Big IPs

Superheroes of all fits are jumping into the fray by billing new video game titles.

The countdown begins for a Dragon Ball: Sparking! ZERO, the first entry in the Budokai Tenkaichi fighting game series for almost two decades.

Unsurprisingly, the next Call of Duty is on its way with Black Ops 6, but more surprisingly, a new Indiana Jones game has been revealed. Meanwhile, people are still worming their way along for Dune.

Marvel Rivals confirms a release date for near the end of the year, but more significantly, confirms that all heroes will be free to play upon launch.

More has been shown on the Mercenary companions that will be in Diablo IV’s “Vessel of Hatred” expansion.

There will also be a new entry to the Batman: Arkham series of games—but alas, exclusively for the Meta Quest 3.

Big Returns

A new Sid Meier’s Civilization boasts new major changes such as a variety of more combinations players can explore and a mechanic to the gameplay that now divides up the development of a world into three different Ages.

Street Fighter 6 and Fatal Fury are throwing some punches with more content, dropping gameplay trailers for Terry and Mai Shiranui respectively.

Capcom had even more to show off with additional footage for Monster Hunter Wilds.

After long anticipation since the first game, a sequel to Kingdom Come: Deliverance has also been revealed.

Little Nightmares 3 will be a new standalone sequel to the original series, the first entry without the original developer’s involvement, Tarsier Studios, and instead entirely developed by Supermassive Games.

A new Dying Light game will also serve as a standalone sequel against the original series.

One of the last reveals of opening night was the highly anticipated sequel to the Mafia, now revealed to officially be Mafia: The Old Country, taking place in 1900s Sicily.

And yet while the Borderlands movie has been spectacularly bombing, much to our chagrin, there is going to be another Borderlands game.

And Some New Faces

An interesting slew of various new original projects have also been welcomed into the mix of announcements, such as We Harvest Shadows, a strange hybrid between farming simulator and horror.

While Tarsier Studios is hands-off with Little Nightmares 3, they have moved on to announced a new game of similar cut with Reanimal, a horror co-op.

Science fiction and tech have been a recurring genre across these slate of games:

ARC Raiders is marketing itself as a new, PvPvE action survival shooter set in a future, ravaged Earth, while Revenge of the Savage Planet brings in a more cartoonish, tongue-in-cheek perspective while you travel your way across aliens world. A.I.L.A. a first person horror game, will be unmistakably tapping into today’s fears around AI.

Although aligning itself with the The Dark Pictures anthology, Directive 8020 will be attempting to explore another multi-linear tale within science fiction horror.

On anthologies—a new animated anthology series called Secret Level, created by Love, Death & Robots showrunner Tim Miller, will be exploring stories based on video games. Several IPs, teased in the trailer included The Outer Worlds, SIFU, and Mega Man.

While Sims fans still eagerly wait for further updates on Electronic Arts’ next big title, inZoi is a new character creation and life simulation game.

Although also emerging from already existing games series—albeit relatively niche—The First Berserker: Khazan will be a new action roleplaying game set in the Dungeon & Fighter universe.

On the more saccharine side of things, Infinity Nikki will be the first foray of Nikki, the dress-up, roleplaying mobile game franchise into a fully 3D rendered, open world setting.

And finally, Peter Molyneux still has more to say, attempting to bring back players to the world of Fable with Masters of Albion.

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“These have been tough decisions and we have not made them lightly, nor are they a reflection on these development teams – we are incredibly fortunate to have the talent, creativity and commitment of the people at these studios.”

Neither decision was made easily, according to the statement, and it really is a shame to see two studios disappear so quickly. However, Lionhead, despite the incredible pedigree, hasn’t made a new game since Fable: The Journey, an on-the-rails game using the Kinect. Lionhead last made something outside of the Fable franchise in 2006, painting themselves in an unenviable creative corner.

As a side note, it’s also sad to see Fable Legends just disappear. I had been in the alpha for a bit and I was actually enjoying the game. It was a good, modern, take on the franchise and with some design tweaks could have done really well. And now it won’t see the light of day.

We hope everyone at Lionhead and Press Play lands on their feet soon.

The post Microsoft Cancels Fable Legends, Considering Closing Lionhead appeared first on Gamesline.

Here’s Peter’s real tweet about it all:

Ahh my account has been hacked, ( you can tell cos they know how to spell) I am not retiring, not closing godus

— peter molyneux (@pmolyneux) January 28, 2016

Original Story: In a series of tweets the long time developer and visionary, albeit sometimes a bit out of focus, Peter Molyneux announced that Godus would be taken down from Steam immediately and he would be retiring from the games industry.

Godus will be taken down from the Steam Store with immediate effect, thank you to all those involved. 1/2 pic.twitter.com/RbUUOuLCGf

— peter molyneux (@pmolyneux) January 28, 2016

This is also the time I would like to announce my retirement from the games industry. It has been a long journey for me. Thank you. 2/2

— peter molyneux (@pmolyneux) January 28, 2016

Molyneux was somewhat divisive throughout his career, known for creating a lot of buzz and expectations for his games but often times never delivering on those promises. While he should be known for helping to foster and create the “god game” genre with classic games like Populous and Black & White, he’s more recently known for failures like Godus. You may remember Godus for it’s many delays, developmental hardships, and it’s promise to give a contest winner unique powers within the game. Very little of that promise ever became reality.

No matter though, to me Molyneux will always be a behemoth of a designer. He had grand visions and looked at games for what they could be, not iterations on what they already are. We wish him luck in his future.

The post Peter Molyneux (Not) Retiring UPDATE appeared first on Gamesline.

Peter Molyneux isn’t having a good week. Godus, his kickstarted god game, has been receiving more and more anger and ire as 2014 closed and 2015 opened. Then, early this week, he announced his team at 22cans will be moving onto a new game, The Trial, before Godus gets a full release. Much of what was promised for Godus hasn’t been developed. The game’s promised timeline for 2014 included key functionality like the ‘Hubworld’, which would enable multiplayer. This would open up the game to possibilities that only Molyneux seemed to fully understand and was, as usual, entirely passionate about. With Godus placed on the backburner it’s no wonder so many would be so angry. While Molyneux still says the Kickstarter goals are achievable his past promises and timelines haven’t been honest with some of the realities of game development and are making the legendary game designer look very bad. 22cans appears to be in poor shape with rumors about email addresses no longer reachable by the press and the 22cans forums completely taken down. To move onto something else while the promises of a public funded game may be the best business decision, it’s a hard pill for so many to swallow. It doesn’t stop there for Molyneux though.

Eurogamer recently sat down to interview the winner of Molyneux’s last game, Curiosity. You may remember the tiny craze created by such a simple game, popular mainly over it’s prize. Molyneux claimed whoever was the player who broke the last block of a giant cube would win a prize, which turned out to be the opportunity to become a god in his next game. That winner was a then 18 year old Scot Henderson and the game he would rule over was supposed to be Godus. The interview with Scot revealed a trip he went on to visit 22cans, where he played an early version of Godus, and was briefed about his role as a god in a video game. The opportunity seemed like a decent one, where Scot could make some money and have a unique role in a unique video game. Scot then returned home from his trip to 22cans and communication with the company started to dry up only months later. The frequency of emails and updates lessened and Scot started getting no replies to his inquiries. The god of Godus couldn’t get an answer of the games own developer.

Molyneux was upset in the same Eurogamer piece hearing about now 21 year old Scot’s experience. And really it seems Molyneux is disappointed in a lot of things this past week. Once again, though, his week wasn’t over. Rock, Paper, Shotgun called and interviewed Molyneux and published the transcript directly onto their site. The first question? “Do you think that you’re a pathological liar?”. From there the interview isn’t a pretty one. The interview almost comes across as an argument rather than a question and answer session.

Molynuex is his own hype man. In an industry where PR representatives and marketing arms of publishers often steer the stream of discussion for upcoming video games, Molyneux stands up for his games. Does Molyneux often promise more than he can deliver? Absolutely. But don’t other games? We have mistaken passion and pride for intentional deception. I don’t think Molyneux should be allowed to get away making promise after promise and never keeping them, but I don’t believe he should be the fall guy for an industry that keeps breaking its promises.

The post Your Week Went Better Than Peter Molyneux’s appeared first on Gamesline.