Final Fantasy 16 Might Not be Shown at TGS 2021, Producer Says

Since its announcement last year, there haven't been a great many updates on Final Fantasy 16, but fans have been holding out hope that Square Enix will have more to show of the RPG in the coming weeks and months, especially with producer Naoki Yoshida having said late last year that Square Enix was planning several announcements on the game for 2021.

Of course, with E3 having come and gone without any trace of Final Fantasy 16, fans are hoping that future events like State of Play presentations or Tokyo Game Show will be where it finally shows up. However, it seems unlikely that a trailer of the game will be shown off in the coming weeks. At a recent Final Fantasy 14 livestream (translated by @aitaikimochi on Twitter), Yoshida said that Final Fantasy 16 might not be shown at Tokyo Game Show, which is scheduled for late September.

Yoshida said that development on the game is progressing well, with work on all scenarios having been completing and voice recording for the game's English version almost entirely done. He then went on to add that in spite of that, the next time they show the game, he wants it to be done and close to launch, so that people will want to (and can) buy it soon.

Echoing earlier statements, he also said that he doesn't want to string along fans with smaller updates on the game.

Final Fantasy 16, whenever it launches will be available for PS5.

NetherRealm Studios and TT Games Won't be Sold off, WB Games Says

There's been a lot of question marks surrounding the future of WB Games as a whole of late. With the Warner Media Discovery Group merger looming large, there's been a lot of speculation about whether or not game development studios owned by WB Games are going to be sold off to potential suitors in the industry.

A recent rumour originating from Windows Central's Jez Corden (during the Xbox Two podcast) claimed that WB Games was, according to some documents seen by Corden, considering selling off NetherRealm Studios – developer of the Injustice and Mortal Kombat games – and TT Games – who have worked on LEGO titles almost exclusively.

However, WB Games says that that isn't the case. In a statement provided to TheGamer, Remi Sklar – senior vice president of global communications at WB Games – stated that both the aforementioned studios would continue to be owned by Warner and were part of the Discovery merger.

"I can confirm NetherRealm Studios and TT Games will continue to remain a part of Warner Bros. Games, and all are included in the Warner Media Discovery merger," she said.

Recently, NetherRealm Studios confirmed that it was ending support for Mortal Kombat 11, and instead completely shifting focus to its next game.

Meanwhile, Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment recently stated, following the sale of mobile developer Playdemic to EA, that all WB Games studios would focus on making games based on WB-owned IPs going forward. Read more on that through here.

The Witcher 3's Netflix Series-Inspired DLC Will Release for Every Version of the Game

Who know when CD Projekt RED's struggles with Cyberpunk 2077 will end (in spite of what they say), but at least they're always going to have the incredible The Witcher 3 to fall back on. Later this year, the Polish developer will be releasing native PS5 and Xbox Series X/S versions of the beloved open world RPG, and on top of all the visual and performance improvements you'd expect, the release is also going to bring some new things to the table.

Recently, for instance, CD Projekt RED confirmed that they are going to release free DLC for The Witcher 3 inspired by the Netflix Witcher adaptation. They promised "more info" in the near future, but left many questions unanswered even so. One of those questions has been answered already, however, with the developer confirming that the DLC in question won't just be for the game's PS5 and Xbox Series X/S versions, and will be available for PS4, Xbox One, PC, and Nintendo Switch owners. CDPR also reiterates that free next-gen upgrades will be supported for those who already own the game on PlayStation or Xbox.

There's no word yet on when The Witcher 3 will launch for the new consoles, but it's supposed to be some time later this year.

Tales of Arise and Final Fantasy 16 Are on Top of the Famitsu Most Wanted Charts Once More

Famitsu has released its latest weekly charts for the most highly anticipated upcoming games, as decided by votes from its readers, and the results are rather predictable. Bandai Namco's and Square Enix's respective action RPGs Tales of Arise and Final Fantasy 16 have been dominating these charts for some time now, and the two are in the top two positions this week once again.

In third place is The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild's unnamed sequel, trailing the leaders by over a hundred votes, while fellow elusive upcoming Switch exclusive Bayonetta 3 is in fourth place. Yet another Zelda game – Skyward Sword HD – is in at No.10. In fact, with the exception of PS5's Gran Turismo 7 in ninth place, all other games in the top 10 are Switch exclusives.

The likes of Pokemon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl, Shin Megami Tensei 5, and Splatoon 3 all figure into the top 10 as well.

You can check out the full top 10 below. All votes were cast by Famitsu readers betweenJune 17 and June 23.

1. [PS4] Tales of Arise – 541 votes
2. [PS5] Final Fantasy 16 – 528 votes
3. [NSW] The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild 2 – 419 votes
4. [NSW] Bayonetta 3 – 410 votes
5. [NSW] Pokemon Brilliant Diamond/Shining Pearl – 355 votes
6. [NSW] Shin Megmai Tensei 5 – 348 votes
7. [NSW] Ushiro – 217 votes
8. [NSW] Splatoon 3 – 204 votes
9. [PS5] Gran Turismo 7 – 180 votes
10. [NSW] The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword HD – 173 votes

[Via Nintendo Everything]

FIFA 22 is Getting its Official Reveal Trailer Later Today

With the final of Euro 2021 looming large and the next season of domestic football just weeks away from kicking off, it is, of course, almost that time when EA Sports lifts the lid on its next yearly FIFA instalment. And FIFA 21 is going to get its reveal imminently.

EA Sports has confirmed that a gameplay reveal trailer for FIFA 21 is going live later today, at 8:30 AM PST. If past FIFA reveals are any indication, the trailer probably isn't going to tell us a whole lot, and will likely be pretty brief- but more gameplay details are going to arrive on this year's game on July 20 as part of one of several panels by EA in the run up to EA Play Live later this month.

Meanwhile, EA Sports has also confirmed that Paris Saint-Germain forward Kylian Mbappe is once again going to be on FIFA 22's cover, just as he was the cover star for last year's game.

Watch Dogs: Legion – Bloodline Review – Iconic Hat and Iconic Mask

Watch Dogs: Legion has its fair share of detractors, but while I do think that the game is not without its issues, I'm also one of the people who actually, genuinely enjoyed it. I thought its Play as Anyone mechanic was a great twist on the series' formula, and opened up a level of freedom and player choice in all of its activities that lent it an almost immersive sim-style quality, to the extent that I could play it for dozens upon dozens of hours and still keep finding ways to keep myself occupied.

Even so, the idea of a new single player expansion that takes a different approach and offers a story-driven adventure of a more focused nature is still an exciting one, so I jumped into Bloodline with some optimism. Now that I'm done with it, I'm mostly satisfied with what it had on offer- though I also think that it feels a lot more pared down than the base game, and that a few other issues hold it back from true greatness. Fans of the series will certainly enjoy what Bloodline brings to the table, but it could have been so much more.

The elevator pitch for Bloodline is an inherently interesting one, at least for fans of the series- Aiden Pearce, protagonist of the first game, returns as the central character, and is paired up with on an on-and-off basis with Wrench, the goofy and loveable mask-wearing hacker from Watch Dogs 2. The two cross paths early on in Bloodline's campaign, and their interests don't necessarily align, but what starts out as a little bit of animosity eventually morphs into an uneasy partnership, as the two work together to take down bigger threats in London.

watch dogs legion bloodline

"Fans of the series will certainly enjoy what Bloodline brings to the table, but it could have been so much more."

I've never really liked Aiden Pearce's character, so I wasn't ecstatic to see him come back in Bloodline. In Watch Dogs 1, he was all too dour and needlessly gruff, and had all the emotiveness of a sack full of doorknobs. Even so, Bloodline actually does a pretty good job of making you care at least a little bit about him, his personal demons, and his character arc. His arc isn't a particularly complex one, and focuses mostly on him coming to terms with his past and seeking forgiveness from his nephew, Jackson- but it's enough to keep you somewhat invested. On top of that, it's always fun to see Aiden in the sort of over-the-top situations that Watch Dogs has come to be known for after it course-corrected following criticisms for the first game.

Of course, Aiden is only half of the story in Bloodline– the other, far more interesting half is Wrench, a fan-favourite character in Watch Dogs 2, who steals the show in his comeback. Wrench is interesting from top to bottom. On a superficial level, his loud and unique visual design immediately grasps attention, while his boisterous personality and his knack for always cracking jokes and dropping strange quips ensures that he livens up every scene he's in. Great acting and solid writing make him easy to like – much more than Aiden by far. It's also great to see the pair work together- given how diametrically different they are from one another, it's always fun seeing them play off of one another.

Most of all, however, Aiden and Wrench bring the kind of focus and gravity that was lacking in Watch Dogs: Legion. Where the base game sort of gave you no reason whatsoever to care about its story, given its complete lack of a protagonist or any main character to latch on to, Bloodline is much more story-driven, and tells its tale in a much more focused manner. No, that story isn't outstanding, and the villain in particular is hilariously cartoonish, but it's enough to keep you going, and Wrench and Aiden in particular (especially the former) make for a great central duo.

"Aiden and Wrench bring the kind of focus and gravity that was lacking in Watch Dogs: Legion. Where the base game sort of gave you no reason whatsoever to care about its story, given its complete lack of a protagonist or any main character to latch on to, Bloodline is much more story-driven, and tells its tale in a much more focused manner."

What about how it plays though? Well, that's where Bloodline is a bit of a mixed bag. For starters, structurally and in terms of its content offerings, the expansion is far more pared back than the base game. It's got several main missions and quite a few side quests, all of which can collectively take you 5-10 hours to finish, but outside of that, there's not a whole lot else on offer. Open world offerings are sparse beyond the aforementioned stuff, which is a little disappointing- though thankfully, you can take Aiden and Wrench into the main game once you're done with the DLC and mess around in London as them to your heart's content.

Aiden is the primary playable protagonist here, and about 60-70% of Bloodline puts you in his shoes, if not more, though you do get to play as Wrench in the expansion's second half as well. Of those two, the latter is definitely the more enjoyable to play as. Aiden's rather vanilla as playable character goes, with some pretty basic hacking and stealth gameplay, and though upgrades (which are acquired by finishing side missions) do spice things up for him as you progress further, he still feels a bit too grounded and, in turn, somewhat plain. Wrench, on the other hand, can fly about on a modified cargo drone that shoots electrified grenades, can drop ninja balls to stun enemies and re-enter stealth, and has his trusty sledgehammer that he uses in melee combat- all of which is to say that he encourages a different kind of playstyle than "run up to enemies and shoot/stealth your way past them".

What this also means is that in the early goings, Bloodline is a bit plain. When you start off, you play as Aiden, and in the beginning, Aiden doesn't have much in his arsenal besides a drone and a couple of weapons and abilities. Missions in the opening couple of hours end up feeling to uninteresting and generic then, and though they do begin to open up as you progress further and unlock more abilities for Aiden – and even more so once you switch gears and begin playing as Wrench –  Bloodline definitely takes a while to really get going. There's also the fact that you only have two characters who can only be upgraded or customized in a very linear and defined fashion through side missions, which means that the freedom of choice that Legion constantly encouraged, allowing you to play however you saw fit, is almost entirely gone in Bloodline.

watch dogs legion bloodline

"There's also the fact that you only have two characters who can only be upgraded or customized in a very linear and defined fashion through side missions, which means that the freedom of choice that Legion constantly encouraged, allowing you to play however you saw fit, is almost entirely gone in Bloodline."

I'm also a little disappointed in all the technical issues I ran into while playing Bloodline. The frame rate wasn't always the most consistent, quite a few times I died and the game refused to read my "hold A to retry" input and forced me to restart, there were a couple of hard crashed that made me boot up the game again, the audio glitched out on more than a few occasions, often to the point of the game going completely mute for a number of seconds, and characters often kept talking over each other during conversations. There were also plenty of animation glitches, a few of them even in cutscenes, which by themselves I would have been more than willing to overlook, but paired with all the other issues, are hard to forgive.

Watch Dogs: Legion – Bloodline is a solid and chunky piece of new content, one that series fans are sure to enjoy, and one that you will definitely like if you were disenchanted with the lack of storytelling focus in the main game. Seeing Wrench and Aiden coming back and working together is certainly a lot of fun, and playing as the former is consistently delightful. But from its open world activities to its limited progression and customization to its pared back open world, it also feels like a bit of a step back from what Legion accomplished. On the whole, Bloodline is worth playing for those who are, for one reason or another, already invested in Watch Dogs– just don't expect anything spectacular.

This game was reviewed on the Xbox Series X.

Can Bloober Team do Justice to Silent Hill?

For those who might be a bit out of the loop on the most recent set of rumors and speculations concerning the potential revival of the Silent Hill franchise, you'll be glad to know there is yet another development in the non-stop swirling torrent of hearsay surrounding the long since dead survival horror series. This time, however, the conversation is about something that is actually confirmed; Bloober Team and Konami have entered into some sort of partnership. According to Konami, the new working relationship is vaguely described as a "Strategic cooperation agreement" and it will involve "jointly developing selected contents and exchanging know-how". Which isn't exactly shedding light on much in terms of detail. But a few things about this partnership and the announcement of it do stand out.

First, Bloober Team is of course known for their moderately long history of developing games in the horror genre. If you've ever played Blair Witch, Layers of Fear, Observer, or The Medium, then you have played a Bloober Team game. For Konami to want to work with them seems to point towards one big franchise under their umbrella; Silent Hill. Unless of course, on the off chance that they're looking to revive their game adaptations of The Thing or Saw, but I think we can safely assume that's probably not the case. Secondly, the timing. Konami is many things, but blind is not one of them. Surely, they have seen the recent swelling of interest in Silent Hill, so is it really just a coincidence that they would announce this strategic partnership with a developer that's widely known for their horror games at such a time? My money is on no. Even if what that Konami and Bloober Team are working on isn't a Silent Hill game per se, surely, odds are, whatever the fruits of this partnership are will ultimately contribute to a Silent Hill game in some way.

But then that brings us to the very reasonable question to ask; is Bloober Team a good fit for Silent Hill? Make no mistake, we're not just talking about any random survival horror IP, here. This isn't Blue Stinger or Overblood. Silent Hill is an incredibly important franchise to its genre and gaming as a whole, and it deserves nothing less than the utmost care, especially considering the ill-gotten treatment it's received in recent years with spin-off dungeon crawlers, bad movies, degrading pachinko machines, and the one promising project we saw glimmers of with P.T. getting unceremoniously cancelled. With a track record that goes all the way back to 2010, which includes 5 pretty decent horror games, the experience for Bloober Team is certainly there – at least on paper. Even though the better games from Bloober Team still aren't necessarily widely regarded as unmissable horror classics, with 5 competent games being released in the fairly short time-frame of just 5 years, which is as long as some teams take to make just one game, the team is clearly well-versed in the nuts and bolts of the genre and has proven they know how to get these sorts of projects off the ground and over the finish line.

This is more than can be said for Double Helix, the studio whose lap Konami dropped the franchise into despite having no discernible experience in horror whatsoever, and ended up making what many consider to be the first truly unimpressive game in the series with Silent Hill: Homecoming. Bloober Team also has the variety of what they've produced on their side. With everything from mobile and DS games back in the early 20-teens, to Basement Crawl which we will promptly ignore, to their eventual horror arc. This started with Layers of Fear, which was decidedly and delightfully disturbing, then Observer which was arguably more of a mystery/psychological adventure game with horror elements, then of course Layers of Fear 2, Blair Witch, and The Medium which admittedly had mixed results, but more importantly, were all a little different in how they approached their horror, and thus, created different flavors of it. The value of the unique experience gained from that level of variety outside of and within the horror genre that Bloober Team has, if leveraged creatively enough, could potentially yield an equally unique perspective for Silent Hill that nobody else, from Team Silent to Hideo Kojima, could ever dream up. Whether or not that perspective would end up being a better Silent Hill game is of course debatable, but I could definitely see Bloober Team being uniquely positioned to provide a fresh take nonetheless.

Of course, there's also plenty of reason to think Bloober Team is not the right pick at this time. While they have churned out some decent horror games in a strikingly efficient manner, none of them really set the world on fire. Layers of Fear was arguably their best work in the genre, but even it still doesn't really begin to approach the overwhelming atmospheric tension or narrative mastery on display in the early Silent Hill games. For Bloober to make something that can stand among those games with any degree of dignity, they would need to make their best game to date. Nothing less. It's also worth pointing out that there are other teams out there, right now, that are making superior horror games to anything Bloober Team has done so far. SadSquare Studio, the folks behind the exceptional game Visage, for example, would fit the bill nicely as they have shown an impressive knack for the more cerebral, atmospheric horror that Silent Hill is known for with just that one game, which has its roots in P.T. anyway. So in a way, they already kind of have a head start.

layers of fear

There are also the folks at Creative Assembly, despite being a team much more well-known for their strategy games, they also made Alien Isolation which was one of the finer horror games of the last generation and is regularly – and rightly – brought up in "best horror games ever" conversations. I would also trust the steady hands of Frictional Games as their work on the original Amnesia and SOMA have been nothing short of outstanding. There's also Kojima Productions whose qualifications I really shouldn't have to explain. Not to knock Bloober Team, but with so many exciting and interesting choices out there to carry the torch for Silent Hill, I can't blame people for being a little puzzled and perhaps even dismayed at Bloober Team getting the nod – if that is indeed what is happening.

You could certainly have either perspective on the matter at this point and be justified. There is a case to be made that Bloober Team is more than capable of taking this on and doing something great with it, but there is just as compelling a case to point to other studios that might have been better suited for the job. Based on what we know so far, if this is what we think it is, I think I lean a little toward the former. While Bloober Team is probably not the team I would have chosen, I can definitely see a path for them to bring something uniquely interesting to the series given their experience and versatility. It might be something I would have to approach with an open mind, but maybe that's a good thing. Maybe it's finally time to let the P.T. dream go, and let a different mindset have a turn at the wheel. Afterall it was the fresh take on survival horror of Team Silent that made the original 3 Silent Hill games so great anyway. Just like it was the completely different perspective Kojima and Del Toro brought to the table that made P.T. such a remarkable experience. Perhaps now it's time for Bloober Team to exhume this corpse of a franchise and reanimate it their own way.

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.

Assassin's Creed – What is Going on with the Series?

Assassin's Creed has been Ubisoft's biggest flagship franchise for pretty much as long as been around, and given how valuable it is to the company, it goes without saying that they're always thinking of ways to ensure its consistent growth, especially from a commercial perspective. And say what you will about Ubisoft, but so far, those decisions have worked out very well for them. Back in 2009, Assassin's Creed 2 elevated the formula of its predecessor and established an open world structure that would be aped by others in the industry for a decade, until Breath of the Wild came along and provided another new open world structure for others to ape.

When that formula started floundering for the series, Ubisoft went back to the drawing board and came back with Assassin's Creed Origins, expanding the series to new horizons and turning it into an action RPG franchise, once again establishing a new formula that the series has been following since then, and which has, in turn, led to the most impressive commercial growth and performances Assassin's Creed has ever seen. And now, it seems like the time is coming for the series to redefine and reinvent itself once again. Following the quick one-two punch of a report by Jason Schreier talking about this reinvention and the subsequent Ubisoft update officially confirming many of those details, we now have a vague and general idea of what to expect- but the general feeling is that this, perhaps, might not be the best possible direction for the series to take.

Before we get into that, let's cover the basics- what do we know for sure, and what's been rumoured but not officially confirmed? What we do know is that Ubisoft is bringing together its Montreal and Quebec studios to collaboratively work on the next era of the franchise, which is taking the shape of a live service model. This online live service project is going to encapsulate a growing, evolving, and changing experience that will regularly add new stories set across multiple settings, each with their own unique tones and methods, all of which will be connected via a single hub, a unified platform, which, in its current early development process, is being referred to as Assassin's Creed Infinity. It's essentially the Fortnite version of Assassin's Creed, if we're being rather reductive about it (curiously enough, reports suggest that Grand Theft Auto 6 is going to do similar things with a growing and changing map- but that's another discussion entirely).

On top of this, there are some other things that are a little bit up in the air right now. For instance, is Assassin's Creed Infinity going to be a premium release, or will it follow a free-to-play model? Neither Ubisoft's confirmation nor Schreier's report have talked about that, but Ubisoft does seem to be determined to emphasize F2P going forward, and a live service platform would, of course, be rather well-suited to something like that. Not that long ago, insider Shpeshal_Nick suggested that the game would indeed be free-to-play, and would even have Destiny-style raids- but again, that's not yet been confirmed. Meanwhile, it's also unclear whether Assassin's Creed Infinity is going to have multiplayer elements. It being a live service would suggest that it will have multiplayer, but according to Schreier, given the fact that the game's so early in development, a lot of the details are in flux right now. The one thing that's certain is that Infinity is going to be a connected hub, a platform that will contain many games and settings being added to it, but how multiplayer will figure in, or if it will even figure in, is not yet known.

Now, out of all of those details, some things are actually rather encouraging. The fact that Ubisoft has confirmed that Ubisoft Montreal and Ubisoft Quebec are going to be working together on a collaborative and much more cohesive vision for the series is one of those things, for instance- a large-scale live service isn't easy to main (Ubisoft's own The Division is evidence of that), but with the combined forces of the Montreal and Quebec studios behind it, Infinity would have a much better shot at getting things right. And Montreal and Quebec are, of course, the two biggest Assassin's Creed authorities. While Montreal was exclusively in charge of the series from its inception all the way up until Unity, since then, the two studios have been taking the lead on alternate entries, with Syndicate and Odyssey being developed by Quebec, and Origins and Valhalla by Montreal (while Rogue, of course, was made by Ubisoft Sofia). The prospect of these two studios co-leading the next big step forward for the series, then, sounds smart, at least on paper.

Meanwhile, the talent confirmed to be in leadership positions for this project is also top-notch. On the production side of things, the likes of Marc-Alexis Côté, Étienne Allonier, and Julien Laferrière have been named in leadership positions, and they've been involved with the series for a long time now. Meanwhile, Jonathan Dumont and Clint Hocking of Quebec and Montreal respectively have been named as the project's creative leads, and both have impressive track records. Dumont was world director on Assassin's Creed Syndicate and and then creative director on Odyssey, while Hocking has been creative director on games such as Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory and Watch Dogs: Legion.

Beyond that, however, things start getting either a little murky, or a little misguided- or, in some cases, both. For instance, it's true that fans have been asking for a more cohesive vision for the series for some time now, and Ubisoft has mentioned that as one of the reasons for this radical change. But most series fans would tell you that they're going about implementing a more cohesive vision in the wrong way. When series fans say they want more cohesion, they're talking about the larger, series-wide story, which, frankly, has been a mess and mostly directionless ever since Assassin's Creed 3 (even though it has started getting back on track starting with Origins). Almost no one wants a live service Assassin's Creed that's possibly an MMO-lite, for all practical purposes. Ubisoft are definitely doing the right thing by trying to give the series a more coherent long-term future, but they're not doing it the way they perhaps should.

The biggest problem with Assassin's Creed Infinity, however, is that it has the potential to exacerbate and double down on all of the worst, most exhausting tendencies of this series in recent years. Complaints about bloat, excessive open world grinding, and a deluge of cookie cutter content that almost feels procedural in nature have been growing louder and louder with each new entry in the series, but rather than cutting down on those aspects, Ubisoft's going with a model that is pretty much built on bloat, grinding, and repeatable content. It's virtually impossible to have a live service platform without stuff like that, at least if you want to retain players and increase engagement. Who knows, maybe Ubisoft will find a way to strike that balance- but somehow, I doubt it.

Meanwhile, as mentioned earlier, there's been no word yet on whether the game is going to be multiplayer, or whether it will be free-top-play- but if it is, what does that mean for Assassin's Creed? Because of its free-to-play, does that mean that it's going to grow more reliant on microtransactions, as any free-to-play game has to be? If it's multiplayer, does that mean the core sensibilities of the series are going to change? Assassin's Creed has always been an extremely narrative-driven series, so how would that even work in an ongoing live service, potentially multiplayer game? There is, of course, the possibility that multiplayer is just going to be an aspect of the experience, with multiplayer-centric quests like raids, or PvP like from the older Assassin's Creed games, or even co-op missions similar to what we saw in Unity. And all three of those, frankly, actually do sound exciting- but not if they become the primary focus of the experience. Multiplayer content like that will be great to have, but most importantly, Assassin's Creed needs to retain its single player narrative-driven identity… and a live service model seems to be at odds with that.

That said, it's still worth noting that for the last few years, the series has, for all practical purposes, followed a live service model. Odyssey and Valhalla especially are both live service games, with continued and prolonged post-launch support in the form of updates, seasonal content, new features and ways to play, free quests, and of course, the big paid expansions. And if that's the model that Ubisoft intends to keep on following for the series, only this time for a single platform that grows and evolves overtime- well, then that's great! That's honestly a sensible evolution for the series (assuming it doesn't shift focus away from single player content). But then again, we don't know if that's what Infinity is supposed to be.

assassins creed odyssey

I'm not writing Assassin's Creed Infinity off, because honestly, we don't know enough about it yet for it to be written off. What we do know so far doesn't sound very encouraging, and seems to be at odds with what the series should ideally be doing- but with the project so early in development and so far away, maybe Ubisoft does have a plan in place that will simultaneously protect the series' identity and move it forward into its next major era. It will definitely be interesting to see how The Division Heartland is structured and handled when it releases next year, because that might give us a pretty good idea of what to expect from Infinity. If Infinity is a hub that keeps on delivering the kind of narrative-driven single player Assassin's Creed experiences that one would expect to see from the series, and if on top of that it adds the sort of surprisingly good multiplayer content the series has been known to deliver in the past, then it might actually be worth keeping an eye on. But that's the ideal scenario, and several harsh lessons have taught us over the years that when it comes to the very idea of a "live service", the ideal scenario is also often the least likely scenario.

With Assassin's Creed Valhalla having been confirmed to receive support in 2022 as well and with Ubisoft Quebec and Montreal being fully focused on Infinity, it doesn't look like there's going to be another new Assassin's Creed game in the interim. There's a lot riding on it, then, and for the series' sake, and the sake of the millions of fans it has across the world, we really do hope that it turns out to be a good idea- even though right now it seems like it probably won't 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.

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt To Get DLC "Inspired By" Netflix Show

When it comes to CD Projekt RED, the overwhelming amount of talk about them over the last year or so has been Cyberpunk 2077 and its various issues. But one can't forget about the game that really helped elevate their brand with The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. The RPG was a massive hit, and helped to spawn a Netflix TV (though technically the games and show are all adaptations of the books series). The show has only helped to bolster an already popular franchise, and now it seems CDPR want to tip their hat back.

As we already know, the game is set to get native PS5 and Xbox Series X/S releases at some point this year. On the official Twitter, they revealed a revised cover art for the release. Along with that, they also revealed there will be free DLCs inspired by the Netflix show. If you're unaware, the show actually adapts two short stories that preceded the main Witcher novels that the games are both based on and sequels to. It's not specified what that DLC will be, or whether it will be next-gen only or also come to older copies of the game. Most likely, we'll know more closer to the next gen release.

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is available now on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Switch and PC. It will also come to PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S sometime this year, which you can read more details about through here. The Netflix adaptation, simply titled The Witcher, has its first season available now on the service, with a second season set to come out in December.

The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles Previews Five Cases With Short Trailers

The Ace Attorney series was an early example of the visual novel/adventure style breaking out in the west. Originally starting on the Gameboy Advance, the franchise would see multiple entries going all the way to the 3DS. However, not every region got every title, as a pair of prequel spin-off titles never saw release outside Japan. That changes this month with The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles, and Capcom wants to give you a quick look at some of the cases you'll be tackling. 

In a series of trailers, you can get an introduction to five different investigations you'll be tasked with cracking: The Case of the Visiting Professor, The Case of the Stricken Steamship, The Case of the Deathly Omnibus, The Case of the Pedestrian Knifing, and The Case of the Pawnbrokery Burglary. Each trailer is short and gives just a brief introduction to the known events and evidence. It's not a comprehensive list by any means, but will give you an idea of the tone and style to expect.

The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles is set to release on July 27th for PlayStation 4, Switch, and PC. You see some gameplay footage, including how courtroom cases play out, through here.