Welcome back to your monthly report of game news, where I do my best to compile everything into one convenient ad-free place, so you don’t have to worry about the pesky cracks that info can fall through at other publications.
Thanks and credit for the banner image as always goes to the Avocado’s one and only Space Robot!
July 22nd: In conjunction with the introduction of the Xbox disc to digital program, Microsoft also announced the long-rumored “Xbox Backward Compatibility on PC” program, which is to say a port of the original Xbox and Xbox 360 emulators used on Series S|X to Windows PC, starting with Blinx the Time Sweeper, Fuzion Frenzy, Crimson Skies, and Conker Live and Reloaded.
July 24th: Obviously meant to include this last time: not long after the Tomb Raider remake’s delay to early 2027 was announced, publisher Amazon Games confirmed that the series’ new mainline sequel Tomb Raider Catalyst has in turn delayed to 2028. And speaking of Tomb Raider: Night Dive is rumored to be taking over from Aspyr and developing the last rereleases left in the franchise’s catalogue, remasters of 2006’s Tomb Raider Legend, 2007’s Tomb Raider Anniversary, the first remake of the 1996 original, and 2008’s Tomb Raider Underworld, the game the upcoming Catalyst is directly succeeding in the narrative timeline.
July 29th: Ron Gilbert and his studio Terrible Toybox informally announced their next game on his blog, and it’s a big deal: Thimbleweed Park 2 has just started production and is targeting an early 2028 launch on PC, just over a decade after the original point and click X Files-inspired mystery adventure came out in 2017. Gilbert also confirmed a Switch port. In a later interview, he explained how the game is being funded and released differently than his past Kickstarter or Devolver+Disney efforts: after receiving multiple publisher offers earlier this year he was unhappy with, he arranged for no strings attached funding from a publicly anonymous rich investor who was a fan of the original game. He received just over a million dollars after carefully outlining his production and self-publishing plan, with his biggest priority simply being a desire to fully pay his co-developers in ways he hasn’t always been able.
Argonaut Games made two new announcements, a Croc 2 Remaster will be launching on October 29th 2026, while their N64 game Buck Bumble is getting rereleased with a new cartridge for original hardware made by Palmer Luckey’s ModRetro. If you’ll recall from the last time we covered him earlier this year, Palmer Luckey was the creator of OculusVR but what he actually deserves to be remembered for is his extremist rightwing views, being a self described Trump supporter and radical Zionist, and for his extensive work building drones to kill innocents for the US military. Most recently, he has praised the Trump administration’s plans to livestream an execution by firing squad.
August 1st: Ubisoft announced that its game Champions Tactics will shut down in October, exactly two years after launch and some months after the game’s headlining blockchain and NFT features were stripped out.
August 3rd: 2064: Read Only Memories developer MidBoss has filed for bankruptcy and revealed that Matt Conn has stepped back in as interim CEO for the studio after he was previously ousted in 2018 for abuse and sexual harassment of employees. Conn never sold his 40% stake of shares in the company which seems to be what allowed him to retake direct control after he was previously “supporting” the studio’s previous CEO Alex Mehrer who took the position in 2025. The Read Only Memories IP is listed as an asset liable to liquidation in the bankruptcy, suggesting it could be sold off before likely closure.
The Netflix exclusive FIFA game released back in June, the corrupt sports institution’s biggest game project since ending the EA partnership, will now see its entire studio liquidated and every developer fired less than two months since launch.
Developer Tilting Point announced that their RPG Star Trek Legends has already been delisted from sale on all platforms and would shut down operations on September 3rd.
Dave Bautista is confirmed to be taking over the role of Kratos in the Amazon God of War TV series after the original lead actor received an on-set injury. Atreus’ actor is also allegedly planned to be recast between seasons in order to convey the time skip between the 2018 storyline and the Ragnarok storyline.
August 4th: A former employee of The Pokémon Company International anonymously filed a class action lawsuit against her employer due to then-director of engineering Ben Tsai using hidden cameras to film coworkers in the bathrooms at the Bellevue, Washington office. Tsai was arrested in July 2026 for possessing and producing child sex abuse materials and committing serial voyeurism through the use of hidden cameras at his various workplaces since 2017, including TPC. Hundreds of videos including those recorded at the TPC office were found at his arrest. Tsai claims that he was investigating transgender employees at TPC.
August 5th: After an entire year of negotiations, management at Microsoft subsidiary and Candy Crush makers King fully rejected the contract proposed by an employee union, as reported by Rebekah Valentine in August after it originally occurred in June. Microsoft and King management claim that the proposed collective bargaining agreement would’ve changed benefits terms and structures for the worse at King’s Swedish office, where the union is primarily based. Microsoft and King also believe that all King offices should operate identically and major changes for operations at the Swedish office would thus create complications for all other offices. King saw many workers fired in 2025 and again in the ongoing mass layoffs that started at Xbox this summer. In response to the contract rejection, two separate trade unions issued a strike notice against King/Microsoft on September 15th and unionized workers officially went on strike September 25th.
Retail leaker bilbil-kun extensively revealed details for the imminent launch of Diablo 4 for Switch 2 ahead of its official reveal at BlizzCon 2026 and release on September 15th. It is a $70 bundle of the base game and both expansions, and will be a code in a box at retail.
August 6th: Indie publisher Devolver Digital announced that it is planning to delist from the stock market and return to being a fully private company pending shareholder approval, almost five years after first going public in late 2021. 90% of investors voted in favor of the decision on September 8th and the company did officially delist and go private on September 16th, leaving its three original co-founders as the sole co-owners. Devolver’s shareholders had massively driven down its value in response to a slower release pace and the company has aptly diagnosed how detrimental the stock market is to making art and to an especially complex form of craftmanship like video games, as the demand for persistent short term growth is simply not compatible with the varying ways success can manifest for media and the demands that go into making good media and art.
Nintendo’s latest earnings release announced that Tomodachi Life: Living the Dream has already outsold its 3DS predecessor by selling more than 8 million copies as of August 5th and Pokémon Pokopia has surpassed 5 million copies sold in just over 4 months. 3.8 million Switch 2 consoles were bought in the April-June 2026 quarter for a total of 23.7 million sold in just over a year, continuing its track record as the fastest selling game console in history with the biggest first year in console history, beating both the Wii and its immediate predecessor. Switch 1 sold about 670,000 units in the quarter.
Neither Yoshi and the Mysterious Book nor Star Fox Remake sold a million copies by June 30th, but Nintendo said both games “performed steadily” in the report. Rhythm Heaven Groove had no official sales announcement but the game had already sold over 1 million physical copies in Japan alone as of September 13th. My informal analysis of secondhand data is that Splatoon Raiders is definitely already a million-seller but I’m less confident of the other summer games.
Roblox announced that its player numbers and in-game spending have dropped sharply since a peak last year, though its daily active users are still over 120 million. The company insists that higher quality experiences and long-term management are now its priorities over short term growth even though it also just announced another genAI tool added to its main game app.
Ubisoft made multiple announcements for the Ghost Recon 25th anniversary, a PC port giveaway, a closed testing program for the series’ next entry, and a new update for Ghost Recon Wildlands including a current gen upgrade, a new mission, some new QOL features, and returning content from limited-release updates. Ubisoft also announced that Eric Baptizat is rejoining the Assassins’ Creed series as overall game director, after directing Valhalla and then leaving Ubisoft to work on Dead Space Remake and Battlefield 6.
Several casting announcements for the Legend of Zelda movie were revealed in trade papers, with Ganondorf said to be played by Uli Latukefu, Impa said to be played by Severance’s Dichen Lachman, Mass Effect’s Yvonne Strahovski reported to be playing a queen, and most notably, Jurassic Park’s Sam Neill will be in the film as his last role before passing away this July.
August 7th: Less than two years after launching the games press website Restart with funding from Walmart, its entire editorial staff including Imran Khan were fired by parent company and ad firm Moonrock.
August 8th: The latest performative Sinophobia from the Trump administration was an executive order targeting imports and exports of outdated electronics between Asia and Japan, which was soon revealed to be affecting gaming hobbyists by restricting their access to CRT televisions and other electronics which are being suspended, confiscated, and destroyed by customs officers.
August 10th: Many of the recently fired developers from Ubisoft Barcelona united to form a new independent game studio called Dark Ritual Studios with their first game announced as Puzzle Mage coming in 2027.
A Chinese District Court ruled in favor of a woman who argued that she had right to inheritance over her son’s 87 separate digital gaming accounts after his untimely passing at the age of 36. This kind of account transference is uncommon due to the strict EULA policies used by almost all digital storefronts, the foundation for the lack of permanent ownership facing the gaming landscape now as total physical disc discontinuation fast approaches.
August 11th: After the premiere of a trailer by Saber Interactive announcing Rideshare Stimulator, a sort of dystopian satirical version of Crazy Taxi, former Saber employee (and trans woman) Stella Sacco went public to say that she had worked as the head writer of the game before being fired and replaced with genAI in the middle of development, followed by genAI being used for passenger voices as well, even though the game has no public AI disclosure. Saber’s official response denied the “replacement” accusation and the use of AI on story writing while admitting extensive use of genAI audio for passenger voices like she said.
Two days later, Saber Interactive CEO and cofounder Matthew Karch, who was already notorious for aligning with reactionary Youtuber Asmongold and for his role in both enacting the mass layoffs at Embracer Group and then engaging in apologism for it after Saber left Embracer, then proceeded to step in and make things worse with a statement to This Week in Videogames. He repeatedly insulted Stella Sacco starting with “Stella who? I had to ask Claude because I have never spoken to her or seen her,” and that he wishes he had replaced her with AI, followed by insisting that she was replaced by a human but also that genAI is a selling point for the game. Four days after that obscenely bad comment, Sacco revealed that she had received a lengthy private apology from Karch once he realized just how bad he was hurting his company’s image, and an AI disclosure was finally added to the game’s Steam page.
Aggro Crab and Landfall released The Final Ascent, the last major content update for their hit co op game PEAK which they announced on August 6th. It added two more areas to the game for a total of four and a new endgame sequence. With the game content complete, it’s ready for the previously teased console ports, which have since been further foreshadowed by an ESRB rating for the PS5 version.
Warner Bros and Embracer Group’s dedicated port studio Aspyr unexpectedly announced and shadowdropped a rerelease (“Legacy Edition”) of the 2011 action RPG Lord of the Rings: War in the North for PC, PS5, Switch 1/Switch 2, and Xbox Series S|X. This was accompanied by a promise that more of the LOTR video game back catalogue was coming back thanks to this partnership, which has already been followed up on with the release of 2014’s Middle Earth: Shadow of Mordor and 2017’s Middle Earth: Shadow of War on September 30th. Those games of course came from the sadly now defunct Monolith Productions.
During the earnings release of Crimson Desert studio Pearl Abyss, the developers announced that the game’s Switch 2 port has progressed considerably and is currently targeting a launch in the first half of 2027, and that their development hell Pokémon clone DokeV is now their main project with a Fall 2028 release window planned. Crimson Desert’s first story DLC later had its release date announced as October 29th.
August 12th: As part of the initial announcements for Phasmophobia developer Kinetic Games’ new publishing branch, Sam Barlow and his studio Half Mermaid revealed their next FMV game project Precognition, coming in Spring 2028 for PC, Switch 2, PS5, and Xbox Series S|X. Precognition is a horror mystery with the same general format as its predecessors Immortality and Her Story, but now with a sci fi focus on a woman receiving visions of the future warping her memories. It’s written in collaboration with filmmaker Brandon Cronenberg, a talented artist and son of the legend, one of my personal favorites, David Cronenberg.
August 13th: Just two weeks after that previous studio shutdown, Netflix yet again cut its gaming subsidiaries down to the bone by fully closing down both Moonloot and Night School game developers, and firing many workers outside those teams as well while insisting that video games are still a priority. Moonloot was making a life sim and never successfully released a game before it shut down, while Night School Studio was of course the creators of Oxenfree and had just released their latest game in June right before closure.
During its latest fiscal release, Embracer Group informally announced that both a third full Kingdom Come game and Darksiders 4 will launch by March 2028 at the latest, its next major releases after the two Tomb Raider games and Metro 2039. The title Kingdom Come Salvation had previously leaked via a public trademark listing.
August 14th: During Disney’s D23 convention, a third Kingdom Hearts 4 trailer was shown in both short and extended forms, officially revealing the game’s first brand new Disney world as the Land of the Dead from Pixar’s Coco, revealing playable segments for Mickey, Donald, and Goofy with the former having Paper Mario esque switching between 2D and 3D and the latter using their established abilities in the Greek Underworld, ending by showing Riku’s arrival in Quadratum.
During a Simpsons panel at D23, creator Matt Groening commented that the 2003 cult classic GTA-alike The Simpsons: Hit and Run is “coming back in some form” in response to a question about a potential sequel, accidentally confirming ahead of announcement what was previously reported by VGC’s Jordan Middler earlier this year. As originally a Vivendi game, this rerelease will come from Xbox and Activision since the latter merged with Vivendi back in 2008, meaning it does belong on the BDS boycott. The other, larger gaming announcements at D23 were summarized earlier.
A small arthouse indie game focused game publisher called Nakana.io announced that they were imminently closing down over lack of funds, during which they put almost their entire catalog on sale at big discounts before the games would be relisted under their original devs.
August 17th: Ukrainian indie game developer Ternox revealed that PlayStation had elected to block the previously approved 1.0 launch of their acclaimed game STONKS-9800 and remove all their previous games from the PS store without any explanation, but on August 21st the decisions were reversed as the company acknowledged that these games were accidentally flagged in an ongoing attempt to purge shovelware, showing another way the line for artistic protection is blurred and compromised in today’s landscape.
August 19th: Jason Schreier reported for Bloomberg that Guerrilla Games is fully removing the live service elements from their three player game Horizon Hunters Gathering due to negative player feedback in private testing, changing it to focus on a smaller scoped co op story mode. The soft-reboot started in June and will be assessed by executives in December, and many devs on the team are already being reassigned to a different project up for assessment at the same time, which is since rumored to be a Killzone project. Only a “tiny team” is currently working on the actual conclusion to Aloy’s story, leaving Horizon 3 still many years away from release.
Dishonored creative director Harvey Smith has revealed his new development studio Black Pony Interactive, which has already been active for a year focused on making new immersive sims with 26 staffers including other Arkane vets.
August 20th: Riot Games announced that it’s ending support for the League of Legends fighting game 2XKO ahead of its first anniversary, releasing two more characters and a final bug fix patch by December 2026 while maintaining servers indefinitely for now. Refunds will be issued for all microtransactions and all content will become free/unlockable.
August 24th: Clear River Games and Square Enix revealed Terranigma Rebirth, a brand new remaster of the cult classic 1995 action RPG which never previously released in North America. It’s coming to PC, Switch 1/Switch 2, PS4/5, and Xbox Series S|X on January 14th 2027.
James Turner announced that he has returned to the Pokémon franchise after being art director for a time and then leaving to make The Plucky Squire. He is now the franchise’s general art and design creative director at The Pokémon Company
Top Hat Studios announced that their Metroidvania Well Dweller will launch on September 22nd 2026 for PC, Switch 1, and now newly confirmed Switch 2, PS5, and Xbox Series S|X ports.
August 25th: Saber Interactive delayed Turok: Origins to a Spring 2027 launch on all platforms for further polish and to join the droves of games avoiding GTA6.
Adhoc Studio announced that Dispatch will be receiving a physical release on PS5, Switch 1/2, and Xbox Series S|X, with a deluxe edition by Lost in Cult.
Color Gray Games and Super Rare Games announced a limited edition physical release for The Golden Idol Saga on Switch 1, containing both Case of the Golden Idol and Rise of the Golden Idol and all their DLCs.
GamesCom Opening Night Live: The traditional preshow was light this year, with the biggest announcements being the tease of a new mainline Worms game from Team17 at the end of a trailer for spinoff Worms: Galactic Tactics, a January 15th 2027 launch date for TankRat, and one of my personal highlights, the reveal of Murals from Dlala Studios. After previously handling others’ IPs with Battletoads and Disney Illusion Island, this is the developer’s first original and self-published project and an isometric 2D action game with a strong handpainted fairy tale world. The main show started with Hoyoverse’s latest nonsense, Nodusfall, a co op action RPG with a dark fantasy aesthetic instead of the usual basic anime look. Next was Rainbow Six Tactics, a turn based current gen spinoff coming in 2027.
Gears of War: E-Day had its story trailer. NetEase announced that its city sandbox game Ananta will launch on January 15th 2027. Silent Hill: Townfall had its cast reveal trailer, most notably featuring Lost’s Terry O’Quinn. Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy had its launch trailer. Pearl Abyss announced and released an Enhanced Edition update for Crimson Desert, adding new cutscenes, dialogue, and characters to expand and rearrange the story. Sea of Remnants announced that it will have closed beta tests starting in December. Arthurian action game Tides of Annihilation had a story trailer. Italian indie dev Unrelated Studio offered another look at their promising debut game Lofsong, a story driven puzzle adventure about wandering the wastelands of Earth.
Capcom’s new trailer for Mega Man: Dual Override, coming in Spring 2027, showcased the new Custom Chips that change your abilities, the new Twinkle Girl boss fight, the Override system which temporarily overpowers you and then weakens you, some Mega Man costumes added to Pragmata, and lastly a tease at the inclusion of Proto Man, whose proper reveal as a fully playable character was saved for the game’s next trailer in the September Nintendo Direct. Rayman Legends Retold, the roguelite spinoff PUBG Ded.net, Control Resonant, Blood of Dawnwalker, the console ports of survival game Once Human, all had quick trailers. RTS Game of Thrones: War for Westeros had its gameplay reveal and an early 2027 release window. Airship Syndicate announced their isometric horror shooter Dust: Origins. Archetype Entertainment and Hasbro/WOTC announced that their ambitious RPG Exodus will finally launch on April 7th 2027. WOTC also showed an extended gameplay reveal for Warlock: Dungeons & Dragons. Co op Arabian Nights action game 1001 Threads of Mizan was revealed by MBC Game Studio.
For Kotaku, Lex Luddy described attending a demo for this game at GamesCom before it was officially announced, where she experienced in real time realizing that she was playing a game owned and funded by the Saudi Public Investment Fund and Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman, through the Middle East Broadcast Center that the Saudi government recently took over. She made several perfectly fair attempts to question Lars Bonde, Ubisoft vet and creative director on the game, about the project’s background, but he was extremely evasive about that while being very open about his animosity towards his former employers at Ubi, describing the game as “payback for a canceled Prince of Persia game”. He emphasized the game’s broader relationship to the Middle East and refused to even say the name Saudi Arabia, let alone directly admit to the professional relationship, insisting that his company is decentralized and self-published.
Back to the show, Chinese developer Silver Studio and their publisher/owner Happy Elements announced that their open world action RPG Silver Palace will release for PS5 alongside PC and mobile, while revealing the game’s horror-themed multiplayer mode. 4A Games and Embracer Group offered a gameplay trailer for Metro 2039, which is coming February 4th 2027. I meant to mention this the first time I covered the new Metro game, but author Dmitri Glukhovsky’s involvement in the story writing for this game is unfortunate as he is an outspoken Zionist opponent of Palestine liberation, a devout genocide denialist and apologist for Israel’s warcrimes. The more innocuously problematic Keighley mainstay Snoop Dogg appeared next, being the next Elusive Target guest star in Hitman. The MMO Aion 2 announced it would launch October 5th. A cinematic trailer appeared for grand strategy game Afterworld. Hoyoverse announced that it would launch life sim Petit Planet by the end of 2026. After a musical performance, Edmund McMillen’s Mewgenics was announced to be releasing for Switch 2, PS5, and Xbox Series S|X on September 8th, after the Xbox port recently leaked and console releases were previously informally confirmed. A physical edition for Switch 2 (complete on cart) and PS5 has also been confirmed for early 2027.
Aliens Fireteam Elite 2 had its launch trailer and shadowdropped release, although its Switch 2 port has still yet to release. 1666 Amsterdam had its early access trailer and shadowdrop. Truck sim Road Kings had a release date trailer. Nekcom offered the latest trailer for their cult classic in the making Showa American Story, still scheduled to launch this year. RedOctane Games announced that their successor to to Rock Band, Stage Tour, will launch on December 10th. Sega had a new trailer focused on the multiplayer mode for Crazy Taxi: World Tour. Saber Interactive had a Turok Origins trailer. A studio of Halo and Battlefield vets announced their survival shooter Gravhounds coming in early access this year, and yes, it’s about dogs. Iceflake Studios and Paradox Interactive revealed the previously leaked Lego Skylines, a family aimed take on city builders and a blatant concession to the currently unacceptable condition of Cities Skylines 2, coming to PC, Switch 2, PS5, and Xbox Series S|X. Another management sim called Transport Fever 3 was shown and released at the end of September. Dead by Daylight makers Behaviour Interactive revealed their co op extraction shooter Exterminauts coming in 2027. Grinding Gear Games announced that my girlfriend’s beloved Path of Exile 2 will exit early access and launch in 1.0 on December 11th 2026.
Ubisoft revealed Heroes of Might and Magic 3 Remake for a 2027 launch, redesigning it with fully 3D free camera gameplay. The Ascent developer Neon Giant and publisher Krafton had the gameplay reveal trailer for the increasingly hotly anticipated NO LAW, an open world cyberpunk FPS/RPG. Krafton also revealed their tactical MOBA Project Zeta, developed by Nirvanana, and Krafton offered a look at the isometric action RPG Tarae: The Unbound. Korean MMO shooter Cinder City had a new trailer. Frictional Games showed the new trailer for their sci fi horror Ontos, which had its gameplay reveal later during GamesCom. Inscryption creator Daniel Mullins showcased the second trailer for Pony Island 2: Panda Circus, announcing that the game will launch for PC on April 27th 2027.
TiGames returned with another look at gameplay for their GenAI integrated game Zoopunk, and another undeniably memorable repeat appearance game was next with There Are No Ghosts at the Grand. Tencent announced that their open world creature collecting game Roco Kingdom will have closed beta tests starting October 27th ahead of its international launch. Chinese story-driven WW2 FPS The Defiant had its first major showcase. NC, the makers of Aion 2, revealed a new multiplayer survival FPS focused on…being a streamer, called Like or Die. The second trailer for Final Fantasy 7 Revelation premiered as one of GamesCom’s final appearances, with a focus on the open world exploration with the parachute, grappling hook, and Chocobos, as well as the reimagined iconic Weapon boss monsters.
Shortly after they announced a 2028 release window for The Witcher IV, CDPR closed out Gamescom Opening Night Live by revealing The Witcher 3 Complete Edition Remastered, built on the final version of the outgoing proprietary RedEngine and featuring a greater mechanical and visual overhaul to the game compared to its original 2022 current gen upgrade, with adjustments to lighting, combat, movement on foot and on horse, enemy AI, skill trees, armor customization, UI, loot, tutorials, accessibility, and more. This is the version of the game that the new DLC will be supported on, and it’s a free upgrade to all existing (digital and physical) owners coming on September 29th 2026 to PC, PS5, Switch 2, and Xbox Series S|X.
The base game was delisted with the Complete Edition/all previous DLCs made free to existing owners all in service to driving as many players as possible to the new Songs of the Past expansion, which had its first gameplay showcase for said DLC also appeared on the GamesCom floor, divulging that it focuses on Dandelion’s family, homeland, and relationship with Geralt and features a new ranged weapon. Some responded to another edition of Witcher 3 by asking where the Witcher 1 Remake is, but CDPR and subsidiary studio Fool’s Theory have an answer: the remake’s production was paused during Fool’s Theory’s work on Songs of the Past and support for Witcher 4, mainly because the remake will be dependent on the UE5 enginework currently being done for Witcher 4.
August 26th: In a Classic Devolver Moment TM, the publisher decided to announce a game launching on the same day as GTA6 after ‘leaking’ it in response to the GTA6 gameplay leaks. The 2D platformer Volvy’s Adventure: Reslimed, developed by Gunbrella’s Doinksoft, is releasing November 19th for PC. It was originally made for the Game Boy Color, and it will come to modern consoles later.
Following the release of the fifth mainline story chapter earlier this Spring, Mob Entertainment announced the next new game in the Poppy Playtime series, a four player co op survival crafting game with procedurally made levels titled Escape from Playtime, coming in early access to Steam on October 21st.
Gaming Minds Studios and Kalypso Media announced that the latest entry in the cult classic nation bulding sim series Tropico 7 will launch on January 28th 2027 for PC, PS5, Switch 2, and Xbox Series S|X, marking the series’ second Nintendo entry and first Switch 2 entry.
Frogwares officially announced that The Sinking City 2 will arrive on Switch 2 in 2027 after its initial launch on August 18th.
After the Supreme Court ruled against Trump tariffs earlier this year, the government issued billions of dollars in refunds to various companies affected, including all three game console makers. Panic announced that it will pass on this refund to anyone who bought a Playdate gaming handheld during the tariff period.
August 27th: GTA6 Extended Look: Rockstar officially premiered its 30 minute gameplay reveal video on Netflix with six hours of exclusivity followed by its Youtube release. The video was captured at native 1440p30fps on base PS5 as part of a larger confirmation that the game is 30fps only on consoles, basically the only one of the generation after Blood of Dawnwalker got an emergency patch, and with the gameplay details learned here, it’s unclear how easily it will run at 60fps on any hardware right now. I’m going to be discussing details here at length because it feels materially newsworthy how evolutionary this game seems to be, how with the state of the industry this could be one of the last AAA games to actually move game design forward, but I will be doing so only after a preface that Rockstar was and is a terribly abusive workplace.
Most recently before the union firing trial started in September, on July 1st three currently employed Rockstar developers and union members at Rockstar North had a big interview at GameDeveloper.com where they accused Rockstar of standardizing crunch/extreme overtime with limited compensation into its worker contracts, allowing company leaders to keep working remotely while everyone else was forced back into full time in-office, scrapping efforts to decrease the company’s gender pay gap and widening that pay gap after the UK and US lurched further rightward, and using extreme lack of transparency towards workers for their pay and promotions, causing the people making the biggest game ever to be paid below the market rate of employees on AAA productions.
The major gameplay evolution achieved is now clear, starting with the new relationship mechanics for the central pair of Jason and Lucia: while they keep working together and the core story remains unchanged, it is entirely up to the player whether their relationship remains platonic, starts romantic and becomes strained, or remains romantic over time, as relationship quality will increase or decrease based on prioritizing consistent communication, good behavior both at home and during crimes, and quality time together outside of the main story missions. The player will also control whether most events and missions are done solo or as a pair and can switch between characters at almost any time.
Other simulation systems have also returned or received greater depth: weight management is returning from San Andreas, car customization is as extensive character customization, cars now need fuel but they drain slowly to keep it from being burdensome, robberies and stealing cars are more complex and dynamic, costume changes, witnesses, and body disposals are all borrowed from Hitman and accounted for when committing crimes, Wanted and Criminal Profile systems have changed considerably, random events are more extensive and can collide into each other, and story missions are supposed to be largely much more dynamic and less rigid to account for all these systems.
The sheer scale is also bewildering: the map is three times bigger than Red Dead 2’s and the main city is twice the size of GTA5’s, every single NPC is unique, has 600,000 unique animations and interactions, and is being tracked constantly, there’s more side activities, more businesses and enterable buildings, and more animals than ever, there’s a significantly more complex dynamic weather system.
It all adds up to genuinely looking like an experience of game design that matches the cultural event status it’s been building up all this time, at the unforgivable cost of treatment toward the workers behind all of it.
The gameplay reveal was also undermined by a hacker or hacker group known as CyberLeek releasing extensive gameplay footage several days ahead of its premiere, and the faucet of leaked gameplay footage has just kept flowing regularly over the past two months, most recently including showing off the game’s nudity and threats to release a playable build of the game before finally officially ending their run leaking the game on October 14th.
August 28th: Unfinished recently made trailer footage from EA Motive’s Iron Man game leaked online, showing flight and combat gameplay and story cutscenes with classic characters, ending with an unspecific Release Window title card suggesting that the trailer could possibly be targeting a near future public debut like this year’s Game Awards.
August 31st: Nintendo unexpectedly released two more first party Switch 2 free upgrade patches in the lead up to its September Direct and the Switch 2’s Western price hike: Pikmin 3 Deluxe now runs at native 1080p handheld, near or at native 4K docked, and has GameShare support for the competitive multiplayer Bingo Battle, while Switch 1 bestseller Mario Kart 8 Deluxe has the same resolution boost, reduced loadtimes, eight player splitscreen races, GameChat camera support, a 96 course race mode, and increased speed. Nintendo also refreshed its console bundle lineup, replacing this summer’s $500 pick 1 of 3 offering with $550 Mario Kart World and Switch Sports Resort bundles in America and issuing Tomodachi Life and Monster Hunter Wilds bundles over in Japan.
Thank you to everyone for your support over the years, in all its forms. I am incredibly grateful for you, all of you, for your enthusiasm, kindness, inspiration, and generosity. I will no longer be asking for your financial support, only for your shining presence in my comments. I am proud to say that this train can keep right on rolling!