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Mortal Kombat 11 was the best-selling game on all platforms in April 2019

Posted on May 22, 2019 by John Scalzo

The NPD Group’s Mat Piscatella has given us a look (via Twitter) at the best-selling games from April 2019.

Unsurprisingly, Mortal Kombat 11 KOed the competition as the top game during the period. And according to Piscatella, NetherRealm’s fighter also became the first game to sit atop the charts as the best-selling individual game on the PC, PS4, Switch, and Xbox One in the same the month.

Not far behind was Sony’s Days Gone. The post-apocalyptic action game was developed by Sony Bend, and while it might have been overshadowed by some of the other titles in the consolemaker’s catalog, it landed in the #2 spot for April.

The remainder of April’s best-selling games chart is made up of a lot of titles we’ve seen before, including recent releases MLB 19: The Show (#3), Tom Clancy’s The Division 2 (#4), Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice (#7), and perennial mainstays Grand Theft Auto V (#6) and Minecraft (#14).

You can find a full list of best-selling games from April 2019 after the break. (more…)

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New Retail Releases: Team Sonic Racing, More

Posted on May 20, 2019 by John Scalzo

Sonic the Hedgehog is stepping out of his famous red sneakers this week and strapping on a racing helmet in Team Sonic Racing, which will be available for the PS4, Switch, and Xbox One (and as a digital download for the PC).

The Blue Blur’s latest automotive aspirations will be joined on store shelves this week by a slew of pair of less-speedy new releases. Sony and Clap Hanz will tee it up in virtual reality in Everybody’s Golf VR for the PS4. And Koei Tecmo will begin writing the next chapter in the Atelier series with the launch of Atelier Lulua: The Scion of Arland for the PS4 and Switch.

Elsewhere on store shelves, publishers and developers continue to fill out the Switch’s library with seemingly every game ever released. During the next seven days, Ubisoft will bring Assassin’s Creed III Remastered (which contains the original game and the Liberation spinoff) to the Switch, while Capcom will package together a Resident Evil Origins Collection (Resident Evil and Resident Evil 0) for the platform, and 11 Bit Studios will do the same for This War of Mine: Complete Edition.

And speaking of expansions, Bethesda will release The Elder Scrolls Online: Elsweyr for the PC, PS4, and Xbox One (UPDATE: The release of the Elsweyr expansion was delayed to June 4).

Finally this week, Oculus will expand their product line with a pair of standalone VR headsets (the Oculus Quest 64GB and the Oculus Quest 128GB), as well as the PC-powered Oculus Rift S.

You can find even more new releases after the break. (more…)

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Rumor: Cold War-centered Call of Duty 2020 scrapped in favor of Black Op 5

Posted on May 19, 2019 by John Scalzo

Activision has been promoting their “Three-Year Cycle” for new entries in the Call of Duty franchise for close to a decade now, but it looks like that roadmap has hit a bit of a snag heading into 2020.

With Call of Duty 2019 currently in development at Infinity Ward, it was assumed that Sledgehammer Games would take the reins on next year’s title. But if a new report on Kotaku is to be believed, Activision has decided to transfer 2020’s entry to Treyarch, who will take the skeleton of its standalone story (which would have been set during the Cold War) and rejigger it into Call of Duty: Black Ops 5.

According to the site’s Jason Schreier, the trouble began when “Call of Duty 2020” was designated as a co-production between Sledgehammer and Raven Studios. The two studios were unable to work together, and development stalled. But rather than take 2020 off, the publisher is pushing Treyarch up in the rotation to produce Black Ops 5:

For 2020, Activision had originally switched things up, assigning the Wisconsin-based support studio Raven to take a leadership role alongside Sledgehammer to make a Call of Duty game set during the Cold War (likely involving Vietnam). As of very recently, that’s changed. Now Treyarch, based in Santa Monica, California, is in charge of leading Call of Duty: Black Ops 5 for 2020.

According to those briefed on the overhaul, Treyarch will take creative leadership on this new Black Ops while Raven and Sledgehammer will serve as support studios for the game, transforming the work they’ve done on their own single-player story mode into a campaign for Black Ops 5, which will also be set during the Cold War.

Activision declined to comment on the report, as they’re busy preparing to unveil Infinity Ward’s Call of Duty 2019 (widely expected to be Modern Warfare 4) sometime in the next few weeks.

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Castlevania Anniversary Collection’s Launch Trailer is here to whip your retro gaming memories into shape

Posted on May 16, 2019 by John Scalzo

Konami has released more than 30 titles in the sprawling Castlevania franchise beginning with the Akumajo Dracula in Japan in 1986, and fans will get the chance to relive some of the earliest adventures of the Belmonts (and their allies) in the newly-launched Castlevania Anniversary Collection.

Available to download now for the PC, PS4, Switch, and Xbox One, the Castlevania Anniversary Collection includes eight games from the first eight years of the franchise. That lineup includes three games that originally appeared on the NES (1987’s Castlevania, 1988’s Castlevania: Simon’s Quest, and 1990’s Castlevania: Dracula’s Curse), two Game Boy spinoffs (1989’s Castlevania: The Adventure and 1991’s Castlevania II: Belmont’s Revenge), the first two 16-bit adventures (1991’s Super Castlevania IV and 1994’s Castlevania: Bloodlines), and Kid Dracula, a comedic reworking of the franchise that had never been released outside of Japan until now.

If those titles are stirring up a few nostalgic memories of pixelated vampire hunting, then you’ll definitely want to take a look at Castlevania Anniversary Collection’s Launch Trailer, which has been embedded above.

The Castlevania Anniversary Collection is part of Konami’s 50th Anniversary Celebration. An Arcade Classics Anniversary Collection was released back in April and the publisher will continue their retro rewind with the Contra Anniversary Collection later this Summer.

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John Romero’s Sigil “MegaWAD” for Doom has been delayed

Posted on May 16, 2019 by John Scalzo

As the co-creator of Doom, John Romero will always have a special connection to the first person shooter masterpiece. In celebration of the game’s 25th anniversary, Romero decided to venture back to one of his earliest triumphs and create a brand new “MegaWAD” for Doom known as Sigil. In Romero’s eyes, this free update would serve as the unofficial fifth episode to the game.

Sigil was originally expected to be available in February, but it’s unfortunately hit a handful of snags along the way. Delays seem to be inevitable with Romero’s projects, but put away your Daikatana jokes, as the developer has admitted (via Twitter) that the most recent problem lies with the production of the limited Beast Box at Limited Run Games:

Sigil has been done for quite a while at this point. There were two production issues at Limited Run — the [pewter statue of John Romero’s head on a spike] and the [soundtrack] disk. The head is now heading through production.

All units are crafted and finished by an individual artist. The second is the disk which is expected in shortly. There was also an issue with that. These are beyond the control of Romero Games, and we desperately wish that we could release it right now. We regret the delay, and have expressed your frustration to Limited Run.

Romero would go on to say that while he isn’t happy with the delay, it’s required because he and Limited Run want to ensure the components in Sigil’s Beast Box are built with the highest quality parts:

We’re sorry. We want Sigil in your hands more than you know. We have to wait until Beast Box players get it before we release the free version. For their part, Limited Run isn’t happy with the delays either, and looks forward to releasing the game.

The Limited Run team has been doing everything it can to resolve the delays and are as frustrated as we are. We all want the game in our hands. The delays are due to making these items higher quality, because we and Limited Run believe you deserve the best possible product. They could have accepted earlier revisions and shipped an inferior product, but we both believe that you deserve better.

A new release date for Sigil wasn’t announced, but it should be available soon.

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Ubisoft has three unannounced games coming in Early 2020 but they’ve delayed Skull and Bones yet again

Posted on May 15, 2019 by John Scalzo

Is Ubisoft hard at work on Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell 7? Nobody’s entirely sure, but the publisher has confirmed that they’ve got three unannounced “AAA” games in the hopper, all set to launch sometime between January 1 and March 31 in 2020.

Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot spoke a bit about these games, calling them “very distinct gaming experiences,” during the company’s most recent quarterly financial report:

We are coming with three very distinct gaming experiences. We wanted to give those games the development they needed because we know they’re long-term sellers, so it’s important that they come with the best opportunity.

We won’t say anything more today. You’ll know more soon.

Sadly, the publisher also said that players hoping to sail the high seas in Skull and Bones will have to wait a bit longer. The pirate-themed multiplayer was penciled in to launch this year, but now it won’t be released until sometime after April 1, 2020. This is the second major delay for the game (it was originally scheduled to be out in 2018), but the development team provided a short update via Twitter, promising that “[their] focus remains on quality”:

Skull and Bones will not be on display during Ubisoft’s presentation at E3 2019, but presumably the three unannounced games will be.

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Konami will add Japanese variants to Castlevania Anniversary Collection in a free update after launch

Posted on May 15, 2019 by John Scalzo

Konami will make the Castlevania Anniversary Collection available to download for the PC, PS4, Switch, and Xbox One beginning tomorrow, May 16, for $19.99. The compilation will include the North American versions of eight games from the early days of the franchise, as well as The History of Castlevania: Book of the Crescent Moon, a behind-the-scenes look at the franchise in an ebook-styled format.

The publisher famously released different variants of their games in each region during the NES era, and they typically offered different difficulty options (Japanese gamers often got an easier version to play) and graphical styles. Though sometimes the changes were made to comply with Nintendo’s discomfort for religious imagery and references at the time.

Fans hoping to test out these different versions with the Castlevania Anniversary Collection were originally out of luck, but Konami has apparently had a change of heart. Writing on the PlayStation Blog, Brand Manager Benjamin Kinney said that these Japanese will be available in a free update “shortly after launch”:

Lastly, important news: we heard your calls and Konami will add Japanese title variants as a free update shortly after launch. Keep your eyes peeled for more details!

The Castlevania Anniversary Collection will include Castlevania, Castlevania II: Simon’s Quest, Castlevania III: Dracula’s Curse, Super Castlevania IV, Castlevania: The Adventure, Castlevania II: Belmont’s Revenge, Castlevania: Bloodlines, and the never-before-released-in-the-US Kid Dracula. It’s currently unknown which games in the compilation will receive Japanese variants in the future.

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Blizzard will open the doors to World of Warcraft Classic on August 27

Posted on May 14, 2019 by John Scalzo

World of Warcraft is set to celebrate its 15th anniversary later this year, and Blizzard plans to kick off the festivities with the launch of World of Warcraft Classic, which will be available for free to all subscribers, on August 27.

This authentic re-creation takes players back to the beginnings of Blizzard Entertainment’s groundbreaking massively multiplayer online role-playing game, a time when Onyxia spread terror from her lair in Duskwallow Marsh, Leeroy Jenkins became a sensation after some ill-advised heroics in Upper Blackrock Spire, and only the bravest or most foolhardy quested alone in Stranglethorn Vale.

With World of Warcraft Classic, Blizzard has rebuilt the original WoW in its most polished and complete state—as it was at the time of the “Drums of War” update (patch 1.12.0), originally released August 22, 2006.

“Building and launching World of Warcraft back in 2004 was immensely challenging,” said J. Allen Brack, the President of Blizzard Entertainment. “A tornado literally tore the roof off one of the game’s data centers during the early days of testing—but Blizzard was fortunate to have hundreds, and then thousands, and then millions of people around the world cheering our developers on.”

Current World of Warcraft subscribers will get the chance to test out World of Warcraft Classic a few months early beginning tomorrow. According to Blizzard, a Closed Beta will begin on May 15th, and it’ll be followed by a series of stress tests over the Summer.

In addition to the impending launch of World of Warcraft Classic, Blizzard is also getting ready to release a special 15th Anniversary Collector’s Edition for the MMORPG that’ll come packed with a “treasure trove of collectibles and in-game bonus items”:

This treasure trove of collectibles and in-game bonus items comes with 30 days of game time for World of Warcraft and includes an imposing statue of Ragnaros the Firelord that stands over 10 inches tall; a pin depicting the head of Onyxia, Broodmother of the Black Dragonflight; a mousepad adorned with a map of Azeroth; a set of fine art prints that illustrate Azeroth’s storied past; and a pair of mounts… the Alabaster Stormtalon, and the Alabaster Thunderwing… in honor of the moment WoW players first took to the skies.

The World of Warcraft 15th Anniversary Collector’s Edition will be available on October 8, and it’ll be priced at $99.99.

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