Opinion
17 CommentsFallout 4 proved bigger isn't always better
I recently watched a talk given by Bethesda level designers Joel Burgess and Nathan Purkeypile during GDC 2016 on the modular level design of Fallout 4. It's a great video to absorb if, like me, you're a settlement junkie or aspiring Fallout modder.
In it, Burgess and Purkeypile covered the history of Bethesda's use of art kits to create the settings and atmosphere of Fallout 3, Skyrim and Fallout 4, detailing how the uniformity and snap-in-place functionality of the pieces within allowed them to more carefully allocate their time and resources during development.
The discussion makes it clear that Bethesda values time management in game development, as Burgess says one of their main goals during the creation of a game mission is to get to a rough playable state as early in the...
News
5 CommentsPixies' 'Where Is My Mind?' comes to Rock Band 4 next week
Harmonix is kicking off July's additions to the Rock Band 4 library with "Where Is My Mind?" by Pixies, the studio announced today.
"Where Is My Mind?" is a song so ubiquitous that we're shocked it wasn't already available in the Rock Band library. (Pixies' "Wave of Mutilation" was in the original Rock Band, and the rest of the album Doolittle was released as downloadable content in June 2008.)
Watchers of Mr. Robot and The Leftovers may remember Maxence Cyrin's haunting solo piano cover of "Where Is My Mind" from episodes of those shows last year. But Rock Band 4 doesn't support Rock Band 3's keyboard peripheral, so that song wouldn't work well as current Rock Band DLC.
The other new Rock Band song coming next week is "Lips of an Angel" by Hinder. Both tracks will be released July 5...
Cover Story
Issue
19
May 25, 2016
Designing Mirror’s Edge: The making of a franchise
Go behind the scenes with DICE on the creation of Mirror’s Edge and Mirror’s Edge Catalyst.
Read moreNews
2 CommentsCapcom is well aware of your Resident Evil 7 finger frustrations
The mystery surrounding the dummy finger in Resident Evil 7 biohazard's demo isn't over yet, according to a flier sent out to Resident Evil Ambassadors today.
Several players have taken to Reddit to share the same cryptic message, which includes the teaser below:
Reminiscent of the good ol' P.T. days, Capcom released a Resident Evil 7 playable teaser following the game's reveal at E3. Players flocked to places like Reddit to swap theories and tear the demo apart for clues. What is the ax actually good for? Who's that ghost lady? Is that finger a key, or nah?
Many surmised that the demo itself wasn't meant to be puzzled over in the same way P.T. was, despite it being a stand-alone experience. It would appear, however, that the dummy finger has more of a role to play....
Guides
3 CommentsInside puzzle guide and walkthrough
Inside, like its predecessor Limbo, is an atmospheric puzzle game that puts a child in a disturbing situation. Your job is to solve puzzles, and our guide has the solution for every one — including videos for the toughest of the bunch. (You can also watch them on Polygon's YouTube channel.)
Inside doesn't name its areas, but we've organized the guide based on geographical locations. Just head to the table of contents below and click for help.
For more on Inside, you can read Polygon's review and press play above to watch our video review.
Table of contents
The Woods
The Farm
The City
Underground
Underwater...
Latest Xbox One Forum Activity View all posts
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| Backward compatibility | addicted2gaming | Xbox One | 5 |
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| Xbox One vs Xbox 360 | addicted2gaming | Xbox One | 3 |
| EA Access Adding NHL16 on March 29th. | BuckThunder | Xbox One | 0 |
Analysis
24 CommentsCan ReCore redeem Comcept after Mighty No. 9?
I want to like ReCore, but the demo at this year's E3 didn't make it easy.
I like ReCore's concept — Joule Adams is a volunteer to help colonize a far-flung alien world, and after waking from a centuries long cryosleep finds "Far Eden" to be a deserted wasteland. With the help of her adorable robotic companions, Joule must unravel the mystery of this world and what happened while apparently shooting the crap out of aggressive alien robots.
I am on board with all of that. ReCore is also being developed by Comcept, the studio founded by Mega Man director and visual designer/legend Keiji Inafune. Working in partnership with Comcept is Austin, Texas-based Armature Studios, which was founded by veterans of Metroid Prime developers Retro.
This all sounds great, until you start peeking a...
News
14 CommentsBlizzard finally fixes Overwatch’s basketball hoop
One of Overwatch’s more captivating activities — punching and shooting the basketballs in the game’s transports while waiting for a round to start — is now out of beta. The latest update to the game finally recognizes when you successfully score a basket.
Prior to the most recent update to Overwatch, tossing a basketball through the game’s basketball hoop was a bit ... anticlimactic. Personal satisfaction from scoring a rare shot was your only reward. But now, landing a two-pointer elicits a burst of confetti and appropriate sound effects.
Here’s a peek at Overwatch’s important new development, captured from a stream from Twitch user AnneMunition:
As part of the basketball hoop patch, Blizzard also released a minor update to Overwatch that adds Competitive Play to the team-based...
News
71 CommentsBioShock: The Collection officially announced
After photo leaks yesterday all but confirmed that Irrational Games' BioShock series would be headed to current generation consoles, publisher 2K sealed the deal with an official announcement trailer today.
BioShock: The Collection will include BioShock, BioShock 2 and BioShock Infinite and will come with all additional single-player DLC. The collection will also feature director's commentary from creative director Ken Levine and lead artist Shawn Robertson.
The bundled collection also includes new content and featurettes for fans of the original games. In the newly remastered BioShock, for example, players will have the option to walk around a virtual museum of concepts that never made it into the original game and tackle a variety of puzzles, splicers and Big...
News
7 CommentsFriday the 13th: The Game may still get a single-player mode
Gun Media's new video game adaptation of Friday the 13th blazed through Kickstarter last year, pulling in an impressive $823,704 in funding. While that's a lot of money, it's almost $1 million short of the $1,625,000 stretch goal that would have seen a "single player survival challenge mode" added to the game.
However, according to Gun Media founder and Friday the 13th: The Game co-creator Wes Keltner, there may still be hope for said single-player mode.
"No questions whatsoever that we want to revisit single-player if the game does well," Keltner told Polygon. "We're taking pre-orders right now. Every single dime we get is going right back into the game to put that kind of stuff in there."
In the initial Kickstarter pitch, Gun Media described Friday the 13th's possible single-player...
News
36 CommentsUnannounced BioShock remaster collection all but confirmed in leak
2K Games uploaded screenshots from BioShock the Collection, a remastered set that would seemingly mark the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One debuts of BioShock, BioShock 2 and BioShock Infinite. The collection has yet to be officially announced, despite several leaks seemingly confirming its existence over the past nine months.
First spotted by a user on NeoGAF, the series of images are hosted on the official website; the game's box art can be found on the site as well. 2K also added a page bearing the set's name earlier today before quickly pulling it from the website. You can look at them below; they include shots from the three games in the series.
These are just the latest developments in the strange saga of 2K's BioShock remaster collection. The company has never officially confirmed...
News
62 CommentsMicrosoft makes its 1 millionth Xbox One Elite Controller
The Xbox One Elite Controller reached an important milestone this week: Microsoft has manufactured one million of them to date, according to a tweet from Phil Spencer, head of Xbox. That’s not bad for a $150 controller that was in short supply last year because Microsoft itself "totally underestimated" demand for such a device.
Here’s the one millionth controller, with the customization to prove it, from Spencer:
Great milestone, our one millionth Xbox Elite controller. Thanks to all who have supported. pic.twitter.com/semvYxD5Yg
— Phil Spencer (@XboxP3) June 28, 2016
The Xbox One Elite Controller launched October 2015, offering Xbox One owners a high-end alternative to the system’s standard controller. The Elite offers a number of customization features, including...
News
10 CommentsSystem Shock reboot is getting help from Obsidian Entertainment co-founder
System Shock, Night Dive Studios' modern take on the classic sci-fi role-playing game, opened for crowdfunding today. The game's Kickstarter page reveals several new details about the project, including that designer Chris Avellone has joined the project. The former Obsidian Entertainment and Interplay member, whose credits include Fallout 2, Planescape: Torment and Fallout: New Vegas, will "help shape and direct the existing narrative of System Shock," according to Night Dive.
Avellone's experience with more modern open-world games was cited as a key reason for bringing him onto the project. He'll join other members of the Fallout: New Vegas team on the project as well. It's one of several reboots Avellone has in the works — he recently announced he's working on the next Prey, which...
News
7 CommentsDoom update adds photo mode this week
Doom's first post-launch content update will add a photo mode to the first-person shooter when it arrives this Thursday, June 30, publisher Bethesda Softworks announced today.
Photo mode is becoming an increasingly common feature in games these days. Titles as varied as Uncharted 4: A Thief's End, Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor and Forza Horizon 2 allow players to make the in-game interface disappear and compose screenshots like they would a photograph.
Doom's photo mode, which Bethesda announced earlier this month, will be available as a toggle in the game settings once you've loaded into a campaign mission. Thursday's patch adds another setting to Doom, and it's one that longtime fans of the franchise will appreciate. A new option for the weapon placement makes guns show up centered...
Call of Duty is getting dragons
Descent, the next DLC pack for Call of Duty: Black Ops 3, is on its way, and it involves fighting zombies and dragons...at the same time.
Activision stated that "Gorod Krovi," the newest mission in the Zombies saga, will take place in an alternate Soviet Union during the 1940s. Players will "face-off against a swarm of mechanized zombie infantry and dodge hell-fire from aerial dragon assaults" in the ruins of Stalingrad. The mission will also feature new enemies, weapons, and gameplay mechanics, including a shield shaped like a dragon that seems to unleash emerald fire.
Descent will also include four new multiplayer maps:
"Empire," a Roman villa and re-imagining of the Black Ops 2 map "Raid"
"Cryogen," a cryogenic prison compound in the middle of the Dead Sea
"Berserk," a...
News
12 Comments'Brexit' spikes as disease name in Plague Inc.
In Plague Inc., you can name a disease after anything you like and make it wreak havoc on Earth's population. In the days since the U.K.'s decision to leave the European Union, the event has become players' top choice for naming their plague.
"Brexit" has taken the No. 1 spot from "Trump," which has retained popularity for the last few months. According to developer James Vaughan, "Brexit" seems to have already reached its peak, whereas "Trump" has remained constant.
Vaughan stated this type of timely response is typical for Plague Inc. For example, around the time of the 2012 presidential election, the name "Obama" saw a spike in prominence. As actual epidemics like Ebola and Zika break out in the real world, they become popular choices in Plague Inc. as well.
It should be noted...
News
11 CommentsEA Sports acknowledges problems degrading FIFA Ultimate Team's most valuable players
Electronic Arts has acknowledged problems with some of the rarest and most talented player cards in FIFA 16's popular Ultimate Team mode, following a weekend in which the community pried apart the mode and discovered inconsistencies that some say have been a part of the game for years.
FIFA's subreddit on Sunday posted the results of a user investigation into how Ultimate Team, a tremendously popular card-collection/player-management mode for the global best-seller, handles a concept it calls "chemistry." That is, when assembling a team, the user is told that players who are countrymen or teammates (or both) of another player adjacent to them in the formation will receive an attribute boost.
FIFA players had complained that special-edition cards — that is, the rarest and most valuable...
News
19 CommentsVideo game releases for July 2016
Below are some of the big video game releases for the month of July 2016. Be sure to check out the list we put together of our most anticipated games of 2016 and 25 games for the summer of 2016. Here are the free games you get with your Xbox Live Gold and PlayStation Plus subscriptions for the month of July.
What are you looking forward to playing? Did we miss anything? Let us know in the comments.
Note: Only games with specific dates are listed below. Some games are announced for July but have no firm release date.
July 1:
The Banner Saga 2 (Xbox One) — Unlike the first game, console players will not have to wait two years to play this sequel, which was released on PC earlier this year. Developer Stoic Studios plans on the third entry releasing on all platforms...
News
19 CommentsXbox Games With Gold offers The Banner Saga 2 and more in July
The Banner Saga 2, the sequel to the 2014 role-playing game from Stoic, will debut on Xbox One as a free Games With Gold title on July 1, Microsoft announced today.
This is earlier than anticipated; Stoic had previously said The Banner Saga 2, which launched in mid-April on Mac and Windows PC, would arrive July 26 on both PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. Publisher Versus Evil announced today that the PS4 version is now scheduled to be released July 5.
The Banner Saga 2 (regularly $19.99) will be free all month long to Xbox Live Gold subscribers, while the other Games With Gold title for Xbox One, Tumblestone (reg. $19.99), will be free from July 16 through Aug. 15. It's a puzzle game from the Quantum Astrophysicists Guild that includes arcade modes, a story campaign and multiplayer...
Culture
14 CommentsOverwatch gives your morning an inspiring start, with a little help from Undertale
A beautiful soul took the cast of Overwatch, and all of the earnest, encouraging things they say when you're up against it, and found a perfect musical accompaniment from Undertale to make you go kick the ass of today and anything that even thinks about making it a bad day.
http://yukisamui.tumblr.com/post/146327587939/i-noticed-almost-every-character-in-overwatch-has
The mash-up is courtesy of Tumblr user Yukisamui, spied last week by The Mary Sue, then yesterday Overwatch's official Facebook page noticed and reposted it, so everyone is now feeling the love.
The voices come from sound files hosted here; Yukisamui noticed that "almost every character in Overwatch has supportive dialogue lines so I decided to put them all together in one massive audio post.
"[A]nd I maybe...
Active Discussions
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