THQ Nordic has officially revealed Red Faction: Guerrilla Re-Mars-tered for Nintendo Switch, with a release date of 2nd July already firmly in place.
Fans of the title will likely remember that Switch controller icons were spotted in the Windows version of the game last summer. We suspected that a Switch version must have been in the works – because why else would they be there? – and sure enough, the game is now confirmed. Hooray!
The announcement comes alongside a trailer (which we’ve included above) and we have lots of juicy details for you below thanks to today’s press release:
Red Faction Guerrilla Re-Mars-tered – Nintendo Switch™ Features: – Choice between Performance and Quality Mode – Fully reworked graphics – heavily reworked textures and graphic features adding, for example, specular maps – Improved shadow rendering – Improved lighting – Reworked shaders and postprocessing – Optional Motion Controls for a better sense of aiming while playing in handheld mode
About Red Faction: Guerrilla Re-Mars-tered Set 50 years after the climactic events of the original Red Faction, Red Faction: Guerrilla allows players to take the role of an insurgent fighter with the newly re-established Red Faction movement as they battle for liberation from the oppressive Earth Defense Force. Red Faction: Guerrilla still defines the limits of destruction-based game-play with a huge open-world, fast-paced guerrilla-style combat, and true physics-based destruction.
Features –Open World Guerrilla Warfare – You decide who, when, where and how to battle. Utilise guerrilla tactics, improvised weaponry, and modified vehicles to lead insurgent attacks on EDF targets. Launch attacks based on your own gameplay style, take on missions in any order you choose, or engage in destructive activities to weaken the EDF’s grip on Mars. – Strategic Destruction – Use destruction to your tactical advantage, setting ambushes or chain reaction explosions to attack enemy strongholds and permanently modify the game environment. Leverage fully-dynamic physics-based destruction to improvise on the fly: blow holes in a wall or floor to set an ambush or escape, take out a staircase to stop your pursuers, or drive vehicles through blown out walls. – Evolving & Emergent Gameplay – Carve your path through an ever-changing landscape as you improvise your combat tactics – mixing gameplay styles, vehicles, weapons and explosives to defeat the EDF. – Epic Sci-Fi Setting – Explore the huge, unforgiving Martian landscape, from the desolate mining outpost of Parker to the gleaming EDF capital city of Eos; then tear through the fully destructible open-world environments swarming with EDF forces, Red Faction resistance fighters, and the downtrodden settlers caught in the cross-fire. – Multiplayer Combat – There is no place to hide when you put your guerrilla warfare skills to the test in a variety of highly destructive multiplayer combat modes.
As mentioned above, you’ll be able to pick the game up from 2nd July for £26.99 / 29,99€ / $29.99.
Excited for this one? As always, we’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments below.
Mortal Kombat 11 only came out yesterday, but fans have already been left rather angry at some of the game’s features. Developer NeatherRealm Studios has announced that it will be working towards satisfying fan demands as a result.
As you may know if you already own a copy, both the Towers of Time and The Krypt game modes give out in-game currency which can be spent on various items – skins, profile icons, and such. A quick skim of sites like Reddit or Twitter tells you that fans believe the playing time needed to earn these rewards (some of which are necessary for harder levels) is far too high. Some players have gone as far as to say that the game has been “designed to get you to spend money” to obtain these items instead.
Likely in hopes of calming the storm, NeatherRealm Studios has addressed these feelings in a Kombat Kast stream, promising changes in the near future. Essentially, it appears that tweaks to the reward system and the items received can be performed directly at the studio, without the need for a full patch to be implemented.
This means that you won’t see an updated version number or necessarily be notified of the changes, but tweaks should hopefully appear as and when the team enables them.
Have you been playing the game? Have you noticed any harsh systems in play? Let us know in the comments below.
When you consider the lifestyle of any company president, it’s only natural to assume they drive the best car, live in a mansion and sit in an expensive chair all day behind a desk made of pure gold. While this might be the loose reality of some leaders, this was not the case for the now-former Nintendo of America President, Reggie Fils-Aimé.
Last week, when Reggie showed some of the items around his office as he packed everything into boxes, an eagle-eyed fan noticed something wasn’t quite right. You see, it’s all to do with the chair behind his desk. According to Nintendo fan and Twitter user Jason Cryer, Reggie has quite possibly been sitting in an entry level Herman Miller Mirra desk chair for his entire career.
It might not seem like such a big deal, but apparently, it is. Herman Miller are known for providing the highest-end chairs to the tech industry. The problem here is the model Reggie was sitting in each day of the week is believed to be 16 years old. It’s so out-of-date, it’s not even listed on the Herman Miller website. It’s also only half the price of the top of the line Aeron model. As noted by Nick Robinson’s YouTube channel, Reggie could have potentially been sitting in this chair for the past 13 years. To put it in perspective, every single employee at Facebook sits in the higher-end Aeron model – a much better chair than the one Reggie sat in.
Cryer thinks “this is way out of hand” and has since decided to take action by setting up a Change.org petition. He wants Nintendo of America to honor Reggie’s time at the company with “a fully-loaded” Aeron chair. At the time of writing, the petition has more than 13,000 signatures. If the situation wasn’t already alarming enough, YouTuber Nick Robinson did a little more investigating and noticed how Doug Bowser’s recent Twitter photos featured the same chair Reggie spent his career in:
For the full breakdown, view the video below:
What do you make of this chair controversy? Did Reggie deserve a better chair? Do you think he was happy with the one he had? Tell us down below.
To further celebrate the occasion, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate is hosting an appropriately-themed spirit board event. This event will allow players to unlock all-new spirits, based on Nintendo’s cardboard creations. You can even pick up your very own headset spirit. Here are the full details, courtesy of the Nintendo Australia Twitter account:
The five-day spirit event “Nintendo Labo: Smash Kit” starts on 26/04! Beat the target spirits in battle to earn triple the usual EXP! Event-exclusive spirits will also make an appearance, so don’t miss out! #SmashBrosUltimate
As noted, the event starts later this week and will run for a total of five days. The last time the game received a fresh batch of spirits was during a Super Mario Party event.
Will you be booting up Smash to add these spirits to your collection? Tell us in the comments.
When Mario Tennis Aces arrived on the Nintendo Switch in June last year, it was accused of being a “lazy” slapdash release that was light on a number of vital features every good tennis game needed. Since then, Camelot and Nintendo have continued to add more content and playable characters as free updates.
The latest character joining the roster is Dry Bones in May. To unlock this character, all you have to do is participate in the online tournament, otherwise, you’ll have to wait until 1st June. Dry Bones is a tricky-type player – so expect to be running all over the court if you’re on the receiving end. Take a look at the promotional trailer below:
If you haven’t played Mario Tennis Aces in a while, last week it received a brand new update, bumping it up to Version 3.0. This update included character balance tweaks, a new intro movie starring Wario and Waluigi and a new ‘Ring Shot’ mode. In case you missed the original post, here are the videos:
Will you be taking to the court to try out Dry Bones? Have you downloaded Version 3.0? Tell us below.
Earlier last week Nintendo rolled out system update 8.0.0 for the Switch. It added a number of nifty features such as the zoom function and the ability to order software. It also included some colourful new Splatoon 2 and Yoshi’s Crafted World icons.
Roughly a week later, version 8.0.1 is now live. This latest update appears to be incredibly minor. See the patch notes below:
Improvements Included in Version 8.0.1 (Distributed 04/23/2019) General system stability improvements to enhance the user’s experience.
To manually perform a system update, open the system settings menu, select system and then select update.
Have you downloaded this super stable update yet? Spotted anything else? Leave a comment below.
The retro video game convention Midwest Gaming Classic celebrated its 18th year in Milwaukee, WI a little over a week ago, and we just so happened to have been in attendance! The convention is host to hundreds of pinball and retro arcade games that are all open for free play, a vendor hall where you can buy almost any game you can think of (yes, I found and almost purchased Zelda: Wand of Gamelon) and also features a number of panels hosted by game creators, personalities and other members of the industry.
The convention does a great job of highlighting the best games of the past, but also shows off some pretty important gaming relics too. From the power suits used in the Nintendo World Championships to the unreleased Nintendo Playstation prototype, you’re bound to see some pretty crazy stuff here.
Needless to say, we had a great time playing games, checking out the dealer’s wares and meeting some industry vets. Check out our highlight video of the Midwest Gaming Classic and let us know if you’ll be booking tickets for next years event! Maybe we’ll see you there.
Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment has today released another Shazam! level pack for LEGODC Super-Villains, providing a second dose of content based on the new movie.
Both downloadable packs add new levels and DC characters inspired by the film and are part of the Season Pass (which you can pick up for $14.99 if you don’t already own it). This new second pack adds the villainous Dr. Sivana as well as the entire Shazam family; we’ve got the full details for you below:
The SHAZAM! Movie Level Packs 1 and 2 offer players the chance to master the powers of favorite characters based on the Shazam! film including Billy Batson and Freddy Freeman who can transform into their Super Hero Shazam form, and unlock four characters embodying the sins of man unleashed by Dr. Sivana including Gluttony, Wrath, Pride, and Envy. The second pack adds villainous, Dr. Sivana, and the entire Shazam family to help you defeat him including Pedro, Eugene, Darla, and Mary, alongside the powerful, Wizard Shazam. Both packs expand the main game’s already large roster of over 150 iconic DC characters.
If you’d rather purchase the Shazam! Movie Level Packs without getting a Season Pass, they can now both be purchased together in a bundle for $5.99.
Have you seen Shazam!? Will you be tucking into this new LEGO content? Tell us below.
Image & Form Games has done very well to branch out from its charming subterranean platforming series SteamWorld Dig into other genres. 2015’s SteamWorld Heist took the aesthetic and amusing writing of that steampunk fantasy universe (which started out, lest we forget, with SteamWorld Tower Defence on DSiWare) and transposed it into a strategic turn-based shooter. The studio’s latest entry in the series is a roleplaying card battler where you build a deck of powerful moves for a party of three heroes and engage in turn-based battle.
SteamWorld Quest: Hand of Gilgamech follows enthusiastic young knight Armilly on her quest to become a member of the Hero Guild. From humble origins, she aspires to be as courageous as ancient hero, Gilgamech. Full of beans, she’s prone to narrating the party’s adventure in third-person as they come across minions of the Void army, much to the chagrin of the rest of the group. You’ll meet new members along the way, but your initial party comprises the afore-mentioned Armilly, alchemist Copernica and brutish healer Galleo. They’re a likeable, irreverent bunch very much in the vein of the casts of previous games.
When you’re not in battle you’ll run around the compartmentalised world, presented side-on, taking direct control of a character (‘L’ and ‘R’ cycle between them). A simple map in the bottom right of the screen shows how these ‘rooms’ connect, and you’ll come across treasure chests and destructible objects containing coins and other goodies. Pressing ‘A’ swings your weapon and this can also be used to get the jump on marauding enemies with a well-timed ‘first strike’, not unlike similar pre-emptive moves in the Paper Mario series, meaning enemy Coglins will start the battle with diminished health.
The meat of the game is in the combat, and it’s chunky, satisfying fare. With every encounter up to six ‘punch cards’ are drawn from your deck to the bottom of the screen. Each character can only use their own cards and you select just three of them for your party to play (these are then replaced the following turn). Cards are split into three types: Strike, Upgrade or Skill. Strike does what it says on the tin and Upgrade cards give you a temporary buff. Each time you use one of these regular cards a cog is added to a shared Steam Pressure meter (SP) which you need in order to play the third type, Skill cards. Skills are powerful but striking the balance between building SP, timing critical blows and managing defence is the name of the game.
Attacks feel pleasingly solid when they land. You get your SP the moment you select a card to play, so if a Skill requires 2 SP and your pool is entirely depleted, playing any two ‘normal’ cards will unlock the Skill to play as your third. Playing three from the same character creates a Heroic Chain which doles out an additional card depending on that character’s equipped weapon. It might, say, provide a protective Mana barrier for the whole party, or simply add an extra strike.
If you’re unhappy with what you’ve been dealt, two redraws of individual cards are available every turn by holding ‘X’ on your desired (or, more accurately, undesired) card. As you find, craft or buy more punch cards, you can incorporate them into your deck with each party member having space for exactly eight cards. Tag team combos come into effect when a certain card displays an icon of another party member; playing any of theirs prior to this card unleashes a powerful combo. Holding ‘ZR’ speeds up the entire gameplay – both run speed and the battles themselves – and this can be permanently toggled on in the menu. We did so and never looked back.
It’s all reassuringly solid, although there’s very little you haven’t seen before. Damage comes in five elemental flavours: Physical, Fire, Frost, Storm and Arcane – no prizes for guessing that enemies have resistance and weakness according to type. As tried-and-true and predictable as its systems are, the game is shot through polish and wit. In fact, its Steam Pressure battle meter, hand-drawn art and amusing writing brought to mind the colourful turn-based battling of Battle Chasers: Nightwar – no bad thing to our mind.
Hero Statues are scattered around the world which replenish your health and provide save points, although enemies in the surrounding area will respawn when used. You choose from three difficulties – Squire, Knight and Legend. Turn-based junkies will likely want to jump to the highest difficulty from the off, especially if you enjoy the grind, but despite a slight spike in Chapter 4, we found the default setting satisfying as long as you fight every enemy you came across.
The foes you’ll encounter run the gamut from mechanical medusas to bratty, over-privileged college kids. The ebb and flow of battle that evolves as you build your deck is addictive and you’re able to upgrade cards and buy and sell weapons at the caravan of a travelling merchant. Winning battles grants the party XP which improves your stats and is shared equally between the three fighters (you’ll have to choose your three from the selection once new recruits join your crew).
The story is divided into four acts with twenty chapters, including a specific ‘challenge’ area that pits you against powerful enemies for rewards. The ol’ SteamWorld charm carries you along on a pleasant ride through the cute-if-predictable narrative and newcomers to the series need no special knowledge before starting out, although series veterans will get a kick out of references to the wider universe and other intertextual nods.
SteamWorld Quest looks lovely, as all the previous games have, with pristine presentation and excellent audio. We were a little surprised to find the touchscreen unsupported – it seems like an obvious feature given the tactility of the cards – although the developer’s attention to detail is present and correct elsewhere. You’re able to remap every single button on the controller, including direction inputs to any alternative of your choosing, for example.
While the nuts and bolts are satisfying, the art is beautiful, and the whole package oozes the same quality we’ve come to expect from Image & Form, we did get a nagging feeling that there’s something missing; some extra mechanic to set it apart from the crowd. It’s hard to put your finger on – especially when everything present is so robust and meaty – but it simply feels like there’s space for a flourish, a little je ne sais quoi to take the game into the realm of ‘essential’. Don’t get us wrong, we racked up over 16 hours on the game’s clock and we enjoyed every one. It’s a tasty burger of a turn-based battler; we just wanted a little more special sauce or some spectacular side dish to turn it into a truly memorable meal. As it is, it’s simply ‘very good’.
Conclusion
Remarkably solid and satisfying, SteamWorld Quest: Hand of Gilgamech is a card battler with an abundance of charm in its art, mechanics and writing. The presentation is slick, the dialogue’s witty and the gameplay’s addictive, although nothing about it feels particularly special – not in the way SteamWorld Dig 2 felt special. It does what it does well, though, and it’s still a thoroughly enjoyable time in that universe. As long as you’re not expecting anything revolutionary, we recommend anybody who likes turn-based battling or who enjoyed any previous games in the series check it out.
Bandai Namco has announced that Doraemon Story Of Seasons will be launching on Nintendo Switch in North America and Europe in autumn 2019.
You might remember our story from earlier this month, in which we shared all we knew about the upcoming title. Essentially, the game is a crossover game between Story of Seasons (which used to be known as Harvest Moon) and Japanese manga series Doraemon. We’ve got some PR below to give you a little more detail:
The popular anime character – Doraemon meets the hugely popular Story of Seasons series in a brand new game DORAEMON STORY OF SEASONS. Players will be able to enjoy traditional Story of Seasons activities like growing crops, cultivating their farm, exploring, bug hunting and many more.
Nobita and other familiar faces from the Doraemon franchise will take part in a heart-warming journey across the games original town. Players will develop the town and their own farm while interacting and forming bonds with the other inhabitants. Of course, Doraemon’s secret gadgets will be there to help them along the way!
Are you excited to get your hands on this one? Glad that it’s coming to the west? Let us know in the usual spot.
