TWIG Aug 1 - Animal Crossing co-director leaves Nintendo, new PS4 firmware update 6.0 in the works
Industry News
Jay Pinkerton, the writer for Portal 2, TF2, and L4D2 is working at Valve once more
After the departure of four members of Valve's writing staff in the past two years, fans became concerned with the company's inner workings. Now, almost exactly a year after leaving Valve, Portal 2 and L4D2 writer Jay Plinkerton has returned to Valve once more. This time, he's working at the company under the role of "other experts", and not writing staff. It's unclear what impact he'll have, but Gabe Newell did state that he wants the company to start making games again sometime soon.
SourceVideo game composer Kickstarts campaign to make orchestral recordings of Star Fox, Suikoden, and Fire Emblem songs
Kentaro Sato is an Orchestral director for the Final Fantasy series, and has been involved with the Philharmonic and Sydney Symphony Orchestras throughout the years. He's now taken to Kickstarter to help get three different musical arrangements published. His plans are to create an orchestral recording of soundtracks from Suikoden II, Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon, and Star Fox. Each of the three games ask for a $40,000 goal in order to be created, and have a month left to be funded. If any reach their goal, they're slated for a Feb 2019 release.
SourceEmulation and Hacking News
Hacker cheats in Splatoon 2 to beg Nintendo to add anti-cheat, gets banned
Cheating has always been a problem with Nintendo games, since the advent of online functionality. And it seems one Switch owner was heavily disappointed by just how easy it was to hack Splatoon 2. Instead of vocalizing how the game's online can be compromised, he instead decided to hack the leaderboards of Splatoon 2, leaving a message; "Please Add Anti Cheat". A Reddit user claimed that he was behind the amusing hack, and was willing to have his Switch banned, just so that he could leave that message. Nintendo did follow through with that, and banned him shortly after, but with no real fix in sight, Nintendo's upcoming paid online service has certainly been left disrespected.
SourceRPCS3 update gives major improvements for emulation of games like God of War and Yakuza
The PlayStation 3 emulator, RPCS3, has been making leaps and bounds in terms of progress lately. The team's latest video shows off some new feats that they've made recently, such as rewriting the way the emulator handles MSAA, multiple games now no longer have graphical issues. Yakuza Kenzan has fully booted ingame, and the first Sly Cooper game is fully playable through the emulator. Dynasty Warriors: Gundam is playable, as well.
General News
Yooka-Laylee will be playable in indie fighting game Brawlout
It may not exactly be the "Banjo for Smash!" we were all waiting for, but if you're a fan of the Smash Bros. inspired game, you'll be able to play as Yooka-Laylee's chameleon and bat pair, alongside other indie characters from games like Hyper Light Drifter and Guacamelee. Brawlout is currently on PC and Switch, and is coming soon to PS4.
SourceSonic 1 port in SEGA AGES adds the drop dash
Next month, Sonic fans will see the original game in the series receive yet another port to a new system. We've seen Sonic 1 get the spindash added to it multiple times, however, this time, players will also be able to use the Drop Dash from Mania in the classic game. A Ring Keep Mode will also be added, which lets you start with 10 rings on every Act. There will be a leaderboard as well, which will keep track of the fastest act clear in Green Hill Zone's Act 1.
SourceAnimal Crossing: New Leaf co-director leaves Nintendo
Isao Maro has been with Nintendo the past few years, where he's been working on Animal Crossing titles. Most recently, he was the co-director of Animal Crossing: New Leaf, the last major entry in the series. As of July 2018, however, he noted that he's left his job at Nintendo. Currently, the only Animal Crossing game known to be in development at this time are updates for the mobile game, Pocket Camp.
SourceHarry Potter Lego Collection potentially coming to the Switch and Xbox One
A UK retailer, Argos, may have accidentally let it slip that a collection of Lego Harry Potter games could be coming to the Nintendo Switch. The repacking of the Years 1-4 and Years 5-7 games already released on PlayStation 4 back in 2016 for £19.99, while the potential upcoming Switch version will cost £24.99 (Xbox One port to cost £19.99) and launch this November.
SourceDragon Ball Xenoverse series hits 10 million units sold
Since the first game's launch in early 2015, the Dragon Ball Xenoverse series has seen mixed reviews, but has found a large fanbase and strong popularity. Both games combined have now reached 10 million copies sold. Though Xenoverse 2 is now two years old, it's slated to get at least two more DLC packs this summer and winter.
Blizzard and toymaker Hasbro announce Nerf Overwatch Blaster gun
If you've ever wanted to fire a Nerf toy gun that's stylized like Overwatch character Reaper's Hellfire Shotguns, then you'll be able to, soon. Hasbro is making Nerf Rival Blasters as a crossover with Blizzard's Overwatch, and the first of which will be Reaper's weapon. The gun will look how it does in the game, however, it'll have a bright orange tip, as American law dictates. It'll also shoot at up to 90ft per second. There's no price announced yet, but it'll be out sometime next year in 2019.
SourceNew PS4 version 6.0 update software coming soon, currently being beta tested
Beta testing registration has gone out to PlayStation 4 users, allowing for them to test out the latest firmware for the console, 6.0. The last update for 5.50 was back in February, which added voice chat "teams" and a supersampling mode. PlayStation hasn't announced what new features this firmware will offer, but we can likely expect it to drop sometime in August.
SourceNo Man's Sky sees record playerbase after NEXT update
When No Man's Sky launched, it became a joke throughout gaming communities thanks to glitches and undelivered promises. Fans were infuriated by the game's lack of content, and developer Hello Games tried to keep things under control. Since then, it's been two years, and a brand new update for the game, titled NEXT, is here. The major update patch added in multiple things that had been initially teased prior to launch, and players have been flooding back to play it. On Steam, No Man's Sky went from Mixed to Very Positive user reviews, and managed to capture a concurrent playerbase of 90,000; a record amount of people since release.
Psyonix forced to reveal lootbox drop rate for Rocket League
With certain governments cracking down on lootboxes and their potential as gambling, many developers are now having to publicly state what the item drop rates of lootboxes are in their games. The latest game to do so is Rocket League, a game that's set to be offering a premium rewards pass later this year. You can see the drop rates for all item crates below.
SourceA Hat in Time reaches 500,000 sales milestone
A Hat in Time launched late last year to critical acclaim, and the 3D platformer shot up to success and praise, overshadowing the rival mascot platformer game that had launched earlier that year: Yooka Laylee. Developer Gears for Breakfast revealed that nearly a year after release, the game has sold over 500,000 copies on Xbox One, PlayStation 4, and PC. If you're a fan, there's DLC yet to come, alongside a new online co-op mode as well.
SourceMinecraft for 3DS gets version 1.6 update
For fans of Minecraft on the N3DS, there's a brand new update available to download. This patch adds in some skin packs for the game, including a Star Wars one, and most importantly, improves the stability. Performance should be improved as well, and there's been a number of bigfixes. You can check out the specifics at the source below.
SourceReview Recap
Official:
Creepy Brawlers (NES)
OPSEAT Gaming Chair (Hardware)
Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker (3DS/Switch)
EZ Flash Omega (Hardware)
Adventure Time: Pirates of the Enchirldion (Switch)
Neverout (Switch)
Users:
Fallout 4
Super Mario Bros. 3
Release Calendar
August 1
Yakuza 0 (PC)
August 3
Warioware Gold (3DS)
August 7
Dead Cells (PC, NS, XB1, PS4)
Overcooked 2 (PC, NS, XB1, PS4)
August 9
Monster Hunter World (PC)
Okami HD (NS)
August 14
The Walking Dead: The Final Season - Episode 1 (PC, PS4, XB1)
August 21
Shenmue 1 + 2 (PC, XB1, PS4)
Guacamelee 2 (PS4, PC)
August 24
Little Dragon's Cafe (NS, PS4)
August 28
Monster Hunter Generations Ultimate (NS)
Yakuza Kiwami 2 (PS4)
This is a Monster Hunter and Yakuza-filled month. Overall, it's a mild amount of titles, but the games that are releasing are huge ones. For those on a PC, Yakuza 0 is the perfect point in the series to jump in, and for those over on PS4 that have played some of the games before, Kiwami 2 will no doubt be a hit. While The Walking Dead never recaptured the heights it attained in season 1, fans still might be interested to see how the story plays out for Clementine. As for indies, Dead Cells is finally breaking out of early access, and is a must-play if you're a fan of roguelites. Going back to the PC front, they'll finally be able to try the mega hit game from Capcom, 6 months after the console launch. If you're a Switch-only owner, though, you won't be left out, because Generations Ultimate will arrive on the Switch later in the month.
