Well, here we are once again, taking a look at the state of the gaming world over the last week or so. We hope you’re ready to join us for our latest recap!
We’re very fond of saying this, we know, but there’s plenty to catch up on, including some fairly big news from companies like Quantic Dream and Ubisoft.
Why not pull up that well-worn chair (we have, after all, been telling you to grab that when you join us for a long time now), grab your favourite drink, and join us for our latest news recap? It’ll be worth your while!
PlayStation Plus prices are going up
This week, Sony upped the prices for subscription service PlayStation Plus, and we’re betting that you can probably guess the reason for that increase.
The increases aren’t particularly significant – you won’t be paying a heck of a lot more if you’re a first-time subscriber – but you’ll still be forking out a little more cash for your games now.
This comes after a number of other price increases from gaming companies, including for PlayStation hardware itself, as well as for Xbox consoles and other paraphernalia.
Sony has apparently confirmed its PlayStation PC U-turn
A few months ago, it was reported that Sony would no longer offer single-player games on PC, although multiplayer games would continue to be multi-platform releases.
Now, Bloomberg’s Jason Schreier has provided credence to the rumour, pointing to PlayStation boss Hermen Hulst reportedly telling staff that PlayStation games would no longer get PC releases.
Supposedly, this won’t apply to the company’s multiplayer offerings, so if you’re worried you won’t get to play the next Marathon with your friends on a cross-platform basis, it sounds like you needn’t fret.
The next batch of Xbox Game Pass games has been revealed
We now know which games are coming to Xbox Game Pass over the next few weeks thanks to one of Xbox’s regular news posts, which revealed the lineup this week.
Alongside games we already knew about, like Forza Horizon 6, Microsoft also revealed that you can expect the likes of Final Fantasy VI‘s pixel remastered version, Escape Simulator, and Remnant II to join the service imminently.
Here’s hoping that Xbox can continue to bring great games to Game Pass and creating value for subscribers, because if it can’t, new head Asha Sharma has her work cut out for her even more than she might already have thought.
An upcoming Dungeons & Dragons game has been cancelled
If you were hoping to check out Star Wars: Jedi director Stig Asmussen’s new Dungeons & Dragons game under the banner of his studio Giant Skull, then your hopes were sadly dashed this week.
That’s because the project, which was only announced a couple of years ago, has reportedly been shut down by Wizards of the Coast. We’ll never get to know what Asmussen wanted for the game now.
As far as we know, Starbreeze’s upcoming multiplayer title remains on the slate, but given how many games are being cancelled these days, that’s far from guaranteed.
The Kingdom Come guys are making a Lord of the Rings RPG
After many weeks of speculation, Kingdom Come: Deliverance developer Warhorse Studios revealed this week that it’s making a Lord of the Rings RPG.
We don’t know much about the project other than the simple fact that it exists, but it’s still pretty exciting to imagine the developer’s particular brand of medieval RPG fun transplanted into Middle-earth.
That’s not all Warhorse is working on, either; the company also simultaneously revealed that the successor to Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 is also in the works, although it might not be a direct sequel.
A new State of Play is coming next week
Fans of PlayStation’s oeuvre, rejoice, for a new State of Play show is coming next week, complete with lots of PlayStation-related announcements.
Sony says that a showcase for the upcoming Marvel’s Wolverine will kick the show off, and more games will be shown during the presentation as well, although we don’t know what those are yet.
Presumably, we can also expect lots of other announcements from Sony first-party studios and third-party partners alike. The show will last for around an hour.
Quantic Dream is shutting down Spellcasters Chronicles
In a move that will almost certainly surprise precisely nobody, Heavy Rain and Detroit: Become Human studio Quantic Dream announced this week that it’s shutting down live-service experiment Spellcasters Chronicles.
The studio announced the move in a social media statement, wherein it confirmed that the game has “not reached the audience needed to ensure its long-term sustainability”.
That’s becoming an increasingly common refrain in the gaming industry, and while it’s sad to see another live-service experiment fail, perhaps this will remind Quantic Dream of what it’s good at. Upcoming narrative adventure Star Wars Eclipse is apparently unaffected by the cancellation.
More Assassin’s Creed, Far Cry, and Ghost Recon games are on the way
Ubisoft confirmed this week that it’s intending to release new games in its flagship franchises, namely Assassin’s Creed, Far Cry, and Ghost Recon, before April 2029.
We don’t yet know what form those games will take, but in its financial report for the last fiscal year, Ubisoft says it expects a “significantly bigger content pipeline” for these “major brands” in the next couple of years.
Presumably, this expectation will include flagship games, but it might also point to new spinoffs and other media surrounding these franchises. Only time will tell, we suppose.
Star Citizen has passed the billion-dollar mark
Lest you think long-awaited space sim Star Citizen has disappeared, think again, because developer Roberts Space Industries celebrated a brand new funding milestone this week.
As reported by Variety, the game managed to pass the $1 billion mark over the weekend, which is a pretty remarkable achievement, especially for a game that still doesn’t have any kind of release date locked in.
Along with the new funding milestone, Roberts Space Industries also announced that Squadron 42, the equally long-awaited single-player spinoff, is “in the closing stages” of development.
