It’s highly likely that at some point in the past year, you’ve watched someone stream on Twitch, Facebook Gaming, or one of the other lesser-known personal streaming websites. Perhaps you’ve finally found your calling or gained a little more insight into what exactly the kids these days are doing on their computers all day. Either way, COGconnected has got you covered with suggestions for yourself or the streamer in your life.

Elgato Stream Deck

Being able to control your stream on the fly is super important, and the Elgato Stream Deck simplifies that as much as possible. It comes in three different sizes depending on how many buttons you think you need, and each of those buttons can actually be turned into a folder where you can effectively have more buttons. Its software is also integrated with a ton of different services you’re likely to use while streaming, and can actually be used when not streaming as well to open up specific programs or adjust speaker volume. But you’ll definitely feel the value most when adjusting OBS without having to pause your game or lose momentum while live.

Torch Mic

If you want a microphone with that sweet RGB aesthetic that doesn’t break the bank, the Roccat Torch Mic will serve you well. As mentioned in our review, it requires zero set up so you can just plug it in and start gabbing away. It comes with three different settings for cardioid, ASMR, and a special quiet mode for those late-night streamers with roommates. Be sure to check out our full review for more details!

Elgato Ring Light

Box lights can be challenging to set up if you don’t have a ton of space in your streaming room, and unless you have specific lightbulbs they’ll probably also hurt your eyes pretty quickly. Grab yourself an Elgato Ring Light and clamp it onto your desk wherever you’d like to make your life way easier. It requires a specific Elgato app to work (not sure why they haven’t centralized all of them yet) in which you can adjust brightness and warmth settings to get the light that’s right for your camera without burning your eyes. It’s a little pricey, but honestly a worthwhile investment.

Xbox Game Pass

Aside from being the best deal in gaming, Game Pass’s library is super useful for streamers. The affordable subscription service comes with over a hundred games including all of Xbox’s first-party exclusives (like the Halo, Forza, and Gears of War franchises), and new releases under that banner are included the day they launch. It also comes with a bevy of noteworthy third-party titles like Marvel’s Avengers, Scarlet Nexus, Resident Evil: Biohazard, as well as the Yakuza franchise to name a few. It also gives access to EA’s own subscription service EA Play, so you can jump into all the sports games you could ever need along with the Dead Space and Mass Effect franchises. It’s available for PC and Xbox separately, but you can also get Game Pass Ultimate which grants access to service on both platforms, as well as the Cloud streaming service which allows you to play games on your mobile devices. It’s perfect for streamers who don’t feel the need to be playing every single new game that drops, but you’ll still get a ton of those included.

Logitech C922 HD Pro

Webcams are not mandatory in the world of streaming, but they definitely help with engagement and showing your audience who you really are. Since most streaming software can’t handle anything higher than 1080p anyways, most streaming webcams are relatively affordable. The Logitech C922 HD Pro is the best of both worlds with an easy price point of $99 USD and full 1080p resolution. The only catch would be the Logitech software that you use with it needs to be updated regularly, but it does offer a lot of versatility in its exposure and zoom settings so you can make it look just the way you want. Coupled with the aforementioned Elgato Ring Light, you’ll look like a pro even if you’re just starting out.

Be sure to read through to page 2 to find 5 more must-have items for every streamer!

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In the interest of full transparency, I do not know a whole lot about audio. It can be a bit of an intimidating subject with its megahertz and other varying levels of hertz. But in the modern-day, a microphone has become an essential part of the home workspace and not everyone wants to put a whole lot of research or money into buying one. Enter the budget microphone – where value and quality do the best they can with their arranged marriage.

The gaming space is no stranger to budget microphones as streamers just starting out have been using the most cost-effective route into the scene as possible. In fact, the first microphone I used for recording my let’s play channel was an Xbox Live headset microphone jammed into a beer can. That’s a real thing that happened before my cousin gave me his old Blue Yeti Snowball. The market has seen an explosion of budget-friendly microphones over the past several years from across the industry, and this past August, German manufacturer Roccat decided to toss its efforts into the fray.

The results are a pleasantly solid microphone with a ton of style to boot. RGB lighting has become a fixture in streaming and gaming setups over the past few years, and the Roccat Torch’s design capitalizes on that without being obnoxious. Using Roccat’s synchronous AIMO smart lighting, the Torch sports slick bars of light on either side of the microphone, and the brand logo in the center of it lights up as well. The light bars will also adjust to how high you’ve set the gain on the mixer pad, which is a nice little detail.

Turn It Up to 11

Speaking of which, the mixer does look a little clunky at first but also adds a bit of a premium feel that makes me think I know what I’m doing when I touch it. In addition to the gain slider, there’s a dial in the center you can use to adjust the volume of your computer and another on the left-hand side that lets you choose what pick-up pattern you’d like to use. It comes with the ever-standard Cardioid for podcasts and streaming, as well as Stereo for musicians and ASMR fans (although if you’re super into that kind of thing, you should probably have a dedicated, specialized microphone for it).

But one thing that makes the Torch unique is the exclusive Whisper pattern that amplifies quieter audio for those who like to stream late at night. I found its efficiency to vary and never really nailed the right volume I should be speaking at to make sure it picked up my full sentences but sure did enjoy using it to do the entire “Rabbit Season/Duck Season” bit from Looney Tunes to try and figure it out. Even if it’s not perfect, the option alone is super handy and will likely be used by tons of people who pick it up.

Another one of the Torch’s exclusive features (and my personal favorite) is the contactless quick-mute. Simply wave your hand over the top of the mic like a Jedi to mute it, and again to go live. It feels way more fun than muting anything ever should, and I’m curious to see if Roccat uses this tech in any of their other gaming accessories moving forward. There’s also a little slider on the back of the mixer that allows you to adjust the feature’s detection distance.

In addition to all the shiny bells and whistles, the Torch doesn’t require any additional software or drivers to do what you need it to right out of the box. There is the Roccat Neon program that simply allows you to either enable or disable the AIMO lighting but it’s enabled right out of the box, and if you’re going to disable it, why even bother? Still, it would have been nice to have some extra features like audio adjustments or filters available. That being said, it may be worth mentioning for any Turtle Beach owners that the Torch is compatible with AudioHub.

Verdict

I genuinely feel confident in recommending Roccat’s Torch microphone, especially for starting streamers looking for a nice RGB compliment to their setup and the nocturnal. Though the Whisper option might need some tweaking through future updates, the Cardioid option that will be used far more often sounds great to my uneducated ears. The simplicity of the setup, exclusive features, audio quality, and sleek design make it worth the $99.99 price tag. Said cost is made even more affordable in ShopPay’s partnership with Affirm to offer it for interest-free bi-weekly payments of $24.99 directly through Roccat’s website.

Thank you for keeping it locked on COGconnected.

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The post ROCCAT Torch Mic is Slick, Affordable and Sounds Fantastic appeared first on COGconnected.

Maybe I should drop the competitive conjecture, but at the end of every year’s festivities fans and journalists will often decide which of the marketing blitz’s participants “won.” In reality, gamers did, because there was something for just about everyone this year. But if success is measured in hype and value provided to platform owners, Xbox murdered and buried the competition on Sunday with corporate gangster-level ruthlessness.

It’s worth pointing out that with Sony absent from E3 yet again the bar was not as high as it had been in previous years. Especially given the state of the other presentations at this year’s E3. Ubisoft went through the motions of their annual milking of the Tom Clancy brand and promised additional content for last year’s Assassin’s Creed (a game widely criticized for its bloated amount of content). Square Enix reminded everyone that they still don’t understand the online video presentation format with poor pacing, dragging out an otherwise interesting demo of their new Guardians of the Galaxy game and squishing the rest of their titles into the remaining time. It’s also worth pointing out that they showed the most meme-able trailer of the entire show with Final Fantasy Origin’s incredibly cringey “Chaos Killing Eminem” (which breaks my heart personally because I was looking forward to this the most out of everything rumored to be shown).

There was also Gearbox’s entirely forgettable presentation that, within the first few minutes of watching Randy Pitchford awkwardly bumble around the set of the Borderlands film while revealing nothing interesting, felt like a form of self-flagellation to watch. On the bright side, Devolver Digital’s consistently bonkers and entertaining presentation riffed on subscription services and NFTs while descending into its signature absurdist humor and showing off some pretty neat-looking titles along the way. Seriously, if Xbox hadn’t murdered it so hard this year, I would be deeming Devolver the winner right now.

Of course, I can’t overlook Nintendo’s great showing. They did a lot of things right like announcing a new side-scrolling Metroid game, a brand new Shin Megami Tensei, and showing off some gameplay from the upcoming sequel to Breath of the Wild. As much as I like to give credit where it’s due, I also lament correctly predicting that the new Zelda game would be “targeting 2022” for release, as that makes it sound an awful lot like the game is even further away than we thought. It’s also great to see new WarioWare and Mario Party games on the way, as well as a remake of the Advance Wars games – Nintendo fans, have been clamoring for all of those for quite a while, so it’s nice to see them finally take up these easy wins. But it was disappointing to not hear about 2021’s Worst Kept Secret in Gaming – the reported new Switch with 4K output. Bayonetta 3, Splatoon 3, and Pokémon Legends Arceus all should have made an appearance as well but were entirely MIA. It also would have been a perfect time to announce DLC for New Pokémon Snap, but I guess I’ll just eat my words on that one (as soon as I get my printer working!). I personally won’t play a lot of games that were shown during Nintendo’s presentation, but it’s undeniable that they generated hype and provided value to platform owners, as you can see from the fans frothing at the mouth all over the internet. Though, there is still an underlying sense of disappointment due to the lack of new hardware news.

The Future Looks Real Good

Xbox, however, brought the ruckus in every way they needed to. PC and Xbox console owners can’t help but feel overwhelmed right now with the number of titles coming to Game Pass over the next few months and set to come in 2022. Hell, even during the presentation Xbox was pouring titles onto the service, including several Bethesda titles and last November’s Yakuza: Like A Dragon. Shiny new updates for Xbox’s successful live service games Grounded and Sea of Thieves (a personal favorite) were also announced, including a full-blown crossover for the latter with Disney’s Pirates of the Caribbean. Release dates for new games coming to Game Pass were announced consistently as well, including The Ascent at the end of July, 12 Minutes and Psychonauts 2 in August, and Sable in September, just to name a few.

But in addition to all of that, Xbox did exactly what they needed to do during this year’s presentation – give fans an update on Halo, flex their recent acquisition of Bethesda, and finally put a bullet in the “Xbox has no exclusives” rhetoric.

The Mission’s Changed

Halo Infinite finally looks as awesome as it should. With a short emotional story trailer shedding some light on the plot of the game and a closer look at the nostalgia-infused free-to-play multiplayer, it looks like longtime fans have a lot to look forward to. I’ll admit the non-committal “Holiday 2021” release window does give me some anxiety, but I have a hard time believing Xbox would miss two holiday seasons in a row with this game (but as we saw earlier I have been wrong before and likely will be again).

Xbox started off the whole show with Bethesda’s Starfield, which is honestly for the best because I bet nobody can actually tell me what the fuck that game is about aside from “space.” This is fine for Xbox’s marketing team for now – especially since they got to confirm that it’s an Xbox console and PC exclusive during their presentation. It’s clearly more than enough for fans as well, seeing as the internet has been abuzz with Starfield rumors for the past couple of months. But the real Bethesda flex on Sunday was Arkane’s Redfall, announced with a cinematic trailer at the end of the show. Also an Xbox/PC exclusive, Redfall is set to be a narrative-driven vampire hunting FPS you can play solo or with friends. Despite the trailer being purely cinematic, the folks at Arkane are masters of their craft and it’s easy to trust that this game will be one of Xbox’s best when it does launch. Plus, if the writing in the full game is as fun as the character banter in the trailer, it’ll likely end up on a lot of 2022’s Game of the Year lists. Plus, all of this helps tackle the aforementioned “no exclusives” argument.

On top of all that, Xbox continued to show off some interesting games including retro-side-scroller Replaced, a heist game called Contraband from Just Cause developer Avalanche Games, and a new trailer for the BioShock-esque Atomic Heart. Oh, plus the winner of the E3 Awards Most Anticipated Game of the Show, Forza Horizon 5. A new Forza Horizon wasn’t a huge surprise, but it was a welcome addition that looks to round out Xbox’s holiday release calendar. It’s set in Mexico and looks absolutely stunning. During the reveal, the developers from Playground Games explained some of the tech they used to bring the skies, terrain, and street art of real-world Mexico into Forza Horizon 5 and it honestly sounded like some of the most impressive technology ever used in game development.

Overall, Xbox did every single thing they needed to do to generate hype and provide value to people who have invested in the Xbox ecosystem – especially Game Pass. Exclusives, third-party titles, indies, DLCs, release dates, a wide spectrum of genres, and presentations for every type of gamer – in this one show alone there really was something for everyone. And if you do have a Game Pass subscription, and it’s pretty likely you do if you own an Xbox or PC, just about every game shown is being dropped onto the service on day one. As someone who does own a PS5, a Switch, a Series X, and a gaming PC, it’s looking an awful lot like the vast majority of my gaming time will be spent on the latter two platforms.

Oh! I just remembered Ubisoft also revealed their Avatar game. Should be a game, for sure.

Do you agree or disagree that Xbox “won” this year’s E3? What else would you have liked to see? Can you explain what Starfield is about? Let us know in the comments!

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The post Xbox Won E3 2021, and It Wasn’t Close appeared first on COGconnected.

Over twenty-two years after the release of the original Pokemon Snap, a sequel has finally been released, and the overall reception has been very positive. The aptly titled ‘New Pokemon Snap’ has several times more content than its predecessor, including some post-credit twists that breathe some fresh air into the game’s already diverse stages. But in the age of hundred-hour RPGs with free post-launch content and live-service games that never end, will it be enough to sate the appetites of fans of the most profitable franchise on the planet? And if it’s not, is Nintendo up to the task given their spotty-at-best record with post-launch support?

I should probably get one important point out of the way: New Pokemon Snap was developed by Bandai Namco, not a first-party Nintendo studio. Bandai Namco’s success with Pokken Tournament won them the opportunity to work on another Pokemon project, and they chose to revive Pokemon Snap. Pokken Tournament was originally released on the Wii U before being brought to arcades with additional fighters and was then ported to the Switch as Pokken Tournament DX. The DX version included the fighters from the arcade version and received a small DLC pack a few months after release but didn’t receive a notable amount of support beyond that.

Earlier this year, producer Katsuhiro Harada responded to a fan on Twitter asking about a sequel to the Pokemon fighting game, saying that he personally would love to make one. Still, the decision is ultimately up to Nintendo and The Pokemon Company. It’s likely safe to assume that this would be the case for any decisions regarding future Pokemon Snap content as well, of which there has been no word or mention of from Nintendo or Bandai Namco so far.

But that doesn’t mean you need to worry that there won’t be more Snap just yet. With few exceptions, Nintendo hasn’t really leaned into the trend of announcing additional content for a game before it’s released, especially when it comes to second-party titles. A perfect example would be November’s Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity, the Zelda musuo game developed by Omega Force and published by Koei Tecmo with Nintendo. It reviewed well enough and sold even better, shipping over 3.5 million copies by the end of 2020. Still, additional content by way of an expansion pass wasn’t revealed until February 2021.

The first wave of content from the pass drops in June, with the second wave coming in November, essentially a whole year after the game’s release. Similarly, Luigi’s Mansion 3, developed by Next Level Games, received a DLC announcement well over a month after its Halloween 2019 release. The first set of playable content was released in March of 2020. Given this pattern with second-party releases, we can likely expect some additional content for New Pokemon Snap to be announced during Nintendo’s E3 Direct (this is just personal speculation).

Who’s That Pokemon?!

In fact, the day before the game’s release, a couple of people datamined the game’s files and found 40 open slots for additional Pokemon to be added.

Here’s your full pokemon snap roster!

Blank spaces are reserved pokemon IDs with empty data (could change in a future update, maybe).

Expect the usual datamining tools release from @Kaphotics and I later today pic.twitter.com/faAiaXet3k

— Michael (@SciresM) April 29, 2021

Of course, this image similarly doesn’t guarantee any additional content the same way that the aforementioned speculation doesn’t. But altogether, it seems to point towards some kind of post-launch support, whether through free updates adding or swapping out Pokemon in the pre-existing levels or through paid expansions that could include more substantial content. A balance of the two would be ideal.

Like many, I loved my time with New Pokemon Snap. The main game is an amazing initial offering, but as I mentioned at the beginning of the article, it’s been over twenty-two years since the original was released. There hasn’t been a single day where I didn’t want more, even as my general interest in Pokemon waned over the years. Now that it’s here and I’ve quickly torn through just about all the content the game has to offer, I still want more. There’s still so much that can be done with not only this game but the Snap franchise as a whole, and the new game only includes 214 out of 893 potential Pokemon.

The best rewards in Pokemon Snap have always been more gameplay, so it would be nice to see significant challenges like completing Photodex entries be rewarded with the chance to snap a photo of that Pokemon’s shiny version, or perhaps getting a score over 5000 on a photo could unlock that Pokemon’s evolution. But naturally, I’d love to see new levels, and Pokemon added to the game more than anything. Perhaps a nice level in the sky with more flying and dragon types, or an abandoned village destroyed by a fierce battle between two legendary Pokemon. Heck, I’d even welcome full remakes of the levels from the original Pokemon Snap in the new engine (although that would likely be wishful thinking at best). Regardless, if and when additional content is announced for New Pokemon Snap, fans have made it pretty clear they’d be happy to ‘Shellder-out’ whatever the asking price is for it.

What would you like to see from post-launch support for New Pokemon Snap? And have you been sharing any of your favorite photos from the game on social media? Let us know in the comment!

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Nintendo held their first full-length Direct in over a year and a half this week and the internet at large seems pretty disappointed. Many fans were expecting the Direct to focus on the imminent 35th anniversary of the iconic Legend of Zelda franchise, a milestone the company is currently celebrating for the Mario franchise. After sitting through 40 minutes of ports and a handful of interesting new titles, Eiji Aonuma appeared to reveal an HD Remaster of the controversial and often maligned The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword alongside a gorgeous new pair of Zelda-themed Joy-Cons. A handful of DLC for Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity was revealed, before Aonuma appeared to mention that there wouldn’t be any new information released regarding the Breath of the Wild sequel during that direct. Sufficient to say, this is not the Direct that many Switch owners were looking for.

The expectations of a slew of Zelda content weren’t set by Nintendo themselves. Those expectations grew from fan and media discourse, and this pattern is familiar to anyone who follows the industry on a regular basis. While these predictions are often wishful thinking, they also come from industry experts discussing what they think would be the best business moves for Nintendo when it comes to releasing products for consumer purchase. From an outside perspective, there really is a ton of absolute no-brainer, guaranteed-mountains-of-money moves that Nintendo could make. Fans aren’t shy about what they’d like to play next, so you can find them in just about any Nintendo-related Twitter thread or fan forum. When Nintendo releases a Direct that doesn’t include almost any of those things, you get social media timelines full of disappointment, while others take a defensive posture on behalf of a multibillion-dollar company.

Hello, Anybody Home?

The reason for such widespread disappointment is that it shows Nintendo isn’t listening to their community. And why would they? More often than not, discourse around Nintendo and their products is devoid of even the gentlest criticism, as their fans are some of the most die-hard the industry bears witness to. Additionally, the Switch was the best-selling console of 2020 by a long shot, partially due to people trying to keep themselves entertained or socialize with friends during the ongoing lockdowns and quarantining. Three of the top ten best-selling games of 2020 were Nintendo first-party titles – Animal Crossing: New Horizons, Super Mario 3D All-Stars, and Mario Kart 8 Deluxe.

All of this makes perfect sense given that Nintendo has the widest appeal of any game developer or console manufacturer. Their name is synonymous with video games, and Mario is essentially the face of the medium. Their games are ingrained in the memories of older gamers and continue to appeal to today’s youth simply by being safe and colorful family-friendly games. The vocal die-hards of the internet make up such a small portion of Nintendo’s sales, why would the developer bother listening to them when doing whatever they want continues to reward them handsomely?

Something else to take into consideration is the long-rumored and much-desired 4K Switch hardware upgrade. This is an interesting and bizarre piece of the Nintendo business plan puzzle because they continue to shoot down these rumors, instead of embracing the market that wants games with higher graphical fidelity. The PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X have been selling out in seconds consistently since their launch back in November (for better or worse), and the PC gaming crowd continues to grow with players hellbent on staying on the bleeding edge of gaming technology. All of that hardware is marketed on their ability to produce incredible 4K resolution and higher frame rates that often do affect the gameplay and presentation in a tangible way.

Time for a Shake-up

I recently started up the Bowser’s Fury portion of the Super Mario 3D World re-release, and immediately noticed the massive visual difference compared to other recent titles. I could see the jagged edges of every model and the smudgy blurs of every mesh. The map looked huge until I finished the first area and more of the playable area revealed itself to be spares bits of land spread out over a stretch of water that actually wasn’t very big at all. Finally, when Bowser sprung out of the sludgy oil and I grab the Giga Bell to transform into Kitty Kaiju Mario, the game interrupted this exciting and climactic moment to display a loading screen that brought the momentum to a screeching halt.

Of course, these aren’t deal-breakers, and I’m in the minority crowd that will actually notice these things as unpleasant or hindrances to the experience. But compared to the seamless dual-world gameplay of The Medium on Xbox Series X/PC, or better yet, the exceptionally impressive real-time world-changing of Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart on the PS5 – the Switch is definitely showing its age.

Despite Nintendo’s insistence that they don’t have plans for an upgraded hardware version of the Switch, fans and media alike are still pretty confident that one will be announced or released by the end of 2021. That same crowd is similarly confident that Nintendo will release Switch ports of the Wii U remasters of Wind Waker and Twilight Princess later in the year as part of Zelda’s 35th anniversary.

If all of these things do come to fruition then it’ll be a great year for Nintendo fans, but I just don’t know if I can count on Nintendo to pull it off correctly. Not because I don’t believe they can, but because I don’t really trust them to. Between releasing games for arbitrarily limited windows of time, selling literal cardboard to people, and adding uninteresting titles to the Switch Online Virtual Console (which is a whole mess on its own), I just don’t trust Nintendo to give fans what they openly want instead of cooking up some monkey’s paw version of a good idea. And honestly, I haven’t hoped or been this eager to be proven wrong in quite some time.

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2020 is finally dead and we’re now over a full two weeks into 2021. While last year was pretty great for gaming, it was not at all great for just about anything else, and so far it looks like the new year is going to give the last a run for its money on both accounts. Luckily I’m here to talk to you about gaming today and what 2021 could hold for our beloved medium. The wild nature of the world we currently live in sometimes shines through in the gaming industry for better or worse, and those are often things we end up talking about for years to come. The Kojima/Konami split, the Virtual Boy, Microsoft buying Bethesda. These things were totally unpredictable…until they happened.

So today, I’m here to cast some bold 2021 gaming predictions out into the universe. Now, do keep in mind that these are just predictions – and in some cases, predictions that are deliberately distant from reality. These are bold predictions after all. I’m simply channeling Murphy’s Law into content for a readership that lives for “what if” scenarios. Try not to take it too seriously, and we’ll all have a better time for it. So with that said, here are my predictions for 2021 in gaming.

PSVR2

The original PSVR has been aging in dog years, and the new Hitman 3 VR trailer definitely reveals the headsets age. Watching Agent 47 knock a dude out in what looks like borderline N64 graphics in VR may have un-sold me on Sony’s headset, despite the premise of Hitman in VR convincing me months ago. Plus, Sony didn’t include native PSVR support on the PS5, instead forcing customers to jump through hoops for a dongle to connect it. This makes it seem like even they are ready to send it to a farm upstate. I predict that later this year in the September – December window, Sony will release a new version of the PSVR. I think it’ll be a wireless headset and come with a brand new set of white move controllers that also have haptic feedback and adaptive triggers just like the DualSense. It’ll also likely launch with some kind of banger title that hasn’t been announced yet, or perhaps a console version of Half-Life Alyx. I would also bank on it all being announced during whatever E3 ends up looking like this year.

Assassin’s Creed Will Take Another Year Off

The most recent Assassin’s Creed entry has been widely regarded as a high point for the franchise and understandably so. The game features some of the best writing in the series along with really solid combat and player progression. It doesn’t feel like the revelation that Origins was, but did a great job of reigning in and refining some of the more superfluous RPG mechanics of the previous two titles. Origins and Valhalla are both instances where taking a year off to work on a better game has resulted in resounding success for Ubisoft. Valhalla sold over 1.7 million units at launch and doubled the active player count of Assassin’s Creed Odyssey, similar to how Origins sold double the number of units of Syndicate. There’s no way Ubisoft hasn’t noticed this if their marketing and accounting teams are paying attention. So I think they’ll take this year off to work on a new Assassin’s Creed as well. Plus, Ubisoft just had a massive holiday season in which they launched multiple major AAA titles in a row, which was going to trend into 2021 until Ubisoft delayed the Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time Remake and Far Cry 6 (though they do still have quite a bit coming out leading up to those releases). Valhalla was developed primarily for previous-gen hardware and the next title likely will be too, but it’ll also be great to see an entry designed specifically for the next generation when it’s in full swing. Also, I don’t think it’ll be in Japan.

Elden Ring Releases

If you look at FromSoftware’s release schedule from the past few years, you’ll see that there’s been at least one “Soulsborne” game released every year since 2014, with the exception of 2017 when they released nothing at all. It’s also worth noting that From didn’t work on the recent Demon Souls remake, but that release still contributes to the pattern as it keeps their brand in the public consciousness. The game’s been in development since 2017, announced back in 2019, and is currently sporting the longest stretch between announcement and release (or any information whatsoever) in the developer’s recent history. I’d be willing to bet that From will show off more details about the game within this quarter, and announce a November release date at this year’s E3 stand-in. FromSoftware doesn’t usually make a whole lot of noise before releasing a game, but I imagine this one’s marketing campaign will have more of a budget after Sekiro swept of Game of the Year awards in 2019 and Elden Ring itself was voted “Most Anticipated Game” at The Game Awards this past December.

Red Dead Redemption Re-Releases

Red Dead Redemption 2 was a massive success for Rockstar Games, being the second-largest launch in the history of entertainment at the time, and making the developer $725 million US dollars. It also launched to massive critical acclaim, often tied with God of War for Game of the Year awards back in 2018. One of the most bizarre things about the game was what it didn’t do with about half of the map in single-player mode, as it included the entire region from the original Red Dead Redemption. Mexico in particular, a massive third of the map was entirely inaccessible without the use of mods or glitches. The rest of the non-Mexico part of the map is still used in Red Dead Online, which recently had a standalone release as well. This particular detail sets up a very specific proposition – Red Dead Online could be separate from a re-release of the game’s single-player content, which comes with a full remake of the first Red Dead Redemption, and extra content connecting the two. Just for the sake of being extra outlandish, why not suggest that a remake of Red Dead Revolver will be included as well using the rest of the game’s map, or it could be a separate region altogether – not unlike the island of Guarma.

Xbox Releases New Elite Controller with Dualsense-Inspired Features

The PS5’s DualSense controller has been getting a lot of credit for making the overall console truly feel next-gen, and rightfully so. The haptic feedback and adaptive triggers have become the reason many players will buy certain games on PS5 over other platforms. Phil and the whole Xbox team have taken note of this and even recently surveyed fans asking if they would like to see these features implemented in Xbox controllers as well. It’s also relatively likely that Xbox was already in the process of making a new version of the Elite controller after releasing the Elite 2 back in November 2019. Their design lab website is also currently down as it seems Xbox has some next-gen plans for that process as well, and it would probably be wise to use this time to implement an even newer version of the controller. Given that the DualSense’s controller has already been torn apart and figured out by interested parties worldwide, it likely wouldn’t be too hard for one of the wealthiest companies on the planet to recreate in their own products. But will that be enough for Xbox? One benefit of the capitalist system we live in is the way competition drives innovation, and given the massive pull that the DualSense currently sports for the PlayStation platform, Xbox may want to throw an extra bell and/or whistle into their new controller. I predict it being made available in time to launch alongside Halo Infinite with a special Halo edition of the controller.

Head over to PAGE 2 for more bold predictions…

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Back in 2017, I was wooed by the Japanese version of Dragon Quest XI. The 3DS version in particular charmed me with its 16-bit graphics option, and the regular version’s gorgeous Akira Toriyama art in full HD was spellbinding as always. It was the first time I had been interested in a Dragon Quest title since the Pokemon-like Dragon Warriors 2: Cobi’s Journey back in the early 2000s. When Dragon Quest XI did finally come to the West it had left behind the 16-bit graphics option that piqued my interest, and it was made exclusively available for PS4. Instead, it packed 4K Resolution (which admittedly was and is stunning on my PS4 Pro), English voice acting, a first-person camera mode, and a harder difficulty level – all of which (except for the 4K visuals) I personally found to be entirely unappealing. I still picked the game up at full price($59.99 USD/$79.99 CAD) and slogged through the painful anime cliches and deliberately boring combat, just so I could enjoy the beautifully realized art of Akira Toriyama (also, Sylvando).

Last year, a new version of the game was released for the Nintendo Switch with the 16-bit graphics option that had sold me on the game in the first place. It also came with expanded plot points, an orchestral soundtrack, an option to speed up battles, more monster mounts, a photo mode, following NPCs, and a nifty little mechanic where you can visit worlds from previous Dragon Quest games for extra side missions. Naturally, these are all things that absolutely appeal to me and many other players because they’re excellent additions that make the game better on a fundamental level. This version of the game is also re-releasing this week for Xbox, PS4, and PC, and comes with a demo that brings your saved progress to the full release. It’ll be retailing for $39.99 USD/$53.99 CAD

I feel as though I’ve been ripped off in some way – but in some fairness, perhaps I should have known better. Re-releases and “Definitive Editions” are nothing new in the gaming industry, with annual sports games and bi-annual fighting game roster updates being some of the most egregious practices. But this dates all the way back to the late 80s and early 90s. The original Dragon Quest came to the West three years after its original release on the NES with enhancements of its own. Updated graphics and direction-facing character sprites were quality of life changes, but the battery-powered RAM for saving the game could change how someone plays it when they have the security to undo decisions they may be unhappy with. None of the changes in DQXI:S DE are that impactful, but it’s hard not to feel like I’ve had a lesser and incomplete experience with the original release. There’s also no known or implied reason that this content couldn’t be patched into the existing game for free, or sold separately as a DLC bundle. Here in the West, the only way to get the complete experience is to buy Dragon Quest XI S: Definitive Edition. It especially stings because I bought the original release digitally, which means I don’t even have the option to trade it in and pay a bit less for the Definitive Edition.

Now I did mention early in this writing that I’m not a fan of the combat or the story, both of which make up basically all of this 100+ hour JRPG. So why would I want to get the “full experience” anyway? Well, it sounds like this additional content could alleviate some of the issues I have with those aspects of the game. Being able to speed up combat on a whim would save a ton of time spent rhythmically pressing X waiting for a battle to be over. Or perhaps those additional story beats for each character that isn’t Sylvando (who is so fun and great) would give me more reason to take an interest – at all – in their stakes in the narrative. I’m also a total sucker for being able to see my party members follow me around, and being able to visit worlds from other Dragon Quest games sounds interesting. Above all, the thing that sold me on the game in the first place would be included. That would be really nice.

Bleeding Us Dry

But I’ve genuinely spent too much time talking about this one example I take personal issue with when there are so many others guilty of the same crime.

When Horizon Zero Dawn originally released on February 28th, 2017 for PS4, its full MSRP was 59.99 USD/$79.99 CAD. Less than a year later on December 5th, 2017, the game was re-released with The Frozen Wilds DLC packed in, as well as the additional content from the digital deluxe edition as Horizon Zero Dawn: Complete Edition for $49.99 USD/$59.99 CAD. Those who had purchased the game at launch still had to buy The Frozen Wilds at its standard MSRP for $19.99 USD/$29.99 CAD (I should note that PS+ subscribers did get a small discount on the DLC), meaning they would have to spend almost a hundred dollars US (and over a hundred in Canada) to have the full content and experience. In some ways, this could be likened to waiting for a game to go on sale. But when I bought Red Dead Redemption’s Undead Nightmare DLC at full price only for it to go on sale the very next day, I was not upset with Xbox or Rockstar. It was additional content that had been out for a few months by that point, and I had only myself and my impatience to blame. In the case of Horizon Zero Dawn, the game had only first released 8 months prior when the Complete Edition was announced. Again, it was hard to feel anything but bamboozled knowing that if I had waited I could’ve paid half the price I originally had for the experience and used that money elsewhere.

Earlier this year 505 Games upset fans of Remedy’s Control by announcing an Ultimate Edition of the game that comes with the DLC packed in for $39.99 USD/$49.99 CAD. Again, the game had originally launched at $59.99 USD/$79.00 CAD with a season pass for $24.99 USD/$33.99 CAD. It wasn’t the Ultimate Edition itself that had upset fans, despite it being announced just a couple of weeks shy of the game’s one year anniversary. It’s that this is currently the only way to get the next-gen upgrade version of the game. 505 even publicly doubled down on this decision, saying “Every avenue we pursued, there was some form of blocker and those blockers meant that at least one group of players ended up being left out of the upgrade for various reasons. As of today, we can’t offer an upgrade to everyone, and leaving any one group out feels unfair.” They do mention that the 2019 version of the game would be backward compatible with the new consoles in the same statement, but it does seem like they opted to leave out the one group of people who supported the game from the very beginning.

Stop Upselling Me

It also seems very odd that 505 and Remedy couldn’t find an “upgrade path” for their existing player base considering Gearbox, Codemasters, Behaviour Interactive, Ubisoft, Studio Wildcard, IO Interactive, Bungie, Epic Games, Tripwire Interactive, Hello Games, Frontier Developments, several developers under Microsoft Studios and Sony Interactive Entertainment, and CD Projekt Red, could all figure it out for theirs. Adding insult to injury, shortly after the announcement a handful of users noticed that their copies of the game had been upgraded to the Ultimate Edition, which was then rescinded. This essentially shows that the upgrade could be enabled for existing owners seemingly with the flick of a switch. Given that other games are made on different engines and have other technological limitations in place, it may be unfair to say that this could be the case for all next-gen upgrades. But given the aforementioned list of developers who got it solved coupled with the number who managed to get things improved on the One X and PS4 Pro, I’d imagine it’s not too far off.

Speaking of next-gen upgrades, I expect to see quite a bit more of this type of re-release practice taking place with more recent titles especially over the first few years of the new console cycle. We’re already seeing it in action with Devil May Cry 5: Special Edition, and the next-gen version of 2018’s Spider-Man being locked behind the Ultimate Edition for the new Spider-Man: Miles Morales. I find the latter method to be less offensive if a publisher decides that a next-gen upgrade needs to be monetized at all, as it does fill out the new $69.99 USD/$89.99 CAD price point in a way I find valuable. That being said, I definitely would not like to see the trend of packing in a next-gen remaster of an older game to make up for lack of content in the newer title just to pad that price point. To be clear, that’s nothing against Miles Morales – I actually like it more than Spider-Man 2018 – I’m just specifying that a trend like that would maybe not be a great deal in every case. Devil May Cry 5: Special Edition is basically adding a character, a harder mode, and the same visual upgrades that the Borderlands 3 upgrade did, but slapping a $39.99 USD/$49.99 CAD price tag on it. If other games have proven that this content could be added in a free update, why should I feel compelled to pay for it?

There’s also the Nioh Collection coming out for PS5 in February. It includes visually upgraded versions of both Nioh games, all DLC for each title, and you can even import your saves from PS4 (the collection is also coming to PC but you can’t bring your PS4 saves to that version as far as I know of this writing). This is interesting because you can buy the remasters separately for $49.99 USD/$64.99 CAD each or you can get them bundled for $69.99 USD/$89.99 CAD, and players who already own Nioh 2 and any of its DLC will get the upgrade for free. However, Nioh 1 will not get the upgrade for free. So in the case of Nioh 1, it’s not as painful because the game will have originally launched 4 years prior to the date of its remaster. But Nioh 2 dropped earlier this year in March. This is a middle ground where it’s not quite the sin that Horizon: Zero Dawn Complete Edition is because Nioh 2 owners do get the visual upgrades at no additional cost, but the game is re-releasing less than a full year later with its additional content for a lower price point. Better than nothing, but not ideal.

Now, this isn’t a cautionary tale of how buying games at launch gets you nothing but a big middle finger from the gaming industry or a pre-Festivus airing of grievances. The real question this recurring issue poses isn’t one I can answer, but something perhaps worth considering the value of for yourself as we enter a new console generation and MSRPs rise. Is a game worth its full price on launch day, knowing there is a very high likelihood it will not only go on sale but re-release for a lower price with more content and perhaps better presentation? The value of that will depend on each person for each game, and what you’ll really be assessing is the value of how soon you need to experience it. The perhaps unfortunate truth for a lot of people will likely be that no, they don’t need to experience it as soon as it’s available. This may not be as commonly true for some compared to how they value film and television, but it will definitely be the case for a significant number of people when it comes to video games. The reasons I personally value entertainment this way is because – well for one, they bring me immense joy – but also because this is the primary way that I relate to people. Discussing contemporary pop culture is my expressway to understanding the people around me, so when they bring up their favorite story or experience I want to be able to have the most insightful conversation with them about it possible. So from my perspective, if I’m being sold an incomplete experience, I’m not only missing things that I may actually enjoy within it like a certain graphics mode or extra narrative content and context. I could also be missing out on an opportunity to relate to someone in a way I value.

Some may consider it entitled to suggest additional content granted to late adopters for less should be free or discounted for early adopters who paid more, but paying for a game at launch feels more like punishment as time goes on. I can’t at all blame people who don’t want to pay a hundred dollars or more in any currency for an incomplete experience. Why bother, when they can wait for it to go on sale, re-release with more content, go on Game Pass/PS Now, or buy it used? Especially in a world where wages have not properly risen in accordance with the cost of goods. As I mentioned, it’s an unfortunate practice I expect to exacerbate itself as early adopters of the new consoles look for proper content and try to have the best version possible of the games they already love without dropping thousands of dollars on a gaming PC (where they would have to re-buy certain games anyways). Hopefully, the goodwill, active player stats, and other boons that developers and publishers garner from releasing free next-gen updates for existing titles persuades others to follow suit. In all other cases, do your best to vote with your dollar wisely.

How do you value buying games at launch? Are there any games you’ve bought only to be re-released with more content later? As always, let us know what you think in the comments, and stay tuned to COGconnected for all your gaming news!

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The post Buying Video Games at Launch Has Become a Punishing Waste of Money appeared first on COGconnected.

Remakes and remasters became a massive part of the gaming landscape over the past generation. While some bemoan the practice of polishing old games for re-release, I personally love that it gives me a chance to dive into titles I may have been too young for or simply missed on their original release. The recent remake of the original Mafia for example has become one of my favorite titles of the whole generation and introduced me to a franchise I previously shrugged off due to not being able to play in order (it’s a whole thing). Similarly, the upcoming Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time remake will allow me to revisit a missed chapter of a favorite franchise from yesteryear. Plus, these remakes and remasters fulfill this seemingly universal vision many players had as children – that the games they played then would be practically photorealistic and cooler than ever in the future. Well, that future is now, and I’ve compiled a list of games that I would love to see fulfilled in that vision. There are titles that would make for a nice trip down memory lane, and some that I would experience for the first time so that I can finally “get” why they’re so beloved. And it would be nice to do so without being subject to the jagged eye-stabbing revolutionary-at-the-time 3D graphics of the 90s and early 2000s. And now that we’re finally in the 9th generation of gaming consoles, it’s a better time than ever to revisit some forgotten or beloved franchises and give them a fresh coat of paint. Here are 10 games that deserve full-fledged remakes for next-gen hardware.

Silent Hill

Oh, Silent Hill – how we pine for thee. After the very public dismantling of Hideo Kojima and Guillermo Del Toro’s Silent Hills, the game’s Playable Teaser has gone down in history as one of the most influential titles in modern gaming. Fans have been begging for a proper resurrection of the franchise since, with many suggesting that Sony should purchase the IP outright (which I personally would be totally okay with, to be honest). I think the best place to be would start from scratch, particularly because the original game is now basically like playing TV static through a distant chain-link fence. The franchise could really benefit from taking a page out of Resident Evil’s book and reimagining some of its earliest and most acclaimed titles to modern standards. This is another instance where a Mafia-like cleanup of the script would be beneficial as well, as a lot of the game’s dialogue rides the line between sense and nonsense. It’s an important franchise with widespread influence, and it deserves a fresh start on new hardware.

Jak and Daxter

Naughty Dog’s PS2 action-platforming franchise is a tonal far cry from the bleak apocalypse of The Last of Us and took quite a turn after its first installment. The Precursor Legacy looks and plays nothing like the gun-toting Jak II and 3. Those sequels also gave voice to the first game’s silent protagonist and made the move to a higher-stakes narrative. The design may be a little dated now, but a full-blown remake could easily fix some of that. Put the camera over Jak’s shoulder for shooting, let it be a little more versatile for platforming moments, and fine-tune the driving controls. Plus, the first games copper Precursor orbs and the sequel’s steel-plated Haven City are perfect for ray-tracing reflections. Also, I know that we got the recent up-rezzed ports for PS4, but a real Bluepoint remake for this series would be phenomenal (especially after seeing their work on Demon’s Souls).

Perfect Dark

Not a lot of people talk about it, but Perfect Dark is actually super weird. In marketing, it’s a futuristic game of intrigue and action. But about halfway through each game, the sci-fi walls begin to peel, revealing bizarre occult story beats while maintaining its poker face. “Here is an alien now,” the first one says completely straight-faced. “Now here is a monk with mystical powers,” Perfect Dark Zero reveals as if it’s totally in-line with the rest of the game’s plot and setting. It’s great stuff and provides a refreshing narrative middle ground we need today between the depressingly serious Battlefields of Duty, and the “I-am-so-random-and-zany-isn’t-that-hilarious”-ness of Borderlands. Perfect Dark also has one of the most interesting arsenals of weaponry in shooters, like the laptop gun that poses as an innocent mobile computer until someone gets too close. And sure, the first game got a remaster back in 2010 (Oh my god it was that long ago?!), but it would be great to see a full-blown remake, complete with its addictive Goldeneye-like multiplayer.

Metal Gear

To be clear, I don’t mean Metal Gear Solid (although a remaster of Twin Snakes would be very much appreciated). I mean a full-blown remake of the original Metal Gear for the MSX2 and NES. These are stories we’ve only gotten to see from overhead – or like most people, only read about on Wikipedia. These games have some moments that don’t exactly bear a whole ton of weight on the series but are referred to often enough that it would be cool to see them fleshed out. Plus, it would be nice to get some more time with Big Boss after the unceremonious, blue-balls experience that is the rushed ending of Metal Gear Solid V. The Metal Gear series has been such an integral part of every generation of gaming that it’s hard to think that we may not see it again – especially without Kojima, who many fans thought would let the series kill him for a while. Unfortunately, we all bore witness to the high-profile ending of his relationship with Konami, who doesn’t seem to be getting back into gamers good graces anytime soon. Hopefully, they’ll sell the IP to a better company (most likely Sony), and we’ll get to save the world from nuclear destruction once again.

Dead Space

It’s been quite a while since we’ve seen a Dead Space title, and a remake would be the perfect opportunity to gauge current interest in the franchise (of which I personally assume there is a lot). It’s not hard to imagine how modern tech like Unreal Engine 5 and Ray-Tracing could make the industrial hallways of the Ishimura that much more haunting. Plus, watching a necromorph chase you down in 60 – or even 120 – frames-per-second would be as smooth as the fear-pee trickling down my leg in that moment. If the developers really wanted to go the extra mile, they could tighten up the narrative script like Hangar 13 did for Mafia: Definitive Edition. They could pack in some references to the Extraction prequel and allude to some events in the sequels, just as fun little nods for the fans. If it were to do well enough, hopefully, we’d get that interesting Dead Space 4 we heard about a while back. Besides, EA has said that they’ve got more than one remaster in the works.

Head over to PAGE 2 for more great games on our list…

The post Top 10 Next Gen Remakes We’d Love to See on Xbox Series X and PS5 appeared first on COGconnected.

It’s been a long hard road through 2020 to get here, but the 4 new consoles have officially been released and a slew of shiny fresh games are available to play on them. Now, some have lamented that they’re not finding the launch lineup for the new hardware particularly exciting – especially Xbox fans. But the PS2 had a pretty unfortunate launch lineup as well, and that’s one of the most successful consoles of all time. All good things come to those who wait, and in 2021 we’ll really start bearing the fruits of our labor. As delayed launch titles and other games start showing up in the first-quarter holiday rush extension that’s become a trend over the past few years, players will be able to dive into experiences pretty regularly that remind them why they spent ~$700 on a console in “The Year That Sucked All the Ass” (the official name of 2020 moving forward). So all aboard the hype train, and indulge in these 20 trailers for all the games set to release next year for the PS5 and Xbox Series X.

1. Deathloop

The team at Arkane has been releasing masterclasses in game design for the past decade, and it doesn’t look like they’re giving up that track record with Deathloop. This sci-fi shooter with a badass 70’s aesthetic has a neat feature where players can drop in and hunt another player right in the middle of the narrative – an exciting opportunity for griefers worldwide.

2. Halo Infinite

Shortly after this gameplay demo was released the team at 343 delayed the game citing issues with development due to COVID-19, which deflated a bit of the excitement around the Series X/S. That being said, delays more often than not lead to a better final product, and I’m actually more excited for Halo now than I was even before this trailer.

3. Ghostwire Tokyo

Gaming’s master of horror Shinji Mikami is bringing his latest creation to the PS5, and it actually looks more like an action game with yo-kai – an interesting departure from his traditional survival horror wheelhouse. The timed exclusivity is being honored in Xbox’s Bethesda buyout, but it’s basically guaranteed that the game will come to Xbox as soon as that contract is up.

4. Kena: Bridge of Spirits

The first game from Ember Lab – a studio made up of professional animators who made the 2016 Majora’s Mask short film – looks absolutely gorgeous, and will surely capture the hearts of players young and old when it drops sometime in 2021. We haven’t seen a whole lot of the game just yet, but I have a feeling merch for those little dudes called The Rot (a very unfortunate name for something so cute) will be flying off of shelves as soon as it’s available.

5. Gotham Knights

A Batman game without Batman actually looks pretty wild, putting players into the boots of Robin, Batgirl, Nightwing, and Red Hood. The game doesn’t take place in the Arkham Universe for some reason, but you can team up with a friend to kick some evil ass in Gotham.

6. Horizon: Forbidden West

Holy crap, this looks gorgeous. Not much else is known about the game.

7: Resident Evil Village

I made the mistake of reading a leak about this game before it was officially revealed that may have spoiled the ending, and so far that leak is lining up with what we’ve seen so far. *Womp womp* for me, but it’s really exciting to be returning to Resident Evil, especially with Chris and some new werewolves to fend off.

8. Psychonauts 2

It’s been a long time coming, but Psychonauts 2 looks closer to completion than ever, and this summer Double Fine revealed that frequent collaborator Jack Black would be joining the team for another wild-looking musical moment. The game takes place immediately following the events of VR exclusive title Rhombus of Ruin, which itself took place immediately following the events of the original Psychonauts from 2005.

9. Dying Light 2

It has been quite a long while since we’ve heard anything about Dying Light 2, and the last thing major development we heard of was not positive by any means. The team has let us know that the game is progressing just fine, but fans are surely getting impatient for this ambitious zombie-slaying adventure.

10. Scorn

I will give $1.00 to anyone who can tell me what the setting of this game is. Whatever it is, it’s beautifully disgusting.

Head over to PAGE 2 for more games…

The post 20 Next-Gen Games to Board the Hype Train For appeared first on COGconnected.

It’s that time of year again where people get dressed up and decorate their house, all in celebration of fear and candy. While things may be a little different this year due to the *gestures broadly at the world on fire,* gaming fans can still scare their own pants off in the safe (but still spooky) comfort of their own home. You may be wondering, “Hey [writer] at {Trusted Gaming News Outlet}, what horror games should I play now that I’ve braved my way through all the titles on your previous list?” Well, dear reader, I’ve compiled a brand new updated list of must-or-at-least-should-play horror titles for you to play in the dark on this, the season of spookies.

Condemned: Criminal Origins

Along with being a great technical showcase and launch title for the Xbox 360, Condemned: Criminal Origins is an excellent psychological horror game. The Se7en/Silence of the Lambs inspired plotline sees SCU agent Ethan Thomas trying to track down a serial killer of serial killers after being brutally maimed and framed for murder at an investigation site. Throughout the game, you’ll spend a lot of time at crime scenes searching for clues and evidence, but the game also has a brutally visceral combat system that actually got the game banned and confiscated in Germany in 2008. The game’s sequel, Condemned 2: Bloodshot, is a little more action-focused but still manages to provide a few solid scares as well. Plus they were made by Monolith, the same studio that made the recent Middle Earth games.

The Forest

The Forest starts out as an innocent father-son vacation that quickly and literally descends into cannibalistic madness after your plane goes down on a remote island. Your son is kidnapped by its flesh-hungry residents, who come for you in the night (and day when they’re feeling brazen), forcing you to set up camp and fortify against them. This game is for those who like more “survival” in their Survival Horror, as you’ll have to gather resources to craft different weapons and barriers for protection. Food resources are particularly sparse, so you’ll likely have to convert to cannibalism early on, which leads to some other particularly disturbing gameplay elements. To double down on the horror, there’s an intricate underground cave system home to mutants that you’ll need to explore with very little light in order to find your son. It can also be played in VR for maximum terror, but you can bring a friend along to watch your back.

SOMA

From the studio that brought you the Amnesia series comes a game that opens on the TTC – for residents of Toronto, nothing is more horrifying than having to be on our absolutely cursed public transit system when you really don’t need to. Luckily you’re quickly transported to an underwater science facility full of sentient robots and something else I saw running through the industrial hallways that I couldn’t quite make out from its silhouette but was definitely not robot shaped. The game also sports a particularly interesting narrative, so if you’d like to experience it without being torn apart by whatever is lurking in PATHOS-II you can turn on Safe Mode to experience it at your leisure. The monsters will still definitely be there watching your every move, but now you can stop to admire their scales instead of running in fear.

The Evil Within

After leaving Capcom and making some non-survival-horror-related games, Shinji Mikami started up his own studio and returned to the genre he helped define with The Evil Within. Though its plot may be a mess and both games in the franchise are overall not as beloved as their predecessors, they still have some pretty strikingly horrifying imagery that makes for great late-night plays right before bedtime. It also does a good job of scratching that third-person survival-horror itch that Resident Evil 4 left unscratched with RE5 and 6. If you’d prefer, you can jump right into The Evil Within 2 which has a nifty first-person mode as well.

Little Nightmares

Admittedly, Little Nightmares is not particularly “horrifying.” It doesn’t employ jump scares or stark-raving madness to give you the scare you’re looking for. Instead, it uses disgusting character design, and the looming questions of “where am I, and what is going on?” to keep you unsettled and your skin crawling. When you start the game (and even when you end it really) you don’t know much about the young girl named Six that you play as – you only really know that wherever you are, you want to get out. The game is appropriately titled as its surreal atmosphere and oblong characters are reminiscent of the nightmares you may have had as a child. That being said, given that the game is pretty PG (much unlike the other titles on this list), it’s a relatively family-friendly horror game if you decide you’d like to play it with your own little nightmares.

Alien: Isolation

Remember Outlast? Imagine that, but with a Xenomorph hunting you down in a derelict space station. This particular Alien game is more reminiscent of the original film, set 15 years after it and putting players in the boots of Amanda Ripley, Ellen Ripley’s daughter. In all honesty, the game is a little lengthy and its nostalgic novelty can wear off. But don’t worry about that, it’s worth playing until that point for the most authentic Alien gaming experience. Plus, the game’s Last Survivor DLC brings the original cast together for the first time in almost 25 years. One of the game’s most interesting features is that if you have a headset plugged in, the Xenomorph will actually be able to hear you talking or breathing while you’re hiding – so be sure to stay quiet!

Click on thru to PAGE 2 for more…

The post 12 More Horrifying Games to Play This Halloween appeared first on COGconnected.

It’s been an interesting week for indie games as just about everything that could happen with a title has happened. We’ve got new game announcements, new game delays, old game updates, and of course, Switch ports. Let’s take a look!

New Reigns Sci-Fi Entry Announced

Beloved swiping RPG Reigns is receiving a wiley new sci­-fi installment by way of Reigns: Beyond, Devolver Digital announced this week. It’s currently in development for Apple Arcade specifically and is set to follow an interstellar rock band of whose resources, gear, and bandmates you will manage. The game’s store preview page is promising quite a bit including dogfights, space pirates, and over 1400 decision cards – that’s more decisions than I’ve confidently made in my life. It looks like the band’s manager will also be a character named Lord Shark, which I must admit, I am most interested in so far. The game’s soundtrack is also being composed by Sam Webster, who also composed the music for Apple Arcade hit Grindstone. There’s no release date for the game just yet, but I personally would bank on it being out by the end of the year.

Axiom Verge Kicked into 2021

Several factors played into the delay of the sequel to the cult hit Metroidvania Axiom Verge, which was set to release for the Switch later this fall. Naturally one of those factors is the impact of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, but some of the others actually bode well for the upcoming sidescroller. Developer Thomas Happ Games explained in a blog post that part of the delay is due to the more sophisticated art style and enemies, who will now scan the environment for the player before trying to escape their inevitable demise. They also teased an item similar to the first Axiom Verge’s Address Disruptor, which allowed players to “glitch enemies and the environment.” As someone who only spent a bit of time with Axiom Verge during a post-Shovel Knight retro-inspired deep dive, the revelation of such a unique item makes me want to give it another shot. Plus, it sounds like the developer is going really hard on this sequel, and that alone makes it interesting to me. The game is now set to drop in the first half of 2021.

Terraria Gets Final *Final* Update

Notorious game that never ends Terraria has received an extra update in addition to the recently no-longer-honestly-titled 1.4 patch, Journey’s End. The new 1.4.1 update “Journey’s Actual End” includes “pieces that were not quite ready in time” for the previous update including 6 Vanity Sets from the Journey’s End Vanity Design contest, a new NPC – “The Princess,” a handful of new achievements, and some new items. You can check out the entire game’s patch notes here, as it looks like there is more than one would expect in a post-final-update patch. The new update is currently available for players on PC, and there’s no set date for it to come to consoles just yet. I personally haven’t played Terraria, but if I were a big fan, I would definitely be super stoked about all this additional content.

If Found… Comes to Switch Next Week

Is it even a weekly indie roundup if an indie game isn’t being ported to the Switch? Publisher Annapurna Interactive announced that they’ll be bringing developer Dreamfeel’s surrealist self-exploration adventure If Found… to the Switch this coming October 22nd. It’ll include quite a few upgrades such as a bonus chapter, extra story stuff, a few new endings, some new artwork, and new accessibility options. It’ll also come with a new song from Irish singer-songwriter Loah and composer 2mello, with lyrics from the game’s co-writer and director Llaura McGee. If you haven’t played it yet (or even heard of it), that’s okay, neither have I! The game’s website refers to it as an “interactive visual novel about searching for connection,” and follows the coming-of-age struggles of a young girl named Kasio as she destroys her diary. It looks pretty artsy, which I love, and is currently available on Steam and iOS if you can’t wait 4 days to dive into it.

Stardew Valley Getting Split-Screen Co-Op

Virtual farmers rejoice! Stardew Valley developer Eric Barone has revealed via Twitter that the game will be receiving vertical split-screen play in the upcoming 1.5 update. As our own Zane Wong reported, players will be able to wander the world of Stardew Valley alone together sitting side by side (or six feet apart) as they won’t be subject to being in the same room at the same time (lookin’ at you, Animal Crossing). Up to 4 farmers will be able to play split-screen on PC, though the console version will only support 2 players (which, sounds a little backwards to me? Who the hell invites 3 friends over to sit in front of their PC?). There’s no release date for the update just yet, but you can find out a little more about what might be in it by checking out Zane’s article.

What do you think of this week’s indie gaming news? Are you checking out If Found… on Switch? Are you gonna get 3 friends to come to play Stardew Valley split-screen? As always, let us know what you think of this week’s roundup in the comments, and be sure to keep it locked to COGconnected for all your gaming news!

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Another week, another exciting slew of indie gaming news. As the launch of the next generation of consoles looms over the industry, indie developers have been letting players know what they’ll be bringing to the table amidst an onslaught of AAA releases. A few developers have also been making sure that those who aren’t upgrading just yet aren’t forgotten about. Let’s take a look!

Bithell Games Has a Big Week

The developer behind Thomas Was Alone has had a busy week after launching their latest “shorts” title, The Solitaire Conspiracy last Saturday. It’s been a great success for the indie team as it’s sold more copies in its first 9 hours than any previous game the studio has put out at launch and has overall reviewed pretty well (it currently has a 76 on Metacritic). It’s currently available on Steam and the Epic Games Store – but wait, there’s more! Bithell Games revealed this week that not one, but two of their previous titles will be coming to consoles later this year. First, John Wick Hex will be coming to Xbox, Nintendo Switch, and Steam (which I know is not a console but the game was previously only on Epic Games Store for PC) this December 4th. It’ll even be getting its own fancy boxed version for its console release, including for the PS4, where it landed shortly after its EGS release last year. The new box art is also super stylish, and I would like a poster for it with my physical copy, please. The game is currently $22.79 CAD/$19.99 USD on Epic Games Store, and it’s looking like the retail price may reflect that (although according to GameStop the Switch version is retailing for $29.99 USD so, we’ll find out!)

Secondly, the studio’s aforementioned breakout title Thomas Was Alone will be coming to the Switch in the first quarter of next year. It doesn’t look like this one will be receiving a physical release, but at least it will join the unending list of demanded and fulfilled Switch ports. Here’s hoping this bodes well for a Solitaire Conspiracy port to consoles in the future!

Hades Developer Discusses a Ton of the Game’s Behind-the-Scenes Happenings

Supergiant’s Hades has been one of the year’s biggest hits, and as someone who was skeptical at first (I just don’t like roguelikes), sleeping on this game is a big mistake. A personal favorite moment I’ve experienced in my time with it has been bumping into Eurydice on my way through Asphodel, where you’ll find her singing a soothing tune – a stark contrast to the epic combat metal blissfully pounding my ears for the previous hours. It’s a nice moment of levity amongst the chaos and the song she sings is, as the kids call, “a banger.” Hades’ composer Darren Korb released a video this week showing fans how to play the song, complete with sheet music and tabs. He also explains that for the version used in the game, he used a Turkish instrument called a bağlama, instead of the acoustic guitar the tutorial here is for. I must insist, if you haven’t played the game, don’t check out the video just yet – hearing the song in the context of the game is a really nice moment and I wouldn’t want it spoiled for you.

Additionally, the team recently showed off a breakdown of each of the game’s visual effects for environments and weapon power-ups over on Twitter. One of the game’s designers also broke down how each of the rooms in the game are designed, and it’s a particularly interesting approach for level design in a genre where so much of the novelty hinges on it constantly changing. On top of that, the Hades team also released a test-branch on both Epic Games Store and Steam for players to get a glimpse into the game’s next update, which is said to include balance changes, a new decorative theme, new voice lines, fixes, “and more.” The team also mentioned on Twitter that the promised cross-saves for Switch should be available sometime later this month, which I will surely use as an excuse to buy the game again.

Bundle of Bugsnax Info Released

Speaking of games I can’t scrub out of my timeline, Bugsnax developer Young Horses dropped a ton of new information about the game this week, including confirmation of its release lining up with the launch of the PS5 as it has already gone gold. It’s set to release the very same day the PS5 drops on November 12th, when it’ll also launch PS4 and on PC through the Epic Games Store. The game’s voice cast was also revealed and includes some pretty recognizable names including Spider-Man’s Yuri Lowenthal, Jedi: Fallen Order’s Debra Wilson, Sonic the Hedgehog himself Roger Craig Smith, and industry guy-who-is-in-everything, Fred Tatasciore. The game will retail for $29.99 CAD/$24.99 US when it drops, and currently has a 15% discount on the Epic Games Store if you’d like to pre-order.

Additional Indivisible Content Canceled After Lab Zero Closes

In the ongoing fallout of Lab Zero Games reports of poor work culture and the dissolving of the studio, additional content for their most recent release Indivisible has been nixed. This is particularly unfortunate for backers of the game on Indiegogo, as there were several characters created by backers and from other indie games that were set to be included. As our own Clayton Cyre reported, publisher 505 Games released a statement regarding the decision, including confirmation of an update for the Switch version of the game on the way. A planned North American physical release of the game has been canceled as well, but fans who bought that version of the game are eligible for a refund. 505 did promise to still release the campaign’s last physical reward, which is a figurine of the game’s main character Ajna. The publisher says the figures are entering production soon, and backers will receive info on their availability within the coming weeks. There was no mention of the Indivisible TV show that was announced earlier this year. It’s a shame that things are ending like this for both the people who worked hard on the game (and surely all those unreleased content drafts sitting on a hard drive somewhere), but also for all the fans who were looking forward to more of a game they love. At least the game did have a full release and is currently available on PC, Xbox One, PS4, and Nintendo Switch. You can check out our review for it right here.

Official statement from 505 Games.

For additional information please visit our website: https://t.co/i3MJqsAZpu pic.twitter.com/spjKLw9JOI

— Indivisible (@IndivisibleRPG) October 9, 2020

What do you think of this week’s indie gaming news? Are you picking up Bugsnax on Day 1? Have you been making your way through the underworld in Hades? As always, let us know what you think of this week’s roundup in the comments, and be sure to keep it locked to COGconnected for all your gaming news!

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The post Indie Classics Come to Console and New Favorites Let Fans Behind The Curtain appeared first on COGconnected.

It’s been a bit of a quiet week in the indie scene as everyone continues to betray their friends in Among Us and slash their way out of the underworld in Hades. Additionally, a lot of current media coverage is revolving around the shiny new consoles launching in a little over a month and the games coming out in a crowded holiday season. Also, did you hear Minecraft stuff is coming to Smash? Because I sure did from every single person I’ve ever come across in my life. It feels like even if something big did happen in indie gaming this week, it might have gotten buried under all the AAA gaming news. But don’t worry, I’ve been keeping track, and here’s a quick breakdown of some of the most interesting indie gaming stories I found this week!

Massive Binding of Isaac Expansion Almost Done

Binding of Isaac creator Edmund McMillen has revealed that the upcoming Repentance expansion is over 90% done and that the team is working to ensure that it’s the “Sequel DLC” players have always wanted. He revealed the update in a blog post over on the game’s official Steam page earlier this week, along with the official Binding of Isaac: Repentance “Coming Soon” page. It’s been quite a while since we’ve heard from the team, and over two years since the Repentance expansion was revealed. McMillen promises that this is the “FINAL FINAL FINAL mega expansion,” and that the game’s blog will be updated “fairly regularly starting the second half of October.” He also promised that fans will “shit your asses when you get your hands on it,” which is…that’s good, right? That’s something to be excited about? The blog post did mention console versions as well, but that a team member named Tyrone will have updates regarding them at a later time. According to the official Steam page, the expansion is set to include over 25 new bosses, more than 100 new enemies, 130+ new items, 2 new playable characters, 5 new challenges, over 100 new achievements, and more than 5,000 new room designs. That’s pretty huge! It’s awesome to see this game come such a long way from its humble flash beginnings back in 2011. Hopefully, we’ll also get some word soon on whether or not this cult classic will be making its way to next-gen consoles anytime soon.

Blightbound Update Brings AI Teammates and New Hero

Early access dungeon crawler Blightbound has released the new “Helping Hands” update that brings AI teammates into the mix. Since the game revolves around players forming a complete party with tank, DPS, and healer roles, this means that those unable to wrangle some friends or matchmake some strangers to join them will be able to continue their dungeon crawling without a disadvantage. Additionally, the game has received a new hero named Seirinne. Seirinne is a thief/rogue archetype with an ability called Shadow Statue that stalls enemies while piling damage onto them over a short period of time, which sounds an awful lot like a former partner of mine. If you’ve been looking to check out Blightbound, now may be the time as it’s currently 20% off on Steam. If you’re already a fan and would like to see the full patch notes, you can check those out here.

Airborne Kingdom Coming to PC This December

If you’re like me and spend way too much time window shopping for games to add to your pile of shame in online stores, you may have noticed a pretty little title called Airborne Kingdom hanging out in the Epic Games Store. It’s a city builder with exploration elements, as you can lift your city into the air and fly it around like a Terran Command Center, plopping it down wherever you’d like. There’s some good news for those who have been waiting to become King of the Skies – developer The Wandering Band has set a release date for December 17th, when the game will launch for PC and Mac and cost $27.99 CAD/$19.99 USD. Here’s hoping by that time we can pull ourselves away from Cyberpunk 2077 and our shiny new consoles long enough to actually give it a shot.

Chinatown Detective Agency Gets New Demo

Speaking of Cyberpunk, the onslaught of indie games sporting the sci-fi subgenre seems to not be slowing down anytime soon. Earlier this week a new demo for point-and-click cyberpunk mystery game Chinatown Detective Agency was released, and it looks like it’ll have its own place in the genre’s current insurgence. Our own Nicola Kapron detailed quite a bit of the demo in covering the news earlier this week (thanks Nicola!) but what’s interesting to me is the way the game wears its influences on its sleeve. For example, in one of the screenshots released, you can see a hologram of a pink-skinned blue-haired woman in the distance – a clear homage to Ana De Armas’ character in Blade Runner 2019. The trailer for the demo also shows off a unique cast of characters and quite a bit of action for a point-and-click with the main character kicking in a door to a hostage situation near the end. The Day One demo can be downloaded for free over on Steam, and the game is slated for an Early 2021 release date.

Amnesia: Rebirth Gameplay Trailer Reveals the Horrors That Await

As much as I love horror, I’ll admit I am too much of a fraidy-cat to dive into the Amnesia series the way I would like to – and from the looks of it, the upcoming threequel Rebirth will not be swaying me out of that mindset anytime soon. I had to actually watch the trailer so I could write this and within seconds felt that familiar sense of “fuck this, I’m outta here.” That’s a good thing because horror games are supposed to put the piss in your pants, right? Well, consider my pants thoroughly pissed. The opening sequence in the trailer is way too relatable of a nightmare we’ve all had of being chased by an unknown entity making disgusting sounds. The rest of the trailer is more atmospheric than anything else but by the sheer virtue of being an Amnesia title, manages to keep you on the edge of your seat. Nicola dives a bit more into what the game’s got goin’ on in their coverage of the trailer, and you can wishlist the game on Steam now before it’s October 20th release date – just in time for Halloween.

What do you think of this week’s indie gaming news? Are you looking forward to the Binding of Isaac expansion? How about stocking up on adult diapers for that new Amnesia? As always, let us know what you think of this week’s roundup in the comments, and be sure to keep it locked to COGconnected for all your gaming news!

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The post Much Anticipated Expansions, Demos, and Trailers in This Weeks Indie Video Game News Update appeared first on COGconnected.

It’s been yet another exciting week full of awesome gaming news and here at COGconnected, we like to give a little extra love to the little guys, the indie devs that don’t have millions of dollars to put behind their dreams and still manage to put out titles with fantastical worlds that we love to play in. It’s been an interesting week as an indie title that’s been out for 2 years is having its biggest moment yet, and an underrated title from earlier this year is coming to the Switch with new content. Let’s dive right in!

Among Us 2 Cancelled

You may have scrolled past “Among Us” during Steam or App Store sales in the past but over the past couple of weeks, its popularity has exploded, and become one of the most popular games on Twitch. The game’s recent success has prompted its developer Innersloth to full-out cancel the sequel that was announced a little over a month ago. Innersloth has decided to move all the content they were planning for Among Us 2 over to the first title, including a new stage, a friend system, and accessibility options like colorblind support. I would also assume that those plans include console ports, which the developer has recently mentioned is challenging due to “communication issues.” Players have also begun asking for new minigames or “tasks” in the future, but it remains to be seen if that is part of the developer’s roadmap. I think it’s an interesting choice to scrap the planned sequel and I wonder if it means that the data Innersloth has collected over the past month implies that the first game would be more profitable than releasing a sequel. In the short time, I’ve spent with the game, I’d also like to see some new tasks, as well as better ways for the imposter to conceal their identity – perhaps a cloaking mechanism or other ways to sabotage the team’s efforts. If you haven’t tried it out yet, it’s worth a shot for only $5.69 CAD/5.00 USD or free on mobile devices.

Mike Bithell Announces New Game

The developer behind John Wick Hex and Thomas Was Alone has announced their latest experimental genre mashup, The Solitaire Conspiracy. Pitched to his Twitter followers as “What if Solitaire, but extra, with powers and a full FMV storied campaign,” it’s a narrative-driven sci-fi solitaire game about the fall of a spy agency named Protego. Kinda Funny Game’s Greg Miller will play a character named Jim Ratio, who helps players save their crews from AI spies. The game will include a full story campaign mode, as well as a Skirmish mode and nerve-wracking Countdown mode. It’ll also feature narration from British actor and comedian Inel Tomlinson, as well as music from Battletech’s Jon Everist. The game’s steam and Epic Games Store pages (where you can wishlist it now) also clarify that the title is separate from Bithell’s “Circular” text adventure series, which consists of Subsurface Circular and Quarantine Circular. The game is set to launch this coming October 6th, and to be honest, I think it’ll be the first time I play Solitaire in over twenty years. I personally haven’t played too many of Bithell Games’ titles, but I adore Mike Bithell’s charm and perspectives in the Play. Watch. Listen. podcast that he does with Alanah Pearce, Troy Baker, and Austin Wintory, and I’m looking forward to playing this unique twist on a game I usually consider to be for the most boring of retirees.

Umurangi Generation Coming to Switch with New DLC

If you haven’t heard of Umurangi Generation or tried it out yet, believe me, you’re missing out. It’s a photography game set in “the shitty future” set in Tauranga, Aotearoa (Aotearoa is the Maori name for New Zealand), and some have been endearingly referring to it as “Cyberpunk Snap.” You play as a courier for the Tauranga Express tasked with taking photos of an increasingly militarized city at the precipice of the apocalypse, and it’s got a super stylish soundtrack. Earlier this week, a new DLC pack simply titled “Macro” and Switch port for the game were announced on the game’s official Twitter. The Macro DLC seems to include quite a bit of new content, and the trailer for it really drives home just how bad I am at that game. It includes a whopping 4 new levels: Tauranga Underground, The Hangar, The Gamers Palace, and The Depths. There’ll also be a few new camera features including selfie mode, shutter speed adjustment, box frame, and players will now be able to crouch to get just the right shot. Players will also be able to traverse the new levels in a shiny new pair of roller skates and stick it to the man by tagging walls with spray paint, effectively making it Jet Set Radio’s hot cousin. The Macro DLC is set to drop on November 7th, and there’s no Canadian price confirmed yet, but the American price of $9.99 converts to $13.37 CAD. You can pick up the base game now on Steam for $17.49 CAD/$14.99 USD, and if you’ve been itching for a good photography game, this one comes with a high recommendation from yours truly.

Two of October’s Shiniest Indie Games Coming to Switch

Nintendo’s hybrid console has been a great home for indie titles since its release in 2017, and that doesn’t seem to be changing anytime soon. This week two developers revealed that their respective titles would be making their way to the Switch alongside PC releases, and for one of them, that means an all-platform launch day (minus Android and iOS but like, whatever). That lucky title would be the hotly anticipated cyberpunk-slasher Ghostrunner, and the other would be Outerloop’s Falcon Age, which was originally released for the PS4 with VR support. It’s exceptionally doubtful that the Switch version of Falcon Age will support VR, but what’s stopping you from sticking it in a bunch of cardboard and strapping it to your face? Nothing, and now that I think of it, that goes for Ghostrunner too. Falcon Age will be coming to Switch and Steam on October 8th along with all of its previously released content updates, as well as touch controls for petting your falcon on Switch. Ghostrunner will drop for just about everything under the sun on October 27th to whet your cyberpunk appetites until November 19th.

New Momodora Series Game On the Way

As part of the franchise’s 10th-anniversary series, developer Bombservice has announced that a new Momodora pixel art game is on the way. They didn’t release much outside of a short teaser revealing the announcement on the official Momodora Twitter, and that this would be the final story arc of the series. Bombservice also revealed that they’ve teamed up with online storefront The Yetee for a small merch line including pins and art prints to celebrate the series, with more on the way in the future. If you’re unfamiliar with the Momodora series, that makes sense, as it seems to be a relatively niche franchise (and if I’m wrong just blast me in the comments). The first two games were originally released on indie platform itch.io, with the third and fourth gaming coming to Steam. The fourth game, Momodora: Reverie Under the Moonlight was released back in 2016, and can currently be played on Game Pass, so check it out if you’re into Metroidvanias and retro action-platformers.

Also, you may remember the unfortunate series of events that befell Lab Zero Games, the studio behind Skullgirls and Indivisible from a couple of weeks ago. It turns out that some of the team members have come together to form their own new studio! It’s great to see that they’re still eager to make games despite the negative experience they had before, and I can’t wait to see what they do next. As always, let us know what you think of this week’s roundup in the comments, and be sure to keep it locked to COGconnected for all your gaming news!

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The post Cancellations and Killer Announcements Highlight The Top Indie Video Game News This Week appeared first on COGconnected.

It’s been a pretty big week for AAA gaming and new consoles, but how are our friends in the indie scene doing? It may have gotten buried under the onslaught of PS5 and Series X info, but don’t worry! I’ve dug up some of the brightest gems from the past week and arranged them in a way that is tasteful and easily digestible for you! Let’s dig in!

Game Devs of Color Expo is Under Way!

The 5th annual Game Devs of Color Expo is showing off a ton of great games this weekend from the 18th to the 21st and will be awarding over $90,000 in grants to 6 different developers. The expo will be showing off a ton of hotly anticipated indie games including Garden Story, She Dreams Elsewhere (which I personally am super looking forward to!), and an interesting-looking game called “An Airport for Aliens Currently Run by Dogs.” The expo is also hosting a demo event on Steam called “Gradient Convergence” where players can check out demos for a ton of the games being shown off, and add them to their Steam wishlist. If you didn’t manage to snag a ticket (they’re only $5 to $10!) you can also check out a ton of the talks coming out of the conference at the show’s official YouTube Channel.

#GDoCExpo 2020 is 2 days long! ?

On Sat 9/19, watch talks & panels by @dapurplesharpie, @metasynthie, @Claude_Jerome, & more. Sun 9/20 features interviews w/ creators of @ValiDateGame, @gardenstorygame, @loveshoregame, & more #indiegames! Register now: https://t.co/t59g26yFrg pic.twitter.com/iCTp2F29ey

— Game Devs of Color Expo (@GDoCExpo) September 10, 2020

Cel-Shaded Shooter “Foreclosed” Gets New Gameplay Video

As the onslaught of cyberpunk games rages on through 2020 (seriously, there’s been so many and we’re nowhere near done yet), publisher Merge Games and developer Antab Studios has given us a deeper look at their upcoming graphic-novel inspired third-person shooter Foreclosed with a gameplay video hot off the presses. The game seems to be coming along really nicely, and the developer has revealed that the game will also be coming to PS5 and the Xbox Series consoles in addition to current-gen hardware. There’s no official release date yet as the game is set to drop in 2021, but you can check out the deep dive trailer right here:

Cuphead Toys Come to Arby’s (But Like, Actually Though)

The folks over at Studio MDHR revealed that their indie hit Cuphead is coming to an Arby’s near you earlier this week. Fans will be able to snag one with the purchase of a kids meal, which is an interesting choice because most adults I know cannot finish that game. Several of the game’s bosses are included as papercraft toys (very loose use of the word “toy” here) that you can wallop with a Cuphead token launcher. But wait, there’s more somehow! Each toy comes with a code for Cuphead camera filters that you can use through the official Arby’s Cuphead app, which I’m sure you, dear reader, already have.

The all-cartoon sensation Cuphead is launching into an Arby’s near you, for a limited time only. Collect all four hero launcher tokens and four constructible boss papercrafts today. pic.twitter.com/ciwaRPitMU

— Arby’s (@Arbys) September 14, 2020

Boyfriend Dungeon Gets Delayed

Kitfox Games made the difficult decision to delay their highly anticipated dating sim Boyfriend Dungeon into 2021. The developer released an official statement explaining that the choice was made to avoid crunch and to make sure the team is in good mental health throughout this tumultuous year. The statement also reveals that two characters who were stretch goals during the game’s Kickstarter campaign will now be paid DLC characters, but backers will still get them for free. You can check out the full statement right here:

A little bit of an update about Boyfriend Dungeon ?

Plain text version: https://t.co/xWRPP6bpYP pic.twitter.com/XA4BTXtcpE

— Kitfox Games (@KitfoxGames) September 10, 2020

Sci-Fi FPS “The Invincible” Revealed

A new indie studio composed of former CD Projekt Red and Techland devs has revealed their first title, The Invincible. It’s inspired by a novel of the same name from Polish author Stanisław Lem back in 1964. It’s about a scientist searching for the crew of their ship after a rough landing on a strange planet, and the description of the novel itself is reminiscent of a more sci-fi focused version of Lovecraft’s At the Mountains of Madness. The game’s art style is also strongly reminiscent of the pulpy magazine and novel covers from the 50s and 60s. The developer (aptly named Starward Industries) promises a non-linear storyline as well as immersive gameplay and is currently being developed in the Unreal Engine. The game is slated to drop for PS5, Xbox Series consoles, and PC next year. You can check out the music preview trailer here:

What do you think of this week for indie games? Are you gonna try “An Airport for Aliens Currently Run by Dogs?” What do you think of the music from The Invincible? As always, let us know what you think in the comments, and be sure to keep it locked to COGconnected for all your gaming news!

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The post The Best Indie News & Video Games From The Third Week of September, 2020 appeared first on COGconnected.

This week in indie games news: celebrations are in the works for a particularly celebrated title, an anime-style adventure is making its way to next-gen consoles, and an acclaimed PlayStation classic makes its way to PC. Let’s take a look!

Toby Fox Details Undertale Anniversary Event (And Discusses Deltarune)

Earlier this week, Toby Fox took to Twitter to announce a concert stream featuring the music of Undertale performed by Music Engine (I don’t really know what it is either) for the game’s 5th anniversary. The stream will be made up of footage from a concert Music Engine performed in May of 2019, and fans can check it out on the official Undertale YouTube page and website on September 15th at 7 pm PST (10 pm EST). Additionally, new Undertale merch will be revealed during the stream including a shirt that Toby designed, with merch proceeds going towards the United Way COVID-19 Response and Recovery Fund. You can get a reminder set up for the concert right here.

https://t.co/CiqBCnPvlA has been updated! First announcement…

♪UNDERTALE 5th Anniversary Concert Stream♪
(organized by Fangamer & 8-4)

On 9/15 at 7PM PDT (10PM EST), we’ll be streaming a free orchestral concert by MUSIC Engine! Check out https://t.co/CiqBCnPvlA for details! pic.twitter.com/CGqrAJQ1wx

— tobyfox (@tobyfox) September 8, 2020

Toby Fox also did an interview with Japanese gaming outlet Famitsu for their 5th Anniversary feature on the game and discussed how development on Undertale’s successor Deltarune is going. There’s no official English translation just yet, but according to the folks at Dualshockers Toby has said that he’s completed most of the game design work. He’s finished the first draft of all the cutscene dialogues, and the help of a small team has allowed development on Chapter 2 to progress much faster than that of Chapter 1. Toby made a point of making clear that he has no idea when the game will release and suggested forgetting about him and Deltarune altogether until that time comes. You can check out some of the screenshots right here:

Publisher Annapurna Announces PS4 Collection

Annapurna Interactive is also celebrating a 5-year anniversary with two PS4 exclusive collector’s bundles. Made in partnership with iam8bit, the bundles include 8 of Annapurna’s most acclaimed titles. Two of the games included – Gorogoa and Telling Lies – will be seeing their first physical releases on PS4 through these collections. Between the two editions, one will be exclusively available through iam8bit – The Annapurna Interactive Deluxe PS4 Edition – and will cost $199.99 USD. It comes with a foreword from the publisher’s founder Nathan Gach, as well as statements from the creators of each game included. The other edition – The Ultimate PS4 Collection – will go for $179.99 USD and includes exclusive box art for each game. You can check out the list of included titles and any of COGconnected’s reviews for them right here:

• Donut County
• Gorogoa
• Kentucky Route Zero: TV Edition
• Outer Wilds
• Sayonara Wild Hearts
• Telling Lies
• Wattam
• What Remains of Edith Finch

The Unfinished Swan Releases on PC and iOS

Speaking of What Remains of Edith Finch, the team behind that game – Giant Sparrow – has brought their debut game The Unfinished Swan to PC and iOS. Released back in 2012 to massive critical acclaim, The Unfinished Swan is a first-person adventure game where you play as a young orphan boy discovering a long-abandoned kingdom as he chases a swan escaped from one of his late mother’s unfinished paintings. Players wander through a blank canvas world using an enchanted paintbrush to uncover its desolate kingdom while solving puzzles and confronting dangerous creatures. It’s an indie-boom darling, and it’s now available on PC through Steam and Epic Games Store for $14.99 USD/$17.49 CAD, as well as the iOS App Store for $4.99 USD/$6.99 CAD. The PC versions are currently 10% off in both stores too!

Monster Boy and the Cursed Kingdom Getting Next-Gen Update

Another indie gem is joining the journey into next-gen by way of graphical updates! Monster Boy and the Cursed Kingdom’s publisher FDG Entertainment revealed that the game will be receiving the 4K 120 frames-per-second treatment for PS5 and Xbox Series consoles, with current owners receiving the upgrades as a free update. Over on Twitter FDG Entertainment also hinted that the game could include some form of DualSense support, and clarified that the promise of 4K at 120fps is specific to HDMI 2.1 supported devices, but HDMI 2.0 owners will still be able to play at 4K at 60fps. There’s no official release date or window for the update yet, but from the way the publisher talked about it in response to some users on Twitter, it sounds like it may not be too long after the new consoles launch.

Hades Switch/PC Cross-Save Plans Change

Last month when Supergiant announced that their latest title Hades would be coming to the Nintendo Switch, they also revealed that players would be able to bring their save files over from Early Access on PC using cross-save. Earlier this week, the developer revealed that they’ve actually run into some issues making that happen, and so the feature will be introduced “in an update later this year after Hades v1.0 launches this fall.” Game development is hard, and I personally would assume that the team is using their time to make sure that v1.0 is totally ready to launch in its fall target window. You can check out our preview of it right here!

pic.twitter.com/dfWJhevjBB

— Supergiant Games (@SupergiantGames) September 11, 2020

What do you think of this week for indie games? Are you picking up the Annapurna Collection? Will you be watching the Undertale Anniversary Concert stream? As always, let us know what you think in the comments, and be sure to keep it locked to COGconnected for all your gaming news!

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The post The Best Indie News & Video Games From The Second Week of September, 2020 appeared first on COGconnected.

It’s been a bit of a somber week in indie gaming as the tail end of Gamescom wrapped up (find some of the best indie news from Gamescom HERE) and some beloved indie studios ran into trouble, with one beloved publisher shutting down entirely. On the bright side, there have been a couple of neat trailers released for some hotly anticipated titles and they are looking better (and closer) than ever. Let’s check it all out!

Skullgirls Studio Work Culture Issues Come to a Head

Over the past couple of months, things at Lab Zero Games became quite tense as sexual assault allegations were made regarding the studio’s owner and co-creator of Skullgirls Mike Zaimont back in July. Then, this past August 24th staff began resigning, citing a toxic work culture perpetuated by Zaimont. Several of the resigning staff posted testimonials on Twitter recounting Zaimont’s inappropriate behavior and their request for his resignation. Zaimont refused and gave staff members unhappy with the decision until August 31st to leave, which several did on August 24th. Shortly thereafter, Skullgirls IP holder Autumn Games and developer Hidden Variable (who works on the Skullgirls mobile port) made an official statement distancing themselves from Lab Zero Games and Zaimont specifically. Earlier this week, Zaimont laid off the remaining studio staff, claiming in an email to Kotaku that: “Unfortunately, Lab Zero was forced into layoffs because we were no longer able to meet our payroll obligations.” According to one of the resigning staff members, Jonathan Kim, Zaimont has yet to agree to severance for the laid-off staff. With the studio’s entire staff gone, the ongoing development of additional content for Indivisible has been brought into question.

Indie Studio Vlambeer Closes Doors

After 10 years of making games including Radical Fishing, Luftrausers, and Nuclear Throne, the founders of Vlambeer have decided to close the studio. Rami Ismail and Jan Willem Nijman announced the decision on the studio’s tenth anniversary this past September 1st, citing their respective (and respectful) diverting trajectories in their game development careers. That being said, the studio’s final game Ultrabugs is still on the way (no release date yet), and they’re currently running a “Vlambeer and Friends” sale on Steam. For the foreseeable future, Ismail and Nijman are planning to do more of what they’ve been doing well for the past few years. Nijman is looking forward to making more games with smaller development teams like 2018’s Minit (which he worked on with 3 other developers), and Ismail is focusing on continuing to make games more diverse through engaging with developers in developing countries.

Sable Gets New Gameplay Video at Gamescom

Indie un-publisher Raw Fury and developer Shedworks released a new look at Sable with a narrated gameplay video from Gamescom. The video explains a bit about the main character’s backstory and has a lot of serene hover-biking across the cel-shaded sand dunes. It also shows off a bit of the environmental diversity from ancient ruins to dilapidated spaceships, and the puzzle platforming players will be doing in them. The game seems to be coming along nicely, though I’m personally not sure if the stunted framerate is serving the game as well as the developer thinks it might be. We’ll find out when the game launches sometime next year.

Indie Smash-Bros-like Fighter Bounty Battle Releases Next Week

After being successfully crowdfunded back in 2017, indie brawler Bounty Battle is finally entering the fray this coming Thursday, September 10th for PC, PS4, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch. Developer Dark Screen Games released an animated trailer to mark the occasion, and players will recognize characters from Guacamelee, Darkest Dungeon, Dead Cells, Owlboy, and the aforementioned Vlambeer’s Nuclear Throne (as well as a whole lot more). It also has characters from indie games that aren’t even out yet, including EITR and Tower of Samsara. Given its mashup nature, it’s sure to be a title that will burden the developer with never-ending character requests – so I’ll start now! I would love to see Raji from Raji: An Ancient Epic join the fight, as she is canonically a skilled fighter, and that game rules. Check out the trailer for Bounty Battle here:

Cloudpunk Gets a Console Release Date

Console gamers who were jealous of PC gaming’s beloved cyberpunk game Cloudpunk earlier this year need not be jealous for much longer. Developer Ion Lands has revealed that the game will be delivered to PS4, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch this coming October 15th. The developer also recently announced that a new update adding a few more hours of gameplay is in the works, and will include a first-person cockpit view alongside a new racing mechanic. It’ll also include some new characters, and missions for old ones. Check out the reveal trailer right here:

What do you think of this week for indie games? Are you looking forward to Sable? Who would you main in Bounty Battle? As always, let us know what you think in the comments, and be sure to keep it locked to COGconnected for all your gaming news!

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The post The Best Indie News & Video Games From The First Week of September, 2020 appeared first on COGconnected.

It’s been another great week for indie games with Gamescom kicking off this past week. Canada’s own Geoff Keighley kicked off the festivities with Opening Night Live on Tuesday, and since then the indie game floodgates have opened as new trailers are released for tons of upcoming titles. Plus, a recent release gets an updated roadmap, a tycoon classic (and a personal favorite) comes to Switch, and more! Let’s check it out!

Ooblets Dev Releases Roadmap

July’s adorable indie-darling Ooblets released its roadmap with details for what the team is aiming for throughout the rest of 2020, as well as when to expect the full launch in early 2021. Players can expect the first major content update this September with the v.04 Nullwhere update. Glumberland is promising a new “visitable region with associated ooblets, new crops, and new recipes” called Nullwhere. Here, the ooblets you’ve already been able to gather will come in uncommon and gleamy versions, with custom movesets in the works as well. As for October, the developer is planning a Halloween event but is currently still cooking up ideas for what exactly that will be. You can check out more of the Ooblets roadmap at the official website, and it looks like the full launch can be expected in mid/late 2021.

Game Dev Tycoon Coming to Switch

Developer Greenheart Games has announced they’re bringing their popular PC and mobile title Game Dev Tycoon to Nintendo Switch this October 8th. This announcement is a bit of a surprise as the game originally dropped all the way back in 2012, and Greenheart has been hard at work on their latest title, Tavern Keeper, for quite some time now. Personally speaking, Game Dev Tycoon is one of my favorite games in general, and it offers a lot of insight into the inner workings of how games get made in the real world. Our own Clayton Cyre gave a great rundown of how the game works when the news broke earlier this week. If you haven’t picked it up on Steam or mobile already, I highly recommend checking it out when it hits the Switch.

Children of Morta Supports Humane Society with DLC

Developer Dead Mage has released an animal-centric DLC for Children of Morta, with 100% of the revenue going to Human Society International. The DLC itself comes with a bunch of new animals that will help players in their journey, as well as an animal shelter where you can take care of all the new critters. These furry companions will have their own happiness levels and offer some useful buffs including XP and speed boosts, as well as increased luck, dodge, and critical hit chances. The Paws and Claws DLC is available now on Steam, Xbox, PS4, and Nintendo Switch for only $4.00 USD, and is joined by a free Treasure Pack update as well.

New Little Nightmares 2 Trailer

A year after being announced at Gamescom 2019, Tarsier Studios debuted a new trailer for Little Nightmares 2 complete with a release date of February 11th, 2021. The sequel is set to take place right after the events of the original game and will see Six accompanied by a new friend named Mono, a little boy with a paper bag over his head. Also, Mono and Six can hold hands and it is super adorable, which should make traversing through this game’s intimidatingly creepy world that much more bearable. When Little Nightmares II launches this coming February, it’ll be available for PC, PS4, Xbox One, and Switch, and you can check out a 15-minute gameplay preview from Bandai Namco right here!

12 Minutes Gets Star-Studded Voice Cast

Annapurna Interactive has finally given us an update on 12 Minutes after over a year of radio silence. This update comes in the form of a new trailer revealing that 3 distinctly recognizable voices have joined the project, with James McAvoy voicing the player character, Daisy Ridley voicing the player character’s wife, and Thomas Wake himself, Willem Dafoe joining the project as the narrator. There wasn’t much information provided beyond that (none, actually), but the game is still slated to release later this year for PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.

What do you think of this week for indie games? Are you looking forward to any of the indie games announced at Gamescom? Will you be picking up Game Dev Tycoon on Switch? As always, let us know what you think in the comments, and be sure to keep it locked to COGconnected for all your gaming news!

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The post The Best Indie News & Video Games August 23-30, 2020 appeared first on COGconnected.

Welcome to this week’s edition of the COGconnected Weekly Indie Roundup, where we’re recapping the past week’s hottest indie gaming news. It’s been another big week for indie games as Nintendo hosted an Indie World Showcase, announcing a ton of games coming in the next several months, as well as some surprise releases you can play right now. It was also a week of delays and unexpected reveals from across the world. Let’s get started!

Reigns Developer Making an Animal Farm Game

Not like Ooblets or Animal Crossing – they’re making a game based on George Orwell’s literary novel of the same name about the Russian Revolution in the early 1900s. According to a press release from the publisher The Dairymen, “players must devise strategies to balance resources, defend the farm, and keep the animal population happy.” The game will feature “1930s painterly graphics,” as well as narration from Abubakar Salim, who you may know better as Bayek of Siwa from 2017’s Assassin’s Creed Origins. His performance is also being directed by Kate Saxon, whose resume includes The Witcher 2 and 3, Alien Isolation, and Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture. The game is set to drop this fall on Steam and mobile.

Golf Story Successor Delayed

Sidebar Games has announced that its ambitious follow-up to 2017’s Golf Story – aptly named Sports Story – won’t be slam dunking a touchdown in 2020 as previously strategized. The game was originally slated to release sometime in “Mid-2020” after being revealed during a Nintendo Indie Showcase back in December. According to the developer, the release is being delayed to allow the team to “ensure that everything makes it into the game.” Sports Story is looking to include many recreational physical activities outside of golf including tennis, football, volleyball, baseball, cricket, and RPG mechanics.

We’ve prepared a Sports Story update video to shed some more light on the situation. ??? pic.twitter.com/FpGPVyFhD3

— Sidebar Games (@sidebargames) August 17, 2020

Firewatch Movie Gets Another Shot

Indie production studio Snoot Entertainment has scooped up the big screen (and small screen) rights to Campo Santo’s 2016 hit. A movie was previously in development with production house Good Universe before it was sold to Lionsgate, which triggered the rights being returned to Campo Santo themselves. The new project is being produced by Keith Calder (Blair Witch 2016) and Jess Wu Calder (One Night in Miami) on the Snoot side of things, along with Sean Vanaman and Jake Rodkin on the Campo Santo side of things (writer and director respectively). There are no further details beyond that, but personally, I think it’s great that more people will get to experience the moving story that Firewatch has to offer.

The Stanley Parable: Ultra Deluxe Version Stanley’d into 2021

This is the game’s second delay after being revealed back in 2018, as it was originally slated for 2019 before being kicked into 2020. Developer Crows Crows Crows announced the news on Twitter with what looks to be a photoshopping of the delay announcements of other titles, edited to include “The Stanley Parable” and the studio’s name. It makes me think – how much are they really packing into this Ultra Deluxe version? As it is, The Stanley Parable takes only a handful of hours to complete, so like…what are they doing in there? Consider my curiosity piqued!

The Stanley Parable: Ultra Deluxe Development Update pic.twitter.com/rdKzJA7yaf

— Crows Crows Crows (@crowsx3) August 18, 2020

Nintendo Indie Showcase Drops Several Surprise Releases

This week’s Indie showcase from Nintendo included quite a few pleasant surprises. Untitled Goose Game is getting multiplayer in an upcoming update and physical release later this fall. Supergiant’s Hades is coming to Switch with cross-save for PC players. The developers behind Reigns are making even more games, with Card Sharks set to be coming to the hybrid console and PC next year. But the real star of the show was all of the surprise launches that day – A Short Hike, Manifold Garden, Spiritfarer, Takeshi & Hiroshi, Evergate, and Raji: An Ancient Epic (which I gush about in my preview) all became available shortly after the showcase concluded. They also dropped with a slight discount, and Nintendo kicked off an even bigger sale for indie titles across the platform.

Chinese Indie Developer Wows Internet with 13-Minute Gameplay Trailer

If you follow people in the gaming community, it may have been hard to miss hearing about Black Myth: Wu Kong this past week. Chinese indie developer named Game Science dropped a whopping 13-minute gameplay trailer alongside a plethora of screenshots for the title, which is inspired by Journey to the West and features soulslike gameplay. Game Science mentions on their official website that they chose to reveal the game in an effort to attract more experienced developers, as their current team is quite small. They also mentioned that the game currently doesn’t have a release window but that “it shouldn’t take 500 years.” That’s great, because that is a very long time, and I will be very dead by then and would like to play this game as soon as possible.

What do you think of this week for indie games? Are you looking forward to Black Myth: Wu Kong? Did you pick anything up from the Nintendo Indie showcase? What’s up with that Animal Farm game? As always, let us know what you think in the comments, and be sure to keep it locked to COGconnected for all your gaming news!

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The post The Best Indie News & Video Games From The Third Week of August, 2020 appeared first on COGconnected.

Welcome to COGconnected’s weekly indie roundup, where we recap some of the hottest indie news of the week! This week we saw a hotly anticipated title get the physical release treatment, a new title from a beloved studio, and a big update on a game that some of us have been looking forward to for a couple of years now. There’s some pretty exciting stuff in here, so let’s get started!

Mortal Shell Gets Physical Release Later This Year

Upcoming soulslike indie title Mortal Shell is bringing its horrifying atmosphere to the physical realm this coming October 2nd. The team behind the game made the announcement on the official website, and the physical edition will be coming to PC, PS4, and Xbox One for $29.99 USD/$39.99 CAD/€34.99 / £29.99. It’s worth noting that the PC version will not actually contain a disc, and will instead contain a key that can be redeemed on the Epic Games store. It’ll also include “an exclusive fold-out poster and softback artbook, featuring never-before-seen concept images and character art,” all of which will also be included in the PS4 and Xbox One versions as well. The accompanying image showing the physical edition’s box art notes that the cover is not final, but personally, I think it looks pretty neat! The digital version of the game is set to drop this coming Tuesday, August 18th for the aforementioned platforms.

Oxenfree Devs New Game Drops on Apple Arcade

Night School Studios of Oxenfree and Afterparty fame released their latest title Next Stop: Nowhere on Apple Arcade this past Friday. In it, you’ll play as a courier named Becket who is tasked with helping a former bounty hunter named Serra find their son Eddie. The gameplay includes dialogue choices similar to past Night School Studios titles, as well as a “spaceship that comes fully equipped with his own personality.” Creative Director Sean Krankel tweeted out a shortlist of inspirations for the game when it launched yesterday, and a couple of them may surprise you:

inspirations include:
– Grosse Point Blank
– Pineapple Express
– the Millenium Falcon
– Designer Republic circa ‘96
– sticking your arm out the window on a road trip https://t.co/ZDMzyRgNjT

— sean krankel (@seankrankel) August 14, 2020

If you don’t have access to Apple Arcade and want to try it out – try not to fret. I personally would assume the game will make its way to other platforms sooner or later, the same way other iOS titles have in the past, including Apple Arcade launch title Oceanhorn 2.

20th Dead Cells Update Includes New Weapons and Level

Dead Cells developers Motion Twin and Evil Empire dropped a new update for the 2D soulslike cult-hit earlier this week titled “Barrels ‘O Fun.” The update adds a new biome named Derelict Distillery that hosts a plethora of explosive barrels, and 3 new achievements for players to unlock. It also comes with a new Barrel Launcher weapon, that does exactly what it says on the tin with a bang (Get it? Because they explode). The update also includes an 8-bit version of the game’s entire soundtrack, which can be enabled from the sound menu. The Barrels O’ Fun update is currently available for players on Steam but will be making its way to console versions at an undetermined date.

Atomic Heart Welcomes Doom’s Mick Gordon and Debuts Boss Battle Gameplay

It’s been a while since we’ve gotten some substantial info from the folks at Mundfish on the hotly anticipated Atomic Heart aside from a 4K gameplay teaser back in March. This week the floodgates were opened to douse us with sweet, sweet details on how things are going with the title, and I’d say it’s all good news! Mundfish confirmed that the game will be coming to PS5 and Xbox Series X alongside the previously announced current-gen versions, and released a shiny new boss battle trailer that includes the first taste of a very industrial-sounding score from Doom (2016) and Doom Eternal composer Mick Gordon. The trailer also shows off quite a bit of gameplay and a mechanic that seems to let players track enemies through walls (similar to the listening mode in The Last of Us). The boss battle itself is against Plyush, which the developer described to IGN’s Ryan McCaffrey as “an organic enemy which might just be a product of some secret governmental deeds.” Personally, I think it looks like Bloodborne’s Blood Starved Beast, but less cute by like, a lot (super cuddly though!). Mundfish also mentioned to IGN that the game is primarily being developed as a next-gen title and that it “will have no loading screens due to [the] fast SSD.” Unfortunately, one thing they didn’t mention this week was a release date, so here’s hoping for one soon!

Pony Island Developer Announces New Deckbuilding Horror Game

It’s a good week when a developer known for weird games announces a new weird game, and this was one of those weeks. Daniel Mullins Games has announced Inscryption, a new roguelike-deckbuilding-escape room-horror game that seems to somehow include even more genres and mechanics than that when you watch the trailer. The game is currently available to wishlist on Steam and is set to drop for PC in 2021 with “likely post-release console launch” according to the game’s press kit. There’s not much else known about the game for now, and it’s likely to stay that way until launch, which I personally will be eagerly anticipating – I love esoteric horror weirdness.

So what do you think? Will you be picking up a physical copy of Mortal Shell? Or jumping back into Dead Cells? And what do you think of Inscryption? Let us know in the comments, and be sure to keep it locked to COGconnected for all the latest indie and triple-A gaming news!

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The post The Best Indie News & Video Games From The Second Week of August, 2020 appeared first on COGconnected.

Welcome to the first installment of COGconnected’s weekly indie gaming news roundup! We’re recapping some of the hottest indie gaming news from this week while delivering some hot-to-lukewarm takes. This has been one of the most exciting weeks for indie games in quite a while, so let’s get started!

Falling for Fall Guys

Gaming’s feel-good hit of the Summer released this past Tuesday to overwhelming success, garnering over 1.5 million players in its first 24 hours. Developer Mediatonic clearly wasn’t expecting this kind of turnout for a little indie game about beans running punishing gauntlets, as the servers took quite a tumble and left the game unplayable for the majority of the day. Some players expressed their disappointment with server issues by review-bombing the game on Steam, but the more excited crowd wasn’t going to allow their new baby to be subject to this negativity. Fall Guys was reverse-review-bombed back into a “Mostly Positive” rating on Steam and has consistently been in the top 5 most-watched games on Twitch throughout the week. Other developers have also been joining in on the fun, with the game launching with exclusive Half-Life skins on Steam, and a Hotline Miam skin joining the shop later in the week. The official Fall Guys Twitter account has also been trying to make a collaboration with CD Projekt Red happen in anticipation of this year’s Cyberpunk 2077 launch, with the latter’s official Twitter account playing along by setting the ridiculous condition of “Just One Retweet” to seal the deal. It’s also worth noting that Mediatonic has opened up some positions for 3D environment art staff on their team, likely to help make some new levels for future updates. Fall Guys has also officially been Devolver Digital’s most successful launch ever, despite the ongoing server issues as more players jump in. Fall Guys is currently available on Steam, as well as PS4 where it’s free for PS+ subscribers. You can check what our very own Jaz Sagoo thought of the game right here!

Mortal Shell Breaks Out This Month

After opening up the beta in July due to overwhelming demand, Publisher Playstack has revealed that Cold Symmetry’s upcoming Soulslike/action-RPG Mortal Shell will be released this coming August 18th for PS4, Xbox One, and the Epic Games Store. The Steam version of the game will be dropping sometime in 2021. The date was revealed in a shiny new trailer that shows off a ton of the game’s unnerving atmosphere set to a neck-breaking symphonic metal track, and a wild new weapon being referred to as a “Ballistazooka.” Mortal Shell is currently available for pre-purchase on the Epic Games Store, and you can check out COGconnected’s official beta impressions right here.

PlayStation State of Play Sets Indies Up for Next-Gen Success

This week’s State of Play from PlayStation sure had a ton of indie-games in it, most of which are coming to both PS4 and PS5 (as well as several other platforms in some cases) over the course of the next year. One of the bigger reveals was an anniversary edition of Braid coming to current and next-gen consoles that’s been entirely hand re-painted. Some areas will include new pieces of scenery or structures, and the game will come with various commentaries from the game’s developer.

Additionally, PlayStation revealed that indie hit Temtem would be coming to the PlayStation 5 sometime next year and will be skipping the current-gen consoles, despite those ports being promised in the game’s Kickstarter. That being said, backers who were waiting on the PS4 and Xbox One versions of the game can claim a refund from the developer, or opt for a copy of the game on next-gen consoles.

This State of Play also included a release date for Spelunky 2, which will be coming to PS4 on September 15th. Octodad developer Young Horse released the first gameplay trailer for the bizarre, already-cult-hit Bugsnax, and puzzle-platformer The Pedestrian by Shookum Games will be coming to PS4 and PS5 next year.

Aeon Must Die! Developer Accused of Abuse and Foul Play

A super-stylish, side-scrolling action game called Aeon Must Die! Was also revealed during this week’s State of Play, but immediately afterward the game was mired in controversy. After the reveal, a separate trailer was uploaded containing new footage not present in the State of Play trailer. The second trailer’s description includes a link to a dropbox full of evidence such as audio files and testimonies from Limestone Games employees who had resigned due to the “endless crunch, harassment, abuse, corruption and manipulation” experienced at the studio. A number of the allegations point towards Limestone Games CEO Yaroslav Lyssenko, claiming he has “covertly” taken the studio from former CCO and co-founder Aleksei Nehoroshkin, as well as sent threatening letters to staff and ignored their legal representation.
Focus Home Interactive is set to publish Aeon Must Die!, and has released a statement regarding the accusations.

Our statement regarding Limestone Games and Aeon Must Die!. pic.twitter.com/75ldhtp27T

— Focus Home Interactive (@FocusHome) August 7, 2020

Aeon Must Die! is set to release for PC, PS4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch sometime in 2021, but given the circumstances, that may change.

Classic Survival Horror Tormented Souls Announced

Tormented Souls was revealed with a new trailer earlier this week, and looks to fill that fixed-perspective, survival horror shaped hole in your heart, as it wears its Resident Evil and Silent Hill influences on its sleeve. The game follows the story of Caroline Walker as she investigates the disappearance of two young twin girls in the super-spooky Winterlake Mansion. The trailer itself reeks of classic survival horror game tropes – soft piano music, tinkering with little items to figure out puzzles, and monstrous-looking-men lurking the halls. It looks like Caroline will also have the ability to traverse the mansion through different time periods by passing through mirrors placed around the mansion. Tormented Souls is set to drop on current-gen consoles and PC next year, and can be wishlisted on Steam now.

So what do you think of this week in indie games? Have you gotten any crowns in Fall Guys? Are you looking forward to Mortal Shell? And what did you think of this week’s State of Play? Let us know what you think in the comments and be sure to keep it locked to COGconnected for all your gaming news!

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The post The Best Indie News & Video Games From The First Week of August, 2020 appeared first on COGconnected.

Xbox’s Summer Games Fest Demo event kicked off this past Tuesday by dropping over 70 demos for upcoming indie games onto the Microsoft Store. That’s an awful lot of demos, and as much as I would have liked to play them all, I also have to sleep, eat, and do other stuff to stay alive that’s quite time-consuming. So, I chose four titles that piqued my interest to take them out for a whirl, and here’s what I thought of them!

Book of Adventum

The demo for Book of Adventum does a great job of asking questions about its world – a derelict, industrial wasteland populated by automatons and you, an “Associate of the Inventor’s Guild.” In this short snippet from the game, you’re tasked with fixing up a transmitter beacon to gain access to an underground facility on Thunderhead Point Island. It’s very clearly inspired by narrative-driven sci-fi shooters from the early 2000s and wears its influences on its sleeve with references to Bioshock and Half-Life in plain sight. The enemy automatons you’ll come across are vaguely reminiscent of Dishonored 2’s Clockwork Soldiers, and combat can get intense pretty quickly, though the game’s controls tend to get in the way of sustaining the fluidity it may be trying to achieve. I found myself continuously halting the action when trying to sprint, as pressing in the left stick brings up the weapons menu, which is also somewhat janky. In fact, I found myself struggling with the controls quite a bit throughout the demo. The B button removes the HUD (or as the game calls it, Goggle Glass) for no discernable reason, and turning on the flashlight involves pressing both B and the left bumper at the same time. Using items is restricted to an inventory menu only accessed by pausing the game, which is definitely a mechanic best left in yesteryear. Overall the game’s story and world do seem intriguing, but its deliberately dated design may hold me back from unraveling its secrets.

Book of Adventum doesn’t have a release date just yet, and it’s hard to find basically anything about it online aside from the existence of this demo. I guess it’s safe to assume that it’ll be available for Xbox One whenever it does release.

Genesis Noir

My interest was piqued by Genesis Noir’s bizarre teaser and unique art style, but I found that neither of them was particularly indicative of what I was going to experience playing this demo – which is honestly a magical thing. It opens up with a brief explanation of cosmic background radiation, which “allows scientists to listen to the moment of the big bang and compose a timeline of the birth of the universe,” and starts you off right then and there at the beginning of all things. Throughout the demo, you’ll explore a city through cinematic, comic-book styled point-and-click segments that transition into improvisational jazz sessions with musicians you’ll meet along the way. It sounds like a lot to take in, but the game does a great job of keeping it simple and engaging. 

Now, I hadn’t read the summary on the shop page, so my interpretation of the game’s plot was: “You play as an aspiring jazz musician making his way in the world.” As it turns out, I seem to have missed the mark quite a bit – here’s the game’s actual description on the Microsoft Store page: A noir adventure spanning time and space. When a love triangle between cosmic beings becomes a bitter confrontation, you’ll witness a gunshot fired by a jealous god—otherwise known as The Big Bang. Jump into the expanding universe and search for a way to destroy creation and save your love.

In another timeline, this could be a Hideo Kojima game.

Genesis Noir doesn’t have a release date just yet but is set to be available for PC, Mac, and Xbox One.

Raji: An Ancient Epic

It’s hard for me to do justice to how awesome this game actually is, but here goes: Raji: An Ancient Epic is an absolutely badass action-adventure game set in Ancient India that, if it were receiving the AAA treatment it deserves, would probably be this year’s God of War. It tells the story of a young carnival performer chosen by the gods to fight off hordes of demons after they kidnap her younger brother, which is told through puppet show vignettes and narrations from Durga and Vishnu. This game is stupid gorgeous, with absolutely beautiful art direction and breathtaking environments that will absolutely inspire you with wanderlust. In the demo, combat doesn’t get too deep, but you’ll definitely feel badass striking down demons with Durga’s Trishula imbued with lightning powers while backflipping off of walls and carts. My only qualm with this game is its pseudo-isometric camera, as it doesn’t do justice to the scale of the environments and ultimately the story itself. I definitely think this game would benefit from a more dynamic camera during gameplay, and a more cinematic one during certain moments evoking signature Bollywood melodrama. That being said, I understand (or at least assume) that this presentation is due to the limitations of the developer’s budget, timeline, or both. This is a game that I’ll definitely be seeing through to the end once it releases, and I hope many others do as well.

Raji: An Ancient Epic doesn’t have a release date just yet, but will be available for PC, Xbox One, PS4, and Nintendo Switch.

Destroy All Humans

The shiny new remaster of Destroy All Humans makes it very clear that it is just that right off the bat with a disclaimer that “while the experience has been upgraded, the content and historical records of the original invasion of the Furons remains a near-identical clone.” This is much more concerning than it is exciting, as standards have changed quite a bit in the 15 years since the original release. The opening cutscenes (shiny as they are) definitely show the game’s age, particularly in its attempts at humor. The gameplay does feel quite a bit tighter and more intuitive than it did on the more recent ports of the original title but ultimately doesn’t translate to being particularly exciting. Destroying humanity feels almost passive from the comfort of your spaceship, but on the ground, it’s still fun to use Psychokinesis to toss puny humans into the stratosphere. Overall I think if THQ really wanted to revive this franchise, it may have been wiser to try something fresh and new. The nostalgia buy for this game will likely be a tighter niche than expected, and I have a hard time believing modern youngsters would see the appeal that I did at age 13. 

Destroy All Humans invades Earth on July 28th for PC, PS4, Xbox One, and Stadia.

Have you tried any of the indie demos currently available on Xbox One? Find any gems you think we should check out? Let us know in the comments!

The post Beat the Heat With These Refreshingly Cool Indie Video Game Demos appeared first on COGconnected.

The upcoming Iceborne expansion for Monster Hunter World is expected to be pretty huge and massive, so it’s not too surprising that it’s set to be the game’s sole full-scale DLC.

In an interview with Game Informer, producer Ryozo Tsujimoto confirmed the news, saying “Yes, Iceborne basically completes World so it will be the last expansion, we’re still planning a lot of updates for the future.”

While it’s great news that there will be more updates, it’s a bit of a shame that the team has no intention of making more of the developer’s best selling game in history. However, it’s nice to think that perhaps they’re forgoing more DLC in favor of a sequel, maybe even for next gen consoles! Wishful thinking, but considering how much money it made for Capcom and ongoing popularity, I’d say it’s more likely than not. That being said, perhaps I’m being ridiculous, wishing for more when the allegedly enormous expansion is still two months away.

Monster Hunter World is currently available for PC, PS4 and Xbox One, and the Iceborne expansion will be dropping this coming September 6th. In other recent news, hunters won’t need to purchase the Iceborne expansion to get the new Dynamic Mode difficulty releasing with the DLC, and Capcom recently released a few trailers showing off new monster hunting weapons. Let us know what you think in the comments!

SOURCE: Game Informer

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After fans found evidence of “Shadow Pokemon” in Pokemon GO‘s data, some also stumbled across a reference to the nefarious and beloved Team Rocket. It looks like Niantic is now officially teasing the longtime Pokemon villain’s entry with a hot air balloon in the hardest game of all – real life.

The Team Rocket is in Dortmund ! from r/TheSilphRoad

A redditor by the handle J0hnd0euf posted a picture from the Pokemon GO Fest in Dortmund, Germany, that shows an airborne hot air balloon sporting Team Rocket’s classic logo. According to Eurogamer, fans present at the event were encouraged to get together for a photo as it passed over.

Tthe datamined information hints that Team Rocket grunts will be making their way to Pokemon GO along with the Shadow Pokemon, and players will get an achievement for taking them on (and for purifying the latter). However, there’s no official word on when the content will be making it’s way yet, so best to wait for the announcement from Niantic.

In the meantime, Armored Mewtwo joined the raid fray yesterday in a promotional event for the upcoming CG remake of Mewtwo Strikes Back, and Game Freak shut down the possibility of the national dex coming to Pokemon Sword & Shield. Let us know what you think in the comments!

SOURCE: Eurogamer, Reddit

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Developer Crytek has revealed that their western PVP-monster-hunting shooter Hunt: Showdown will be leaving Xbox Game Preview and Early Access in August for a full launch, complete with a physical retail edition.

The game will be receiving a ton of updates between now and then and is promised to release with a new boss, map, and two “new times of day.” There’ll also be a new Quick Play mode, new AI, and over a dozen new weapons to root-n-toot with.

The exact release date is August 27th on both PC and Xbox One, and a PS4 launch is set to drop sometime this fall. The game will be priced at $39.99 USD ($49.99 CAD), and a physical retail edition will be distributed by Koch Media. Be sure to check out the most recent trailer from GDC back in March. Let us know if you’ll be joining the hunt in the comments!

SOURCE: Crytek

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