Image: Activision / Liam Robertson / Did You Know Gaming
A new report claims that Crash Bandicoot 5 was greenlit by Activision, but was then canceled very early in development due to Crash 4 selling poorly and the publisher wanting to focus more on live-service titles, like Call of Duty: Warzone. Interestingly, this game would have seen the wumpa-fruit-loving marsupial cross over with another platforming mascot, Spyro the Dragon.
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According to a new report from gaming journalist and historian Liam Robertson, formerly Activision-owned studio Toys For Bob began working on a multiplayer Crash Bandicoot game after it had wrapped on the Spyro ReignitedTrilogy. But then the company took some of that work and began developing 2020’s Crash Bandicoot 4: It’s About Time. That game was well-liked by fans and critics, and Toys For Bob began planning a follow-up.
This new game, known internally as Crash Bandicoot 5, was planned to be a direct sequel to Crash 4 and would be a single-player 3D platformer, like previous entries in the long-running franchise.
Did You Know Gaming / Liam Robertson
Robertson’s video includes concept art and possible story ideas for this never-finished Crash sequel. At one point, the developers were planning to include Spyro in the sequel, with the report claiming that the two would have worked together to save their respective universes from a giant cataclysmic event. Both characters would be playable, and players would even see both characters’ universes in this multiverse pitch.
Kotaku has reached out to Activision about the report.
According to the report, Toys For Bob only worked on Crash 5 for around three to four months and largely focused on concept art and early environments. In the winter of 2020, Activision canceled Crash 5, reportedly due to Crash 4‘s low sales and the publisher wanting to focus on online games over single-player titles. Toys for Bob then worked on Crash Team Rumble, a short-lived and not very popular online game that you probably forgot even launched.
A lot of The Veilguard’s systems seem to draw heavily from Mass Effect, and that includes a spin on Andromeda’s ability loadouts. Since you can’t access all your abilities on a wheel like you used to, The Veilguard has you decide on what attacks you’ll have at your disposal on a given quest and assign them. The showcase had a warrior version of protagonist Rook kitted out with a “This Is Sparta”-style kick, a grappling spear used to draw enemies in close, and a shield-like aura to protect her from damage. They definitely seem to be going for a tanky, brawler build, and picking the abilities best for whatever approach you’re going for will be key to defining your playstyle.
Also in the loadout is an Ultimate ability called Warden’s Fire, which rains down an area-of-effect attack on enemies. It sounds like this might be exclusive to Grey Warden Rooks, one of the origins you can select for your hero in the character creator at the beginning of the game.
There’s a fairly good chance that you, like us, keep forgetting that Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is a first-person game. Each time we see any footage, it’s a jarring moment to remember that this isn’t a reskinned Tomb Raider or Uncharted, but instead puts us directly inside Dr. Jones’ head. This is exacerbated by so much of the stuff we’ve seen in trailers constantly jumping to cinematic third-person views, given how odd of an angle it is when trying to show off the game. But now we’ve seen ten minutes of in-game footage, and it’s starting to make more sense.
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At this week’s Gamescom, developer MachineGames, the force behind games like 2014’s Wolfenstein: The New Order and its sequel, described what has been shown before as highlighting their approach to “building an immersive narrative, full of twists and turns and exciting set-pieces.” But today we would see the enigmatic “gameplay.” They wanted to show off “what it is like to actually play as Indiana Jones and experience his adventure, to look through his eyes.” So it was perhaps unfortunate that this was immediately followed up by yet more footage of the grave robber smashing an ancient statue to recover a secret doohickey, all via a staged, third-person view.
This continued on as Indy’s thievery caused traps to trigger, closing the doors and filling the room with sand. But lo, a high window eventually comes within reach, and here, at last, we’re actually seeing the world through the behatted one’s eyes and leap forward into…a scripted series of slips and slides as the temple falls down around him.
OK, I’m being mean, but they set me up. After this, we do at last start to see some actual footage of the game as it will be experienced, and it’s a far more controlled and considered game than I was expecting. At some points, it appeared to play more like a first-person adventure game, with Indy inspecting scenes for clues, picking up objects to examine, and attempting to piece together where he needs to be. And where he needs to be is stopping evil Nazi rival explorer Emmerich Voss from finding a series of relics and returning them to his Fuhrer.
This all begins when Voss breaks into the doctor’s Massachusetts university and steals one such relic, and we begin trying to find out what he’s up to. In the aftermath of the break-in, we see Indy picking up photographs, looking through papers, snapping photographs to unlock more details about various items and areas, and arguing with Italian journalist Gina, who is only interested in accompanying him to find her sister.
Screenshot: MachineGames/Lucasfilm
But it’s not all poking around in ancient ruins and halls of academia. The other most joyously repeated theme of what we were shown was hitting bad people on the back of the head with shovels. There seems to be a strong emphasis on improvisation, with objects lying around in the world available to be grabbed and used as a one-off advantage. Those shovels, for instance, shatter at the handle once they’ve been walloped around an unsuspecting head, and Indy tosses the remains aside. The same goes for metal bars used to knock loose bricks out of walls, or staffs thrown across ravines into the rock wall, to then be swung on with Indy’s whip.
Shovels weren’t the only means of combat, of course. The real focus was fisticuffs, with fights playing out as a sort of boxing minigame, you and the enemy exchanging blows, attempting blocks, and general biffing noses. Such moments would often begin with Indiana using his whip to pull at a buddy’s ankle to bring them to the floor, and then engaging in pugilism on their recovery, swapping punches until one of you is down.
Talking of Indy being down, in a highlight of the shown footage we saw our hero losing a fight and falling to the ground, but then thanks to a skill—True Grit—gained and added to his skill tree, he was able to make a last-ditch effort to reach out for his iconic hat and rally himself for one more try. It felt so very, very Indiana Jones.
It’s also worth noting that Indy’s perspective is not stubbornly first-person, after all. When he climbs, it switches out to third-person view, looking extremely like a Tomb Raider game as he Lara Crofts his way around ledges and climbs vines. It’s almost as if…it could have been a better perspective? But the insistence on “seeing through his eyes” prevails. It’ll end up being a combination of the two as we experience the larger challenges, climbing around vast obstacles to solve elaborate puzzles.. At one point we saw Doc Jones pouring wine into ancient bowls to reveal secret numbers, then finding routes to reach a huge raised frieze of Christ and adjusting levers to match the code.
Honestly, watching the footage and realizing that this is a slower, more focused game than the frantic cutscenes we’ve seen before have suggested, has made me much more excited to play it. Stealthing into a room, ker-blamming a baddie with garden equipment, and then using a whip to kwa-ping a gun out of another enemy’s hand looks really rather tremendous, especially when such action is interspersed with both exploration and puzzle solving. As sound director Pete Ward puts it, “The focus of this game is adventure,” with a desire that players find their own uses for the tools the game offers.
I’m much more excited now to return to 1937 having seen this footage, to see how well this mix of approaches can meld together, especially with the good news that Troy Baker’s Harrison Ford impression holds up much better than I’d previously thought. This could…maybe…actually be one to get really excited about. Although I’ve still no idea what’s so great about the circle.
It’s now possible to quickly and easily play the original 1997 Diabloon your PC or phone via a simple website. Just load it up on your browser and you can start killing demons and skeletons like it’s the ‘90s all over again.
Diablo IV – Bear Bender Build
The original Diablo was developed by Blizzard North and released in January 1997 for PC. Its single dungeon, evil monsters, creepy town, and loot-filled catacombs forever changed the action RPG genre. Today, the OG Diablo might seem a bit small and simple compared to the wild open-world adventure we find in 2023’s Diablo 4. But Diablo’s vibes are still unmatched by any of its sequels, and now you can experience the classic ARPG for free on your phone or PC browser.
As spotted by PC Gamer, a new website has popped up that lets you play the shareware version of the original Diablo in your browser. This new web-based port of the game was built using Diablo’s original source code, which was previously reconstructed by GalaXyHaXz and the Devilution team and can be found on GitHub.
Blizzard / Izie
Now, keep in mind that unless you own Diablo and upload the “DIABDAT.MPQ” file, you won’t have access to everything found in the retail release. Still, the shareware version of Diablo lets you play as a warrior who can’t talk to NPCs, but can kill demons and loot weapons in the dungeon under the church in Tristram.
In my testing, this browser-based port of Diabloplays really well. I had no issues exploring the dark corridors and killing zombies and skeletons. Just toss your old Diablo save and DIABDAT.MPQ file onto a service like Google Drive or a USB stick and you can play Blizzard’s seminal ARPG anywhere with an internet connection.
In fact, you could be playing Diablo right now on the device you are currently using instead of working or reading the last sentence of this blog.
The Crimson Diamond is AVAILABLE NOW!! (Launch trailer)
Play it on: Steam Current goal: Solve an old-fashioned mystery
A few weeks ago, I mentioned how I was captivated by Unavowed, a point-and-click adventure from the folks at Wadjet Eye. Well, I’ve finished that one (it was great) just in time for a brand-new entry in the genre to come along. And while Wadjet Eye’s output is most reminiscent of ‘90s adventure games that offered full voice acting and elegant drag-and-drop interfaces, this new game, The Crimson Diamondfrom designer Julia Minamata, is influenced by an earlier era of adventures, ones that ran in EGA and had you typing in what you wanted your character to do. I can’t wait to explore its mysteries.
The Crimson Diamond is perhaps most reminiscent of Sierra adventures, especially the Clara Bow games which saw their plucky heroine tossed into murder mysteries during the roaring ‘20s. Itcasts you as Nancy Maple, a young woman investigating the discovery of an unusually large and valuable diamond in a town in northern Ontario, Canada. It’s clear from the trailer that her investigations will find her encountering people with motives of their own, some of them sinister, and land her in no small amount of peril. Sign me up!
People often talk about the evolution of adventure games from text parsers to purely graphical interfaces as a net good, as if text parsers were just a crutch, a relic from the genre’s early days that we no longer needed, but I’ve always thought of them as two fundamentally different approaches, each with their own strengths. I think there are ways in which the presence of a text parser can encourage creative thinking that a purely graphics-based interface doesn’t always allow for, and in addition to digging into the plot of The Crimson Diamond, I’m eager to see how it uses this design element that so rarely gets employed in modern games. All in all, it sounds like a perfect fit for a cozy weekend. —Carolyn Petit
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Austin Williams, Carolyn Petit, Moises Taveras, Kenneth Shepard, and Ethan Gach
Officially, Valve—the company behind Steam, Half-Life, and more—has yet to announce its next big game. However, thousands of people are currently playing and posting about Deadlock, Valve’s next big game, literally right now. So uh, what’s going on?
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Thanks to leakers and dataminers, we’ve known about a Valve-developed multiplayer game for a few years now. Before it was Deadlock, it was likely codenamed Neon Prime. At one point since it reportedly started development in 2018, the MOBA/character shooter hybrid was possibly going to be set in the Half-Life/Portal universe, but that has seemingly changed based on gameplay leaks that occurred in May. Now, it seems a rumored playtest for Deadlock is currently underway, with the game developing a community of players on Reddit.
As spotted by IGN, over on SteamDB—a third-party website that tracks various stats about Steam games and players—Deadlock’s player count has been steadily increasing over the last few months. In the last few days, the game cracked 18,000 concurrent players. That means it’s one of the top 65 most played games on Steam, and Valve has yet to even tweet about it or release a trailer.
IGN reports that Deadlock’s current early access period is using an invite system, letting players on Steam grant access to other players. It’s understood that Valve is allowing players with early access to talk about the game online with other players, but videos and screenshots still seem to be under a strict NDA. Many are posting about the game and how much they like it on the Deadlockthegame subreddit.
That means we are in a really weird and somewhat unprecedented situation. A new Valve video game is gaining thousands of players on Steam, it’s got an active subreddit, and we’ve even seen videos of the game in action. Deadlock is real. It’s a thing. It’s Valve’s next game. Yet, officially, Valve has yet to announce it or even tease it.
Many players assume that a full-on reveal for Deadlock and an open-access beta are coming sooner rather than later, with many suggesting September. But for now, we have to wait and see when Valve will decide to announce a game that thousands of people are playing and which already has guides and tier rankings. Strange times. Meanwhile, Valve might be working on Half-Life 3based on some recent leaks. Strange times indeed, folks.
Cat Quest III departs from the first two games of this light-hearted action-adventure series in a variety of ways, especially with its pirate-themed naval combat. Still, it also retains a lot of familiar gameplay mechanics and concepts that ensure if you played the previous games, you’ll feel right at home. Whether you’re a returning player well-versed in Cat Quest’s history, or you’re brand new to the franchise, we’ve compiled a solid list of tips to help you get started in this feline-focused adventure. – Billy Givens Read More
Prison Architect 2, set to launch in September, has been indefinitely delayed, with the studio behind the game also announcing that it will refund customers who pre-ordered the prison building sim. It’s yet another road bump for publisher Paradox Interactive following the cancellation of a Sims-like game in June.
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Originally released in 2012 on PC, Prison Architect lets players build and maintain large prisons filled with criminals and guards. The original game received updates for years and was even ported to consoles and mobile devices. In 2019, Paradox Interactive purchased the franchise from original developers Introversion Software, and in 2024 announced a full, 3D sequel. However, the game was delayed earlier this year. And now, it’s been delayed again with no new release date.
On August 2, Paradox and developer Kokku announced that Prison Architect 2 was no longer arriving on September 3. In a post on the official Paradox forums, the devs explained they “need more time to improve both the game’s performance and its content.”
Paradox Interactive
The studio and publisher also added that they “can’t commit” to a new release date or window as they are re-assessing the “scope of work needed to be done before the game is release-ready.” It also warned that communication between the team and fans will be limited until they feel more “comfortable” showing the game and talking about a release timeline.
As a result of this indefinite delay, Paradox Interactive is refunding all pre-orders on all platforms and has pledged to include all previously promised pre-order digital items in the base game.
In a Q&A included with the announcement, the studio and Paradox stressed that Prison Architect 2 isn’t canceled.
It also doesn’t help that Paradox has had a string of failures and misfires over the last year or so. Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2, first announced in 2019, was nearly canceled after multiple delays and a developer swap in 2023. The Lamplighter’s League was an expensive flop. And Cities: Skylines 2 launched in such a poor state that Paradox was forced to stop all DLC plans so the devs could focus on fixing the city builder.
Even Prison Architect 2 had some issues before this delay, with the original studio—Double Eleven—leaving the project over a financial disagreement with Paradox, leading to the publisher swapping the team out for Kokku in 2024.
FAIRHOPE, AL—Exploiting the popular online game platform for his own perverse ends, local Roblox user Rodney McKinney, 68, was accused of grooming 56-year-old Roblox user Walter Rhodes, sources confirmed Wednesday. “For the past several months, Mr. McKinney, a 68-year-old Roblox user, used the game as a means to foster an inappropriate relationship with an impressionable young 56-year-old that was sexual in nature,” said officer Mike Cavazos, noting several obscene messages in which the baby boomer offered the much younger Gen X user Robux in exchange for lewd images of Rhodes’ flabby, mature body. “It was clear from their correspondence that Mr. McKinney knew the victim was 56, as he stated in chats that he was ‘old enough to be [Rhodes’] supervising manager.’ And though he claimed that messages inviting the victim to move off Roblox to a more private LinkedIn chat were innocent, we believe otherwise.” At press time, authorities claimed McKinney attempted to conceal his indiscretions by warning Rhodes not to “tell your mom, if she’s still alive.”
Microsoft shutdown the Xbox 360’s marketplace this week and nearly two decades after the console first launched it feels like the final nail in the coffin for a particular era of gaming we’ll probably never see again.
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The Xbox 360 came out a year earlier than the competition and $100 cheaper than the base PlayStation 3. It seemed to make all the right moves, using Halo, Gears of War, and Call of Duty to jump start online multiplayer into the soon-to-be dominant form of gaming, while investing it all back into indie curation, big exclusives, and marketing deal that made the console feel like the place everyone had to be.
In some ways it felt like the best of all worlds, and by the end of the generation you could pick up an Xbox 360 for just $100 and play dozens of the best games ever made. The culture was far from healthy, and some of the places making everything were a mess to work for. But it was also a fun time, and a weird one. Here’s what we’ll miss about it and why the Xbox 360 still feels so special to us.
Carolyn Petit: The first E3 I ever attended was in 2005, with the Xbox 360’s launch still some months out and I have to say, the games I saw on the show floor looked amazing. It’s hilarious to me now considering I haven’t even thought about this game in probably 15 years, but at that time, the game that blew me away the most was probably GRAW. Interestingly, though, despite my initial excitement about the console being rooted in its graphical power and my lust for next-gen spectacle, now, when I think back on what made the console so special to me, it’s not really about that aspect of it at all. What about you Alyssa?
Alyssa Mercante: I’ve told mine on Kotaku.com more than once, but I had borrowed my high school sweetheart’s original Xbox to play Halo 2 when he went away to college, but not long after that Halo 3 came out, which wasn’t backwards compat. So I went out during my free period in high school (we had an open campus for seniors, you could take your car and leave if you didn’t have class), and drove to a Target where I spent my summer job savings on a 360, Halo 3, and Xbox Live.
Ethan: I have zero recollection of the Xbox 360’s launch. What was I even doing at the time? 2005. Hmm. I was going into my senior year in high school, barely playing anything except for the occasional late-stage PS2 game—Shadow of the Colossus and Dragon Ball Z: Budokai, followed eventually by Okami and Final Fantasy XII. My only real memory of the beginning of that console cycle is my brother getting a PS3 and me having almost no interest in it. It wasn’t until my girlfriend’s roommate’s boyfriend in college got me hooked on Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 that I finally picked up a super cheap used Xbox 360 arcade edition for like $150. That four years after the console launched but still somehow only the mid-way point.
Carolyn: Yeah, I don’t remember exactly when I finally got one myself—I certainly couldn’t afford one at launch, and my memories of the time around release have a lot to do with playing Peter Jackson’s King Kong: The Official Game of the Movie (lol) at GameStop kiosks.
Moises Taveras: The first time I ever played an Xbox 360 also had to do with Call of Duty: MW2. It was all the rage with the kids in my middle school, but I was largely looking from the outside in as a) a PlayStation kid since my youth and b) someone who came from a family too poor to afford more than one console. But eventually, I made friends who had 360s and I remember us all cramming onto a couch in the smallest bedroom imaginable at our friend Howard’s house and playing local multiplayer matches till we lost our voices from shouting. I learned really quickly then that the 360 was synonymous with multiplayer and socializing with folks and it made me want one so bad. Little did I know I wouldn’t get a 360 till the very end of the console generation!
Carolyn: I think part of the Xbox 360’s dominance in that era can be attributed to the fact that it offered the best online experience for folks wanting to play Call of Duty, but it also did something incredible that totally won over people like me. I’m not saying I didn’t have an amazing time playing Gears of War co-op, I absolutely did, and huge credit to Microsoft for putting out a steady stream of banger exclusives that really made Xbox Live feel essential. But for me, when I think about the Xbox 360, what still gets me excited most is Xbox Live Arcade, and particularly amazing games like Pac-Man Championship Edition. Games like this took the arcade leaderboard competition of my childhood and absolutely exploded it. Suddenly I was staying up nights pouring everything I had into beating my friends’ high scores on online leaderboards for all the world to see. Man, it was incredible.
Moises: Supergiant Games’ Bastion absolutely blew my mind as far as what I thought games could be. It being a console exclusive to the 360 through XBLA broke my heart and kept me from the portfolio of what’d become my favorite studio, and then Xbox just kept pumping out indie titles like it. Honestly, my working definition of an indie game was largely informed by this era of XBLA games.
Xbox Dashboard Evolution 2001-2019 (Xbox Original, Xbox 360, One)
Kenneth Shepard: The Xbox 360 was the first console launch I was really tuned into the industry for. I was full-blown sicko mode for that thing as a kid, and was counting down the days. I was a huge Rare fan at the time and Kameo and Perfect Dark Zero were a huge deal to me. But broadly, I think I fell off video games for a bit because the system just didn’t speak to my tendencies. As Moises said, the 360 became the multiplayer system and I preferred gaming in solitude, and eventually pivoted to the PS3 in the final years of that generation. But I played the Mass Effect trilogy on the 360, so I ended up keeping an old 360 in my home longer than any other system. I had to replace the household 360 more times than probably any other system my family owned.
We got a launch window system that died by the time Halo 3 came out, so we had to replace it swiftly. Then I got my own 360 for Christmas 2009, just before the launch of Mass Effect 2. That sucker lasted over a decade. It gathered dust for large swaths of the time, but since I didn’t own an Xbox One, it was the only way for me to go back to my old Mass Effect trilogy saves until the Legendary Edition came out in 2021. So while I had mostly abandoned the system by the end of the generation, the 360 is still a defining system in my life because it gave me one of the most important video game experiences of my life. I’ll always be grateful for it, even if I think the Microsoft was a trailblazer for some of the industry’s worst modern tendencies with it.
Ethan: That was the other thing that I think tipped me in the direction of the Xbox 360 besides the price and walled multiplayer gardens. As someone coming from the PS1 and PS2, it just had more of the RPGs I was craving earlier or in better condition. I came to the original Mass Effect late but it blew my mind. I got to catch up on Star Wars: The Old Republic. It was synonymous with retro and couch-coop indie games for me like Castle Crashers and Super Meat Boy. It really did just nail a lot of the same things that the PS4 did a generation later and which ultimately helped Sony to reverse the tide.
Moises: it’s so weird to think about now given Xbox’s current situation and catalog, but the 360 was where all the games were!
Carolyn: Another thing that was a big factor for me, I have to admit, is that I was totally cheevo-pilled. The Xbox 360 brought about the advent of achievements and I got extremely excited about pulling off absurd things like beating Call of Duty campaigns on Veteran to get all the achievements. I no longer put much stock in achievements or trophies, but to this day I greatly prefer the at-a-glance number that reflects your achievements compared to all the trophies of PlayStation’s system. And on top of that, the whole interface on Xbox just felt so much more inviting to me than that on Sony. I think avatars were really smart of them to introduce in that era. I loved signing on and seeing little cartoon versions of all my good friends online, playing games of their own. In comparison to that, the whole interface of the PS3 just felt cold and impersonal to me, and that console would end up gathering dust in my entertainment center.
Ethan: The Xbox 360 home screen definitely felt a lot more inviting and hit that sweet spot of clutter to chill. The controller was also very solid. Have any of you gone back and tried to hold a PS3 DualShock? It feels like you’re being pranked. I take it none of you ever had an issue with red-ringing or other hardware failures?
Photo: Mark Davis (Getty Images)
Moises: Nope! Correct me if I’m wrong but those issues got ironed out with later iterations of the console, so by the time one of my best friends let me indefinitely borrow his 360, it was smooth sailing for me.
Carolyn: I did have to send mine back for repairs once, and for a while there at least, it felt like everyone I knew who owned one was hitting the red ring. There was a period there, at least in my circle of friends, where there was real disbelief and anger that Microsoft had sold us all a product that was so prone to failure. I think it speaks to just how fond people were overall of the console—its library, its interface, its online features—that today, when you bring it up, you’re far more likely to get fond recollections than bitter complaints. It was so good that even the considerable irritations so many of us experienced with it are now just a footnote in our memories.
Ethan: My console ended up red-ringing in like, 2012? But then I read that you can just put it in the oven and bake it at a low temperature to loosen up the glue. Has worked like a charm ever since.
Carolyn: Wow, I never knew that!
Ethan: I think one of the reasons people look back so fondly on the Xbox 360 is that, in retrospect, it felt like the last time you could contain the entirety of what was going on, coming out, and being talked about in your head at any given time. It was still very intimate and physical, with midnight launches and stacks of controllers in the split-screen coop session. There was spectacle with E3 but also the feeling you alone were discovering these incredible hidden treasures on Xbox Live Arcade, which was like a return to finding the internet for the first time again.
Carolyn: I agree. And they just had so many games that became sensations for a time, from Braid to Geometry Wars. The curation was exceptional, and it was an era in which it still felt like the whole culture, or much of it at least, could still come together for a few weeks around some exciting new downloadable game.
Moises: Yeah. By comparison, when the PS4 really started to pivot to those smaller more intimate games early in its lifetime, it wasn’t that those games were lesser, but it did feel like they were being more haphazardly thrown on the platform to fill gaps between big exclusives. Meanwhile XBLA had these clearly thought out rollouts and events that made a big deal of Arcade titles. Also everything was less shitty. Xbox Live Gold was the original multiplayer subscription, and the only one for quite some time, but it at least seemed to provide value with great deals and a platform that produced rock solid multiplayer hits. It also wasn’t as expensive as anything is nowadays.
Carolyn: Before we wrap things up here, I think we can’t talk about what an amazing console the 360 was without saying a little more about its games. Are there any games y’all want to shout out as particular favorites that really helped make that library great or were emblematic of what the console was doing? When I think about the 360, I think about how the grittiness of Gears of War coexisted harmoniously alongside the whimsy of Viva Pinata, and I’ll never forget the dozens of hours my friends and I spent driving around doing challenges together in Burnout Paradise. It really did feel, more than a lot of other consoles, like it offered something for everyone, and like the people behind it thought deeply about how to bring people together to share in the experiences it offered.
And even though some of its games were also on PlayStation, at least everyone in my friend group, won over by the cheevos and online features of Xbox, always bought multiplatform games there, which perpetuated the console’s dominance in that generation. It’s a little wild to think how this generation it feels somewhat the opposite for me, like most people I know play most multiplatform games on PlayStation. Wild how the tables have turned. But yeah, any other 360 shoutouts?
Moises: I cannot separate the 360 from the stunning role it did in promoting so many smaller studios to the mainstream. I already invoked Bastion from Supergiant Games, but I can’t not shoutout Limbo and Playdead, which has now delivered two absolutely singular game experiences in a row. Oh and Shadow Complex does still own.
Ethan: Limbo was incredible. While the indie darling backlash was fair and warranted, it was really an incredible run of curation there for several years. The Dishwasher games were great, and really spoke to that sense of Newgrounds 2.0 animating the grungy vibe of XBLA. It’s also wild how much Microsoft tried to court Japanese RPG fans with Blue Dragon and Lost Odyssey. For me personally, Dungeon Defenders is still an all-time great. One of the last times I was able to rope friends into playing something for hours with me on a couch.
I was trying to think of my top five favorite 360 games, exclusive or no, and couldn’t stop listing stuff. The end of that console generation was so strong, on both 360 and PS3, maybe there’s hope that the Series X/S and PS5 pick up in their final years. But with massive budgets, long development times, and so much risk-averse consolidation, I’m not hopeful.
Carolyn: Whether it picks up to some degree or not, I think it’s safe to say that there will never be an era quite like that exemplified by the 360 again. The console was just perfectly poised to take advantage of a given moment in gaming culture and technology, employing exciting new ideas like achievements to build a sense of both community and friendly competition around games in ways that its library and online service leveraged brilliantly. Also, Sneak King was great.
Ethan: Any parting thoughts since you vanished, Alyssa?
Alyssa: LMAO. The time my 360 red ringed right before I went up for senior year of college. The day before. And I went out and bought another because not having one wasn’t an option. That or the time my mother heard me cursing out misogynists in Italian?
Ethan: Was it on the $3 phone bank operator Xbox 360 headset?
Image: Kotaku / Ubisoft / Sony / Rocksteady / Nosyrevy (Getty Images), Digital Sun, Vicky Leta / Blizzard, Nintendo, Ryu Ga Gotoku Studios / Sega, Cyan Worlds Inc
This week, Ubisoft released a statement addressing what might generously be called a “controversy” about the upcoming Assassin’s Creed game, Shadows. Let’s be real, though. It’s just the latest salvo from a reactionary hate movement. You can read our thoughts on that, the terrific texture of Yakuza 0, the missteps of Nintendo World Championships: NES Edition, the amazing sound design of the Riven remake, and more, in the pages ahead.
As you wander the wasteland of Appalachia, you may notice what looks like an oddly dressed ghoul stumbling down the cracked pavement toward you. It’s actually a Scorched, which isn’t anything special, but lately you might’ve seen them dressed in holiday attire. The bright red and white frock of a Scorched Wanderer stands out in the bleak post-apocalypse, and if you manage to beat your fellow survivors to the punch, you can actually farm Holiday Scorched in Fallout 76 for fantastic rewards. Why would you want to? Well, read on. – Brandon Morgan Read More
Paramount+ announced today that it has canceled Xbox’s Halo TV show after its second season. The team behind the show is reportedly looking to shop the sci-fi adaption around to other places in an effort to continue the series.
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On July 18, Paramount confirmed with The Hollywood Reporter that the Halo TV show will not receive a third season on its streaming platform. In March, the show—based on the popular Xbox video game franchise—ended its second season with fans hopeful that there was more to come following an uptick in quality. But that isn’t going to happen, or at least not at Paramount+.
“We are extremely proud of this ambitious series,” said Paramount+ in a statement confirming the news. “And would like to thank our partners at Xbox, 343 Industries, and Amblin Television, along with showrunner and executive producer David Wiener, his fellow executive producers, the entire cast led by Pablo Schreiber as Master Chief, and the amazing crew for all their outstanding work. We wish everyone the best going forward.”
The Hollywood Reporter says that its sources have confirmed that Xbox, 343 Industries, and Amblin are all interested in continuing the live-action series somewhere else. It’s reported that Paramount is supportive of this plan.
Xbox / Paramount
“We deeply appreciate the millions of fans who propelled the Halo series to be a global success, and we remain committed to broadening the Halo universe in different ways in the future,” said 343 Industries in a statement. “We are grateful to Amblin and Paramount for their partnership in bringing our expansive sci-fi universe to viewers around the world.”
We’re about halfway through the summer and I’ve given up on avoiding sweat You’re probably about halfway to giving up on Elden Ring’s Shaddw of the Erdtree DLC, but we can help with that. We’ve also got a tip for a free game for you to snag, and some FF14 advice. Read on for more of this week’s best tips.
Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtreelaunched some weeks ago, meaning players have hopefully managed to surmount its immensely difficult fights (the last one in particular) and roll credits on the expansion. However, a contingent of players have found themselves underwhelmed by the conclusion, and the expansion’s narrative content as a whole, since Shadow of the Erdtree is Elden Ring’s only DLC and bears the weight of sending off one of the biggest games of our time.
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Some have expressed frustration with the ramifications, or lack thereof, of Shadow of the Erdtree. Many expected characters from the base game to return in some way, react to the events of the expansion, or simply play a bigger role in it, especially ones who have close ties to Miquella, the DLC’s central character. The lack of consequence, and the absence of new dialogue that’d further the player’s understanding of the story, have been a sore point for folks who are starved for morsels of Elden Ring’s massive, sometimes inscrutable narrative.
There’s a contingent of folks who are especially disappointed in the final cutscene of the DLC, feeling that it does very little to pay off the experience that preceded it. That sentiment is likely bred from the fact that Shadow of the Erdtree ends in a massive fight. I’m talking, like, a huge pain in the ass that is even rigged against the player thanks to insane hitboxes, seemingly unavoidable attacks, and the kinds of long combos that Elden Ring has become infamous for doubling down on. Once you have beaten that absolute unit of a final boss, there’s a cutscene that can be triggered, and many fans of the game are none too pleased with its brevity and lack of oomph, for lack of a better word.
Spoilers for Shadow of the Erdtree’s ending follow.
For many, this ending to Elden Ring’s saga seems like a whimper rather than a triumphant bang. The scene is straightforward enough (or as clean-cut as FromSoftware’s esoterica can be) and that appears to be the source of the tension. Miquella, the quintessential character of the entire expansion, appears for the first time and effectively doubles down on his goal, or at least restates it. There is no pomp to the affair. Miquella is kneeling throughout the scene, which takes place in a void save for the nearby throne of the Elden Lord, and it is over before you know it. It betrays no significant new insight.
I won’t lie: this does kind of suck ass. I actually get the contingent who were maybe expecting more from the end of this DLC. Elden Ring is an epic, and if this is the end of it, yeah, it’s not exactly what I would’ve expected. But while some are fixated on the short nature of the ending, others are pissed because of how little it appears to add to the story, or at the least their understanding of it all.
Elden Ring, like most of FromSoftware’s oeuvre, is fascinating to digest and think about. I love people who sniff out bits of lore and propose theories about the motivations of characters and the larger schemings of the world. I too have fallen asleep to many Vaatividya videos piercing together scraps of item descriptions into a cogent and deeply tragic narrative. However, these practices have also borne a kind of fan that demands “truth” from these games. People who expect answers for their sleuthing and investment. In my humble opinion, those folks are playing these games—and engaging with art—in a reductive manner, and only getting in the way of their own enjoyment.
The absolute truth of these games is supposed to elide you, you dingbats. Whatever absolute meaning you are trying to wring from them flies in the face of the entire point of FromSoft’s preferred method of storytelling. If Miyazaki wanted players to know everything about the game, he and his team could’ve simply written it out for you in a game rich with endless dialogue, exposition, and scenes pontificating on every minute detail. The fact that these games have never fit that mold should have clued you all into an obvious fact: there is no truth waiting for you at the center of Elden Ring or its expansion.
Disgruntled players who can’t believe that Shadow of the Erdtree would end in such an abrupt and curt manner are outright hoping that there’s a secret ending to be uncovered. Though Elden Ring didn’t have a secret one, it did feature multiple endings depending on what quests you completed and what force/faction you ultimately aligned with. Shadow of the Erdtree lacks a similar framework, and Miyazaki has outright stated that the DLC wouldn’t impact the endings already baked into the game, but that hasn’t stopped a select few from praying that those claims were little more than a red herring.
I find how little I understand Elden Ring to be a fucking joy, y’all. When I do come back to it, I love trying to click the puzzle pieces together. Some of them fit, and others don’t. Some of them may never click and that’s okay. I can master the game’s mechanics and dog-walk half of these bosses in my sleep, but there’s something about the fact that I may never really understand all of its mysteries, including Miquella’s motivations for abandoning the Lands Between and seeking godhood, or whatever people are bent out of shape about. I’ll never really stop exploring the larger-than-life cast of Elden Ring and that keeps the thrill of it alive. I don’t need to know everything about Elden Ring to know that I love it and love being engaged by it. Believe it or not, that’s enough.
Above all else,Zenless Zone Zero is beautiful to look at. HoYoverse’s latest action RPG gacha title, following 2020’s Genshin Impactand last year’s Honkai: Star Rail, has a lot much going for it, with a beautifully detailed world, characters, and animations. Underneath that style there is even some substance, but the game may not be able to best HoYoverse’s other successful titles in the long run.
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Smart features that lessen the gacha grind make ZZZ perhaps the most player-friendly title in HoYoverse’s growing library, but it lacks a good hook that will keep the player coming back for more. In the dozen or so hours I’ve spent with ZZZ it takes shape as a promising melting pot of useful features and gorgeous design that I’m worried won’t garner the same avid fan base as its siblings.
Damn, Zenless Zone Zero has style!
In Zenless Zone Zero you take on the role of a Proxy, a person who guides agents (the characters you control in combat) through dangerous pocket dimensions called Hollows. These Hollows have valuable resources, so the residents of New Eridu (where the game is set), are always in want of a good Proxy to guide them in hopes of turning a profit. At the start of ZZZ,you help a trio of agents escape the Hollows and fall into a rabbit hole of intrigue and mystery that only gets deeper the more you play.
Image: HoYoverse
Immediately upon starting, New Eridu and its inhabitants stand out visually, thanks to the game’s incredible urban punk aesthetic that blends the futuristic and nostalgic. The protagonist duo Belle and Wise (per HoYoverse’ tradition since Genshin Impact, you get to pick to play as a female or male main character) are another great example of ZZZ’s wonderful design. Belle has a simple gray and orange color palette only contrasted by the dark blue of her stylish short hair. She’s wearing a fashionable ensemble with geometric patterning that alternates between her main colors while also sporting a walkman-like device on her hip. It’s a fit that would be right at home in the most fashionable neighborhoods of New York City.
That high-quality design extends to the rest of the game’s cast, each of whom is stylish and could very well be your new favorite character, which is the ideal for a game that asks you to pay real-world money to get the characters you want. I especially love the variety ZZZ offers, which includes non-human characters, like a bear named Ben Bigger, a first for aHoYoverse game. Similarly, New Eridu is a shining city filled with a love of the real world’s past. The central neighborhood you explore while not actively on missions (we’ll get to those) is littered with stores dedicated to physical media (what a concept). Belle and Wise run a video rental store that you get to manage while they aren’t doing their less-than-legal activities guiding people through the Hollows.
ZZZ’s core gameplay loop is centered around the Hollows. You can accept missions that send your party of three into the dangerous dungeons to fight and gain loot. Some missions progress the story, some are side activities, and some are combat-focused challenges to test your skill. In contrast to the open-world of Genshin Impact or the more expansive space traveling escapades of Honkai: Star Rail the world of ZZZ feels small. That extends to missions, which you begin not by traveling a long distance to a location, but by launching into them from a simple menu. It reminds me most of HoYoverse’s Honkai Impact 3rd, but that’s not where the similarities end. ZZZ’s entire combat system feels most like HI3.
Image: HoYoverse
Even when it works, I kind of wish I was playing something else
In ZZZ, you control one member of your party at a time in real time combat against hordes of enemies. Each character has a basic, special, and ultimate attack, with the latter two charging up as you perform basic attacks. This alone is fairly simple and probably will feel familiar to anyone who has played HI3 or Genshin Impact. However, ZZZ’s special sauce is it sassist attacks. Before an enemy attacks, a short sparkle signals to switch characters. If timed perfectly, you dodge the incoming attack and can in turn do some big damage. With this system, combat encounters take on a certain flow that can feel exceptionally good when you string together assist attack after assist attack, unleashing ultimates and decimating the enemy in no time.
HoYoverse constantly iterates from one title to the next, and ZZZ’s combat is clearly the result of some great iteration on Genshin Impact, which to this day has a pretty boring combat loop. Combat shines even brighter thanks to some of the best animations I’ve seen HoYoverse put to screen. When compared to Genshin Impact, it’s a wonderful improvement, however it can’t reach the same heights as this year’s HoYoverse competitor, Wuthering Waves. WuWa still feels much more engaged than ZZZ, as even in the latters’ most challenging fights the combat loop can lean towards button-mashing without the need for much thought.
Naturally, ZZZ’s combat loop is in service of gaining in-game resources by which you can unlock and upgrade new characters and weapons. Thankfully, that gacha grind isn’t nearly as bad as something like Genshin Impact or Honkai: Star Rail. Everything feels more easily accessible to the player through the limited collection of activities. You can probably get your favorite character with a lot less work than it would take in other HoYoverse games due to ZZZ’s approach, which shows the developer is clearly attempting to make quality of life improvements to its games (and something I desperately hopes makes its way back to Genshin Impact and HSR). Combined with the smaller world and simple mission design, ZZZ is HoYoverse’s most approachable and player-friendly title. Yet it still hasn’t gotten its hooks into me.
HoYoverse
Ironically I think the reason for that is because ZZZ sands maybe one too many edges off the HoYoverse formula. While combat is the most impressive it’s ever been in a HoYoverse title, it feels too easy, which makes moment-to-moment gameplay unengaging. The characters and world are gorgeously designed, but the story itself isn’t very enticing as of yet. The stories of Genshin Impact and Honkai: Star Rail are what keep me coming back, but even with ZZZ’s a lower barrier to entry I find its narrative to be easy to bounce off of. To be fair, the game is in its first week and has barely gotten started on the narrative front, so things could get better, but right now, it’s not gripping me. More than anything, while playing ZZZ I find myself wishing its improved features could just be put in the HoYoverse games I’d rather be playing.
As much as I love many things in Zenless Zone Zero, I can’t quite place it in the HoYoverse portfolio. Alongside Genshin Impact, Honkai: Star Rail, and Honkai Impact 3rd, Zenless Zone Zero feels like it has the biggest hurdles in the way of its success. Genshin is already an established hit with an avid fan base thanks to a sprawling open-world matched by an equally sprawling story. Honkai: Star Rail has become popular in its own right after only being released a year ago on the strength of its tight turn-based combat and enthralling space opera adventure. Then there’s Honkai Impact 3rd, which despite releasing back in 2016, still has loyal fans. This all stretches the potential player base for ZZZ even thinner. I hope it does find its audience, however, as there is a lot to love.
Zenless Zone Zero is now available on Android, iOS, PC, and PlayStation 5.
A screenshot I took while Remote Playing the Elden Ring expansion this weekend.Screenshot: From Software / Bandai Namco / Kotaku
I used to consider myself a certifiable cloud hater. I’ve never enjoyed my experiences trying to engage with cloud gaming, which allows players to stream their console games to PCs, smartphones, and dedicated handhelds, as well as adjacent remote play technology. In my limited experience, it was always too laggy, made the games look ugly as shit, and needed far too potent a signal to work even passably well. However, I went away this past weekend and didn’t want to lug around either of my consoles, so I gave it an earnest shot again and I must say, I’m pleasantly surprised with how far cloud and remote gaming’s come. – Moises Taveras Read More
The developers behind Space Marine 2 have announced that a planned multiplayer beta has been canceled as the team wants to focus all of its attention on the retail game and its launch. And after the last few years, which saw many big games launch in rough shape, this sounds like a smart move.
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Announced in 2021, and then delayed in 2023, Space Marine 2 looks pretty dang rad. I’m very excited to check out the third-person shooter when it launches later this year. And I’m not even a big Warhammer 40k guy! I just loved the original Space Marine, which launched on PC, Xbox 360 and PS3 in 2011. And this new entry looks to be even bigger and better. But if you were excited to check out the upcoming Space Marine 2 before its launch via a beta, well, bad news: It ain’t happening anymore.
On June 28, developers Saber Interactive confirmed that it was not going to hold a previously planned Space Marine 2 online multiplayer beta test. The devs say that the game is “almost ready” and that they are focused on optimizing, polishing, and fixing any remaining bugs and issues. As such, the devs decided to cancel the beta as they claimed it would take “the development teams away” from preparing for launch.
“We know this is disappointing news for some of you,” said Saber Interactive in a Steam post on Friday. “As a thank you to those interested in participating, players who registered via the online signup before June 28, 2024, midnight Paris Time, will receive the limited Bolt Pistol skin.”
“We appreciate your understanding and continued support as we work towards delivering the exceptional game you deserve,” said Saber.
Focus Entertainment / Saber Interactive
The now-canceled beta test was first teased in August 2023, with players able to sign up for access on the game’s official website. At the time there was no release date or window for the beta. After that initial tease, however, Saber Interactive went radio silent on the beta, leaving some fans worried about whether it was going to happen at all. Now we know.
On Steam, some fans expressed concern that Saber Interactive was trying to hide the game from players before launch. Others were confused as to why it took so long to announce this news. Personally, I’m hopeful that the team being allowed to focus on finishing and polishing up the main game instead of running a beta will give Space Marine 2 the best chance at launching in solid shape.
We will have to wait and see if canceling the test paid off. Space Marine 2 finally arrives on PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC on September 9.
Screenshot: 343 Industries / Claire Jackson / Kotaku
It ain’t perfect, but damn do I love Halo Infinite. So naturally, I wasn’t all too thrilled when it suddenly kept crashing before it even reached the main menu and nothing seemed to fix it. Verifying the game’s file integrity, reinstalling it, restarting Windows, casting spells and rituals in the forest. Nothing! Turns out, the problem for me and many other players was that we were using Nvidia driver 555.99.
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Released on June 4, 2024, Nvidia Game Ready and Studio Driver 555.99 caused quite a bit of havoc for many fans of Halo Infinite as it rendered the game unplayable for most who had an Nvidia card and were timely with their driver updates. The workaround, of course, was to roll back to driver version 555.85. Halo developer 343 Industries acknowledged the issue early on. It released a statement via the official Halo Support X account stating that it was working with Nvidia to be sure the issue wouldn’t persist into the next driver update. Thankfully, driver version 556.12 was released on June 27 and lets Halo Infinite launch and run without issue.
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Odds are if you found your way to Nvidia driver 555.99, you probably know how to update your system to the latest version to get back into some Halo. If not, you can download the driver via Nvidia’s GeForce Experience app (which is how I prefer to manage my drivers), or by downloading the driver directly from Nvidia’s website. The latter is a handy way to locate past drivers should you run into any other issues.
While rolling back to the previous driver was the solution to playing Halo Infinite on a PC with an Nvidia card, it’s usually preferable to keep your machine’s drivers as up-to-date as possible. But now that 556.12 fixed the Halo issue, I have a can of Monster energy, an aggressively frantic metal playlist, and endless rounds of Husky Raid with my name on them.
Some games make my heart bubble up with joy. They remind me of thumbing through tiny, beautiful booklets and tag-teaming tough bosses with friends. Not everyone’s childhood was easy, simple, or happy, but all of us have moments in our lives we look back fondly on and games that briefly bring them back to us. Panzer Paladin is one of those for me, and the retro action platformer is finally getting a second chance on PlayStation and Xbox.
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It was made by Tribute Games, the indie team behind 2022 GOTY contender Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder’s Revenge. Before that, they were best known for the puzzle RPG Wizorb and the run-and-gun side-scroller Mercenary Kings. All of the studio’s projects have showcased top-tier pixel-art and a flare for turning the fundamentals of old genre classics into homages that looked great and felt novel. Following 2017’s Flint Hook, described early on as “Spider-Man with a gun,” Tribute released Panzer Paladin, a 2D platformer where you pilot a mech and collect giant medieval weapons.
It’s structured like Mega Man with a stage select screen and boss fights at the end of each level. It borrows from Blaster Master in that you can exit your mech to navigate parts of the levels as tiny pilot with a grappling hook. It plays like Zelda II, Nintendo’s one-off side-scrolling experiment that threw Link into tense 2D duels against armored knights. What Panzer Paladin has that those games don’t is a sophisticated breakable weapon system where you collect swords, spears, axes and other deadly tools as you play, even crafting your own and sharing them online with other players.
There’s plenty of spike pits but no Castlevania-style knockback hitting you into them, and every level has optional checkpoints. The combat is crunchy, the levels are imaginative, and the art is oozing with love, respect, and appreciation for the 8-bit era. But the boss fights are tough, and there are definitely some controller-throwing platforming sections. The warm fuzzy feeling you get from the retro nostalgia does not stop Panzer Paladin from being, all things considered, a pretty hardcore throwback.
Gif: Tribute Games / Kotaku
Its development also followed a now uncommon trajectory. Announced in early 2019, Panzer Paladin was made in just over a year and came out in the summer of 2020, months into an unprecedented pandemic nobody saw coming. It launched exclusively on PC and Switch, with a free content update in the fall that added a leaderboard and challenge levels. At the time, Tribute said there were no plans to bring the game to PlayStation or Xbox, leaving retro enthusiasts on those platforms out of luck.
With Shredder’s Revenge done and its DLC out last year, the timing finally lined up to bring Panzer Paladin to other platforms. If porting was as easy as copying and pasting some code, it might have happened a lot sooner, but Tribute works with a proprietary game engine and had to bring on outside programming help, as well as navigate a byzantine platform certification process that included making sure server support for the game’s user-generated content—its player-crafted weapons—didn’t break on PlayStation or Xbox.
“You go through certification and you get bug reports for some things and there’s always the temptation to go, ‘Oh, we could correct this in a specific way, or we could add a feature to this,” Ray, a producer who helped coordinate the process, told me in a recent video interview. “But there’s also that little voice that says we need to keep it as simple as possible, so we get through certification and we introduce less risk of something breaking because we changed something else.”
With that complete, Tribute can now focus on its next project. Will it be a one-game studio or is there room for another Panzer Paladin-sized experiment in its future? “Right now we have multiple projects in the pipeline including some ports,” publishing manager Eric Lafontaine told me (several of the studio’s older games like Wizorb aren’t on modern consoles). He added that the team is currently growing, a reassuring sign at a time when lots of other indie studios are facing extinction.
In the meantime, Panzer Paladin is ripe for re-discovery like a long-lost NES cartridge juiced up on modern tech. There’s no shortage of gorgeous looking retro games on PC and console these days, but it only takes a few minutes with Panzer Paladin to see there’s much more to it than just another incredibly GIF-able pixel art game. And one of the things I now love most about it is the way it’s brain-wormed its way into my own nostalgia for the summer of its original release. 2020 was an absolute shit year in so many ways. Playing Panzer Paladin offered brief moments of retro respite I still haven’t forgotten. And now it’s back with a Platinum Trophy on PS4.
