Wuchang: Fallen Feathers is a New Soulslike Action RPG Set in Imperial China
AAA game development is clearly on the rise in China, and various studios have made strong impressions with early showings of their upcoming games, from Beijing Joyfun's Faith of Danschant: Hereafter to, of course, Game Science's Black Myth: Wukong. Another developer has thrown its hat into the ring as well, with Leenzee Games announced Wuchang: Fallen Feathers.
Wuchang: Fallen Feathers is a Soulslike action RPG, which means you can expect similar, deliberately paced combat, boss fights, challenging encounters, progression, and more. It is set in imperial China, focusing on "the chaotic final years of the Ming Dynasty."
The game's announcement trailer is a meaty one at roughly eighteen minutes long, and shows quite a lot of gameplay, including various locations, supernatural enemies, and even a boss fight against a massive monster, so there's plenty to look at. Check it out below.
Wuchang: Fallen Feathers has been announced for PC and consoles, which will presumably include only PS5 and Xbox Series X/S, especially seeing as the developers are currently eyeing a 2024 launch.
Gran Turismo 7 Trailer Focuses on Porsche Cars
Gran Turismo 7 was one of several major upcoming first party games to take the stage at the PlayStation Showcase earlier this month, and with a new trailer and several subsequent updates, we've learned quite a bit about Polyphony Digital and Sony's upcoming racing sim. On top of that, we've now also got another brief new trailer to look at.
This 30-second teaser focuses entirely on Porsche and its roster of cars that will be available in Gran Turismo 7. New additions like the Porsche 917K and the 917 Living Legend are briefly show off, along with a number of Porsche cars that are returning from Gran Turismo Sport. Of course, we also get to see bits and pieces of gameplay footage to check out, so if you're looking forward to playing the game, you can view the trailer below.
Gran Turismo 7 launches on March 4, 2022 for PS5 and PS4. It's been confirmed that the game will feature cross-gen multiplayer across PS5 and PS4, but the vast majority of the game (including the single player campaign) will also require a persistent internet connection.
Quantic Dream Might be Working on a Star Wars Game – Rumour
The Star Wars license was exclusive to EA for a good while there, but Disney has been handing it out to several other developers across the industry in recent months, suggesting a different approach to developing Star Wars titles. If a new rumour is to be believed, it seems they've tapped up another studio to make a new game in the series- though the combination might surprise you.
Noted insider Tom Henderson's Twitter activity seems to be suggesting that French studio Quantic Dream, developer of the likes of Heavy Rain and Detroit: Become Human, is working on a Star Wars title. Henderson uploaded an image showing lightsabers superimposed over a scene from Detroit: Become Human. Shortly afterward, he liked a number of replies asking if a Quantic Dream Star Wars title was what he was hinting at- including one that directly mentioned the pattern of his liked tweets, and one that specifically asked him to like the tweet if Quantic Dream is indeed working on a Star Wars game.
Of course, this is by no means an official confirmation- it's not exactly crystal clear even as leaks go. If it is accurate though, Quantic Dream and Star Wars would be a curious combination, and it would be interesting to see if the hypothetical game would be similar in style and gameplay to the studio's previous works or take on an entirely new approach.
Quantic Dream has, of course, had an eventful few years, first having gone multiplatform following the launch of Detroit: Become Human, and then taking their first steps forward into self-publishing plans. More importantly, the studio has been under fire for a long time now, owing to allegations of major issues at their workplace, which even led to a lawsuit.
Meanwhile, regardless of whether or not this game is real, Star Wars fans have plenty else to look forward to between Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic – Remake, Ubisoft Massive's open world Star Wars game, and that inevitable sequel to Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order, whenever that comes out (or even announced).
— Tom Henderson (@_Tom_Henderson_) September 18, 2021
God of War: Ragnarok Will Have Various Shields with "Different Defensive Options and Abilities"
Several gameplay and story details on God of War: Ragnarok have emerged in the days since Sony finally formally unveiled it, and one aspect of the game that we've learned plenty of interesting things about is the combat. Director Eric Williams has spoken plenty about how Ragnarok will put a much greater emphasis on player expressiveness and choice through more options in both combat and progression, and something else that that will trickle down into is specific kinds of gear.
Speaking in a recent interview with Jon Ford (which you can view below), when asked about the different kinds of shields we saw Kratos using in the trailer, Williams confirmed that there will indeed be various shields in God of War: Ragnarok, each with their own defensive attributes and properties, before adding that enemies and combat encounters will be designed in a way where players will be encouraged to experiment with different kinds of gear and abilities in certain situations.
"I don't want to go too deep on it, but yes, there are different shields, and they have different defensive options and abilities," Williams said. "The reason we're doing this is we really want to open up expressive choice to the way that you build your Kratos, like the equipment and loadout and things like that. So all the way down to the defense, you can kind of play a little differently. And then the enemies know how to respond to that, or force you into these different situations where you need to use different things. So I think it will be fun for players to explore that. But also, we wanted it to be more expressive, where your choices matter when you set them up."
In another recent interview, Williams also confirmed that the combat in God of War: Ragnarok will bring back several mechanics and combos from the series' Greek era games that Santa Monica Studio wasn't able to implement in the 2018 title. Read more on that through here.
God of War: Ragnarok is out in 2022 for PS5 and PS4.
Call of Duty: Vanguard Open Beta Has Been Extended Until September 22
EA may have delayed Battlefield 2042's launch by a month, but it looks like Call of Duty: Vanguard is still on track to launch on time. Ahead of its release, the shooter's open beta recently went live a couple of days ago. The original plan was for the beta to last through the weekend, until today, September 20- but it seems Activision has slightly altered that schedule.
Taking to Twitter via the series' official page, Activision confirmed that the open beta for Call of Duty: Vanguard has been extended and will now run an additional two days. If you didn't get a chance to jump in over the weekend, you now have until September 22, 10 AM PT to dive in and try out the game. There's a healthy number of maps and modes to check out, too.
As for the full game itself, Call of Duty: Vanguard launches on November 5 for PS5, Xbox Series X/S, PS4, Xbox One, and PC.
🚨BREAKING🚨: The #Vanguard OPEN BETA has been extended until Wednesday Sept 22 at 10am PT.
For those that haven't had a chance to enter the fray, this is your moment 🎖 pic.twitter.com/dLShw7qUQb
— Call of Duty (@CallofDuty) September 18, 2021
Final Fantasy 14: Endwalker's Meaty New Trailer Details Various Job Changes and Improvements
Final Fantasy 14 has an excellent track record when it comes to expansions, with each new major addition to the game bringing with its tons of new gameplay and story content to keep players busy for dozens more hours, if not hundreds. The upcoming Endwalker expansion is looking like it's going to be the biggest of them all, and in a meaty new video, Square Enix explains some of the biggest changes being made to the various Jobs in the game.
The video is over eighteen minutes long, and goes over a number of Jobs, including White Mage, Black Mage, Dragoon, Paladin, Bard, Dancer, Machinist, the new Reaper class, and many more. One of the biggest changes being made is to the Summoner class, which will now actually involve summoning Primals, bringing it significantly closer to what players have wanted from that Job for so long. Get the full details for all the Jobs below.
Final Fantasy 14: Endwalker launches for PS5, PS4, and PC on November 23. Check out its PC requirements through here.
Shin Megami Tensei 5 and Final Fantasy 16 Top Famitsu Most Wanted Charts Again
Last week's Famitsu charts for the most highly anticipated upcoming games saw some interesting changes in the top positions, with Shin Megami Tensei 5 taking the top spot and Final Fantasy 16 coming in at second place. In this week's charts, that continues to be the case, but just as it was last week, the two are separated by very few votes.
Beyond the those two, most of the top 10 is dominated by upcoming Switch games. Super Robot Wars 30's PS4 version takes sixth place (with its Switch version coming in at No. 9), and the only other non-Switch game in the top 10 is The Legend of Heroes: Kuru no Kiseki at No. 8.
Most of the other games in the top 10 are familiar names in these charts. Bayonetta 3 has jumped up to No. 3, while The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild 2 remains at fourth place, as does Metroid Dread at No. 10, and Splatoon 3 at No. 7. Pokemon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl, meanwhile, climb up to No. 5.
You can check out the full top 10 below. All votes were cast by Famitsu readers between August 26 and September 1.
1. [NSW] Shin Megami Tensei 5 – 700 votes
2. [PS5] Final Fantasy 16 – 675 votes
3. [NSW] Bayonetta 3 – 488 votes
4. [NSW] The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild 2 – 454 votes
5. [NSW] Pokemon Brilliant Diamond/Shining Pearl – 387 votes
6. [PS4] Super Robot Wars 30 – 315 votes
7. [NSW] Splatoon 3 – 297 votes
8. [PS4] The Legend of Heroes: Kuro no Kiseki – 272 votes
9. [NSW] Super Robot Wars 30 – 263 votes
10. [NSW] Metroid Dread – 262 votes
[Via Nintendo Everything]
God of War: Ragnarok – 9 More Things We've Learned About It
Sony and SIE Santa Monica Studio have been more generous with details on God of War: Ragnarok than most people would have anticipated. Thanks to a meaty reveal trailer and subsequent interviews and updates, we know quite a bit more about the game's story and gameplay than we'd have expected to know a year out from its launch. We recently spoke about some of the most crucial of those details in a recent feature, but plenty more information has emerged since then that we'll be going over here.
WHY IT WILL CONCLUDE THE NORSE SAGA
God of War: Ragnarok being the final game in the series' Norse saga has taken many people by surprise, but though most believed that we'd be getting at least a trilogy of Norse games, Santa Monica Studio is confident that it can wrap things up in just two games. And as it turns out, that was a decision made by none other than God of War (2018) director Cory Barlog, who's been replaced as director by Eric Williams for Ragnarok. Speaking in a recent interview with YouTuber Kaptain Kuba, Barlog explained that the primary reason for wanting to wrap up the story in two games was that developing an entire trilogy would have taken close to fifteen years, at which point the story, according to him, would have become "too stretched out." Barlog says that with that in mind, and given the story that Santa Monica Studio wanted to tell in Ragnarok, he was confident that they would be able to wrap things up by the time the credits rolled on the second game.
FIMBULWINTER
Ragnarok is, of course, the big event that the game is going to lead up to (it's in the name, after all), but before Ragnarok, there must be Fimbulwinter. As God of War: Ragnarok kicks off, we'll see all nine reals being affected by Fimbulwinter in different ways. Speaking in an interview with IGN, director Eric Williams said that you shouldn't expect every realm to be blanketed in snow and ice. That said, Midgard, as the epicenter of Fimbulwinter, got affected by "permafrost," as Williams calls it, which we saw quite a lot of in the game's reveal trailer as well, including the completely frozen Lake of Nine.
CAMERA
God of War (2018) did a lot of bold and interesting new things, and one of its many experiments that paid off was its camera. On top of dropping the series' traditional semi-fixed cameras and instead taking a zoomed-in over-the-shoulder third person view, God of War (2018) was also a single uninterrupted camera shot from start to finish. An impressive achievement, if nothing else. Unsurprisingly, it's been confirmed that God of War: Ragnarok, too, will be a single camera shot from beginning to end without any cuts or interruptions.
PLAYER EXPRESSIVENESS
God of War: Ragnarok is building off of an excellent foundation in the combat department as it is, and it looks like Santa Monica Studio has the right ideas for how to improve things even further in the sequel. One thing that Ragnarok's combat is apparently going to emphasize quite a bit is player choice. Speaking to IGN, Williams said that one of the primary goals of the development team has been to give players various tools to deal with enemies, from gear upgrades to various attacks and combos to more link-ups with Atreus and more. Meanwhile, with players having a wider range of offensive options, enemies, too, will be more defensively and offensively capable themselves, which means players should (in theory, at least) be encouraged to properly leverage their full arsenal.
VERTICALITY
This is another area where God of War: Ragnarok is improving upon its predecessor's combat- by incorporating level design into combat encounters themselves. As we saw in the reveal trailer, Kratos will be able to use his Blades of Chaos as a grapple hook to pull himself up to higher ledges, calling back to grappling from older God of War games. This, as per Williams, is baked into the combat as well, with encounters being more vertical and players being encouraged to make proper use of the space around them. Of course, enemies, too, will be able to use this verticality to their advantage, which should make for some interesting encounters.
MORE COMBAT DETAILS
The Blades of Chaos making their grand comeback halfway through God of War (2018) was a moment that those who's played the game aren't likely to forget anytime soon- but the Blades were very much that game's secondary weapon. Ragnarok isn't going to sideline the Leviathan Axe, of course, but it looks like Santa Monica Studio is going to take advantage of the fact that the Blades of Chaos are going to be usable in the entire game, right off the bat. And that're doing it in a way that is sure to please series veterans, by bringing back a lot of moves and combos from the older God of War games. We've already seen a few of these in the reveal trailer, like Kratos using the Blades to grab an enemy in the air and slam it into the ground, or using them to pull himself forward and ram into an enemy, or even the grapple. In the aforementioned interview with Kaptain Kuba, Williams said that combat with the Blades of Chaos in God of War: Ragnarok will bring back "the greatest hits of things [they] didn't get to" in the previous game.
VALKYRIES
The Valkyries may not have been a critical part of the main story in God of War (2018), but they most definitely were a critical part of that experience as a whole, and were some of the most challenging, grueling, and entertaining boss fights in that entire game. We don't know in what capacity we'll be seeing the Valkyries in God of War: Ragnarok, but we do know that they will be returning- and better still, that there will be two entirely new Valkyries. Actors Erica Lindbeck and Evanne Elizabeth Friedman have confirmed that they'll be playing Hrist and Gna in the game, but it remains to be seen how prominently they'll be featured in the game.
EINHERJAR
Kratos and Atreus are going to be taking on the Norse pantheon in their attempts to stop Ragnarok, which means that they're going to be squaring off against Odin himself- who, of course, will use every tool he has at his disposal. That includes the Einherjar, who are deceased Norse heroes and warriors who were delivered by the Valkyries to Valhalla upon death, so that they could fight for Odin when Ragnarok comes. It's more than a little likely that Kratos and Atreus will be squaring off against a few of these great warriors. Various actors, including Laura Stahl, Anna Brisbin, and Aaron Phillips, have confirmed that they're playing Einherjar in the game.
MUSIC
Music has always been one of God of War's strong suits, even going back to the PS2 days. And just as God of War (2018) reinvented its gameplay while still feeling like a proper God of War experience, so, too, did it wipe the slate clean with its music, thanks to an excellent soundtrack composed by Bear McCreary that was completely new and fresh, and yet still felt like God of War. In Ragnarok, McCreary has confirmed that he will be returning as composer, much to the delight of series fans.
ELEX 2's Story Trailer Teases Impending Disaster
Over the last several years, we've seen a revival of sorts, at least within the mainstream, of a certain type of RPG. Thanks to games like The Witcher 3 and other smaller scale hits like GreedFall, the more western styled RPG has gotten a new wind. One of those games was 2016's ELEX, a hybrid fantasy and sci-fi game. The sequel was announced not too long ago, and now we get an idea of what this new story will be about.
A new trailer, which you can see below, was released that highlighted the game's narrative. Here the protagonist, Jax, is going around trying to warn the various factions of the game about an impending threat. He's largely met with resistance in the form of dismissal and hostility. We get to see a host of characters and locales you'll interact with, as well as the dark threat that looms over the world.
ELEX 2 has been announced for PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One and PC. As of now, no date or timeframe has been announced. You can check out an interview we did with the game's Creative Director about the title through here.
Destroy All Humans! 2 Remake Confirmed At THQ Nordic 2021 Digital Showcase
THQ Nordic has finally lifted the curtain on its upcoming Destroy All Humans! 2 – Reprobed remake during its digital showcase today. Check out the video below for more details.
Destroy All Humans! 2 – Reprobed is of course, the second part of this popular franchise. This remake – much like the original – is a complete reimagining of the original with a brand-new graphics engine and revamped gameplay mechanics. The remake will also include couch co-op like the original.
Considering how big of a success the remake for the first game was, it's no surprise that THQ Nordic would want to continue giving the same treatment to other entries of the franchise. This announcement, however – isn't a surprise, given that the reveal was accidentally leaked yesterday by PlayStation. Details on the release date are scant for now, but THQ Nordic has confirmed PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Pc, Xbox Series X, and Xbox Series S as release platforms for the game.