Like CD Projekt Red's previous games, there are tons of ways to customize your character in Cyberpunk 2077 to suit your liking. This level of personalization even stretches into the game's various gun types, which come in three unique flavors.When it comes to customizing guns, there are two significant ways to do so. First, you can change your gun's appearance by applying different skins or paint jobs. In contrast, the most meaningful way to customize your gun is by applying attachments and modifications, such as silencers and scopes. You can also specifically boost a gun's specific individual statistics.Aside from customization, it's worth noting as your proficiency with specific guns increases, your reloading and shooting animations change. For example, your crosshair might become smaller, indicating that your accuracy is improving, or your reloading animation becomes faster. According to senior level designer Miles Tost, this was implemented to better feed into your character's growth. "You really get this sense of progression and your character evolving as you play the game," said Tost. "I think that's a special experience when you combine it with the way you customize your gun where you get this feeling that this is your signature gun and that you're really good at using it." We learned a ton of new details about Cyberpunk 2077 during its recent deep-dive stream, including more information about how non-lethal playthroughs will work, the three different playstyles, and more. If you're keen to grab the game, be sure to check out our Cyberpunk 2077 pre-order guide.Cyberpunk 2077 is launching on April 16, 2020, for PS4, Xbox One, and PC.Info from Gamespot.com

The Gearbox panel at PAX West announced Homeworld 3, but that’s not the only return for the real-time strategy franchise. The company also teased Homeworld Mobile, complete with a brief teaser-trailer showing off the spacefaring ships in flight.The spin-off is being developed by mobile studio Straosphere. Gearbox noted that the title isn’t finalized, because like Homeworld 3, it’s still in the early stages. If you back Homeworld 3’s crowd-funding campaign on Fig, you’ll get priority access to Homeworld Mobile.Homeworld has been relatively quiet since the release of Homeworld 2 in 2003. It received a Remastered Collection in 2015, which was well-received by critics, including in GameSpot’s Homeworld Remastered review.“The Homeworld series' legacy, however, has always lain within its story-focused campaigns, whose excellent action and inherent beauty endure and excel, even in light of the 16 years that have passed since the original's arrival,” wrote Kevin VanOrd. “It is a huge universe out there, but Homeworld Remastered Collection makes a great case for asserting your presence within it.” Info from Gamespot.com

Imagine that you wake up one morning and, to your horror, discover that you had inadvertently committed an act of infidelity. Think about the kind of confusion and dread that might race through your head at that moment. How did it happen? What the hell are you going to do? How on earth are you going to explain and amend the relationships with all parties involved? What kind of deep-seated anxieties might have led to this moment? In 2011, Atlus' Persona studio explored this predicament with Catherine, using a peculiar blend of social simulation and Sokoban-influenced action-puzzling. Eight years later, Catherine: Full Body is a remaster that demonstrates how well the game's distinctive premise and exploration of adult themes still hold up, even if its new additions to the plot don't fit in seamlessly.Vincent is a 32-year-old man in a long-term relationship with his girlfriend, Katherine, and at a stagnant point in his life where he isn't exactly sure what he wants for his future. His core group of friends are in different circumstances, but they share similar dilemmas; being in your thirties is hard. Vincent has recently found himself plagued by frequent nightmares of scrambling up a crumbling tower, and he's losing sleep and in a constant haze because of them. One morning, after a big night of drinking, he wakes up next to someone who is absolutely not his girlfriend, and what follows is a frantic, weeklong crusade to try and deal with the repercussions and decide what he wants to do with his life before Katherine can discover what's really going on.Central to Vincent's coping process is his aforementioned core group of friends. Every night after work, they all get together at their local bar, The Stray Sheep, to hang out. It's in these regular social scenarios where Vincent can confide in his friends, talk through his state of mind, sound off on his next course of action, and, hopefully, find a resolution. The conversations between characters are mostly predetermined, though the onus to spend Vincent's limited time having them is on you. A key component which you do have influence over, however, is your cell phone. Vincent will regularly be contacted throughout the night (by Katherine and his new fling, Catherine), and how you choose to respond to their text messages and calls, if at all, will impact Vincent's ethical compass--represented as a meter with opaque binaries.Time ticks along as you perform actions in the bar, and its patrons will come and go. You can skip these social sections entirely if you wish, but doing so robs you of the game's most engrossing component. Vincent's journey is a deeply introspective one, and though the plot's major beats unfold in the cutscenes that bookend each day, the nuances of his character come through in his interactions with other people. Managing Vincent's connection to his phone, and, in turn, how he treats the women in his life from a distance, sways how he might later react to significant plot points and revelations. Getting to know Vincent's deeply flawed but sympathetic friends, as well as peeling away at the backstories of the other bar patrons as the week goes on, helps to explore themes revolving around maturity and the nature of human relationships. Full Body's inclusion of the Japanese vocal track also provides an interesting and different take on character performances if you've already experienced the English version before.The ebb and flow of your social actions--chatting to your friends, ordering another drink, checking your phone intermittently, and spending time with Vincent's idle thoughts--make the ritual of whittling away time at the Stray Sheep strangely satisfying in its mundanity. The evocative soundtrack helps to foster this relaxed contemplative state, as does the game's holistic but understated audiovisual style. It's an incredibly pleasant atmosphere to be in, and it succeeds in replicating the quiet delight of spending a night drinking with friends with no particular occasion.It's nice to have that safe haven, because when Vincent goes home to bed each night, the nightmares start, and that's when things get really stressful. What's causing the nightmares is a mysterious unknown at first, but from the outset, it's clear that they act somewhat as a lucid metaphor for Vincent's internal strife. You need to guide Vincent up a sheer, crumbling tower constructed entirely of cubes and other cuboids, sometimes while being chased by a monstrous personification of one of Vincent's objects of anxiety. The tower is rarely more than three cubes deep, and while its construction might sometimes form a natural staircase for Vincent to climb, you'll frequently need to create a path upward yourself by pushing and pulling the cubes around in strict, grid-based arrangements.This task quickly escalates in difficulty, as the sheer tower faces become higher and harder to navigate. There will be fewer pieces to work with, while blocks with unique properties will also appear, such as being immovable or shattering after being stepped on twice. These scenarios stop you from creating an ordinary staircase, and they force you to think of more unorthodox ways to arrange and move around the tower. Vincent can hang on the edges of blocks, and blocks will support each other so long as a horizontal edge connects; both these rules are fundamental to many of the techniques required to work your way up.Finding that potential path takes careful consideration and forward-thinking, and this can be nerve-wracking. You need to keep up your momentum, lest the stage crumble under your feet and you fall, and the soundtrack--rousing renditions of an inspired selection of classical pieces--ratchets up the urgency of your ridiculous predicament to a high degree. It's very easy to put yourself in a dead-end situation, even with the game's generous undo mechanic, and at times you might stare at the pieces you have to work with for what seems like an eternity without any inspiration. But when you do have a sequence of moves in mind, successfully put them into practice, and start flying up the tower without pause, that sense of mastery and accomplishment is incredibly exciting.This remaster also includes a number of additional difficulty options and assists, however, if reaching those moments of elation are too few and far between. These include, among other things, a "Safety" difficulty level, which eliminates failure, and an auto-climb option that can be disabled on a whim. Catherine's puzzle difficulty does spike in places, so it's a boon over the original for anyone who wants to keep up the momentum with Vincent's story. If you love the puzzles, though (and I certainly do), Full Body also includes a handful of additional modes, which dramatically increase the amount of available stages. The story mode offers a "Remix" variant featuring new block types and stage layouts; the in-game "Rapunzel" arcade cabinet boasts a buffet of new stages in the same vein, too. Babel returns as a discrete puzzle mode with challenging, randomised stages for one or two players, and there's also a head-to-head competitive mode with local and online options. There's a lot here, but the biggest addition to Catherine is the inclusion of another potential love interest for Vincent, named Rin.While Katherine is sensible and Catherine is uninhibited, Rin acts as a sheepish but wholehearted personality for Vincent to fawn over. She's introduced right from the get-go and woven into the game's existing story beats, both in new cutscenes and into the social segments at the Stray Sheep. However, perhaps unsurprisingly, Rin's integration isn't an entirely seamless one. On a superficial level, story moments involving Rin will often play following whatever cinematics were part of the original game, and with that come some pacing issues. These new scenes have a strong, stylish direction, featuring more interesting edits and creative shot compositions than existing ones, but they unfortunately make the rhythm of cycling between social simulation, nightmare puzzles, and stretches of cinematics feel a little unbalanced. More significantly, though, the integration of Rin completely dismantles the game's enigmatic sense of mystery.If you've played the original version of Catherine through to one of its many different endings, then you'll have at least some idea of how Vincent's real-world difficulties and his nightmarish tribulations are related. However, it was previously hard to get any tangible sense of how things might fit together until the original game's penultimate chapter. Conversely, as soon as Rin appears on screen in Full Body, it is immediately clear that something is amiss, and this feeling of peculiarity is ever-present whenever Rin is involved in a scene. Even though her arc is an enticing new mystery in itself, and does feel additive to someone who already knows everything about the original Catherine's narrative, it's a shame. As soon as Full Body starts, Rin acts as a big, flashy distraction from the largely grounded and plausible story that Catherine revels in during its real-world sequences for most of its running time.Chasing Rin through the new branching path in the story feels a little inelegant overall, too. Actively choosing to pursue either Catherine or Katherine as Vincent's ultimate goal always feels like trying to hit a moving target. Trying to push Vincent in a certain direction on the game's ethical meter was difficult because of how hard it was to decipher which choices represented what--not just in Vincent's text messages, but also during the series of confronting "confessional" questions that you're asked in-between nightmare levels (eg. Would you rather kiss an alien or a corpse?). Pursing Rin feels far more blatant--a series of questions are flagged upfront as opportunities to "break" the meter and set off on a whole new path.Once you do break onto that new path, things go to some fascinating places. But the broad feeling of the new story branch is that it feels, well, too broad. Rin's enthusiastic earnestness rubs off on the direction of the new content a little too much, and even though the scenarios posited are genuinely interesting to see unfold, it lacks a more grounded subtlety that invites a similar level of contemplation to the existing branches for Katherine and Catherine. What's more dismaying is that the ultimate conclusion to Rin's story branch actually feels like it undermines the otherwise positive themes the new chapters work so intensely to convey, seeming to suggest that the kind of love that Rin and Vincent can potentially share is fantastical in nature.But Rin's presence still brings an intriguing new edge to Vincent's crisis, and Full Body still tells a fascinating, personal tale. The nightmarish block puzzles are still weirdly intense and satisfying to surmount, and the Stray Sheep is still a wonderful bar to spend your nights in. Full Body does a great job in refining and refreshing the Persona studio's fascinating foray into the social lives of adults, and Catherine continues to stand out as a game that feels both incredibly bizarre and authentically intimate. Info from Gamespot.com

Man of Medan is set almost entirely at sea on an enormous, abandoned boat. Loosely based on the real-life mystery of the OSS Ourang Medan, which became a shipwreck in the late 1940s after its entire crew were lost under mysterious circumstances, Man of Medan is also the first part of Supermassive Games' proposed Dark Pictures Anthology--a series of short, branching horror narrative experiences in the vein of its tremendous 2015 surprise hit, Until Dawn. If you've played Until Dawn, you'll know what to expect. But despite a smart online co-op mode, Man of Medan's weak narrative ultimately makes it a disappointing first installment.The game's plot jumps between five different playable characters who are all experiencing the same event. You'll determine their ultimate fates by making decisions for them, as well as responding to quick-time events. There are reportedly 69 different potential deaths you can experience (including those of non-playable characters), but it's also entirely possible that your whole crew will survive. Alternatively, they might all die. Man of Medan's main selling point is that your decisions will affect how things play out, how the relationships between your characters will develop, and what you'll uncover and experience along the way.In conversations, and at pivotal points in the plot, you'll often be given three options, one of which is always to say or do nothing. So focused is Man of Medan on its story, there are no puzzles to solve or combat systems to master outside of these choices, just lots of exploring and quick-time events. However, the game is plagued by a big central problem: a fundamentally weak plot.The story isn't engaging, as the player is given little reason to care about the characters and the horror tropes being explored mostly feel hackneyed and uncreative. After a brief prologue scene set in the '40s, you spend Man of Medan's four-hour (give or take) runtime in the present day. The story opens with the crew planning a dive to a previously untouched sunken fighter plane from World War II, which ultimately leads to a series of events that sees them trapped on the Medan, a seemingly haunted abandoned ship, held captive by a pirate gang who are convinced that the ship--which is riddled with dead bodies--contains treasure. Naturally, things start going bump in the night, and the gang finds themselves dealing with various ghouls and terrors too.There are plot holes and character inconsistencies throughout, some minor, some more blatant. It’s perhaps easy to forgive the questionable presence of rats all over the boat, still gnawing on hunks of meat that have been on the ship since the 40s, but it’s less easy to excuse how blasé the characters act about the horrifying situations they find themselves in. They're mostly unlikeable, too--There's the cool but insecure Alex, his dorky younger brother Brad, Alex's outgoing, wealthy partner Julia, Julia's obnoxious but well-meaning brother Conrad, and Fliss, the captain of the small boat the four have chartered at the story's opening. The dialogue is generally not very good; at times it successfully recreates the feeling of watching a fun-but-silly teen slasher, occasionally hitting that good-bad sweet-spot as a character awkwardly refers to something as ‘lit’ or flirts awkwardly, but it can also be annoying when the five central characters' interactions sound stilted and unrealistic. Without spoiling anything, the story also explains a little too much about what's happening on the Medan in a way that makes repeated playthroughs much less satisfying.There's also an over-reliance on jump scares, which cheapens the horror experience. One standout sequence midway through the game that does a great job of getting under your skin, as Brad finds himself stuck in a looping hallway that grows just a bit weirder every time he travels down it, but otherwise Man of Medan is reliant on spring-loaded cats and lots of suddenly-morphing faces. On the plus side, it looks tremendous--the character models can be a bit waxy, but the ship is extremely detailed and creepy, and the game effectively communicates how unpleasant the act of exploring a creaky rustbucket full of dark corners and rotting corpses must be. The trade-off, at least on a base PS4, is that animations frequently stutter, breaking the mood as frames slip away.There are pacing issues, too, especially with the extremely slow opening section that weighs down repeat playthroughs. While you can see different scenes or experience unique outcomes with each playthrough, some scenes will be essentially unchanged each time, which can quickly grate. You'll also occasionally have to check in on 'The Curator', an omnipresent suited man who is clearly meant to be the mascot for and host of the Dark Pictures Anthology. He's a pompous version of the Crypt Keeper (from Tales From The Crypt), but without any of the "good evening, boys and ghouls" merriment you want from a horror anthology host, and as a result, he doesn't quite fit.Multiplayer is Man of Medan's big addition to the formula laid out by Until Dawn. There are two forms of co-op: Shared Story, in which two players tackle the game together online, and Movie Night, where up to five players can play together offline, playing through the chapters of whichever characters they are assigned at the start. Playing together on the couch is perhaps meant to evoke that "don't go in there" feeling of watching a fun horror movie with friends, but Man of Medan's relatively straightforward level designs, which never make it seem dangerous to wander off-path and explore the open doors and alternate pathways you encounter, don't particularly facilitate this. Death is more often down to a failed QTE rather than a dialogue choice you made or because you decided to investigate something spooky. In fact, right near the end, a mistimed button press can be the difference between everyone surviving and everyone dying--being responsible for that in front of your friends is more embarrassing than it is funny.However, so many of the game's issues feel like much less of a problem when you jump into the smart and innovative online mode. It is, without a doubt, the definitive way to experience Man of Medan, especially if you're playing with another person who is familiar with the material. Shared Story sees you both playing at the same time, taking control of different characters as their scenes play out simultaneously. You'll both, eventually, get a turn with every character (if they live long enough), and often your paths will diverge. Once the five main characters meet after the initial prologue, Shared Story immediately offers a more engaging experience than the single-player campaign can.Early on, for instance, I played through a sequence where two characters dived down to inspect something underwater, while my co-op buddy stayed on the boat and experienced a different part of the story. In single-player, you'll still see both scenes, but one will be greatly truncated. In online co-op, some scenes are expanded, or you might occasionally see parts of the story, or make choices, that cannot be accessed in single-player.This led to the two of us conspiring to make certain things happen, to bend the game's story to our will. We were more successful with some outcomes than others (a failed quick-time event led to an unexpected death early on), but working together to achieve dramatic satisfaction, and choosing when to reveal what just happened and when to let the other player try to figure out what we'd done in our scenes, was a delight. Each player won't see every scene when playing this way, and it's entirely possible to play without ever communicating, which makes the plot more unpredictable.No matter how much or little you choose to share, though, Shared Story is absolutely the right way to play the game. It's very well designed; my co-op partner and I never found ourselves waiting for the other player to hurry up and trigger the next cutscene, and being able to see how your friend is trying to direct a scene, and deciding whether to help or hinder them in that, is excellent. It feels like you're working together to wring as many interesting outcomes as you can out of the game, and effectively doubling the number of potential choices leads to a much stronger sense of variety.Man of Medan is still telling a weak story, though, as much as Shared Story plasters over this with its excellent take on co-op, which lets you plan things out and work together to craft the narrative you want to tell (and kill the characters you find the most annoying). If you can organize a session with someone else who owns the game and play through the whole thing together, it's an excellent experience; but if you're after another single-player horror narrative experience like the one offered in Until Dawn, it's very disappointing. As a show of the potential for the Dark Pictures Anthology, Man of Medan is largely a success, but as a first episode, it leaves plenty to be desired. Info from Gamespot.com

Industry veteran John Carmack, who founded Doom and Wolfenstein studio id Software, has spoken up to share his thoughts on the video game industry's long-standing practice of long working hours.Appearing on the Joe Rogan Experience podcast, Carmack started off by saying the video game industry is unlike other big technology businesses where employees are taken care of "incredibly well" with good wages and lots of benefits. The video game industry offers a generally worse employment package, and not only that, but the hours are longer, Carmack said."You look at the game industry; it doesn't pay as well, there is less job security, and they work you a lot harder," he said. "There is the problem of the fact that when you have an industry--and this has been the way for artists forever--where if you've got something that people are passionate about and want to be involved in, supply and demand works its way and you wind up in a situation where they don't have to be paid as much."On the subject of long working hours in game development, Carmack said this level of passion and enthusiasm--while controversial--can lead to phenomenal results."The other side of that is it allows products that otherwise couldn't exist to exist by people working at that level in a way that maybe couldn't be sustained in other industries," he said. "Probably many of the greatest things that were ever made in gaming were only possible by people throwing themselves at that level at it.""You look at the game industry; it doesn't pay as well, there is less job security, and they work you a lot harder" -- John CarmackCarmack went on to acknowledge the debate and discussion surrounding over-working. For years now, there have been calls for game developers to unionize, but largely it has never happened. For his part, Carmack said he doesn't agree with those who want to see laws enacted to prevent people from working "that hard." Carmack acknowledged that his perspective is privileged and different because he co-founded a company, id Software, that would go on to make incredibly popular, seminal games. Still, he said he maintains that he believes it's a good thing when people commit to a project and work more than what other people might think is reasonable."There is some serious debate about it. Some people despise that about the industry, that nobody should work that hard. There are people that think there literally should be laws that should prevent people from working that hard," Carmack said. "I always have to argue against that. There is a power to obsession where being able to absolutely obsess over something ... Instead of work/life balance, it's your life's work. Everybody will point back [to me] and say, 'Well that worked great for you; you're the founder of a company; you were in a position where you got to make your own decisions.' But is that OK to say for the 19-year-old out of a game dev program that's being overworked? I have to always be aware that my view into the industry is obviously very colored by my experiences. I never actually worked inside of one of the big EA or Activision studios."He continued: "It's possible they have some valid criticisms, but I still still come down on--I think it's great when people throw themselves at [their work] beyond what other people think is reasonable. They have free will; they've chosen to do that. If that's what they think is going to help them get close to their goals, I'm not going to try to make that impossible for them."If people want to work long hours, that's their decision, Carmack said. The common response to this is that even if an employer doesn't require hours beyond what's normal, there is an expectation to. Carmack doesn't buy into this, however; he said people who work long hours--at least at the companies he's been involved in--are largely choosing to do so on their own volition."I think it's great when people throw themselves at [their work] beyond what other people think is reasonable" -- John Carmack"I'm not involved in the HR departments of all of these companies, but the ones that I have been familiar with or that I've known people doing that, largely they come back and say, 'These people are choosing to do this.' The rejoinder is, 'Oh it's a toxic culture that makes people want to choose to do that,' but I definitely don't buy into that sort of social engineering level of things. If they're doing it, they've agreed that they'll wave the flag and say I'm doing this because I care so much about this. I don't think that's a problem."Looking back in time, Carmack said he remembers that id Software programmer Michael Abrash--who had a family--would work "reasonable" hours when he was there in the '90s working on Quake. Carmack and other higher-ups at id Software worked longer hours, often past midnight, but no one gave Abrash grief because they were aware of his contribution and value to the team and project. He said he sees the same being true today at game companies. If employees demonstrate their value during work hours, then there is no reason they should feel compelled to stay longer, Carmack said.Carmack said he still works around 13 hours per day in his role at CTO of Oculus, which is owned by Facebook. He said he sees diminishing returns when he works longer than this, and he added that he needs eight hours of sleep per night to function at his best. Info from Gamespot.com

Sega has officially taken the wraps off the next Yakuza game--and it contains a major change for the action series. During a press conference today series creator Toshihiro Nagoshi unveiled the new game as Yakuza 7. It aims to be a "watershed" moment for the Yakuza series, Nagoshi said.The game, which is set in Yokohama, features Ichiban Kasuga as the main character. Kasuga apparently is a big fan of Square Enix's Dragon Quest series, and Sega was able to work out a deal to be able to talk about the Dragon Quest franchise in Yakuza 7.In a big change for the Yakuza series, it appears the combat now plays out in a turn-based system. You can see this in action in the video below. Interestingly, the developers, Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio, released an April Fools video this year that joked that the Yakuza combat would change to turn-based. As it turns out, it really is.Nagoshi said during the press conference that he hopes fans will welcome the change to the combat system, and if they don't, the developers will consider switching back with the next release.Nagoshi: classic Yakuza game format reached one complete style so wanted to try totally different to jump. Our experts of action game creation made this RPG with their flavor; hope fans welcome this change. If not, happy to change back to action game for future releases. — Takashi Mochizuki (@mochi_wsj) August 29, 2019 Yakuza 7 will release on January 16, 2020 in Japan for PlayStation 4. The game will be released in the West later in 2020. You can check out the first trailer in the embed above.【龍が如く7 記者発表会】バトルの映像を少しお届け！周囲の環境や物を使ったおなじみの要素は、リアルタイムの物理演算によって取り入れている。周囲の環境も汲みながらコマンド選択をしていくことが楽しいバトルに！#龍が如く #龍が如く7 pic.twitter.com/UWAM1TEa6u — GAME Watch (@game_watch) August 29, 2019The newly launched Yakuza 7 website contains numerous new images for the game. Click through the images in the gallery bellow to see them full size. We'll have more details on Yakuza 7 in the time ahead, so keep checking back for more.Info from Gamespot.com

Gears 5 is coming soon, and that means support for the previous game, Gears of War 4, is coming to a close. In a blog post, developer The Coalition said it is a "bitter-sweet" moment to say goodbye to some features of Gears of War 4. As fans may recall, Gears of War 4 was the first brand-new Gears game that The Coalition developed after taking over the series from Epic."We're incredibly proud of what Gears 4 achieved, and how our time together with the community over the past three years has shaped what Gears 5 has become. Thank you truly, deeply, for all your support since October 2016. It's meant the world to us," the studio said.Looking ahead, Gears of War 4's Ranked Season will come to an end in January 2020. "With the vast majority of the game's population moving to Gears 5, we will be removing all aspects of Ranked play from Gears 4," The Coalition said.Taking the place of Ranked play in Gears of War 4 will be new playlists for the Core and Competitive modes. Given the player population will likely be relatively low given people may shift to Gears 5, The Coalition is expanding the latency and skill rating rules. Additionally, there will no longer be quit penalties when Ranked is finally removed.Additionally, The Coalition will no longer add new Events to Gears of War 4. "Our focus is on Gears 5 to our maximum capabilities," the studio said. The achievements "Better Than Bacon" and "I Like Em Crispy" seemingly require Events, so after January 2020 the studio will update the game so the Midnight Omen and Flaming Weapon skins can be crafted.What's more, The Coalition said it plans to look into the possibility of adding a permanent XP boost for all of Gears of War 4. However, "At this point we are unable to promise this change," The Coalition said.Gears of War 4's servers will remain online for the foreseeable future, so those who want to keep playing still can. Gears 5 launches on September 10, but the game unlocks four days early for people who buy the game's Ultimate edition or subscribe to Xbox Game Pass. The game is available to pre-load right now, and you can see GameSpot's rundown of the Gears 5 server start times, launch maps, and more. Info from Gamespot.com

Update: Although the first images that surfaced of Project Resistance were captured using a YouTube video thumbnail grabber website, more high-quality picture have now surfaced and can be found on GamesTalk--we've also included one of the images below. The last of the four images certainly seems to hint at a four-player cooperative game in the vein of Resident Evil Outbreak.Original story continuesCapcom is unveiling a new Resident Evil project just prior to the Tokyo Game Show on September 9. Tentatively titled Project Resistance, little is known about the upcoming game but we do know that it's coming to PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC via Steam. A teaser trailer should shed more light on what to expect from Capcom's latest.Following the teaser trailer's reveal on September 9, Project Resistance will have a booth at TGS where attendees can watch members of the development team show off gameplay for the first time. There's no indication on whether this footage will appear outside of the show floor, but residents of Japan will be able to get their hands on the game by advance registration.The Resident Evil Outbreak website has been updated with a blank white screen that just says "OK" in the top left corner. This may prove significant, as the same thing happened to the Resident Evil 2 website prior to the remake's release. Or it could mean nothing and this is just upkeep to maintain the web domain. Time will tell. A new four-player cooperative Resident Evil game would certainly be interesting, though.All will be revealed on September 9 at 8:00 am PST // 11:00 am ET // 4:00 pm BST. Info from Gamespot.com

NBA 2K20 is a game about playing basketball, but there's also a surprising number of activities in the game that have nothing to do with throwing a ball through a hoop. 2K Sports already revealed all of the new activities in 2K20's The Neighbourhood social space, and now a new trailer is showing off all the ways its loot boxes and gambling mechanics work with what resembles an actual casino.The trailer, which almost feels like a parody, revolves around the card collecting MyTeam mode. By opening card packs you'll hopefully get rarer and more highly rated players that can even evolve like Pokemon in this year's game. By racking up wins in the reimagined Triple Threat mode, you can earn in-game currency, more card packs, and a chance to "spin to win!" for various jackpot prizes.There are also ball drops where you get to watch a pinball fall through a series of pegs, hoping it lands on one of the color-coded platforms on the way down to presumably win some kind of player card. There's also a literal roulette wheel and a slot machine, just in case the gambling mechanics weren't already obvious enough. Each of these activities has appeared in the series before in some form or another, but dedicating an entire trailer to cheap games of luck is particularly tone-deaf.The series has caught plenty of flack in the past for the number of microtransactions featured in both MyTeam and MyCareer. "Microtransactions are everywhere, and trying to advance without them feels nearly impossible," our review for NBA 2K18 said. The in-game Virtual Currency flowed a little more freely in NBA 2K19, but microtransactions still loomed over everything. 2K even added seemingly unskippable pre-game ads in another move that rubbed some fans the wrong way.Rather than temper controversy, NBA 2K20 seems to be embracing the contentious business model, which isn't too surprising considering its microtransactions have proved to be incredibly popular. Whether wheel spins and slot machines constitute gambling or not when no actual money is involved is up for debate. But the result of these randomized games is sure to influence the lure of any available microtransactions if things don't go your way. Not to mention the game is rated E for Everyone with only one slight mention of in-game purchases. Either way, marketing a game in such a way is more than a little disconcerting.NBA 2K20 launches on September 6 for PS4, Xbox One, Switch, and PC. Check out our NBA 2K20 pre-order guide for all the info on pre-order bonuses and what's included in the Digital Deluxe and Legend editions. You can also download a free demo for NBA 2K20 right now. Info from Gamespot.com

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 took the "go big or go home" approach to sequel design. Despite all of its bombastic, over-the-top action and world-ending stakes, however, the one scene that stuck with most people, and drummed up plenty of media coverage in the process, was the now infamous No Russian mission.In the early campaign level, players control undercover CIA agent Joseph Allen as he attempts to infiltrate a Russian terrorist cell. Unfortunately, part of blending in with the villainous group means joining them as they shoot up an airport full of innocent civilians. You can choose to gun down the fleeing crowds of people yourself, or sit back and watch it unfold. Either way, playing through the scene is unsettling and uncomfortable, especially considering the sheer number of mass shootings that occur every year. Fans and critics alike have always questioned whether the scene was necessary to tell Modern Warfare 2's story, and this division existed within developer Infinity Ward, too."No Russian polarized this studio," art lead Joel Emslie says in an interview with Game Informer. "There was a side of the studio that felt that it should be played from the perspective of a security guard that got caught up in it, then there was the other side that liked the way it was going. I remember doing all the civilians for No Russian, and I just wouldn’t … there was a point in time where we were discussing how gory we would get with the people who were getting hit. I pulled back, and I said, 'You don't need it. People are getting tagged and their squibs are going off; it’s all good.'"Emslie showed his wife and she was adamant the scene needed more gore, so he went back and changed it. "My wife looked at it and she's all like, 'Where's all the blood and guts?' and I'm like, 'We didn’t need to do it,'" he explains. "She called me out. She calls me on my bulls***. It's pretty funny. She looks at things in a different lens. She's a lawyer. She doesn’t mess around, but she's a good gut check on stuff."Based on what we know about the upcoming reimagining of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, the next game in the series could feature similarly unsettling and controversial moments. Campaign gameplay director Jacob Minkoff, and studio narrative director Taylor Kurosaki, don't think this will be restricted to one or two particular scenes, though. "People ask us that internally over and over. They're like, 'Where's your blankety blank scene?'" Minkoff says. "There are so many of those at this point that people have stopped asking that question.""The answer is it's the whole game," Kurosaki adds. "I could come up with a list of like eight different things that it could be. Who knows what it will be.""I suspect there will be a number of different moments and people will call out their different favorite moments," Minkoff says. "In the same way that in [Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare], people called out the nuke and the aftermath sequence where you crawl out of the helicopter, or they called out the AC-130, or Crew Expendable, or All Ghillied Up. There were a bunch of those, and I feel very confident that we have a bunch of those."We'll know for sure when Call of Duty: Modern Warfare launches for PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC on October 25. Info from Gamespot.com

Pokemon Masters, the latest mobile spin-off of the popular franchise, is now available to download for free on iOS and Android devices. It features teams of three "Sync Pairs"--notable trainers with their partner Pokemon--doing battle in a new region called Pasio.The game is free-to-play with microtransactions, ranging from $1 to $80 for various bundles of the in-game currency, gems. Those can purchase you a chance at unlocking new characters, in typical gacha-style. Based on our hands-on impressions, though, the story mode appears to have plenty of depth outside of that aspect. If you're jumping in, we have a guide explaining how to evolve Pokemon in Masters that should help to explain this complex mechanic.Pokemon Masters on iOS App StorePokemon Masters on Android StoreThe game features 65 trainers from across the games and anime series, but the battles work very differently than you may have come to expect from past Pokemon games. You control all three of your team's trainers, and the types and weaknesses are displayed in battle. The combat is also real-time with cooldown timers for your moves. In co-op you can use special "unity attack."Meanwhile, fellow mobile game Pokemon Go is still go-ing strong. On November 15, the next main series games, Pokemon Sword and Shield, will be released for Nintendo Switch. Check out how these games are changing battling.Info from Gamespot.com

Update: The Switch version of Sushi Striker is now sold out at Newegg, but the 3DS version is still in stock. The original story follows.The Nintendo Switch is home to a ton of hidden gems, but one that you may have overlooked is Sushi Striker: The Way of Sushido, a charming sushi-matching puzzler from Nintendo and Theatrhythm Final Fantasy developer Indieszero. If you've missed out on the game, you have a chance to right that wrong and pick it up for a fraction of its usual price thanks to this fantastic deal.As spotted by Cheap Ass Gamer, Sushi Striker is available for dirt cheap right now at Newegg. The game is currently listed for $12--more than 70% off its usual MSRP of $50--and you can drop that price even further to $6 with the discount code EMCTDVE22. Simply apply the code at checkout to get the extra discount.See Sushi Striker at NeweggSushi Striker casts players in the role of Musashi, a young Sushi Striker who sets out on a quest to liberate the world's sushi supply from the evil empire. The game features more than 150 stages, which unfold as fast-paced, plate-matching battles against the empire's minions. The story is as knowingly ridiculous as it sounds, and the theme song alone is worth the price of admission. We gave the game a 7/10 in our Sushi Striker review. "Despite its imperfect transition to Switch, Sushi Striker is one of the more enjoyable puzzle games in the console's library. With a substantial campaign that's propped up by clever mechanics and a charmingly ludicrous story, the game offers a wealth of single- and multiplayer content to dive into," we wrote.Sushi Striker is also available for 3DS. That version normally retails for $40, but Newegg has it listed for $10, and the aforementioned discount code will drop the price down to $5.Info from Gamespot.com

Hideo Kojima's not the only one handing out cameos in his games lately. The enigmatic game director is a guest voice actor in Control, the latest action game from the surreal minds at Remedy Entertainment.Back in March, Kojima's publicist tweeted out that the Metal Gear Solid creator was doing "some voice recording for the other Sam." Now we know this was referencing Sam Lake, Control's lead writer and the former face of Max Payne, as opposed to the lead character in Kojima's upcoming Death Stranding. Not only that, but Akima Saito, Kojima Productions' Head of Marketing, also makes a cameo alongside his colleague, providing the English translation for Kojima's Japanese lines.Multiplayer First discovered the very missable easter egg, noting that Kojima and Saito both appear in Control's end credits.The side mission in question sees Kojima play the role of Dr. Yoshimi Tokui. As protagonist Jesse Faden climbs inside what looks like a sensory deprivation pod, Kojima narrates a peculiar meditative experience involving the flavor of a bag of potato chips, conversations with trees, and an army of hostile forklifts. You can see for yourself in the video below--just beware this will obviously spoil the side mission if you haven't played it yet.It's a suitably surreal cameo considering the game it occurs in and Kojima's own penchant for the bizarre.You can read GameSpot's review of Control right now, check out how long it takes to beat, and even grab a copy for $10 off on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. Info from Gamespot.com

Blizzard Entertainment is suing a number of companies and individuals involved in the making of the free-to-play PC and mobile game, Glorious Saga. The Overwatch developer alleges that the game is a "massive infringement" of its Warcraft intellectual property, stating that "they created a game whose content is almost entirely copied from the Warcraft games and related products."Polygon reports that Blizzard is seeking a court order to stop the infringement and maximum damages for the "serious and irreparable harm to Blizzard and its business."Defendants did not just copy a few discrete elements from Blizzard's Warcraft games," the company claims in the suit. "Every character in the Infringing Game was copied from a character from the Warcraft games, and many even bear the names of popular characters from the Warcraft games such as Jaina Proudmoore, Gul'dan, and Malfurion." Blizzard is seeking "$150,000 per infringed work." The image below is taken from the lawsuit, showing side-by-side comparisons between the offending character designs."Every monster, creature, animal and vehicle in the Infringing Game was copied from the Warcraft Games. Weapons, amulets, and other objects were taken straight from the Warcraft games, without pretense. Audio cues and sound effects from the Warcraft games were reproduced for the Infringing Game."The suit claims that the defendants have "profited handsomely" from Glorious Saga and its alleged copyright infringement. Even the game's mobile icon recreates the cover for World of Warcraft's Battle of Azeroth expansion, depicting a human and orc locking eyes while snarling at each other. Blizzard alleges that the use of Warcraft material was "willful and intentional."Five companies and two individuals are named in the suit, including Glorious Saga developer InstantFuns, and Sina Games--a subsidiary of Chinese software and tech company Sina Corp. Blizzard alleges that this isn't an isolated incident for the developer either, as it claims the company also advertises various unlicensed mobile games using the names and characters of well-known IP, such as Yu-Gi Oh!, Naruto, and Pokemon. Glorious Saga is just "among the latest" to have done so.Blizzard believes many of the defendants are simply shell companies created "as part of an overarching scheme to deceive Blizzard or members of the public," with the two individuals responsible for running them also named in the suit. Each of the defendants is based outside of the United States, but Blizzard has chosen to file the suit in the Central California US District Court as each company conducted its business through US- and California-based companies, using Google Play and Facebook to distribute and market Glorious Saga to US customers.Info from Gamespot.com

Amid all the controversy surrounding the Epic Games Store that came to a head earlier this month, the digital game store has quietly continued to offer free weekly games for its users. Over the past few weeks and months, players have been able to claim critically acclaimed titles like Alan Wake, Hyper Light Drifter, Overcooked, and The Witness, and the best part is that they're all yours to keep forever, no subscription required. This week's offering of deals is no exception: For the next seven days, you can claim Celeste and Inside, two platformers with drastically different aesthetics but equally memorable stories. All you need is a free Epic account to snag the two titles.First up is Celeste, a gorgeous platformer about climbing a mountain and conquering one's inner demons. You control a young woman named Madeline, who has traveled alone to Celeste Mountain in the middle of winter, determined to reach its summit. As she climbs the mountain, she encounters a colorful cast of side characters who help (or hinder) her journey, including a fellow climber with whom she develops a close friendship. Celeste is an extremely difficult platformer, but also a forgiving one--there are settings you can adjust at any time to decrease the difficulty, even if it's just to get past one particularly frustrating obstacle. Easily one of the best games of 2018, Celeste is a true gem worth experiencing.A few weeks ago, Epic released Playdead's Limbo as a weekly freebie, and now you can play the studio's follow-up puzzle-platformer, Inside. Similar to Limbo, Inside features a dark, monochromatic environment full of dangerous traps and monsters. The protagonist is an unnamed boy, who must navigate this hazardous environment without dying (spoiler: you'll die a lot) and eventually stumbles upon a bizarre scientific experiment. In addition to normal platforming elements, Inside also introduces a mechanic that lets the boy control bodies to help him solve puzzles. Just as in Limbo, there's no dialogue and the ending is a bit open-ended, but it's one you won't soon forget.Both Celeste and Inside will be free to claim until September 5, when they'll be replaced by the next round of freebies, The End Is Nigh and Abzu.Claim this week's free games at EpicInfo from Gamespot.com