Warp Zoned Presents
Video Game Canon- BAFTA Games Awards: All the Winners from 2003 to Today
- Clair Obscur Completes the Sweep by Winning “Best Game” at 2025-2026 BAFTA Games Awards
- Boss Fight Books to Get a New Look for Richard Moss’s “Age of Empires”
- GDC Awards: All the Winners from 1996 to Today
- Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 Wins “Game of the Year” at 2025-2026 GDC Awards
Warp Zoned Presents
- Video Game Research Library
- We Pitched a Museum a 1993 Game Hint Line (And They Actually Said Yes) – Yarn Spinner (2026)
- The History Of The Word “Metroidvania” And How It Spread – A Critical Hit (2025)
- Creator of Hit Game Shovel Knight Is at a ‘Make or Break’ Moment – Bloomberg (2025)
- Shadow of the Colossus: An oral history – Design Room (2025)
- In 2005, games started rewiring our brains – The AV Club (2025)
Most Recent: PS4
Dark Horse will publish The Art of The Last of Us Part II this June
Dark Horse Books will peek behind-the-scenes at one of this year’s most-anticipated games with their next artbook… Naughty Dog’s The Last of Us Part II.
The game will make its PS4 debut on May 29, but fans will have to wait until June to dip into The Art of The Last of Us Part II. Spanning 200 pages, the book will be available as a Standard Edition ($39.99) and a limited Deluxe Edition ($89.99), though both will contain “an exhaustive collection of original art” and “intimate creator commentary” about the game’s design:
Follow Ellie’s profound and harrowing journey of vengeance through an exhaustive collection of original art and intimate creator commentary in this deluxe full-color hardcover volume: The Art of The Last of Us Part II.
Created in collaboration between Dark Horse Books and the developers at Naughty Dog, The Art of The Last of Us Part II offers extensive insights into the making of the long-awaited sequel to the award-winning The Last of Us. The Deluxe Edition also features an exclusive cover and slipcase, as well as a gallery-quality lithograph.
The Art of The Last of Us Part II will be available in bookstores on June 16.
Posted in Etcetera, News, PS4
Tagged The Last of Us Part II
Descenders will catch air on the PS4 and Switch in 2020
Publisher No More Robots has announced that Descenders, RageSquid’s procedurally-generated downhill biking game, will be released for the PS4 and Switch sometime in 2020. Originally released through Early Access for the PC and Xbox One in 2018, Descenders has received more than a dozen major updates over the last two years, and was upgraded to “Version 1.0” in 2019:
Descenders is extreme downhill freeriding for the modern era, with procedurally generated worlds, and where mistakes have real consequences. Will you lead your team to glory and become the next legendary Descender?
Descenders is a fast-paced extreme downhill biking game that’s easy to pick up, but difficult to master.
In addition to Descenders’s digital debut on the PS4 and Switch, the game will also be available this year as a special Retail Edition thanks to a co-publishing agreement with Sold Out. More information about the Retail Edition will be announced at a later date.
Posted in News, PS4, Switch
Tagged Descenders
First Gameplay Trailer for MLB The Show 20 bangs the drum for David Ortiz, John Franco, Gary Sheffield, and Mariano Rivera
The snow is still thick on the ground, but Sony San Diego wants the world to start thinking about Spring.
Earlier today, the developer unveiled the first Gameplay Trailer for MLB The Show 20, which will be released exclusively for the PS4 on March 17. The short video features a quick glimpse at the new Showdown Mode, as well as a montage checking in with some of Major League Baseball’s favorite players, and an introduction to a few never-before-seen Legends (Gary Sheffield, John Franco, David Ortiz, and Mariano Rivera).
The trailer also features a steady percussive accompaniment, a “Banging Scheme” if you will, that I’m sure is just a coincidence.
Sony San Diego will reveal more details and gameplay footage from MLB The Show 20 in a series of Developer Livestreams over the next two months. You can view the schedule for the upcoming streams at the PlayStation Blog.
Posted in News, PS4
Tagged MLB The Show 20
Grand Theft Auto V is the best-selling game of the 2010s
The NPD Group’s Mat Piscatella has one more list of best-selling games for us… the best-selling games of the 2010s.
Originally posted on Twitter, the chart was topped by Rockstar’s Grand Theft Auto V, but the majority of the list was dominated by Activision’s Call of Duty franchise. Seven of the ten slots were claimed by the shooter series, leaving only two remaining places for Rockstar’s Red Dead Redemption 2 (#7) and Mojang’s Minecraft (#10):
Best-Selling Games in 2010-2019
1. Grand Theft Auto V
2. Call of Duty: Black Ops
3. Call of Duty: Black Ops II
4. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3
5. Call of Duty: Black Ops III
6. Call of Duty: Ghosts
7. Red Dead Redemption 2
8. Call of Duty: WWII
9. Call of Duty: Black Ops 4
10. Minecraft****** All Digital Sales Not Included
****Digital Sales on PC Not Included
While the Call of Duty franchise remains a perennial presence on the sales charts, there’s no guarantee it’ll have the same impact on the 2020s. After all, the best-selling game from 2000-2009 was Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare is the best-selling game of 2019
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare has dominated the sales charts throughout October, November, and December. So it wasn’t much of a surprise when The NPD Group’s Mat Piscatella declared it the best-selling game for all of 2019 as well (via Twitter). But many of this year’s biggest titles managed to crash their way into the Top Ten.
A few yearly sports updates, NBA 2K20 and Madden NFL 20, finished just behind Activision’s shooter. Another franchise FPS, Borderlands 3, slid in at #4. And rounding out the Top Five was NetherRealm’s blood-spattered sequel, Mortal Kombat 11.
The lower half of the Top Ten gave us a few games we’ve seen before, as 2018’s Super Smash Bros. Ultimate meleed its way to the #7 slot, while 2017’s Mario Kart 8 shifted into the #10 slot. In between, you could find Respawn’s Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order (#6), Square Enix’s Kingdom Hearts III (#8), and Ubisoft’s Tom Clancy’s The Division 2 (#9).
While none of Nintendo’s new releases made the list, the consolemaker was responsible for the two most-successful pieces of hardware in 2019. The Switch was the best-selling hardware platform of the year, while the Switch Pro Controller was the best-selling accessory.
You can view the full list of 2019’s best-selling games in handy list format after the break. (more…)
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare goes 3-for-3 as the best-selling game of December 2019
December 2019 came and went without any major new releases, which left a big opening for Activision’s Call of Duty: Modern Warfare to threepeat as the best-selling game of the month. And according to The NPD Group’s Mat Piscatella (via Twitter), that’s exactly what happened.
It was a good holiday season for all as multiple games from Electronic Arts (Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order at #2, Madden NFL 20 at #3, FIFA 20 at #13, and Need For Speed Heat at #15) and Take-Two Interactive (NBA 2K20 at #4, Grand Theft Auto V at #11, and Red Dead Redemption 2 at #12) fought their way into the Top 20. But with ten titles in the Top 20, it was Nintendo that claimed the most spots on the list. Luigi’s Mansion 3 ranked the highest at #5.
You can find the full list of best-selling games from December 2019 after the break. (more…)
CD Projekt RED augments Cyberpunk 2077’s launch date to September 17
Another big Spring release has been slapped with a delay, as CD Projekt RED recently confirmed that Cyberpunk 2077‘s launch date will move to this Fall.
In a statement posted to Twitter, the developer said that while the sprawling RPG is “complete and playable,” they need more time for “playtesting, fixing, and polishing” to make it “perfect”:
We are currently at a stage where the game is complete and playable, but there’s still work to be done. Night City is massive – full of stories, content and places to visit, but due to the sheer scale and complexity of it all, we need more time to finish playtesting, fixing and polishing. We want Cyberpunk 2077 to be our crowing achievement for this generation and postponing launch will give us the precious months we need to make the game perfect.
Seems like a missed opportunity not to use “breahtaking” in place of “perfect,” but it is what it is. Cyberpunk 2077 is currently in development for the PC, PS4, and Xbox One, and it’ll be released on September 17.
Get your first look at The Joker’s Mortal Kombat 11 appearance in this new trailer
With the most nominations in the field, Joaquin Phoenix’s Joker is heading into this year’s Oscars as the odds-on favorite for “Best Picture.” But the character always has something else in his bag of tricks, and earlier today, NetherRealm Studios unveiled the first trailer for The Joker’s upcoming appearance in Mortal Kombat 11.
Like his appearances in the Injustice franchise, The Joker’s latest incarnation looks to be an agile fighter who carries around a crowbar and a set of comically-large boxing gloves. But The Joker always wants to leave ’em laughing, so it’s fitting that he also has one of the best Fatalities I’ve ever seen.
The Joker will be available for Kombat Pack owners on January 28, with a full release scheduled for February 4. He’ll launch alongside the DC Elseworlds Skin Pack, which includes DC-inspired Skins for Noob Saibot (The Batman Who Laughs), Baraka (Killer Croc), and Kitana (Catwoman). A separately-available “Time Lord of Apokolips” Skin will also transform Geras into the spitting image of Darkseid.
Mortal Kombat 11 is currently available for the PC, PS4, Switch, Xbox One, and Google Stadia.