announced for this release this year and having multiple character reveals, The King of Fighter 15 still has no announced platforms. The previous title launched as an exclusive to the PS4 and then came to PC, so presumably this will at least be on those platforms. We'll keep you updated when it's made official.
Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War Might Be Getting a "Large-Scale Zombies Experience" Soon
Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War and Warzone are heading together into their second joint season soon, and it seems Treyarch and Raven Software have a lot of plans focused on zombies for the two games in the coming weeks. Lately, we've been getting reports that Zombies might be headed to Warzone soon, and now, it seems a new large-scale Zombies mode is headed to Black Ops Cold War as well.
The new mode, titled "Outbreak" was leaked on the Call of Duty website itself, and is described as "a new, large-scale Zombies experience." That premature reveal has since been pulled, but you can check out a screencap below (courtesy of MP1st). According to leaks, Outbreak is supposed to be a co-op PvE open world mode set in a big Fireteam map.
Of course, it remains to be seen exactly how much of this will be true, but while the details still remain murky, the leak on the series' official website makes it clear that Outbreak is a real thing. Here's hoping it gets announced soon.
Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War and Warzone are available on PS5, Xbox Series X/S, PS4, Xbox One, and PC. A new Call of Duty game also launches later this year. As per reports, it'll be developed by Sledgehammer, and will be set during World War 2 again.
