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Aliens: Fireteam Elite Confirmed for August 24th, New Trailer and Digital Deluxe Edition Revealed

Following up on Best Buy listing its release date, Cold Iron Studios and Focus Home Interactive have confirmed that Aliens: Fireteam Elite will be releasing on August 24th. The base game will cost $39.99 on PS4, PS5, Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One and PC via Steam. Check out the latest trailer below.

Along with the Standard Edition, there's a Digital Deluxe Edition for $69.99. It includes the base game, the Endeavor Veteran Pack and the Endeavor Pass for access to four cosmetic DLC bundles. Releasing post-launch, these DLC bundles will contain new weapon colors, head accessories and class kit skins. Major gameplay updates after release will be free.

Those who pre-order either edition will receive the Hardened Marine Pack. This offers the Bandana Head accessory, the Digital Red Camo weapon color, Chestburster joke emote and three decals for weapons. For more extensive gameplay showcasing the co-op shooter in action, head here. Stay tuned for more details in the coming months.

WB Games' Studios Are Going to Focus on WB Franchises Going Forward

Reports of WB Games being sold off – at least in bits and pieces – by parent company AT&T have been doing the rounds since last year, and even though at one point it seemed like that was no longer on the table, those reports recently heated up once again. Now, EA has purchased mobile developer Playdemic from WB Games for $1.4 billion in cash- so what does that mean for other studios at WB Games?

In the press release announcing the Playdemic acquisition, WB Games David Haddad said that the company's studios are going to focus on working with Warner Bros. own IPs, and that Playdemic's sale is a part of that strategy.

"We have enjoyed working with the talented team at Playdemic as they have grown Golf Clash beyond all expectations into a hit mobile game with tremendous longevity," Haddad said. "While we have great respect for the Playdemic team, our decision to divest is a part of our overall strategy to build games based on Warner Bros. storied franchises."

Currently, nearly all studios at WB Games are working on franchises owned by Warner Bros. WB Games Montreal is working on Gotham Knights, Rocksteady is working on Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League, and Avalanche Productions is working on Hogwarts Legacy.

There's no word currently on what exactly is in the works at Monolith Productions, developer of Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor and its sequel. There's also NetherRealm Studios, who have been alternating between Injustice and Mortal Kombat for a while now.

EA Acquires Mobile Dev Playdemic from WB Games for $1.4 Billion

EA has been looking to expand its presence in the mobile market, loves anything and everything to do with live services, and has a penchant for enjoying big success with sports games, casual or otherwise. Now, with their newest acquisition, they're looking to check all three of those boxes.

It's been announced that EA has acquired mobile developer Playdemic from WB Games and WB's parent company AT&T for $1.4 billion in cash. Playdemic is known for its 2017 title Golf Clash, which has garnered over 80 million players across iOS and Android since its launch up until now.

If that seems like a lot of money, well, that's because it is- but for EA, who want to keep driving growth for their mobile games, their sports games, and their live services, this is clearly a deal they wanted to lock in.

"Playdemic is a team of true innovators, and we're thrilled to have them join the Electronic Arts family," said Andrew Wilson, EA's CEO. "In addition to the ongoing success of Golf Clash, the talent, technology and expertise of Playdemic will be a powerful combination with our teams and IP at Electronic Arts. This is the next step building on our strategy to expand our sports portfolio and accelerate our growth in mobile to reach more players around the world with more great games and content."

Said Paul Gouge, CEO of Playdemic: "We founded Playdemic with a focus on creating highly engaging and innovative game experiences. Our success with Golf Clash has proven our approach and demonstrated the ability of our incredibly talented teams to develop and operate best in class mobile games. Joining EA, one of the most successful games companies in the world, is an important next step in our journey and we are excited to continue to develop both Golf Clash and new titles as part of the EA family."

This follows from recent reports that WB Games' studios are going to be sold off by parent company AT&T. Last year, reports suggested that EA was among several parties interested in an acquisition.

It's Taking Developers Just a Few Days to Add AMD's FSR to Their Games

AMD has launched its supersampling tech, FidelityFX Super Resolution, with seven games supporting it at launch, and a whole slate of games confirmed to be adding support for it down the line. We've heard from developers in the past about the potential of FSR, but what are the devs who've already worked with the tech saying about it?

AMD recently uploaded several video interviews with developers of games with confirmed FSR support (transcribed by Wccftech), and the one thing they all seem to agree on is that tech is very easy to work with. Pretty much every developer has been able to add FSR support in just a few days, which is something we've heard from Square Enix studio Luminous Productions as well, whose Forspoken is supporting FSR.

Said Mateusz Makowiec, CTO at Terminator Resistance developer Teyon: "FSR is open source, so we were able to merge it with our internal engine changes. It took maybe a day to integrate it with the engine and then some time to add the option to the UI. We didn't need to make any tweaks, it just worked."

The Riftbreaker developer Exor Studios' COO Pawel Lekki said: "FidelityFX Super Resolution is great because it's super easy to implement. The initial implementation took us two days and as soon as we got implemented we started tweaking the game, the engine, to make it look as good as possible. That additional tweaking time was about an additional week, so in total I think the implementation time was just a bit over a week. This is really not a lot in terms of game development time schedules. Regardless of the platform, we can deliver the same technology, we don't have to customize it per vendor, it just works."

Evil Genius 2 studio Rebellion's founder and CTO Chris Kingsley said: "Implementing FSR in our games was very easy, it was pretty much drop-in and it was only a few days. It was remarkably easy, I think it would be fair to say."

Teemu Jyrkinen, CEO and creative director at Kingshunt developer Vaki Games said: "As a small game studio, we want to use technologies which are easy to implement and easy to use. With AMD FidelityFX Super Resolution, the implementation was easy and we could see the benefits right away from the first playtest."

Finally, Godfall developer Counterplay Games' CTO and executive producer Emil Anticevic said: "It was important to us that their upscaling technology is an open solution, because this allows us not only to easily implement this in Godfall but also to customize it to achieve even better results. Not only is FSR easy to implement and to see a substantial performance boost, but it does so regardless of what brand of hardware you're running on."

Of course, the actual impact of FSR implementation remains to be seen, but early signs seem to be promising. Here's hoping we see positive results in the not-too-distant future. 

You can check out AMD's partner showcase videos with the aforementioned developers below.

Halo: The Master Chief Collection Devs Are Considering Increasing the Player Count

Halo: The Master Chief Collection is in the great shape right now, packaging the entire series (except Halo 5) into a single package that looks great, runs great, and has a large and thriving community that plays it constantly, not least because of the excellent support it's received from 343 Industries. The developer has been taking consistent steps to keep improving upon the collection- and they're not done just yet.

Speaking during a recent Xbox podcast (via @MintBlitz on Twitter), Halo: The Master Chief Collection producer Sean Swindersky said that 343 Industries is considering increasing the maximum player count. Currently, the player count stands at 16, but Swindersky says that though there are factors to take into consideration (such as the performance across all platforms), 343 might potentially be eyeing a player count of 40-50. "That would be wild," Swindersky added.

Considering how well The Master Chief Collection is doing and how many players are not just sticking with it, but diving in day by day, an improvement as significant as this one would be a big deal. Here's hoping we can see it come to fruition some time in the future.

Halo: The Master Chief Collection is available on Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, and PC. Meanwhile, Halo Infinite is launching for the same platforms this Holiday.

Genshin Impact Trailer Teases Kazuha's Story

The next big character coming to Genshin Impact is Kaedehara Kazuha, a sword wielder with an Anemo vision. In a new trailer, he's seen on Beidou's ship after escaping from Inazuma. As the moon hangs high up in the sky, Kazuha reflects on the past and the coming storm.

It seems that Kazuha's departure from Inazuma was due to his vision, which various hunters were after. Whether this indicates visions being outlawed in the region or something else remains to be seen. Either way, it should be interesting to see how this plays into the Traveler's journey to Inazuma when it eventually becomes playable.

As for Kazuha, he'll be available on June 30th via a new Event Wish so make sure to save up those Intertwined Fates and Primogems. Genshin Impact is currently available for PS4, PS5, PC, iOS and Android. For more details on the PS5 version, check out our review here.

Monster Hunter Stories 2: Wings of Ruin Opening Cinematic Revealed

Capcom's Monster Hunter Stories 2: Wings of Ruin is out next month but will have a demo on the Nintendo Switch on June 25th. To hype up the same, it's released the opening cinematic for the RPG, which sets up events driving the main plot. Check it out below.

The opening sees Ena, a Wyverian hiding from some Hunters and seemingly caring for an adult Rathalos. The latter entrusts her with an egg and then comes under attack, leading to its escape. A whole bunch of Rathalos can then be seen leaving the island. The protagonist, a descendant of Red from the first game, witnesses this and it's clear that bad stuff is going down.

Eventually, the egg hatches into Razewing Ratha, a flightless Rathalos with black wings that will seemingly bring about the end of the world. As for how the protagonist meets and becomes its Rider, you'll need to play the demo when it goes live. All progress will transfer over to the full game so it's well worth trying out. There's only one save slot in the demo though with the max level being 11.

Monster Hunter Stories 2: Wings of Ruin is out on July 9th for Nintendo Switch and PC. For more in-depth gameplay, head here.

Aliens: Fireteam Elite Out on August 24th, as per Best Buy Listing

Cold Iron Studios' upcoming co-op shooter Aliens: Fireteam seems to have received a slight name change. According to a listing on Best Buy (as pointed out by Wario 64 on Twitter), it's now called Aliens: Fireteam Elite and set to release on August 24th. It also costs $39.99 across all platforms and as the PS4 listing indicates, there's a free upgrade option to the PS5 option.

The developer has yet to confirm the release date or price point so expect an official announcement in the coming days. Aliens: Fireteam Elite is set in, surprise, the Alien universe and places you in command of a Marine Assault Unit. When a distress signal emerges from LV-895 in the outer colonies, it's up to you to slay Xenomorphs, either alone with AI teammates or two other players in co-op.

Along with different weapons and perks, there are different class abilities like an AoE blast, auto-turret and so on. Over 20 different enemy types await with Xenomorph Drones, Runners and Spitters to tackle. Aliens: Fireteam Elite is coming to Xbox Series X/S, PS4, PS5, PC and Xbox One.

S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chernobyl's E3 2021 Showing Made an Exciting Promise

S.T.A.L.K.E.R. is a first person shooter series that started in 2007 and was released on Windows PC that was generally received well enough, but also divided first-person shooter fans to a notable degree due to its handful of technical issues and visual glitches here and there. The game ultimately ended up aging relatively well when compared to many of its contemporaries because of its more unique setting and interesting concepts like its bleak setting and its blend of horrifying monsters and spooky locations with relatively traditional first person shooter gameplay mechanics. The game reviewed well with most mainstream critics and was even awarded for its atmosphere by GameSpot, but still ultimately was held back from unmitigated greatness as a result of its buggy nature. It may, then, come as little surprise to many that the game never quite turned into a major franchise with it being well over ten years since we've heard anything official from the franchise.

Most of the time when IPs like this go for more than a handful of years without a new sequel getting announced we get don't get another one, but with this IP it appears we will have an exception on our hands as S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chernobyl was recently announced to be coming from the same studio to Windows and Xbox in April of 2022. From the vertical slice trailer that we saw for the game's announcement, there appears to be a lot in the game that is praiseworthy. From what sounds like pretty good voice acting, an interesting story that expands on the ideas of the original game, to the audio design we have plenty to be excited for with this upcoming game. However it's really the graphics that were the standout characteristic here. S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chernobyl is arguably the best-looking game announced for E3 this year as it currently stands, and if you watch the trailer a couple of times you'll see a lot of reasons to think that.

First the environmental stuff. From what we see in the trailer, there appears to be a lot of emphasis placed on the time period and just general state of affairs in the world for the game. Most of the vegetation "in the Zone" looks appropriately fried, most of the technology shown seems either constricted by its time period or fancifully evolved from it with a 1980's technology gone awry aesthetic, and it all looks good together, adding up to a convincingly appropriate look and tone for a game based on the area and time period of the Chernobyl disaster. With that setting would obviously come a lot of dilapidated buildings, crumbling infrastructure, and of course a desolate landscape that nobody of sound mind would ever want to hang around in unless they had to.

The outside environments vary greatly from the interior ones as well. In the trailer we see inside a couple different types of buildings, with older decaying structures that have entire sections of walls missing and broken floorboards that give way when characters step on them. Whether those animations are canned and structured or dynamic and actually reacting to weight being pressed upon them in real-time is ultimately immaterial to the effect they provide. Subtle things like that go a long way to establishing the unkempt nature of the structures that you'll be visiting in this game. These are buildings that have obviously been through some catastrophic events and haven't been maintained well since then. As a result, they feel adequately battered and decrepit. One internal structure during the trailer takes on more of the game's science fiction aesthetics with toxic green light spilling out and over the rusty browns and reds of the rest of the room and looks really interesting as a result. So aside from the graphical prowess and realism of the presentation, it's also looking like the game is going out of its way to have a nice variety of locations that all look distinct but still appropriate for the story and setting, which is exactly what you want in a game like this.

Inside all of those environments of course are the little things that anybody who likes a good looking game will appreciate. Shadows are dynamic and subtle. Heat from the campfire warps the environment behind it in real-time, and the character models themselves are quite a step up from most current gen models you are likely to see with plenty of detail and independent objects on their outfits moving in real-time.

s.t.a.l.k.e.r. 2 heart of chernobyl

There are several moments where the other non-playable characters are conversing with the main protagonist and all of them look great. Mouth movements are smooth and seem to have lots of points of animation while also matching up with the dialogue in ways that seem more genuine than a lot of the mouth movements that we've gotten accustomed to from most games that often look robotic outside of cutscenes.

It might seem like a small thing, and perhaps it is, but having believable real-time animations with NPC's can absolutely go a long way to helping you feel more invested in that character and what they are doing, which of course creates a more immersive experience overall. Even more striking is the gunplay, showcasing some extremely good looking weapons, the more interesting of which with intricate moving parts and subtle particle effects spraying out of the muzzle as it's fires, as well as some eye-catching animations of things being blown apart by grenades and fragments of boxes flying towards you.

This really seems to emphasize just how visually messy an actual firefight can be with things breaking apart and explosions impacting more than just their immediate area of effect. One can only imagine what these systems might be able to visually pull off in some of the game's later sections when combat gets more complex and involves more enemies at once. The enemies themselves aren't seen much, but the recognizable squid-mouthed monster design from the original game does seem to make an appearance here which is nice to see, as a close up shot of the monster is shown that really takes that grotesque design to a whole new level. Blowing these things away as well as some of the other creatures that are surely in store for us in this game should be a feast for the eyes for anyone looking to enjoy a good roster of horrible monsters and disfigured humanoid designs.

s.t.a.l.k.e.r. 2 heart of chernobyl

Surely we still have a lot to learn about the newest game in the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. franchise as there do seem to be some other gameplay mechanics at work here. This franchise might have been on ice for a while but it does appear to be heating back up with this newest entry. Interacting with this world's cast of incredulous, eccentric characters and battling with its horrifying abominations should, if nothing else, be a visual showcase for current gen consoles. Hopefully we'll get to learn more about it soon, because if these graphics are any indication then the game surely has more than a few more tricks up its sleeve.

Note: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, GamingBolt as an organization.

What Have We Learned About The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild 2 from its E3 Teaser?

Two years after first confirming development on a direct sequel to The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, at their E3 2021 Direct, Nintendo finally showed us more of a game. It was a brief trailer, and there's still so much about the game that we don't know yet- it's name, for starters. But even though it was brief, it was quite packed, showing quite a bit of new things and possibly hinting at others.

To start off, within its very few seconds, the new trailer pretty much demolished most theories fans had come up with over the past two years based on the game's first teaser. While most had been guessing that Breath of the Wild 2 would have a sizeable underground area, it was confirmed with the new trailer that the exact opposite is true. Rather than taking us deep underground, the sequel is taking us to the skies.

We saw everything from islands floating in the clouds to skydiving to paragliding on a far larger scale than anything in the first game. And with all that, it's hard not to draw comparisons with Skyward Sword. After all, flight sections were a major part of that game. There's also the fact that Skyward Sword HD is coming up soon- perhaps the remaster's launch might suggest some connections with the Breath of the Wild sequel? With the game putting such an emphasis on the skies and flight, could we see some narrative connections with Skyward Sword? Perhaps Loftwings could make a return? Even if something like that doesn't happen, we can at least expect some references on a smaller scale to Breath of the Wild 2 in Skyward Sword HD. That's something Zelda has been known for in the past, whether that's with Ocarina of Time 3D and Skyward Sword or with Twilight Princess HD and Breath of the Wild.

Moving past that, however, there might be some other narrative hints in the teaser as well. Though the new trailer was focused largely on the surface and the sky sections, a few seconds in the beginning were focused on the underground once again, and putting that together with what we saw in the first trailer, we might have some hints about what's going on in the story. Zelda and Link have clearly entered this network of caves or whatever it is to look for something- so perhaps they're looking for the source of Calamity Ganon? It certainly seems like the two of them in the underground section is how the game begins. Perhaps they travel into labyrinths beneath Hyrule Castle to find the source of the evil they defeated earlier to ensure that it never comes back again?

Most people have come to the conclusion that that figure we've seen in both trailers is none other than Ganondorf. Which would make a lot of sense, honestly- perhaps Ganondorf was sealed away underneath Hyrule Castle thousands of years ago, and Calamity Ganon and the Malice that we saw in the first game were bits and pieces of his powers leaking out?

Either way, whatever it is that Link and Zelda find in those caves, it's obvious that things are not going to go well for them. In the trailer, we see Zelda falling into a deep abyss, which might just how she gets separated from Link. And perhaps she's going to be in need of rescuing again somehow, and we might not see her until the end of the game. That's by no means guaranteed, but that's the series' go-to formula. In the gameplay footage we've seen so far, we've only seen Link alone, which throws any theories about the two of them being together in this game out the window.

breath of the wild 2

It's not just Zelda who is probably going to run into trouble underground. The very first seconds of the trailer show us Link getting caught in some sort of corruption that grabs hold of his arm and begins climbing upward. That corruption looks a whole lot like the Malice from the previous game, which is interesting, but more importantly, there's another very brief shot in the trailer that, together with this shot, might have given us a crucial narrative detail. We also see a magical blue-white glove of light enveloping Link's arm in the trailer, and the fact that it's the same arm we see getting corrupted can't be a coincidence.

What that seems to suggest is that Link is going to catch some of that Ganon corruption, but to stop it from spreading, he's going to get this magical protection on his arm. The technology and aesthetic of that glove looks a lot like Sheikah tech, but it's possible that it's connected to something else- perhaps some other civilization that resides in those islands in the sky. The fact that we see that protective glove or magic or whatever it is around Link's arm in tons of other shots in the trailer tells us that he's going to be spending most of the game with that thing on- which would make sense, if he has some sort of Ganon blight corruption on his arm that would spread if not for that protection.

It also seems that that arm protection is going to serve gameplay purposes. The Sheikah Slate, it seems, isn't returning, and that purpose is going to be served in the sequel by Link's new arm protection. Or at least that's what it seems like from that trailer. The shot where Link freezes a spiky ball rolling downhill back upwards to trample the enemies behind it clearly shows him using that power with his right arm, which is the one with the protection. He isn't holding a Slate in that show.

Beyond that, there are a few other interesting gameplay details of note in the trailer. We've only seen a few brief shots that show us large portions of the world, but there weren't any shrines in any of them. Does that mean shrines are gone, or is that just something Nintendo has done for the purposes of this trailer? Meanwhile, we also see plenty of enemies in trailer, but most of them are familiar ones (other than that weird rocky mech thing, which- who knows what that is), while there doesn't seem to be a ton of variety, which was one of the few issues people had with Breath of the Wild. Of course, we do see some interesting variations (like Bokoblins with large spiky horns, or that Stone Talus with a Bokoblin outpost built on its back), so it's entirely possible that there's new things in the game that Nintendo will show later. Hell, that's not just possible, it's pretty much guaranteed.

the legend of zelda breath of the wild sequel

At one point, we see Link using a flamethrower attached on his left arm. That raises a few questions. Is that a permanent item or piece of equipment that we're going to carry with us throughout the entire game? Because if it is, players could do some really interesting things with Breath of the Wild's complex physics and chemistry systems. Or perhaps that flamethrower is a new kind of weapon? If that's true, does that mean it's going to be breakable?

But the most intriguing thing in the trailer by far is, funnily enough, Link's hair. At different points in the trailer, we see Link with one of two different hairstyles- one being the classic ponytail look from the first game, and sporting longer, wilder-looking hair in the second style, without a ponytail. What's interesting is that there's a bit of a pattern in when and where we see each style. Every time we see Link with his old hair, he's either on the surface, or in some underground section or cave, which is technically part of the surface. Every time we see him with long hair, however, it's in the sky sections- either diving or gliding through the sky, or on-foot on one of the floating islands.

So why exactly is that? Clearly, there's some sort of separation between the two sections that visually apparent. Could the separation be related to time? Maybe there's some sort of temporal distortion and the islands in the sky are flung into the future, while the surface sections are in the present? I know this one is a bit out there, and there's every chance it's totally off-base, but The Legend of Zelda loves its time travel, that's for sure.

There are a few other elements  in the trailer that also seem to be hinting at some sort of time distortion. There's the ability with which Link reverses the spiky ball, of course, while we also see him reversing the fall of a water drop and somehow using it to travel to a floating island above. There's also the fact that we've heard the same reversed-sounding music track playing in both trailers, which might not necessarily mean anything, but for my money, is being used by Nintendo to convey to fans that there's some time travel shenanigans going on. Oh, and somewhat off-topic, but now that we're talking about that reversed drop of water- could those perhaps be points scattered throughout the map that let you get to various islands floating in the sky? It would certainly be a unique method of teleportation.

the legend of zelda breath of the wild sequel

Either way, whether or not time travel is involved, something interesting is going on with Link's hair. There's also the fact that every single shot with Link's new hair is very carefully framed in a way that you cannot see his face. That's something that fans have obviously noticed, and there obviously has to be a reason for that (unless it just ends up being a massive coincidence, which seems highly unlikely). It's hard to guess at what that reason might be at this point, but there's little doubt that there's something going on there.

Of course, it's entirely likely that all of this turns out to be completely inaccurate. After all, after Breath of the Wild 2's first teaser, everyone was convinced that underground sections were going to be a big part of the game. There's every chance that when the next trailer arrives (which hopefully won't be too long from now), many theories we've had here will be dashed against the wall as well. The game's clearly a ways off from launch (to the extent where I wouldn't be surprised if it misses its 2022 launch window), and obviously, there's tons that Nintendo haven't shown us. Either way, one thing this trailer definitely makes clear is that Breath of the Wild 2 is shaping up to be a much more ambitious sequel than the iterative upgrade we were all expecting it would be.

Note: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, GamingBolt as an organization.