[UPDATE] The issue appears to be fixed, as the Xbox Support site no longer mentions any problems with The Witcher 3.
The original story is below.
If you’re having trouble playing The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt on Xbox One right now, it’s not just you. Microsoft has confirmed an Xbox Live issue is preventing players from accessing the game.
“Are you unable to launch or install The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt? We’re working to address this ASAP! Thanks for staying patient. We’ll fill you in as soon as we know more,” an update from 4 PM Pacific reads on the Xbox Live Status page.
Over on Microsoft’s forums and Reddit, players are reporting that they’re receiving the Error Code 0x87de2726.
The Fallout 4 announcement yesterday led to a dramatic upswing in sales of the most recent entries in the series, Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas, at least on Amazon. The online retailer’s Movers & Shakers Chart (via Videogamer) shows that Fallout 3 Game of the Year sales rose 1,163 percent, while the New Vegas Ultimate Edition enjoyed a dramatic 409 percent upswing in the wake of the reveal.
Fallout 4 is the latest project from Bethesda Game Studios, which most recently released The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim in 2011. The game is at least partially set in Boston, as yesterday’s reveal trailer showed a post-apocalyptic Fenway Park and USS Constitution, among other Beantown landmarks.
Todd Howard, the director of Fallout 3 and Skyrim, has returned to direct Fallout 4.
Bethesda has not announced a release date for Fallout 4, but the company’s own website said the game will launch later this year. We’re expecting to see and hear more about the game during Bethesda’s first-ever E3 briefing later this month.
For more on Fallout 4, check out the game’s reveal trailer and some images in the gallery below.
Square Enix’s latest Active Time Report, a video broadcast expected to bring news about Final Fantasy XV, will begin in less than two hours. The event kicks off at 6 AM PDT / 9 AM EDT / 2 PM UK. You can watch the entire event right here through the YouTube embed below.
[UPDATE] Naughty Dog’s Neil Druckmann, the co-director for Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End, appears to have confirmed the The Nathan Drake Collection. An official announcement is expected later today.
Well… that hit a few hours too early. See you in the AM. G’night y’all.
Naughty Dog’s Uncharted series will be getting a release in the form of Uncharted: The Nathan Drake Collection. Brought to our attention by Greg Miller (via Twitter) the game was spotted on the PlayStation Store briefly before disappearing.
No additional details of what the collection contains were revealed in the leak. GameSpot has reached out to PlayStation for comment and will update this story as more details become available.
The newest confirmed entry in the Uncharted series is Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End. The game is scheduled for release sometime in the first quarter of 2016, much later than its original 2015 release window. Explaining the Uncharted 4 delay back in March, directors Neil Druckmann and Bruce Straley said: “Giving us a few extra months will make certain that Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End not only meets the team’s high standards but the high standards that gamers have come to expect from a Naughty Dog title.”
Multiple retailers have suggested that Fallout 4, the long-awaited open-world RPG from Bethesda, will be available in 2015.
Although its publisher Bethesda Softworks has not yet officially confirmed a release date or release window, it has provided a strong indication for a 2015 release.
Bethesda’s own online store initially listed the Fallout 4 release date as “TBA 2015.” This was later changed to “TBA.”
Currently, both Amazon and GameStop have the game listed for December 31, most likely as placeholder dates, but nonetheless set in 2015.
Another listing comes from Australia retailer EB Games, which sent out promotional material following the announcement. The image, which was posted online by a NeoGAF user, states that Fallout 4 is “coming 2015.”
UK retailer Game has also listed a 2015 Fallout 4 release date.
Bethesda left about a year between the first announcement and final release of both The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim and Fallout 3. However, Fallout New Vegas, the last Fallout game to be released, was available just seven months after its debut announcement.
Bethesda’s other upcoming projects include the Doom reboot, which will be fully unveiled at E3 2015 and free-to-play multiplayer shooter Battlecry. However, both these games do not yet have release dates.
In April 2013 Bethesda confirmed its Skyrim development team, believed to also be the devs behind Fallout 3, had fully moved on to its next project, as it had reached the point where it required the studio’s full attention.
Activision’s toys-to-life franchise, Skylanders, has now sold through more than 250 million toys since the franchise debuted four years ago, the publisher revealed today as part of the announcement of the next game in the series. As stated previously, Skylanders has generated $3 billion for Activision so far.
The next entry in the franchise, Skylanders SuperChargers, was announced today. This game changes things up by introducing vehicles (land, sky, and sea) to the series for the first time.
Twenty new character toys and 20 new vehicle toys will be available for purchase when SuperChargers launches in September for consoles, PC, and mobile. For lots more on SuperChargers, check out GameSpot’s just-published hands-on preview and a new trailer below that features Travis Pastrana.
The Skylanders franchise faces more competition than ever this year. In addition to Disney Infinity and Amiibo, Warner Bros. will release its exciting-sounding LEGO Dimensions in September, featuring toys based on heavyweight franchises such as Batman, The Lord of the Rings, and The Simpsons, among others.
Nintendo has sold 10.5 million Amiibo toys by its latest count, while sales figures for Disney Infinity are unavailable.
Summer doesn’t actually begin until later this month, but The Witcher developer CD Projekt Red’s GOG.com on Wednesday launched its annual Summer Sale. Free games, daily bundles, and more will take place through the Summer Sale, which runs today through June 21.
In addition to the standard discounts on games, GOG shoppers have a chance to score up to three free games during the sale period.
Spend more than $1 during the Summer Sale and you’ll receive a free copy of SimCity 2000; spend at least $20 and you’ll unlock S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Clear Sky; spend more than $50 and you’ll get a free copy of Xenonauts.
New deals for GOG’s Summer Sale will appear on the site every 12 hours–more than 100 discounts will be available every day. Altogether, GOG more than 700 games will be marked down during the sale period by as much as 90 percent.
GOG kicks things off with deals on The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt (10 percent off), Lichdon Battlemage (87 percent off), and Jade Empire (80 percent off). A variety of bundles, including the Lucasfilm Adventures collection (Monkey Island, Sam & Max, and more) will be available for 66 percent off.
Head to GOG’s website to see all the deals. As always, all games are completely DRM-free.
GOG isn’t the only online retailer with plans for a summer sale. Just last week, the dates for Valve’s annual summer sale leaked, suggesting the event would kick off on June 11, meaning it would overlap with GOG’s.
It’s been nearly four years since Activision first introduced Skylanders, the now-annual toys-to-life franchise. New Skylanders games have debuted with new types of figures or accessories; whether it be the larger figures in Skylanders: Giants, creatures made of swappable halves in Skylanders: Swap Force, or the speaker-embedded portal that brought trapped bosses to life in Skylanders: Trap Team. However, the next instalment, Skylanders: SuperChargers, will introduce a completely new feature and new toys to accompany it: vehicles.
At certain points in the game, an access point will allow the player to place one of these new vehicle toys on the Portal of Power and pair with an in-game Skylander character. This allows that character to enter the vehicle in-game. There are three different classes of vehicles; ground vehicles which allow the player to race on land, water vehicles to weave through obstacles underwater, and flying ships to do battle with in the sky.
SuperChargers will introduce 20 new vehicles paired with 20 new matching Skylander figures. While the vehicles can be used in-game with any new or old Skylander character, pairing a vehicle with its matching Skylander partner will activate a Supercharge state in-game, granting the player new abilities and combos. This was demonstrated to me with a new version of returning character Hot Streak, who when paired with his chosen car, gained a powerful fireball shooting ability. The vehicles themselves are introduced with a brief in-game cinematic when summoned using the portal of power–an intro that could be likened in its outrageousness and glamour to that of a car show spectacle.
If you don’t have a specific vehicle type, you cannot access the areas that have been designed for them; these areas are simply gated from the player. While platform levels do make a return in Skylanders: SuperChargers, it was these vehicular sections of the game which really captured my attention during a preview session hosted by Activision.
Racing On Land
Getting behind the wheel in SuperChargers will feel very familiar to those who have played Mario Kart. The course shown was beset with sharp turns, littered with hazardous obstacles, and at one point launched the player high into the air to land on an adjacent platform. Similar to Nintendo’s flagship racer, each course contains alternative routes to the finish line. Taking time to explore these alternative routes is beneficial, as they sometimes contain new parts which can be used to customize and boost the in-game stats of a vehicle. Collected parts can be added to a vehicle the instant they are picked up, an action which pauses the game mid-race and opens the vehicle customization screen.
The race culminated with a boss battle, at which point the Activision representative switched out their Skylander character in favour of Hot Streak, who was paired with this particular vehicle. Equipped with Supercharge, Hot Streak could weave around the boss in the vehicle and spew destructive fireballs at the enemy. It wasn’t all physical fighting however; once the boss was defeated, a simple puzzle had to be solved to progress through the section’s exit.
The vehicle toys themselves will have articulation that allows interaction outside of the video game. For example, the wheels on Hot Streak’s car spin. However, I was warned that the vehicles’ figures were not recommended for contact with water, unlike some of their in-game counterparts in the following section.
Diving Into The Sea
The next part of the demonstration took the Skylander character for a plunge into the sea with a water vehicle that looked like a cross between a boat and a submarine. Racing through the water track started off as a straightforward affair, but dodging obstacles by submerging underneath the water’s surface turned the section into an aquatic course with two sections–one above water, and one underwater. Hazards on the surface of the water could be avoided by diving underneath, and vice versa.
Like in the land race, the sea level culminated with a boss fight that required the player to simultaneously dodge obstacles and shoot enemies. The dramatic swell and crash of the waves made the fight appear more challenging than its land counterpart. I was particularly impressed with the textures and animation of the water; according to the Activision representative, SuperChargers is a game “built for next-gen consoles,” despite being available for last-generation consoles. With the boss in the water section defeated, the Skylander took to the section which inspired part of the series’ name–the sky.
Sailing Through The Sky
Like previous sections, taking off into the skies required a specific vehicle figure to be placed on the Portal of Power. Activating a flight-capable vehicle in the game started up the sky section, which had the player weave the ship through the air to pick up collectibles and shoot cannons at enemies. While the ship’s acceleration could be controlled, left on its own it would fly slowly to its destination, thanks to an autopilot system of sorts in place to ensure that players are guided to where they need to go.
As with the land sections, picking up new parts during the section instantly opened up the customization screen, allowing the player to add new parts to their ship soon as they were collected.
Compatibility With Old Content
Parents will be relieved to hear that SuperChargers will be compatible with all previously released Skylanders figures and Portals of Power. Tying in with this backwards compatibility, Activision has confirmed that a digital version of the game will also be released for sale. However, the bulk of the game’s new content will still need the new vehicle figures to access. Not all vehicles and figures will be available at launch, though the starter pack will include new versions of returning characters Hot Streak, Spitfire, and Stealth Elf. Only the new versions can be partnered with their chosen vehicles to unlock Supercharge in-game–using the old versions of these characters will not produce any extra effect.
While the new types of levels in Skylanders: SuperChargers were impressive to behold, the need for additional vehicle figurines was not. If the land vehicle stages, water levels, and sky battle sections will make up a large portion of what is new in the game then restricting players who don’t own the corresponding vehicles will mean that they miss out on what makes SuperChargers unique. Crying wallet aside, the changes in scenery these new sections will offer look interesting enough to welcome newcomers and seasoned collectors alike, and kids will likely love playing with the new vehicle figures–both in-game, and outside of it.
CD Projekt Red’s acclaimed role-playing game The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt features a rich world with lots of quests to take on and characters to interact with. But what happens when you reach the end of the story? There’s no need to stop, as CD Projekt Red has now confirmed the game has no hard level cap.
“There is no level cap,” CD Projekt Red community lead Marcin Momot said on Twitter (via IGN).
This would suggest that unlocking every ability and mastering each is at least theoretically possible. But you certainly don’t need to do this to finish the game, as reviews have pointed out.
In response to Momot’s comments about The Witcher 3 having no level cap, some fans called for some kind of New Game Plus mode. Momot has not responded.
It’s possible that The Witcher 3’s upcoming paid DLC, Hearts of Stone and Blood and Wine, will offer some kind of solution for players who want a new, high-level challenge.
Online retail giant Amazon has updated its store page for Naughty Dog’s Uncharted 4: Thief’s End with the game’s official box art.
The cover art, which you can see below, is fairly standard fare for modern third-person shooters. It features Nathan Drake, with ruffled hair, presumably because he has been shot at a lot and has been diving around quite a bit, leading the unkempt look. Or perhaps he used a bit of Garnier Fructis texturising wax to achieve that I’m-not-even-trying surf hair style.
Drake’s face is partly obscured by shadow, with his forehead prominently showing an injury, likely from all the aforementioned diving around. The use of shadows is particularly interesting because Uncharted 4 has been pitched as a much darker entry in the successful series, and will delve into the protagonist’s chequered past.
With the Uncharted 4 cover, Drake seems to be in a jungle, which would explain why he has unbuttoned his shirt–it’s hot. But he’s also the kind of guy that would work really hard on his pecs but not overtly brag about his gains. Instead he’d simply give the world a peek and wait for the compliments to roll in.
Naturally he’s holding a gun, because no self-respecting Indiana Jones facsimile would leave home without one. Drake is also looking down with an expression of anguish. Although this is speculation, this may be because he’s dealing with the reality of killing yet another person.
Either that, or he’s lamenting the fact that he left home wearing sandals and now his feet are just full of potentially poisonous thorns. On top of that, opportunistic indigenous wildlife may have clamped down on his exposed toes and are suckling the blood from his tired, malnourished body.
In summary, box art is man with gun looking sad/angry.
“[With] The Last of Us, we went to great lengths to try to create this reality, but we were still limited by the amount of overdraw the PS3 could handle, etc.,” Straley said when the game was first revealed.
“Now, the PS4 is allowing us to push so much more density, so it’s fun to go back and go like, ‘Oh, look at the things we wish we could have done in Uncharted 1, it’s just like, this is easy, let’s just make this.’ It’s nice to be able to explore something and look back and go, ‘Wow, remember when we couldn’t do any of this?’ It’s kind of neat.”
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