Warp Zoned Presents
Most Recent: PS4
Bithell Games announces the “fight-choreographed chess” of John Wick Hex
John Wick will return to theaters on May 17th in the highly-anticipated John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum, but Keanu Reeves’s third most-popular character is also thinking of coming back to the world of video games in the not-too-distant future as well.
Mike Bithell, the creator of Thomas Was Alone and Subsurface Circular, will bring John Wick Hex to the PC/Mac (exclusively via the Epic Games Store) and consoles. No release date was announced, but the developer describes the game as “fight-choreographed chess,” and players will need to tap into their strategic side if they hope to survive each encounter:
Created in close cooperation with the creative teams behind the films, John Wick Hex is fight-choreographed chess brought to life as a video game, capturing the series’ signature gun fu style while expanding its story universe. Players must choose every action and attack they make, while considering their immediate cost and consequences. Every move in John Wick Hex feels like a scene from the movies, and every fight contributes to your progress on the job and requires precise strategic thinking.
Perform well and progress in the main story mode (which features an original story created for the game) to unlock new weapons, suit options, and locations. Each weapon changes up the tactics you’ll use and the manner in which you’ll play. Ammo is finite and realistically simulated, so time your reloads and make the most of weapons you scavenge on the job.
Ian McShane and Lance Reddick will reprise their roles from the film series in the game, and publisher Good Shepherd Entertainment plans to show off a playable version of John Wick Hex at this year’s E3 Expo.
Employing a “unique graphic noir art design,” the first trailer for John Wick Hex has been embedded above.
Bruce Campbell says Evil Dead’s Ash won’t come to Mortal Kombat 11 as DLC fighter
The latest game in the long-running Mortal Kombat franchise, Mortal Kombat 11, made its way onto store shelves in late April, but we got a possible peak at the game’s upcoming downloadable characters shortly after it launched thanks to dataminers over at Reddit. At the time, the game’s code pointed towards the addition of series stalwarts Fujin, Nightwolf, Shang Tsung, Sheeva, and Sindel down the road, as well as guest characters The Joker, The Terminator, Spawn, and Evil Dead‘s Ash.
However, Bruce Campbell creatively debunked the rumor on Twitter earlier this week. According to the actor (who has starred in three Evil Dead movies and the recently-concluded Ash Vs Evil Dead cable series), he won’t be appearing in the game as Ash:
Consider this my finishing move against a certain internet rumor. pic.twitter.com/6vKPZvTfQu
— Bruce Campbell (@GroovyBruce) May 6, 2019
This is disappointing news (and it throws the rest of the DLC slate into question), but I guess Evil Dead fans will just have to be content with the character’s recent addition to Dead By Daylight.
Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to dig out my copy of Mortal Kombat: Armageddon and perform a few Fatalities with my Kreate-A-Fighter version of Ash.
Just Shapes & Beats: Hardcore Edition will be released for PS4 on May 10
The PlayStation Store is about to get a little more radical this week, as Berzerk Studio has announced that Just Shapes & Beats: Hardcore Edition will be available to download for the PS4 on May 10.
Just Shapes & Beats originally launched for the PC and Switch in 2018, and it’s probably best described as a “dodge ’em up.” Players are attacked from all sides by a variety of Shapes, but as long as they survive until the end of each level’s chiptune-like Beat, they’ll move on. You could watch the new trailer embedded above, or see how Berzerk’s Mike Ducarme tried to explain it to the PlayStation Blog:
Just Shapes & Beats is a musical bullet-hell-ish? It’s weird to explain… you play a shape, you dodge beats, which are also shapes, you can play with up to three friends, who are also shapes. It’s not a bullet hell in the pure sense of the term since it’s a lot more based on dodging and surviving than attacking. It’s more like a dodge ‘em up I guess?
As you might have guessed from the new subtitle, Just Shapes & Beats’s PS4 debut will introduce Hardcore Mode, which ratchets the difficulty up to “dog owners not cleaning up behind their animal” level. Again, I’ll let Ducarme explain:
Of course, my good sir, you’ll be happy to know that the PS4 release also introduces HARDCORE MODE. We made our designer watch videos of things that anger him, like people cutting in line at the coffee shop because they know the staff, and dog owners not cleaning up behind their animal, and then let him loose in the wild. Every stage has been redesigned in some form or another to give you a whole new experience that will make even seasoned Souls-like players weep, longing for their mother’s warm embrace.
According to Berzerk, Hardcore Mode will be coming to the PS4 “first,” so PC and Switch owners will (hopefully) be able to try it out sometime soon.
Posted in News, PC, PS4, Switch
Tagged Just Shapes and Beats
Platinum Games plans to self-publish two unannounced games so they can control the sequel rights
Platinum Games rose from the ashes of Capcom’s beloved Clover Studio, and the developer has gained quite the large following over the years thanks to a game catalog built on unique ideas and wild concepts. But the vast majority of those titles were produced in collaboration with larger publishers, and even though Platinum has been interested in revisiting those worlds in sequels and spinoffs, the contracts they signed have prevented them from doing so on their own.
This conundrum was on Executive Director Atsushi Inaba’s mind when he recently sat down for an interview with Video Games Chronicle. According to Inaba, Platinum Games has decided to begin self-publishing some of their future projects so they retain control over the sequel rights:
“It’s absolutely the truth that there are cases where you want to do a sequel but if you don’t own the IP, you can’t do it,” Inaba explained.
“It’s that simple, and quite frankly in the case of Bayonetta it took a lot of time and energy to get it to the point where sequels could be made. It wasn’t as simple as picking up the phone and asking, ‘hey, can we do this?’ There were a lot of pieces that needed to fall into place and a lot of negotiating that had to occur.
“That’s a pain. That’s a hassle. For us as creators, we want to get to the point where self-publishing allows us to own our IP and do what we want with it, including making sequels. So the faster we can have that freedom, the better if will be for all the creators here.”
Platinum Games is currently developing Astral Chain for Nintendo as a Switch exclusive, but Inaba confirmed that the company also plans to self-publish two unannounced games at some point in the future. The veteran developer later said that one of these titles goes beyond the typical Platinum weirdness and is “unlike anything else”:
“Right now we’re in the middle of designing something that has never been done before. I know a lot of people say that, but the game we’re working on truly is unlike anything else,” he said.
“Even for our varied history of veteran game developers, this is something that has never been designed before. So from a game design perspective, we’re very excited right now.”
Hopefully we’ll learn more about Platinum’s upcoming projects very soon.
New Retail Releases: Saints Row: The Third for Switch, Xbox One S All-Digital Edition, More
As we inch ever closer to the Summer sun, there’s just a small smattering of new releases heading to your local game shop this week.
Deep Silver and Volition will bring Saints Row: The Third – The Full Package to the Switch, making it the first game in the franchise to land on a Nintendo console. The Full Package will include the entire Saints Row: The Third experience, including the main game and all three expansions.
Also this week, PS4 owners will be able to give Ghost Giant a look. The puzzle adventure is a PlayStation VR title where players take control of the titular Ghost Giant and help a little boy named Louis feel less lonely.
Finally this week, Microsoft will take their first step into a discless “all-digital future” with the release of the Xbox One S All-Digital Edition. The console will feature a 1TB hard drive and it’ll come packaged with full-game download codes for Minecraft, Sea of Thieves, and Forza Horizon 3.
That’s it for this week’s retail releases, but you’ll find plenty of other new games on the PlayStation Store, Xbox Games Store, and Nintendo eShop later this week.
Posted in News, PS4, Switch, Xbox One
Tagged Forza Horizon 3, Minecraft, Saints Row: The Third, Sea of Thieves
Call of Duty 2019 will be announced sometime in the next two months
After dropping support for Destiny 2 in January and later laying off a significant portion of their staff in February, Activision has spent the majority of this year attempting to shift their efforts towards a new “franchise-focused approach.”
Naturally, a big part of that approach will include a new entry in the Call of Duty franchise this Fall, and CEO Bobby Kotick recently teased a few tidbits about that game (which is currently known as Call of Duty 2019) during the megapublisher’s latest quarterly financial report. According to Kotick, Call of Duty 2019 is in development at Infinity Ward, and Activision will announce it sometime within the next two months. With the E3 Expo scheduled for mid-June, this timetable shouldn’t come as much of a surprise.
Kotick also believes that after the announcement, it’ll be “really clear” why the company is so excited for Call of Duty 2019:
So we continue to feel incredibly good about this year’s game coming from Infinity Ward. The game’s going to be revealed later this quarter. I think it’s going to be really clear then why we’re really so excited about the release.
Combining a “franchise-focused approach” with Infinity Ward means it seems very likely that Call of Duty 2019 will eventually be revealed as Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 in the coming weeks. But while we don’t know that for sure at this point, we do know that the next entry in the Call of Duty franchise will be released sometime this Fall.
Posted in News, PC, PS4, Xbox One
Tagged Call of Duty: Modern Warfare
Koji Igarashi’s Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night will be released on June 18
The visuals present in the earliest demos of Koji Igarashi’s Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night did not receive the kindest reaction from fans. Many leveled their criticism against the “bland” environments, but others targeted the game’s “poop” presentation. Since then, the famed developer took these criticisms to heart and continued to pour his soul (and millions of dollars worth of Kickstarter funds) into the game’s presentation in anticipation of a 2019 release.
Now, Igarashi is ready to showcase just how far Bloodstained has come in a brand new trailer, which has been embedded above.
Igavania is back! With the support of the Bloodstained community, 505 Games and ArtPlay have taken the extra time and care to ensure we’re doing things RIGHT. Check out some before and after comparisons in this new video to see all the hard work we’ve poured into Bloodstained over the last year.
Publisher 505 Games also used this opportunity to announce the Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night’s release date. It’ll be available for the PC (through Steam and GOG), PS4, and Xbox One on June 18th. A Switch launch will follow a week later on June 25.
New Retail Releases: Final Fantasy XII: The Zodiac Age, Fade to Silence
Just a pair of new titles will make their way to retail shelves this week.
After bringing Final Fantasy XII: The Zodiac Age to the PS4 in 2017, Square Enix will now give Switch and Xbox One owners the chance to relive the acclaimed RPG. The remaster includes several improvements over the original PS2 release, including enhanced visuals, 7.1 surround sound, and an Auto Save option. Meanwhile, the new Zodiac Job System features more customization in leveling up characters and the punishing Trial Mode asks players to survive 100 consecutive battles.
Elsewhere on store shelves this week, THQ Nordic will bring Fade to Silence to the PC, PS4, and Xbox One. The post-apocalyptic survival game will feature wintry environments and massive monsters as players gather resources in the hopes of “balancing short term needs versus your long term goals” while unraveling “a puzzling story.”
That’s it for this week’s retail releases, but you’ll find plenty of other new games on the PlayStation Store, Xbox Games Store, and Nintendo eShop this week.