What started out as an April Fools' joke turned out to be more than that: we're getting a new class in Roboquest! The Superbot cannot equip new guns - he eats them instead to gain upgrades - but comes with a blaster and "Captain McSlice", a new living sword. The sword is also unlocked for other characters to use, after completing the quest necessary to recruit Superbot.

Along with a new name, there will be 15 minutes of gameplay showcased this coming Tuesday, on June 11th!

Here is the full quote:

Hi everyone,

Summer is nearly upon us, and as promised, we’re ready to provide an update on our big reveal. We’d like to invite the world to join us on Tuesday, June 11, for the official first look at gameplay for the next Dragon Age!

After Dragon Age: Inquisition launched, the studio was given an incredible opportunity to explore, test, and validate a variety of gameplay concepts as we worked to determine what the next Dragon Age could look like. We brought everything to the table which, yes, even included a multiplayer concept. The time we spent experimenting and iterating gradually taught us a lot. This work, and the amazing support from EA, helped us re-focus on creating an incredible single player game, with all the choices, characters and world building you’d expect from us.

At BioWare, we create worlds of adventure, conflict and companionship, where you’re at the center of it all. As fans of our franchise know, every Dragon Age game has delivered a new standalone story. Set in the world of Thedas, these tales explore epic locales and threats, always thrusting you into a new conflict. Each game also introduces a new lead hero – The Warden, Hawke, The Inquisitor – that you can call your own. You can expect all that, and more, with the new game. And of course, much like your unique hero, it wouldn’t be a Dragon Age game without an amazing cast of companions – right? 

Each of the seven unique characters that make up your companions will have deep and compelling storylines where the decisions you make will impact your relationships with them – as well as their lives. You’ll unite this team of unforgettable heroes as you take on a terrifying new threat unleashed on the world. Naturally, the Dread Wolf still has an important part in this tale, but you and your companions – not your enemies – are the heart of this new experience.

So, to capture what this game is all about, we changed the name as the original title didn’t show just how strongly we feel about our new heroes, their stories and how you’ll need to bring them together to save all of Thedas.
We proudly introduce to you Dragon Age™: The Veilguard.

We know you’ve been waiting a long time for this reveal and we’re so ready to show you what we’ve been up to. We’ll see you on Tuesday, June 11th at 8:00am PT at the Dragon Age YouTube channel with over 15 minutes of gameplay from the opening moments of the game that has you jumping back into Thedas on your new adventure.

This moment means so much to everyone at BioWare, and we wouldn’t be here without you. We’re ready to have some fun, so join the chat early…we’ve got a few special surprises for you. 

Thank you for all your support. See you soon,

Gary McKay

Executive Producer, Dragon Age, and General Manager, BioWare

A remake of Yooka-Laylee was just announced during the Guerrilla Collective stream. Titled Yooka-Replaylee (have fun Googling that), it has high-quality graphics, remixed levels, a map, and a lot more.

Come check out my guide on preparing for the expansion! I list off locations of Bell Bearings for buying supplies, as well as rare materials you'll want before you enter the Land of Shadow. Not sure how to get there, or how to improve once you're inside? I have that info too!

I for one am *not* ready for the expansion lol. My current playthrough may be sitting next to Miquella's Cocoon, but my inventory for Smithing Stones and Glovewort is pretty low. I'll need to stock up if I want to experiment with some of the new weapons (supposedly 100 in all, across 8 new categories).

ELDEN RING™ Shadow of the Erdtree

• Download Size : 16.502 GB
• Pre-Load : June 19
• Launch : June 21

The former PlayStation exclusive, which can also be found on PC via Steam and the Epic Game Store, will have a new home in a couple months. Below is the original launch trailer for the game, plus the Xbox teaser below it.

I've had a computer running for the past almost 4 days rendering Hearthstone cards to do a full database update here on Out of Games, and I've uncovered a few fun, updated numbers during it.

• There are 29830 cards in the Hearthstone client as of the most recent patch.
• 22650 of those cards can be rendered.
  • Cards like the buffs you see on mouseover on the gameboard, or buttons in Battlegrounds, don't get rendered.
  • Only 6249 are classified as being collectible, and a bunch of those are heroes or duplicates for core set.
• 10692 of those cards can be rendered as golden cards.
• 121 of those are Signature cards.

Now what gets a bit weird is we actually have 30510 cards in our database, which is almost 700 more cards than what exists in the client. I haven't had an opportunity to dig into that yet to figure out what the differences are; I'm certain there has to be something interesting there.

Just figured someone might find those numbers interesting. As for why there are so many unplayable cards in the game, well there's this fun thing in game development where devs will make use of an existing feature in the game for something else.

In World of Warcraft, the most famous use of this is how they used to do pathing for NPCs. I'm not sure if it's still done this way because it's been a long time since I've done any logging on the WoW client, but I know in Legion you could actually see some of them if you were "lucky". Blizzard spawns hidden waypoints for NPCs to travel, or for you to collide with when you hit a portal to zone into an instance. In the WoW dev's debugging client view, these NPCs are actually little bunnies. 

Fallout 3 also does something funny with their trains. Trains are actually human NPCs that are simply wearing a train as a hat, so in reality the trains are just people running around.

Reusing existing technology saves on development time.

For Hearthstone, Cards takes on a lot of this burden.

• TB_BaconShopLockAll_Button is a card with the name "Freeze" which is the button on the Battlegrounds board that freezes the shop.
  • All buttons on the Battlegrounds board are cards internally.
• Buffs like the +2/+2 from Power Word: Feast are cards themselves.
  • These are called enchantments internally and all the card ids have an "e" suffix.

We import everything that is in the client into our database so if you take off the collectible filter, you can find cards that don't have images which means they usually have something weird going on.

Note that all the freshly rendered cards are not yet imported to the website as of posting this thread. That's going to take some time to upload and process on our end!

This season is focusing on the Eternals, featuring Arishem (the Celestial/big red guy).

I've never been super familiar with the characters, so if I remember the movie correctly, Arishem commanded the Eternals to watch over Earth until the planet had enough...lifeforce? to birth a new Celestial; the Eternals eventually fought each other over whether or not they would continue with that purpose, after coming to love humanity. This led to the big fingers sticking out of Earth, which never gets mentioned anywhere else in the MCU - a plot hole so big you could drive a Celestial through it!

I'm currently still working through Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door; it's every bit as wonderful as my memory of it from 20 years ago would indicate :D
Edit: Defeated the final boss, so I guess it's just wrap-up time with the Pit of 100 Trials and getting everything else I missed.

Three weeks from now, Shadow of the Erdtree will release for Elden Ring, and I will very much be in line for that. In the meantime, I'll finish TTYD, write a review of it, and see where the rest of the month takes me. I've got all sorts of stuff I could play, and I can't help myself but add more to pile over time lol.

I was thinking of doing some "Timely Reviews" of older games, to fill in the gap: my first idea was Bug Fables, because it's like Paper Mario and it could be fun to review a similar game I've never played. That would of course involve buying yet-another game, so we'll see. I was also thinking of reviewing Wildermyth, now that the developers have finished working on it and gone into "hibernation"/shut down(?). Any suggestions would be welcome!

Charge into a brand-new, supersized adventure with ASTRO across more than 50 exciting and diverse worlds on September 6, 2024. 

Monster Hunter Wilds is an action-RPG that lets players freely explore a living world and experience best-in-class combat as they take down fearsome monsters alongside friends. Monster Hunter Wilds comes to PlayStation 5 in 2025.

Silent Hill 2 set to release on October 8th Having received a letter from his deceased wife, James heads to where they shared so many memories, in the hope of seeing her one more time: Silent Hill. There, by the lake, he finds a woman eerily similar to her... "My name... is Maria," the woman smiles. Her face, her voice... She's just like her. Experience a master-class in psychological survival horror―lauded as the best in the series―on the latest hardware with chilling visuals and visceral sounds. 

Path of Exile 2 on Consoles will introduce a Couch Co-op mode as well as support Cross-Play and Cross-Progression. Early Access is available on all platforms in late 2024

When eight friends return to the isolated lodge where two of their group vanished a year prior, fear tightens its icy grip, and their mountain retreat descends into a nightmare with no escape. Face your fears and determine who survives Until Dawn in this seminal horror classic rebuilt and enhanced for PS5 consoles and PC. Coming Fall 2024. 

Marvel Rivals, the Ultimate Super Hero Team-Based PVP Shooter, is now available to WISHLIST on PlayStation 5! Prepare for the Closed Beta Test, where players will assemble an All-star Marvel squad in epic battles across ever-changing battlegrounds.Wishlist now on PlayStation Store and get ready IGNITE THE BATTLE!

Arrives holiday 2024 on PS VR2.

Studio and publisher Skydance Games offered a first look at gameplay for its upcoming action adventure VR game, Skydance's BEHEMOTH, slated to release later this year. The gameplay trailer offers viewers a glimpse of the breathtaking traversal gameplay, brutal physics-based hand-to-hand combat and larger-than-life boss battles that await them. Skydance's BEHEMOTH tells an original story set in the Forsaken Lands, the plague-ravished wasteland of a once glorious empire, where its inhabitants are driven mad and cities have fallen to ruin. Players take on the role of a cursed warrior embarking on a perilous quest to rid the Lands of an insurmountable threat: the monstrous Behemoths. In glorious VR fashion, this treacherous journey will bring the warrior to their limits, requiring their wits, skills, and unyielding determination to overcome whatever brutality the Forsaken Lands have in store for them.

Ballad of Antara is an upcoming fantasy Action RPG from TipsWorks Studio and Infoldgames, releasing in 2025 on PlayStation 5.

A faraway land is on the verge of being lost to a conflict from eons ago, and the invasion that followed it. Embark on a perilous journey, seek towering divine creatures, to reclaim the twisted and lost fundamentals of the world.

The open-world dress-up adventure game "Infinity Nikki" is about to start its PlayStation 5 beta test in Q3.

Venture into the vast Miraland to unravel the mysteries of "styling". Alongside Nikki, awaken the magical powers hidden within various outfits and embark on a journey filled with fun.

Concord aims to be a tight, well-balanced, 5v5 FPS. Characters are unique with their own abilities and the team has utilized their experience with strategy and fighting games to add depth.

Every week will introduce a new cinematic focusing on different characters so you can learn about the story behind the Concord Galaxy. Here is an early look at the character selection screen.

Here's the gameplay trailer seen at today's State of Play.

The ability to play with up to eight(!) people at once is finally upon us...not that I have that many friends who play the amazing Pokemon-like that is Cassette Beasts >_>

• Party-up with up to 8 players, all visible in your world as you travel!
• Battle your friends in 1v1, and even assign custom rules to your battle such as enabling/disabling sticker attributes!
• Trade tapes with each other, including any stickers you’ve applied!
• Team up for raid battles against Rogue Fusions to receive Cyber Material to help you obtain Bootlegs faster!

The game is also 30% off, from now until June 3rd. If you're looking for an alternative to Pokemon, with an interesting story and an expanded gameplay system, look no further!