Summer is really starting to heat up now. The weather in the UK has been turning gradually hotter for a week or so, and we’re due a few days of scorching sun before things settle down again at the end of the week.
Whether you’re looking for a respite from the hot weather or you’re the kind of person to indulge your lizard tendencies by sunbathing constantly, we’ve got another roundup of gaming news for you to enjoy.
Here’s what’s been happening this week in the gaming world.
Heihachi is coming back to Tekken
This week, we learned that Tekken series mainstay and all-around bad egg Heihachi Mishima is making his return to the franchise as the third Tekken 8 DLC character.
Heihachi will arrive sometime in autumn, and his trailer indicates that he survived his fatal volcano encounter with Kazuya at the end of Tekken 7, although it’s not entirely clear how.
Since Heihachi will arrive at the same time as a big (and free!) story update, though, we’ll probably learn more about what happened between the two of them and how Heihachi clawed his way out.
The Cybertruck is now in Fortnite
This week, Tesla’s Cybertruck made its way to Fortnite, causing consternation and mockery alike amongst the battle royale game’s player base.
Unusually, the truck’s introduction appears to have caused concern among Fortnite’s own developers, with several staffers at Epic expressing their disapproval over both Tesla CEO Elon Musk and the truck itself.
Of course, those staffers were quick to remind everyone that their opinions belong to them and aren’t representative of the company, but we’re not entirely sure that’s going to make things better for Epic or Musk.
Helldivers 2 gets a major update
Despite the Sony account controversy, Helldivers 2 is still going strong (albeit not quite as strong as it was on launch), and this week, Arrowhead and Sony announced the shooter’s biggest update yet.
Escalation of Freedom is coming in August, and it will bring new enemies, new objectives, and a whole new difficulty level for you and your squad to (attempt to) tackle.
There’s still no sign of the long-rumoured third faction, and it doesn’t look like they’ll be added to the game anytime soon, but this should still be a decent amount of content to sink your teeth into.
The second Activision Blizzard Game Pass game has arrived
In March this year, Activision Blizzard’s action RPG Diablo IV arrived on Game Pass, and this week, Activision and Xbox announced the studio’s second game to come to the service.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III was announced as an Xbox Game Pass inclusion on Tuesday this week, arriving on the service the very next day. That’s not a bad turnaround, if you ask us.
Expect to see more Activision Blizzard games arriving on the service in the near future; Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy and Spyro Reignited Trilogy have both been tipped as the next inclusions.
Humble Games collapses
This week, Humble’s publishing wing Humble Games announced that it had made the decision to “restructure” its business, letting several employees go.
Humble staff themselves dispute the scale of said restructuring; former creative lead Chris Radley claims that Humble Games has been completely shut down and that “operations have been handed off to a third party consultancy”.
The future of Humble Games’ projects appears to be in some doubt, but several developers, including Temtem studio Crema, have clarified that their plans won’t be affected too much by the publisher’s woes.
Fallout: London is finally out
When it comes to mods, few are quite as ambitious as Fallout: London, a total conversion mod that aims to give you the chance to explore London in the Fallout universe.
Well, this week, the mod finally launched, having been in development for five years. You’ll need a copy of Fallout 4 on PC to play it, and you’re better off playing the GOG version, because making the Steam version compatible is a bit of a headache.
When you do manage to get it running, you’ll be able to explore a world that’s roughly the size of the base Fallout 4 map and the Far Harbour DLC map combined. Not bad!
S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 won’t be releasing in September
Ukrainian developer GSC Game World has had a bit of a nightmare when it comes to long-awaited sequel S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl.
The game was stuck in something approaching development hell for a number of years, and now that its development is finally back on track, it’s once again been delayed, this time to November.
We can only hope that all of these delays contribute to a better game, although given how buggy the original S.T.A.L.K.E.R. releases were, we’re not holding out much hope.
It looks like Soul Reaver might be coming back
What’s the one gaming property you most wish would make a return? If it’s Legacy of Kain, then you may be in luck, if merchandise spotted at San Diego Comic-Con is any indication.
A Resetera user managed to spot a statue of Legacy of Kain mainstays Raziel and Kain in a booth at Comic-Con, complete with cards with “Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver I & II Remastered” on them.
If these cards are anything to go by, then we might be about to get remasters of some of the most influential and exciting (if slightly wordy) action-adventure games of the past few decades.
The BioShock movie’s budget has been reduced
Right now, a movie based on iconic first-person shooter BioShock is in the works, but if a recent report is anything to go by, it won’t quite be the grand adventure you might be imagining.
According to producer Roy Lee (via Eurogamer), the budget for the movie has been “lowered”, resulting in a “more personal” project as opposed to “a grander, big project”.
Honestly, we think that’s probably a better direction for BioShock to go in anyway; it’s not about the spectacle, but the very human and tragic story of Rapture.
