SIE Bend Studio’s Days Gone is a day away. Ahead of the game’s imminent release, the Oregon-based developer took to the PlayStation Blog to announce DLC plans for the post-apocalyptic, open-world action game. It’ll include a new difficulty mode and additional challenges, and will be available in June.

According to a blog post penned by SIE Bend’s game director, Jeff Ross, Days Gone will receive a new difficulty mode (appropriately called Survival) and challenges centered around the bike, horde, and/or combat. All of this comes at the low cost of free.

Ross detailed what this Survival difficulty mode entails. “Survival difficulty mode tests players by daring them to beat the story with increased difficulty settings, no player perks like Fast Travel or survival vision, and an immersive HUD that removes maps and indicators from the gameplay screen,” the post reads. “Every tweak and change made is designed to further immerse players and ratchet up the tension to make this the definitive survival experience.”

Days Gone will reward those brave enough to face the horde on Survival mode. Ross states that players who beat the game on Survival will unlock “new trophies and unique bike skins,” though there’s no confirmation on what these are or will look like.

On March 8, SIE Bend posted a tweet celebrating Days Gone’s completion. The tweet announced that Days Gone went gold, signifying that the game passed certification and is officially ready for distribution digitally and physically. Days Gone will launch on April 26, 2019.

from GameSpot – Game News https://www.gamespot.com/articles/days-gone-gets-free-dlc-this-june/1100-6466452/

Epic Games has been teasing a Fortnite x Avengers: Endgame crossover event for a little while now, and with the release of update 8.50 we finally know the nature of that crossover. The patch notes, which you can read in full below, detail the Fortnite Endgame LTM and all the changes in the latest update.

The Fortnite Endgame LTM sees players split into two teams. Team Thanos, which is made up of Thanos himself and his Chitauri Invaders, must recover the six Infinity Stones hidden around the map. The Heroes, meanwhile, must defeat their opponents to win.

Heroes respawn until either they win or Team Thanos recover all six Infinity Stones, at which point respawns are turned off and Team Thanos must simply hunt down the remaining Heroes to win. Whoever finds the first Infinity Stone will transform into Thanos, who becomes more powerful with each retrieved Stone–he’ll gain more health and shields, be able to jump higher, and deal more damage, for example. If Thanos dies, another random Chitauri player will become the mad titan after a short wait.

To help in their fight, the Heroes start the match with a treasure map that leads to a Mythic Avengers item, while more Avengers items can be found in chests. You can read plenty more about the new mode, as well as the changes to Save the World and Creative modes, in the patch notes below, via Epic Games.

This isn’t the first time Epic and Marvel have collaborated: there was a similar Thanos-themed Fortnite crossover event for Avengers: Infinity War, which clearly proved popular enough to pave the way for this Endgame follow-up. The film is out now in some territories, and the critical reception has been positive.

“Endgame is a love letter to the entire MCU–the whole thing,” said Michael Rougeau in GameSpot’s Avengers: Endgame review. “It’s messy and confusing, and there’s going to be a lot of discussion about whether the ending even makes sense–it basically breaks the rules set up throughout the entire movie leading up to it. But holy hell is it an emotional, fulfilling ride. I have no doubt we’re going to spend the coming weeks picking and pulling it apart until we’ve over-analyzed every single aspect imaginable. But right now, in the aftermath, Avengers Endgame feels like a win.”

Fortnite: Battle Royale Update 8.50 Avengers: Endgame Patch Notes

Limited-Time Mode

Summary

Thanos and his Chitauri invade the Battle Royale island, in search of the six Infinity Stones.

Mode Details

• Endgame features a team of heroes fighting to stop Thanos and his Chitauri from claiming all six Infinity Stones.
• Both teams respawn when eliminated until the other side completes their objective.
• On one side is the Hero team. Heroes respawn when eliminated until the enemy team has found all six Infinity Stones.
• Heroes start with a treasure map that leads directly to a Mythic Avengers item.
• Other Avengers items can be found in Chests throughout the map.
• The goal for the Hero team is to destroy the Chitauri army and defeat Thanos.
• Team Thanos is comprised of Chitauri Invaders and Thanos himself.
• Chitauri Invaders start with a powerful laser rifle, an anti-structure grenade attack, and a jetpack that lets them briefly leap high into the air.
• The first Chitauri to recover an Infinity stone will be transformed into Thanos.
• Thanos has a powerful punch, a destructive beam attack, and the ability to jump high into the air and then smash anything in his way when he comes back down.
• Each time an Infinity Stone is claimed, Thanos’ abilities grow more powerful and the Chitauri gain health.
  • Reality Stone (Red) = Heath & Shields doubled (1000->2000)
  • Soul Stone (Orange) = Siphon activated (grants Thanos shields only)
  • Mind Stone (Yellow) = Jump height doubled
  • Space Stone (Blue) = Ground Pound AOE size tripled, damage x6
  • Time Stone (Green) = Big knockback added to each hit, damage x3
  • Power Stone (Purple) = Laser damage x6
• If Thanos is eliminated from the match, another Chitauri will become him after a short wait (unless Thanos is the last one standing).
• If Thanos & the Chitauri find all six Infinity Stones, Heroes will no longer be able to respawn.
• The goal for Thanos and his army is to find the stones and then eliminate the remaining heroes.

Weapons And Items

Bug Fixes & Improvements

• The Hold to Swap functionality is now confirmed upon releasing the Use button rather than when initially pressing it.
• This should help with the issue of accidentally swapping.
• If a player is eliminated by fall damage while inside a vehicle, the player that last damaged that vehicle will receive the credit for that elimination.
• Re-enabled hit markers to be server-side authoritative instead of client-side.
  • This will help prevent instances where players see hit markers but no damage.
• Players that were Rebooted into Rifts were teleporting into the sky but would not enter skydiving mode.
• Vehicles weren’t getting impulsed away from the Reboot Van.
• Collision for the Reboot Van was not affecting some vehicles, allowing them to hide inside of the Reboot Van.
• The yellow “invulnerability” effect wasn’t appearing on players who were revived by the Reboot Van.
• The Reboot Card was still playing its spawn sound even if the player disconnected.
• Dropping inventory items while in vehicles with weapons is now blocked to prevent various camera issues.
• Traps were occasionally being placed in the middle of a tile rather than against a wall when using Builder Pro.
• When exiting vehicles, the equip animation will now always play before weapons can be fired.
• This will prevent the issue where players would occasionally see themselves fire right after exiting a vehicle before the server had time to register the shot.
• The elimination feed text will no longer display the “eliminated by ally” message if an ally interrupts a player reboot animation.
• Fall damage was being taken when using a Jetpack (in supported Limited Time Modes) after being launched from the Pirate Cannon.
• Players were not able to negate fall damage using a Flintlock Pistol while crouching.
• Players couldn’t see the nameplates of party member’s Reboot Cards in the UI.
• Players would not drop a Reboot Card if they were eliminated after confirming a Reboot but before their teammate actually spawned.

Gameplay

Bug Fixes & Improvements

• We’ve resolved an issue that was preventing the correct amount of Survival XP from being granted after games and have gifted XP to players as compensation.
  • You’ll receive this compensation via the Gifting system.

Competitive

• New Tournament – April 27 & 28: Fortnite World Cup Online Open Week 3 ($1,000,000 total prize pool!)
  • Top performers in each server region will qualify to the Fortnite World Cup Finals in New York City. Full Fortnite World Cup details and official rules can be found here: https://www.epicgames.com/fortnite/competitive/events/world-cup
• Solo Game Mode
  • Participation in this event requires both players to have reached Champion League in Arena.
  • Region Lock is in effect – players may only participate in the qualifier for a single server region each week of the Online Opens. The server region of the first match entered for that weekend’s tournament will be the one the player will be locked into for that entire weekend.
  • Format:
    • April 27 – Round One: All Eligible Players.
    • April 28 – Round Two: Top 3000 Players from Round One.
• Streaming Replays – Currently only available on PC & Mac
  • Added tournament Match History, which can be viewed by selecting a player on the leaderboards.
    • Replays can be viewed from each match that player has played.
  • Added the ability to spectate live matches during tournaments by selecting a player on the leaderboards.
    • Note: Match must have been running for 10 minutes for live replay to be available.
  • Added the ability to view a specific match by game session ID using the “View Streaming Replay” button in the Replay Browser.
• Arena & Tournaments will now record profile stats to Solo/Duo/Squad categories rather than as an LTM.

Bug Fixes & Improvements

• Players in Arena were incorrectly seeing themselves demoted to a lower division after losing Hype.
  • This was strictly a visual issue and all Hype values and division unlocks are once again being displayed correctly.
• Tournament posters in-game were incorrectly showing certain events as starting in ‘2 Days’.
• Tournament posters and the Arena Panel were not loading properly on mobile devices.

Performance

Bug Fixes & Improvements

Resolved a cause of significant hitching during skydiving. and during late game combat.

Art And Animation

• We’ve added a unique animation for petting the dog and other Pets.

Audio

• Added Sound Visualizer without Spatialization (panning) of sounds in-game.
  • By introducing this mode, if you are a hearing-impaired player, then you will now be able to play the game with audio and the visualizer turned on simultaneously!
  • Drop in and give us your feedback about these changes either in-game or on our social channels to help us continue to make improvements for the future!

​​​​​Bug Fixes & Improvements

• Various gameplay sounds (gunshots, walking, reloading) will no longer retrigger at incorrect/random times.
  • This was causing “ghost” sounds to be heard when nothing was causing the actual sound effect.
• Fixed an issue that would cause certain things to not have looping audio when they should.

Replay

Bug Fixes & Improvements

• When healing with foraged Banana or Apples, the full visual effects weren’t playing when viewed in replays.

Mobile

• The reactive effects were not working properly for the Marshmello Outfit.
• MSAA anti-aliasing enabled on P30 Pro, Mate 20, Mate 20X.
• The interact button now has context-sensitive icons.
• You can now move while the map is open by providing input on the left side of the screen.

Bug Fixes & Improvements

• Made improvements to stability and to resolve some crashes.
• Made performance improvements on the iPad Mini 4 and Air 2.
• The movement joystick wasn’t appearing on the HUD for certain devices.
• Push notifications were not being sent after updates finished downloading.
• Blocked players on player’s friend lists were not appearing as ‘Blocked’.
• The fire button and right fire-stick would not function after anchoring the Baller grapple with tap to fire.
• The right fire-stick was not allowing camera movement while in the Baller.
• The Baller grapple was not releasing on the first tap.
• Players could get stuck in an infinite fire loop after exiting the Baller while it was anchored with the grapple.
• Double tapping was required to detach the Baller’s grapple when using tap to fire.
• There were visual issues on the Back Button in the menus.
• Voice Chat icons from players set to “sit out” were not appearing.
• Ammo boxes weren’t opening.
• The Confirm and Cancel buttons in Squad Management were difficult to touch/interact with.
• The Option menus were closing the unapplied changes was closing the entire menu instead of just the popup prompt.
• Menu icons could be removed from the HUD Layout Tool.
• Vehicle boost icons were appearing different between viewing them in a match vs in the HUD Layout Tool screen.
• The Score Tracking widget can now be removed from the Mobile HUD
• Score Tracking widget can now be removed from Mobile HUD
• It was difficult to see character and weapon animations while using the Boom Bow.
• The Map widget was setting its anchors inappropriately when moved in the HUD layout tool, making some attached game mode UI push the Map widget off the screen.
  • You may need to reset the Map widget in the HUD Layout Tool to resolve this issue.

from GameSpot – Game News https://www.gamespot.com/articles/fortnite-update-850-adds-avengers-endgame-ltm-patc/1100-6466465/

Respawn CEO Vince Zampella has revealed there are no plans to do weekly updates for Apex Legends. The battle royale game will continue to have seasonal updates instead, in an effort to prevent development crunch at Respawn.

Although Zampella didn’t reference Epic Games or Fortnite in Respawn’s reasoning, his announcement does come in on the heels of a Polygon report that revealed Epic Games maintains its ability to do weekly content updates for Fortnite with severe work crunch. Employees have reported working anywhere between 70-100 hours a week. Some employees have even been fired for missing deadlines after choosing to not work weekends, which further cultivates a culture where working long hours is expected of all employees.

“Our intention was to always be seasonal, so we’re kind of staying with that,” Zampella saidin an interview with Gamasutra. “The thought was ‘Hey, we kind of have something that’s blowing up here, do we want to start trying to drop more content?’ But I think you look at quality of life for the team. We don’t want to overwork the team, and drop the quality of the assets we’re putting out. We want to try and raise that.”

Zampella explained that the plan for Apex Legends was always going to be from season to season, despite the popularity of Fortnite thanks in large part to its weekly updates. However, Zampella did admit that Respawn is still figuring out the pacing for new content in Apex Legends. For now, the length of Apex Legends’ seasons is a “total guess,” and there’s a chance they could either be made shorter or longer in the future.

Respawn knows Season 1 was too light on new content, Zampella continued, and the developer already has plans to provide a much larger offering in Season 2. “All the resources on the team are focused on getting this game in a better position so it plays well, so we have enough content, so the seasons are better,” Zampella said.

Apex Legends is available on Xbox One, PS4, and PC. In our Apex Legends review, Phil Hornshaw wrote, “Apex Legends is a mix of smart shooter ideas that makes for a competitive, team-based game that gets at all the best parts of battle royale while addressing a lot of the weaknesses. Respawn’s intense focus on team play makes Apex more than just a worthy addition to the genre; it’s an indicator of where battle royale should go in the future.”

from GameSpot – Game News https://www.gamespot.com/articles/apex-legends-sticking-with-seasonal-content-drops-/1100-6466461/

Mortal Kombat 11 recently revealed the roster’s final playable character, Frost. The stylish Sub-Zero apprentice is unlockable by playing the campaign, but for those who want a shortcut or just aren’t interested in the story mode, you can purchase her separately.

Frost is available on Steam and consoles for $6. On PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch, she appears to only be listed through the in-game marketplace, rather than as a separate game item on the storefronts themselves. The price is consistent throughout the different platforms.

Frost is a unique inclusion on the character roster, as all of the other playable characters are available right from the start. Frost is a locked character, only obtainable after completing chapter four in the story campaign–or by purchasing her.

While selling a shortcut to an item that can be unlocked through normal play isn’t uncommon, the store listings do not appear to give an indication that she can be obtained without a purchase. In fact, her store listing is very similar to the one for Shao Kahn, who can only be obtained through purchase if you missed him as a pre-order bonus. The Steam reviews on the DLC are mostly negative, with many players citing the fact that you can unlock her through play.

GameSpot has contacted NetherRealm for comment, but has not received a response as of the time of publishing.

“There’s a diverse roster of interesting characters and playstyles, and the story mode is an entertaining romp,” Edmond Tran wrote in GameSpot’s Mortal Kombat 11 review-in-progress. “The unfulfilling approaches to the game’s dynamic single-player content and progression may feel like they’ve totally whiffed (at least at this early stage), but Mortal Kombat 11 hits where it matters.”

from GameSpot – Game News https://www.gamespot.com/articles/mortal-kombat-11-selling-a-character-you-can-unloc/1100-6466447/