The landscape of Mars is rocky and barren, but the planet’s skies sometimes hold clues to its past in the form of clouds. NASA’s new Cloudspotting on Mars project is a science initiative that lets the public be a part of some new research as the agency studies what happened to Mars’ atmosphere, now much thinner than…
The upcoming long weekend is a great time to score deals on mattresses, home goods, beauty, summer fashion and more.
With Atari turning 50 this year, the brand’s current owner plans to celebrate with a collection that brings together five decades of games. Announced today, the aptly named Atari 50: The Anniversary Celebration will include more than 90 titles spanning the Atari 2600, 5200, 7800, ST, Jaguar and Lynx. What’s more, Atari hired Digital Eclipse, a studio that’s best known for its work on The Disney Afternoon Collection and the Street Fighter 30th Anniversary Collection, to oversee the project.
“When it comes to emulation or bringing classics back or doing really any sort of remastering or reimagining, I don’t know if there’s anybody who does it better than Digital Eclipse, so they were always our first choice,” Atari CEO Wade Rosen told Game Informer.
Atari has yet to share a complete list of the games that will appear on the compilation, but in addition to many classics, the collection will include six new retro-inspired games. One of those is a sequel to 1981’s Haunted House for the Atari 2600. Haunted Houses will feature modern 3D voxel-based graphics and new levels for players to explore. Atari 50: The Anniversary Celebration will cost $40 when it arrives later this year on Xbox, PlayStation, Switch, PC and Atari VCS.
Valve’s previously announced ports of Portal and Portal 2 finally arrived on the Nintendo Switch yesterday. At just $20 for both titles it’s an absolute steal for two of the best puzzle games of all time, but according to one modder, the release also apparently means that other classic Valve games will run on the…
Overwatch 2 beta time is now, assuming you’re looking for early access to a beta build of the game before it’s released later this year for multiple platforms.
Mario + Rabbids: Kingdom Battle was a pleasant surprise. A charming game that married Nintendo’s Mushroom Kingdom with the chaos of Ubisoft’s Rabbid mascots and crammed it into a game that was, well, pretty much a cartoon interpretation of the tactical strategy series XCOM.
It was an unlikely early hit on the Switch. Ubisoft was able to offer a different kind of game than Nintendo was offering in its first-party titles. Apparently, that was the seed that led Ubisoft Milan Creative Director Davide Soliani to Mario + Rabbids. Talking to Engadget, he said, “[We] should create something that makes sense from Ubisoft’s point of view, something not happening in Nintendo’s catalog.”
Ubisoft fulfilled that brief with Kingdom Battle. Soliani added: “We can match the aesthetics [of Super Mario], using and misusing the elements…. The contrast is the drive.” That’s the context for this sequel, too.
In Mario + Rabbids: Sparks of Hope, Mario et al. (and their Rabbid equivalents) face a shared threat, called Cursa. The blended worlds of Mario and Rabbids are being contorted by darkness, but this time it’s a little more galactic. Expect to see varied worlds, à la Mario Galaxy, with the Lumas of that game being transformed into Sparks, elemental sprites that work like summonable magic attacks in the many, many battles.
That may sound new to anyone that played Kingdom Battle, but there are far bigger changes afoot. We’re yet to play the game, but judging from the new teaser and Davide Soliani’s explanation, it’s going to feel different – less of an XCOM tribute and something between tactical strategy conventions and the manic dashing and leaping of typical Mario games.
Your party of three heroes can now move around in real-time, no more grids. You’ll be able to see how far a character can move within their environment thanks to a white outline, but you’ll be able to figure out cover and optimal attacks on the fly. Each hero will get their turn before the baddies get to, well, return the favor. Soliani says this should help the game to feel more “natural”.
Crucial elements will include where you move your hero (as long as you don’t shoot), utilizing items to extend movement and even using some enemies against other enemies – like hurling a Bob-omb towards some unsuspecting enemies on the other side of an area. Like Kingdom Battle, the synergy with other heroes will be crucial in tackling the biggest enemies.
Alongside companion elemental Sparks, which will grow in abilities as your characters do, each hero will have their own unique weapon this time, running the gamut from melee weapons like swords through to dual pistols and even bows. (You can’t have a game in the 2020s without including a bow.)
You’ll be joined by some new characters, including a Rabbid with a sword called Edge. (Dumb, I love it.) and age-old rival Bowser, who’s apparently a heavy-hitter equipped with what appears to be a bazooka.
More freedom in battles is mirrored in the game too. The worlds you’ll explore should feel more open-ended than the areas of its predecessor. Explore planets, take on fetch quests (this is a Ubisoft game after all), solve the major darkness problems of this specific planet – or just do the bare minimum and move on to the next part of the game.
This should all help Sparks of Hope feel a little more contemporary – aided by a pretty incredible array of musical talent. Kingdom Battle composer Grant Kirkhope, who also contributed to Rare’s epic run of Nintendo 64 games, returns, joined by Gareth Croker (Ori and the Will of the Wisps, Halo Infinite) and Yoko Shimomura (Kingdom Hearts, Final Fantasy XV). Those are some gaming music heavyweights which should help ensure all these different worlds sound as different as they’ll look.
Judging from the teaser and Soliani’s comments, Ubisoft is evolving Mario + Rabbids at a swift clip, modernizing the battle system and adding further strategic wrinkles and customization to fights. Sparks of Hope could feel like a different sort of tactical battle game, and if they nail the synergy like the first game, it could be just as entertaining.
TikTok promises to keep its U.S. users’ data safe and sound are not satisfying at least one member of the Federal Communications Commission. FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr said in a blistering letter Wednesday that the Chinese company has proved it can’t be trusted with the information users give it, and should bundled…
Prime Video’s Paper Girls adaptation for Amazon just dropped a trailer that makes the beloved characters from Saga’s Brian K. Vaughan and Cliff Chiang’s critically acclaimed graphic novel series jump right out of the comics and onto our screens.
Netflix wants you to keep your account… No, Netflix NEEDS you to keep your account. So, in order to keep you around, the company needs to give you other reasons to paying your monthly tithe. And it seems to believe a pivot to mobile video games might do the trick.
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