Top Story
PlayStation 5 will release in Holiday Season 2020 with notable controller updates
Sony has finally confirmed that PlayStation 5 will launch during holiday season 2020, and revealed some the console’s features in an exclusive interview with Wired.
First off, the controller will feature two new major features: Haptic feedback, essentially more fancy vibration. The vibration motors will have a greater expressive range, enabling more nuanced feedback. Second, the rear triggers will be ‘adaptive’, allowing developers to adjust the triggers’ resistance.
Both these features make the new controllers much more tactile. They will also use USB Type-C for charging. and be a little heavier than the DualShock 4 – but still lighter than an Xbox One controller with batteries inside.
Haptic technology could have been implemented in the PS4 Pro
The Wired article mentions that Sony’s “controller team has been working on haptic feedback since the DualShock 4 was in development. They even could have included it in PS4 Pro”. According to Product Manager Toshi Aoki, the technology was kept for the next-gen console to avoid fragmenting the user base. Take heed, Nintendo!
Unlike the PlayStation 4 Pro, the PlayStation 5 will support 4k blu-ray, and maximum disc capacity is increased from 50GB to 100GB. Mark Cerny also confirmed that “there is ray-tracing acceleration in the GPU hardware”. There will also be new data management tools: “Rather than treating games like a big block of data,” Cerny says, “We’re allowing finer-grained access to the data.”
This means you could install parts of a game depending on what you want to play, say just the single-player campaign or just the multiplayer mode. You can also download a whole package, and later delete parts you don’t expect to use again.
Now that Sony’s finally started talking in more detail about their new console, we can hopefully expect more information soon.
Time For A Quick Daily Quiz?
Rocket League is actually a sequel, but to which game?
- Mutant Fighting Cars League
- Super Soccer Car League
- Super Battle Cars Arena
- Supersonic Acrobatic Rocket-Powered Battle-Cars
The answer will be revealed at the end of this issue!
News Bits
Rocket League’s Halloween update arrives on October 14th
The Haunted Hallows is returning to Rocket League on October 14th, bringing back the Candy Corn currency and exclusive Halloween-themed items. The update isn’t just about Halloween though, so expect some new features as well. Look out for the new post-game party-up system that allows you to group together with a team you just played a match with.
There are also team-coloured boost meters that make it easier to see which cars are on what team. The developers are also adding quickplay buttons, two new esports teams – Complexity and Spacestation Gaming – as well as giving the news panel a much needed lick of paint.
New MediEvil gameplay compares the original game to the remastered version
MediEvil is rising from its grave once more, and the official PlayStation YouTube channel has released an extensive video showing how the remaster differs from the original game. The most obvious difference is a massive visual update to bring the more than 20 year-old game up to modern standards. Other features, like the camera controls, don’t seem very different from the original – which is as expected, since this is a remaster and not a remake or sequel.
MediEvil Remastered lurches onto the PlayStation 4 on October 25th.
Daily Fact
The Metro games are based on a series of Russian novels
There are three games in the Metro series now – Metro 2033, Metro: Last Light and this year’s Metro Exodus – and it looks like the redux editions of the two first games will launch on Switch soon. This is excellent news, since all the games are exceptionally well-designed shooters oozing with atmosphere featuring imaginative, well-told stories.
Part of the reason the storytelling stand out is their roots in a series of excellent novels by Russian author Dmitry Glukhovsky, who envisioned a post-nuclear world where the remaining residents of Moscow were forced to create an underground society in the Metro tunnels. All three books – Metro 2033, 2034 and 2035 – have been translated into several languages, and are well worth reading whether you’re a fan of the games or not.
While the first and last games adapt the first and last books, 4A Games eschewed Metro 2034 in favour of developing a direct continuation of 2033’s “bad” ending for Last Light – though they did get help from Glukhovsky to write the new story.
Daily News
Bluepoint Games announce secret PlayStation 5 project
Along with news of PlayStation 5’s release date, a recent Wired article also quoted the president of Bluepoint Games, March Thrush, who said “We’re working on a big one right now,” hopefully referring to a game and nothing … untowards.
Bluepoint Games are best known for their work on a slew of PlayStation 4 remasters, including all three Uncharted games, Gravity Rush and Shadow of the Colossus.
Come on Bluepoint, don’t keep us in the dark
Obviously, fans have already started speculating, and one of the big hopes is that it could be a remake of Demon’s Souls. The first game in the Souls series hasn’t received the same attention as its younger brothers in the Dark Souls franchise, and is still only available for PlayStation 3, complete with a 30FPS lock and pretty low-fidelity graphics.
The last two games Bluepoint remastered were Gravity Rush and Shadow of the Colossus, favorites of fans and critics alike, and also quite niche. Unfortunately, we don’t have any more information to go on, so we’re at the mercy of Sony’s slow drip of revelations leading up to the new console’s release in a year’s time.
Metro Redux and Call of Juarez: Gunslinger headed for Switch?
Where would news journalists be without retailers accidentally revealing unannounced games? Now a Portuguese retailer might have done an oopsie with Metro Redux for Switch. GamingReplay listed Metro Redux (which includes both Metro: 2033 and Metro: Last Light) on their website, with a release date in December. They immediately pulled the listing, which didn’t really stop the rumour mill.
60FPS? On my Nintendo Switch?
There’s already speculation and arguments about whether the Switch is capable of running the Metro games, which have pretty demanding PC versions. Both Metro: 2033 and Metro: Last Light were released for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 in 2009 and 2013 respectively, so we already know the games can run fine on low-powered hardware – the question is whether it can run the remastered Redux versions that ran at 60FPS on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One.
Then there’s Call Of Juarez: Gunslinger, which has been rated by the ESRB, suggesting it’s coming out soon. Techland has also hinted at a surprise launch for the Switch before the end of the year. Well, looks like the surprise is ruined!