We’re right in the middle of the strangest Gamescom I can remember. The usual reason for 2020 has seen the show shift gears to be more about digital showcases and demo releases, and so far they’ve done a much better job at staying relevant than E3 did, but I can’t say I don’t miss heading over to Cologne and trekking into the convention halls for a string of appointments about all sorts of games.
In the News This Week
You can catch all the major news from Gamescom 2020 Opening Night Live here, but we’ve got some highlights from the show and elsewhere in video games.
- Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart is a PS5 “launch window” title – see the extended gameplay video here
- Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War revealed – out this November with cross-gen bundles and paid upgrades
- Fall Guys Season 2 goes medieval in October – it’s now the most downloaded PlayStation Plus title ever
- Epic decide Fortnite Chapter 2 – Season 4 update will not be coming to iPhone, iPad and Mac on 27th August
- The new Xbox Series X and Xbox One UI is going into testing for Insiders this week
- Genshin Impact PS4 release date has been confirmed
- Hitman 3 release date confirmed along with free PS5 and Xbox Series X upgrade option
- Frontier Developments to publish Lemnis Gate, a time-loop multiplayer FPS coming in early 2021
- The Sims 4 Star Wars: Journey to Batuu goes to Disneyland in September
- Joe Staten returns to help 343 Industries finish Halo Infinite’s campaign
- Report: A new Nintendo Switch with 4K support is in development for 2021
- The Witcher: Monster Slayer is Pokémon Go, but for The Witcher fans
And we got the announcement of our monthly free games:
- September’s Games with Gold includes The Division
- September’s free PlayStation Plus games are PUBG & Street Fighter V
- Stadia Pro gets 6 more free games this September including Super Bomberman R Online and Hitman
Giveaways
We’ve teamed up with EPOS Sennheiser again to give away their GSP 601 Gaming Headset. We’ll be running it through the weekend, with entries closing on Tuesday 1st September. Make sure you don’t miss out!
Giveaway – Win an EPOS | SENNHEISER GSP 601 Gaming Headset
Games in Review
We had another stacked plate of reviews this week, from Dontnod’s latest narrative adventure Tell Me Why, to The Last Campfire from Hello Games, Project CARS 3, Windbound and more!
- Tell Me Why – XBO, PC – 8/10
- The Last Campfire – PS4, XBO, NSW, PC, iOS – 8/10
- Captain Tsubasa: Rise of New Champions – PS4, XBO, PC – 8/10
- Best Friend Forever – NSW, PC – 8/10
- Chinese Parents – NSW, PC – 8/10
- No Straight Roads – PS4, XBO, NSW, PC – 8/10
- Train Sim World 2 – PS4, XBO, PC – 7/10
- Project CARS 3 – PS4, XBO, PC – 6/10 – (Video Review)
- Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles Remastered Edition – PS4, NSW, iOS, And – 6/10
- Windbound – PS4, XBO, NSW, PC – 6/10
- Kandagawa Jet Girls – PS4, PC – 6/10
- Aokana – Four Rhythms Across the Blue – PS4, PSV, NSW, PC – 5/10
- Is it Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon? – Infinite Combate – PS4, XBO, NSW, PC – 3/10
And then we had two simply excellent bits of gaming kit for you to consider… if you can afford them.
- Creative SXFI Gamer Gaming Headset – 10/10
- Thrustmaster HOTAS Warthog – 10/10
Featured Articles
With all of that going on, it’s understandable that features and previews took a bit of a back seat this week. Still, we dove into Scarlet Nexus’ Brain Punk and unique monsters as Bandai Namco look to lead the action JRPG into the next generation, while Tom has been playing Wasteland 3 for a review in progress, and Jim went hands on with Amazon’s MMO New World.
I spoke to Frontier as Jurassic World Evolution: Complete Edition was announced for Nintendo Switch, and Aran caught up with the minds behind Foreclosed, an RPG-shooter that came from the dehumanising bureaucracy of the real world.
What We Played rounded things out for the week, featuring Wasteland 3, Project CARS 3 & Fall Guys.
Trailer Park
Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War early campaign cutscene revealed
Star Wars Squadrons single player gameplay revealed
Unknown 9 is a paranormal adventure coming to PC and next-gen consoles
LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga delayed to 2021 – check out the new gameplay trailer
Crash Bandicoot 4: It’s About Time new Flashback Tapes levels revealed at Gamescom
Dirt 5’s Playgrounds arena creator mode revealed in new trailer
Doom Eternal: The Ancient Gods Part One campaign DLC is coming out in October
Your Achievements
Here’s what you in our community has been up to this week:
- hornet1990 finished Battlefield 1’s single player, letting him get half his hard drive space by by deleting it, Battlefield V and COD WW2! He’s now started on Horizon Zero Dawn, and been trying to upgrade his PC for some Flight Simulator 2020.
- Crazy_Del finally got the Transformers platinum, and then scooped up the 10 shortest and cheapest platinums he could find on PSN. His next target (and 450th platinum) is Batman: The Enemy Within.
- It was the usual amount of Dreams for TSBonyman, who’s been making some potentially seizure-inducing audio visualisers in the game.
- And Andrewww fell in love with Erica, discovering it from his PlayStation Plus back catalogue and thoroughly enjoying its interactive movie vibes. Alongside that, he played Lovers in a Dangerous Spacetime with his kids, another PS Plus game from all the way back in 2017!
I hope you have a good weekend and we’ll see you on the other side!
