News Game Plus - Week Ending May 2
Last of the Ghost of Tsushima
It seems as though indefinitely is only around a month as Naughty Dog has given a new release date to their highly anticipated sequel, The Last of Us 2. I’m losing all sense of time but it feels like just a few weeks ago that Sony and Naughty Dog delayed The Last of Us 2 indefinitely. This decision raised a lot of questions due to the vagueness of the delay with many wondering just how bad the delay would be. With word choices such as indefinite used to describe the delay I fully expected it to be a little longer than about a month and expected it to get the same treatment that Breath of the Wild received when it simultaneously launched on both the floundering WiiU and much awaited Nintendo Switch.
This week on the PlayStation blog, Herman Hulst, head of Worldwide Studios, made a surprise post announcing the newest date for the latest Naughty Dog adventure. The Last of Us 2 now has an official date of June 19 which is just a few short weeks from the previous release date of May 29. In the post Naughty Dog made responding to the delay at the start of April they said “we were faced with the reality that due to the logistics beyond our control, we couldn’t launch The Last of Us 2 to our satisfaction”
I know a lot of people are probably thinking what can really change in just a few short weeks but we are all adapting to this new way of life quickly. Over the past month there have been plenty of stories about factories getting back up to speed or getting back to completely normal operations. June 19 is still almost two months away and a lot can change in two months as well for the better.
The digital release wont be an issue, it also seems like an extra month to print and ship physical copies could help as well. Its possible that Sony is not concerned with the physical sales as they may have enough data on games like Doom Eternal, Resident Evil 3 and Final Fantasy 7 and saw just how well the digital portion performed. This could have been enough to make Naughty Dog and Sony feel comfortable that one of the most anticipated games of the year by many will still be able to perform within their guidelines.
One of the major questions when Sony announced the delay of The Last of Us 2 was what will happen to Ghost of Tsushima. Sony’s other anticipated exclusive from SuckerPunch seemed in doubt as well. The post from the Herman this week on the blog was a little bittersweet, with the news that we were getting Last of Us 2 probably sooner than many expected but that the first game from SuckerPunch in about six years would be getting delayed. However, the news wasn’t too bad as Ghost of Tsushima only got delayed about a month, landing on a new release date of July 17. This is great news as it means we will hopefully have two amazing games to play through this summer, and they are spaced well enough apart that you wont have to rush through if you are the kind of person that needs to play games right away.
Sony clearly has a strategy in motion here as Last of Us 2 could have easily taken the July release date, which would have meant that Sony wouldn’t have had to delay Tsushima. However, they clearly want to get The Last of Us 2 out the door first, Late last week, large spoilers for The Last of Us 2 began to surface on the internet and it’s possible that the reason Sony wants to get this game out first is to limit the time between these leaks and the time consumers can purchase the game. It’s very possible that some of these spoilers will be enough to eliminate a sale or at the very least postpone it until the game is cheaper, which is still removing money from the pockets of Sony and Naughty Dog. These spoilers are very unfortunate as these people have spent a good chunk of their lives making this game what it is, if you haven’t been spoiled then try to avoid them and if you have seen some of them don’t ruin it for others.
Xbox & Nintendo Summer Plans
This week we got some good news and we got some bad news regarding Nintendo and Xbox Series X and their plans moving forward. I always like to get the bad news out of the way first, which leads to the story that developers are being told by Nintendo that their big June Nintendo Direct will not be going ahead as usual. Although not confirmed by Nintendo, there has been a lot of speculation that the tentpole June Direct that they have had since 2013 will likely not be happening this June. Nintendo has always used the June Direct as the big showcase to highlight its biggest offerings for the upcoming holiday season. Their June Direct is also usually anchored around a their biggest title of the year with this year being likely focused on Mario and its remakes, collections and new entries.
Clearly Covid-19 has affected Nintendo with the Switch being scare at retail, three years into the consoles life cycle and while it’s great news that the system is sold out, eventually the ripple effect of the over demand for the system catches up with the supply. Nintendo is currently having troubles getting the Switch back in stock worldwide and that might just be the start of their problems. The speculated postponement of their June Direct also seems indicative that working from home has made it quite hard on the developers to hit their targets. The real challenge is having developers work from home but still achieve similar results with working conditions that aren’t ideal. Factories around the world have either resumed full production or are most of the way there as it seems much easier to maintain social distancing at a factory as opposed to a development studio.
The good news is what we could be playing this fall. Xbox announced on Twitter this week shortly after the reveal of the latest Assassins Creed that a new episode of Inside Xbox will be taking place May 7. “You want to see games for the Xbox Series X? We want to show you games for the Xbox Series X. Check out first look, next gen gameplay from our global developers partners within Inside Xbox on Thursday May 7”
Microsoft clearly understands how internet hype works and is giving fans around a week to look forward to this event and to build expectations. The Assassins Creed reveal, which we will talk a little about later seems to have been received well and having the gameplay premiere of a blockbuster franchise is a good place to start. As I said earlier Xbox has been slowly giving us teases regarding their next gen console and this looking like the first in depth preview regarding their future says something.
Microsoft didn’t get to the status the company is at by accident. They are very much aware of the shortcomings the Xbox One had at launch compared to the competition. If you asked a handful of people what the main issue was with the Xbox One they would say lack of games. It’s no coincidence that the first event regarding the Series X is focused around games. You can’t sell consoles on exclusives alone, you need to have premier, third party support as well. Xbox furthered the anticipation by tweeting out “We’re bringing friends to our next showcase and they have games, lots of games!”
Ubisoft has always been a major supporter of new console launches, whether that be with multiplatform games like the Assassins Creed series among others or by having console exclusives like ZombiU for the WiiU. Ubisoft has seen success following this formula as people with a new system need games to buy. The install base for a launch console is usually small but the benefit of launching alongside a console is that these are very engaged customers. It’s very possible that we will see more from Ubisoft with the amount of games they should have coming out at the end of 2020.
As for the announcement, it is specific that it will be third party games only as Aaron Greenberg, GM of Xbox games marketing said “Also know the Xbox Game Studios teams are hard at work on some big summer plans” That alone is pretty great news that there should be such a massive amount of games to play on the Series X, both exclusive and third party that it requires two different showcases. As for when we can expect that, I would assume that it will happen during June when they typically would have had their E3 briefing. When E3 was cancelled physically, Xbox was one of the few companies that immediately announced they would still be holding an event during the same time frame.
One thing that I am very hopeful to see next week is if they are able to specifically demonstrate some of the new features the Series X will be bringing to the table. Some of the features that we already know about include the SSD and how that is supposed to eliminate load times and Smart Delivery and how we can tangibly benefit from that. These games are going to look amazing, there is no doubt about that but it would definitely be the icing on the cake if they are not only able to show of new games, possibly ones that aren’t announced yet and pair that with how these games incorporate the new features of the Series X.
Assassins Creed 2020 Announced
There is only one game that we know for sure will be shown at the Xbox Series X centric episode of Inside Xbox and that is the latest instalment in the Assassins Creed franchise. The latest entry in the storied franchise confirms the leaks and rumours to be true, which means that the Assassins Creed Series will be built around the Viking era. A while back leaks came out from screenshots to keychains dubbing the next entry Ragnarok, which between now and then has obviously changed for the better. Assassins Creed Valhalla will be the first entry in the series since 2018 when Odyssey was released and the series delved deeper into RPG.
Both Origins in 2017 and Odyssey is 2018 took the franchise in a new direction after Syndicate was the final nail in the coffin for many longtime fans of the series, who became tired of the same. Ubisoft took a long look and decided that for the longterm health of the franchise that it was better to take a longer break in the development cycle and figure out what Assassins Creed needed to be successful. Many praised Origins as a return to form and a step in the right direction for the franchise with Syndicate averaging around a 75, Origins averaging around an 85 and Odyssey following in the same footsteps.
While it does seem like Vikings will be new direction for the series there will still be many familiar and returning elements. Shown in the trailer, your character still has the hidden blade as part of his weaponry but it sounds like you will once again go back to the open seas as well building settlements, both of which appeared in Black Flag, which was also developed with Ubisoft Montreal in charge. Stop me if you have heard thus one before but according to the press release from Ubisoft “In Assassins Creed Valhalla, nearly every decision you make will have lasting effects throughout the world” Hopefully this actually means something this time as there have just been too many times that developers have made it seem like your choices matter only to produce a slightly different outcome.
As for exciting new additions to the series, according to the post Valhalla will include “visceral new combat system that lets you bash, dismember and decaptitate your foes. You will be able to dual wield axes, swords and even shields against the greatest variety of enemy types ever seen in Assassins Creed”. This sounds fantastic but there are a couple of reasons that I am cautiously optimistic. The first is that the bar has already been set for a norseman game when God of War was released in 2018. That game was all around incredible from top to bottom and from start to finish but the combat felt amazing. The other concern I have is that since these games are being developed for the current gen as well as next gen I am concerned that the combat system will be somewhat limited as it will need to work across all platforms.
However its the final addition that has me looking forward to Valhalla the most and that is raids. “Raids will be more action packed and brutal than anything Assassins Creed has seen before” I am excited for this because raids in most games are always a very tough and challenging endeavour and the hope is that this aspect of Valhalla will remain single player. We have seen raids of many different types and sizes but what would truly make Valhalla raids original is if they had raids exist as a solo experience.
Assassins Creed Valhalla has shown enough and said enough to get my attention thus far and I am very much looking forward to the gameplay world premiere that will take place on Inside Xbox this week