Author: Zach Barbieri

Stellar Blade was a title that caught my interest from the first time it was showcased, long before it became one of the biggest and most relevant titles of PlayStation’s 2024. It just feels like a ME game, from its art direction to its combat, a blend of old-school styles with new-school implementation. Despite how excited I was though, I couldn’t help feel this gnawing in the back of my head. A while that nagging will not go away, at least until the game releases, the Stellar Blade demo helped ease those fears that Eves’ journey is everything that I…

A new Marvel game that looks like a riff on the Overwatch and Valorant formulas has been announced. Marvel Rivals is being created by NetEase and Marvel Games and it will see players take the roles of their favorite heroes in 6v6 PvP matches to see who reigns supreme. This news comes after a week of rumors of its existence started circling. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DA4iVv4MARE Players will take the role of heroes from around the Marvel Universe, using their abilities to help their team come out the victors of each round. At launch, the game will feature 16 heroes to choose from…

Death is the one constant we all have in common. A billion stores with different beginnings, and middles but always the same outcome. This is probably why, we as a species have decided to obsess over it well into our earliest days of cave paintings. For me, I have always fallen back on the words of our greatest profits, Streetlight Manifesto who once said “I prefer the mystery remains, Unexplained.” Hauntii, a game by Moonloop Games LLC, takes a more beautiful approach to death through its art and simplistic narrative. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L2xXlO2qKdc In Hauntii, you take the role of a ghost…

Overwatch 2 was initially billed as a refresh on the series, promising to focus on the one thing the game had going for it in a growing sea of live service games, the characters. Part of this was a PvE mode that would focus on some of the lore, diving deeper into character-specific narratives. This was to be titled Hero Mode and it was scrapped last year after the game had already gone through extensive struggles since the launch of Overwatch 2 acted as a bigger update that completely erased the game the first game. There were still PvE modes…

Sony officially announced Stellar Blade, their upcoming hack-and-slash action game, will receive a demo on Friday, March 29th at 7 am PDT / 2 pm GMT. This follows speculation that a demo was coming, partially fueled by ShiftUp, the developer behind the game, accidentally revealing it through the PlayStation store before quickly removing it. This demo will take place at the beginning of the game, running up to the first boss fight. For placers concerned that they will need to replay this narrative, or a potentially challenging boss fight over again at launch, the save carry will carry over to…

According to a Bio for developer Shinji Mikami listed on the website for the upcoming Shadow of Damned Hella Remastered, it appears the developer has founded a company named Kamuy Inc. Beyond simply naming the studio, there is no other information given about what this company does, or even if he will remain in the video game industry. Mikami left Tango Gameworks in 2023, the studio best known for developing The Evil Within, though is also known for titles Ghostwire: Tokyo and Hi-Fi Rush, the later releasing shortly before his departure. He founded the studio in 2010 before ultimately selling…

I’ll start this review of Rise of The Ronin by being honest, I have always had and always will have a bias for Team Ninja. This goes back to Ryu Hayabusa as he hacked and slashed his way through enemies through two Ninja Gaiden titles, some of the best action games ever made. Then Ninja Gaiden 3 was released, following their former leader’s departure and everything changed. I was worried there was no path forward for the studio. That was when Nioh was released. Now, Nioh wasn’t the perfect vessel, and as some would point out it was built on…

Remedy has published its financial report for 2023. In it, the company made €33.9 million which is ultimately a decrease of 22.2%, down from €43.6 million during the same period in the previous year. Additionally, the developer reported an operating loss of €28.6 million for its full-year results but noted they received €5.2 million in royalties from Alan Wake Remastered. Remedy has attributed this loss to “increased investments” in several upcoming projects. One of the projects named Kestral (formerly known as Vanguard) received a €7.2 million impairment charge after the game was changed from its planned free-to-play model to a…

The upcoming Bungie revival of their classic series Marathon is receiving a new director. This is amid reports that additional changes are happening at the studio. While the studio still has the most successful Destiny 2, their acquisition at the hands of Sony years ago has failed to lead to the profit lines that the company had hoped for. This news also follows an extremely turbulent year for the studio, having been hit with large-scale lay-offs in 2023. Around this time it also came out that Sony had the option to dissolve Bungies’ current board and replace it with one…

Anybody who knows me, or has followed my writing, knows I love a good drive. Now, a drive around your town is fine, but there is something liberating about a trip along the highways and byways, your past slowly fading in the rearview mirror and your future stretching out in front of you. And somewhere in between those two is you, changing in real time. This might be why the new game Open Roads, being developed by the Open Roads Team and published by Annapurna Interactive, has me so enticed. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XQA1O4QM914 The story follows the road trip of Mother Opal,…