Valve Announces Next-Gen Handheld, New Bioware IP
Valve's E3 booth was mostly dedicated to showing off Half-Life 3 and Half-Life: Alyx, the former of which will be coming to the Hyper Nintendo and the Apple Quest sometime next year, after its release on the Stadia this September. Half-Life 3 remains one of the most popular PC games of all time, and its console release is sure to add to its sales count, while also providing an excellent way for the next generation consoles to flex their muscles. However, Valve saved one of its biggest announcements for a press release distributed the week after E3: the Steam Deck, a handheld device capable of playing most, if not all PC games, will be released early next year, to compete with Nintendo's Game Boy Zero and Apple's iPhone G. The Steam Deck will no doubt be significantly more powerful than both of its competitors, but also significantly bulkier, and more expensive. Still, a way to play your Steam libraries on the go without having to rely on streaming or lugging a laptop around is a very intriguing prospect indeed, and could give some of this year's upcoming PC games a boost as well. We've yet to learn of the Steam Deck's pricing or exactly release date, which are both expected to be revealed sometime later this year.
The next bit of Valve news is limited to a small teaser of an upcoming Bioware project which is coming to PC, and will be focused on a hidden laboratory which will serve as a hub for a variety of experiments, which will then become their own different game segments. This new game is already fairly deep in development, and is expected to be released in 2022 or 2023. Players will need to explore the lab for clues which will allow them to piece together the information they'll need to embark on a quest or mission which will take at least several hours to complete, forming the basis for a new game in its own right, and according to the game's developers, these segments will take on a variety of genres, and can differ significantly based on how players put the clues together. This new project is codenamed The Experiment, and according to Bioware, it may well form the basis of an entirely new genre of video games. It's definitely one of the most intriguing game concepts to come out of Valve yet, though the fact that it was teased on Valve's website and not at E3 does lead to a bit of doubt, or perhaps simply a sign of Valve not wanting to take attention away from Half-Life, which remains the company's most significant IP. Half-Life: Alyx released just a few days ago on PC and Stadia (and will be coming to both the Hyper Nintendo and Quest at the launch of those consoles), and you can check out our review here (SPOILER: the game is very, very good).
-from an article on Gamespot, posted on June 29, 2020
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2020 NBA Playoffs
First Round:
(1) New York Knicks over (8) Detroit Pistons, 4 to 1
(5) Philadelphia 76ers over (4) Chicago Bulls, 4 to 3
(3) Washington Wizards over (6) Toronto Raptors, 4 to 3
(2) Indiana Pacers over (7) Charlotte Hornets, 4 to 1
(1) Los Angeles Lakers over (8) Utah Jazz, 4 to 0
(4) Memphis Grizzlies over (5) Portland Trailblazers, 4 to 2
(3) Dallas Mavericks over (6) Denver Nuggets, 4 to 3
(2) Las Vegas Aces over (7) Phoenix Suns, 4 to 1
Second Round:
(1) New York Knicks over (5) Philadelphia 76ers, 4 to 0
(2) Indiana Pacers over (3) Washington Wizards, 4 to 2
(4) Memphis Grizzlies over (1) Los Angeles Lakers, 4 to 3
(3) Dallas Mavericks over (2) Las Vegas Aces, 4 to 2
The New York Knicks and Los Angeles Lakers remained at the top of the NBA, thanks to young phenom Liu Fauzeng and the legendary LeBron James respectively. They dominated their respective conferences, finishing well ahead of the rest of the league, with 65-17 and 62-20 records respectively. Only the Las Vegas Aces, at 56-26, were even in the Lakers' league in the West, while the 53-29 Pacers were well behind the Knicks in the East. The Nuggets were expected to be competitive, but Willard Jones' injury woes returned, and Denver struggled to a #6 seed. Young players were dominating the league, most of whom are now exclusive TTL due to their young age. Among the better young players in the league who don't even exist IOTL include Dallas' big center Chuck Aghalor, a Shaq-like presence in the paint who averages 25 points, 12 rebounds, and 4 blocks a game, along with the Estonian superstar Robin Kimsen, whose outstanding passing and shooting have made him a young superstar on the rising Toronto Raptors. Players who were OTL busts like Adam Morrison remain in the league as cagey veterans ITTL, with Morrison joining a core of young talent on the Memphis Grizzlies to help them reach the Western Conference Finals in a massive upset over the heavily favored Lakers, and Greg Oden, who has dodged the injuries that plagued him IOTL, and is now a valuable backup center on the Knicks.
(1) New York Knicks over (2) Indiana Pacers, 4 to 1
This series was somewhat marred by controversy, with Liu Fauzeng making headlines for his staunchly pro-China comments in the runup to the series, in which he condemned ongoing human rights protests in Hong Kong. This led to outrage in the American press, especially after the NBA refused to comment on his statements. Fauzeng was showered with boos by fans, even receiving some jeers at Madison Square Garden. Meanwhile, the Pacers have continued to thrive under the veteran shooting of Klay Thompson and Gordon Heyward (both of whom have remained with the Pacers for the duration of their careers), along with the second year phenom Johnnie Hubbard, who has blossomed further and now looks to lead the team into an outstanding decade. This series was closer than the 4-1 result would indicate, with games 1, 3, and 4 going down to the wire, and Liu Fauzeng making one of the best plays in NBA history to win Game 4 and prevent the Pacers from tying things up at 2 games a piece. Game 4 took a lot of the wind out of the Pacers' sails, and the Knicks won Game 5 by double digits, putting them in their third straight Finals and giving Fauzeng a shot at a threepeat.
(4) Memphis Grizzlies over (3) Dallas Mavericks, 4 to 2
The Memphis Grizzlies continued their miracle run after knocking off the Los Angeles Lakers in an incredible Game 7 in round two. This series was also extremely competitive, and Dallas fought hard all the way, taking Game 1 and narrowly losing in Game 2 before rallying back to win a tough Game 3. From there, however, the Grizzlies came up big, winning the next three games of the series by 5, 7, and 4 respectively, and making their way to the 2020 NBA Finals, where they hoped to stop the Knicks from winning their third straight title.
2020 NBA Finals: Memphis Grizzlies over New York Knicks, 4 to 2
In one of the biggest upsets in NBA Finals history, the 51-31 Memphis Grizzlies defeated the 65-17 New York Knicks in an exciting series that saw a number of close games and thrilling finishes. After Memphis stunned the Knicks in Game 1, New York rallied to take Games 2 and 3, and, like the Mavericks series, it looked like Memphis' Cinderella run might be over. However, the Grizzlies roared back, winning Game 4 by three points. Then, Game 5 saw some of the most thrilling back and forth action ever in an NBA Finals game, going to three overtimes (the first Finals game to do so since Game 5 of the 1976 NBA Finals between Boston and Phoenix, which some called the greatest NBA game ever played). Memphis won by a single point in a thrilling finish that saw Liu Fauzeng put what looked like the game winning shot in the basket with just 5.2 seconds left, only for Memphis' Ribbon Reed (a 20-year old second year player out of Michigan State University) to drive down the length of the court and score the game winning layup for Memphis, giving them a 3-2 series lead going into game 6. There, it was another thriller, going into overtime, with Adam Morrison hitting the game winning three at the buzzer to give the Grizzlies the win and the NBA title. Morrison would retire after the game, though he wouldn't be the Finals MVP (that honor would go to another young Grizzlies player, La'Quell Robinson, a third-year small forward from USC who averaged 24.2 points, 7.5 rebounds, and 5.8 assists in the series, with his defense limiting Liu Fauzeng's output just enough to help the Grizzlies win). Though Morrison's retirement deprived the Grizzles of a leader, Robinson would step up and lead Memphis' young nucleus in the coming years.
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At just 15 years of age, Regan Hardwick is already an entertainment industry veteran with several years of acting roles under her belt. She's perhaps best known for starring as one of the leads in Cartoon Network's acclaimed Lyte and Darke (which will begin airing its final season in September), but in recent years, she's made her presence felt in front of the camera, with several guest roles in various series, as well as the leading role in the Fox Family made-for-TV movie Princess Academy, based on the popular children's novel by Shannon Hale. She's about to begin appearing on Disney Channel's She's Got It! as a rival to Crystal Rain's lead character Christy, who signs with Siren's record company after Christy steps away for personal reasons. In a case of life imitating art, Hardwick signed a record deal with pop icon Selena's production company earlier this year, and her debut album Phoenix is due to release in November. Hardwick will be embarking on a cross-country concert tour beginning in September, and she's already being hailed as pop's next big thing, after the meteoric rise of Shannon Sciorra just last year. Unlike Sciorra, whose Youtube fame was focused entirely around music, Hardwick's online presence is more well known in the tabletop gaming community, filming reviews of tabletop games new and old alike with her friend and Lyte and Darke co-star, actress Inez Delgado (a 20-year-old superstar in her own right, with a lengthy IMDB page). In fact, Hardwick cites Delgado as her biggest inspiration and as the one who encouraged her to sign a record deal. She'd previously performed only at private concerts and conventions, though she also has a couple of songs on the Lyte and Darke soundtrack, sung by her character. After receiving praise from a number of fellow actors and singers, Hardwick started getting offers for record deals at 14, but wanted to weigh her options first. Fortunately for her, she happened to have a friend in the industry. Through Delgado, who is also well known as the goddaughter of Selena, Hardwick also maintains a relationship with Selena herself, and after a few recording sessions with and lessons from the Latin music legend, Hardwick gained the confidence she needed to cut an album. While a newcomer to the music business, Regan Hardwick is no stranger to the spotlight. She calls herself the "Nerd Princess", an homage to her parents: comedian and geek icon Chris Hardwick, and the late GameTV presenter and voice actress Brittany Saldita, who passed away from ovarian cancer in 2014. The two co-founded the geek-themed website The Nerdist, and Regan (and her older brother Arturo, currently attending college at UCLA) have been frequent presences on the website all throughout their childhood, with Regan often showing up on Brittany's "Nerd Mommy" blog, and later co-hosting the aforementioned Turn The Tables with Inez Delgado.
Regan's first single, "From The Ashes", drops in July, and though it has yet to hit the streaming services, music critics have showered it with praise. Though Hardwick did collaborate on most of her album's songs, she played a major role in writing both the lyrics and music, and though she does sound every bit her age, with her voice slightly lighter than many of her pop contemporaries, critical praise has focused on the polish in her voice and on the complexities of the lyrics, which focus on subjects ranging from fantasy worlds and tropes to the death of close loved ones. One critic calls Hardwick's sound "prog pop", blending modern pop music chord progression with the ambitious instrumentals and themes of 70s era progressive rock. Her album cover, in which the young singer is looking over her shoulder with her back mostly to the camera, fiery wings appearing out of her all-black clothing ensemble, projects an image of power rather than the raw sexuality of older artists, and in a recent interview with Blender, she told the interviewer that she wanted her album to be an "inspiration, both for girls my age and younger but also for anyone who's hurting or who's suffered loss, to rise from the ashes of their grief and move forward to achieve their true potential". Her collaborators include both Selena and her daughter Crystal Rain, Ariana Grande, and even her BFF Inez Delgado, who contributed instrumentals and lyrics for two of the songs on the album. Hardwick, who had been attending private school in Los Angeles for the past two years, will continue her studies while touring, and plans to graduate next spring, completing her high school degree before her 17th birthday. She says she plans to attend college sometime afterward, but admits that, depending on the success of her first album, her music career might get in the way somewhat. When the Blender interviewer asked her if she's worried about giving up her normal life too quickly, she just laughed, recalling the wealth of life experience she's already had up to this point.
"I've never had a normal life, really," she told the interviewer. "But, apart from losing my mom, I've had a really good life so far. Now it's time for me to get out there and see what I can do."
Regan Hardwick turns 16 in August, her Phoenix tour begins three weeks later with a concert in Los Angeles, California.
-from an article on Concertbuzz.com, posted on June 18, 2020
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It's been a busy month for Rare, who just launched Ben Breaks The World on Reality, two weeks after the release of Velvet Dark Artifice for the Game Boy Zero. Both games received strong praise from critics, with Velvet Dark Artifice scoring some of the best reviews ever for a handheld shooter, and Ben Breaks The World already looking like one of the best received new Nintendo IPs in a long time. Though the company is still working on "at least one" new IP for Nintendo's upcoming Hyper Nintendo console, Rare's next big project is Slaughtered Planet 3. The game received a feature in the February 2020 issue of GameInformer magazine, and though the game was absent from E3 (we're expecting it to show up as the highlight of a future Nintendo Direct), it's already well into development, as the pictures and interviews from that GameInformer cover article can attest to. Rare has always been at the cutting edge of technology on Nintendo consoles, and it's no secret that their upcoming game, which will conclude the intense sci-fi RPG trilogy that began life on the Sapphire and continued on the Reality, will establish a new benchmark for visuals and gameplay on the Hyper Nintendo. Rare's focus on Slaughtered Planet 3 has seen some disappointment from fans of some of their other IPs such as Conker and The Dreamers, while still other fans want Rare to go back to making Donkey Kong games, but according to the lead on the Slaughtered Planet 3 team, Mike Chapman, the team is "quite pleased" with their company's current focus, and looks forward to developing other titles "once work on the last Slaughtered Planet nears completion".
Of course, Rare also maintains the popular Nintendo Reality battle royale game Battle Buddies, and fans who want to play as Conker, Edison, Cameo, the Battletoads, or even the Kongs can do so in this game, which has shown little signs of slowdown, still boasting "several hundred thousand" daily players, and even showing up at e-sports events and on livestreams. Battle Buddies continues to have a full-time team at Rare dedicated to regular development and updates, though it's expected that these updates will start to slow down next year, as development focus shifts to the Hyper Nintendo. Whether Battle Buddies will get a Hyper Nintendo-focused update or a full next-gen sequel is anybody's guess, but the game remains a top priority at Rare and should continue to do so well into the future, having sold well over ten million copies to become the Reality's eighth best selling game to date, with cosmetic DLC generating more than a billion dollars in revenue for Nintendo during the game's five years of release.
-from an article on Blargo, posted on June 24, 2020
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Game Spotlight: Ben Breaks The World
Ben Breaks The World is an action/adventure game developed by Rare and published by Nintendo exclusively for the Nintendo Reality. It centers on a 15-year-old runaway named Ben Brochner, who develops reality warping powers that make him a target of mercenaries and the government alike. Though at first he uses these powers for mischief and personal gain, he soon makes the acquaintance of a number of individuals who will ultimately come to care about him and influence him to use his powers to save the world. Ben Breaks The World combines elements of 3-D platformers, beat 'em up games, and even physics based games to give the player a sense of power and control, allowing them to learn Ben's reality manipulating powers as he does, using them for a variety of tasks both trivial and consequential. Ben's powers include telekinesis, reality warping (transforming one object into another), gravity and time manipulation, illusions, and the creation of objects out of thin air. While this would seem to make him almost invincible, there are limits to his powers, with a meter that governs how much of certain powers the player can use, and Ben not being able to use the full extent of his powers right away. Powers are given gradually, taught to the player through a series of intuitive gameplay challenges and demonstrations, organically showing off the new powers and giving players a chance to learn them and get good with them. The game itself is actually somewhat linear, there are open environments but not a lot of sequence breaking or side quests, the main storyline is fairly carefully choreographed to teach the player the full extent of Ben's powers and convey the story. With that said, there's still enough openness to give the player some room to breathe and to allow them to explore the world and use their powers in a variety of different situations, with upgrades to Ben's health and power use meters being the main reward for doing this. As the game's name implies, players can sometimes cause various space and time disruptions with the careless use of Ben's powers, leaving "artifacts" throughout the world that remain throughout the game. Though it's not truly possible to "break" the game with these powers, it does give the player a sense of Ben's power and of the consequences for the use of various skills, with players commenting on certain things as the game goes on. Ben Breaks The World boasts some of the Reality's most detailed and advanced graphics, especially on the Reality Neo, and the game also makes great use of VR if the player chooses to use it. The graphical style blends realism with some stylized character models, giving characters a look that's halfway between photorealism and an animated cartoon (think something akin to the style of a Perfect Dark Zero, though obviously a lot better looking). The game's voice acting is mostly performed by seasoned pros, with Josh Keaton as the voice of Ben, Kimiko Glenn as the voice of Jada (a 16-year-old girl who becomes Ben's first real friend since running away, and eventually his love interest), Maya Rudolph as the voice of Carol (a social worker who takes an interest in Ben and who becomes like a mother figure to him later on), and Christopher McDonald as Dr. Johnson (a scientist and government agent seeking to stop Ben but later seeking to take Ben's powers for his own), among numerous others. The game's general tone (dialogue, mood) can be somewhat compared to Jessica Saves The World, though it gets more serious, especially later on as Ben's angst about his childhood begins to surface and his powers start to go out of control.
The game begins with a brief explanation of who Ben is (a boy who ran away from home at 13 from his abusive dad and neglectful mom), he's been living on the streets for two years, occasionally in foster homes but mostly on the streets, and has had his powers for about a month before the events of the game, mostly using them for petty crimes and pranks. There are people genuinely trying to help him, including Carol and some of his fellow kids from the streets (some of whom become close friends, others who betray him), though there are also others trying to jail him or take advantage of him, and he mostly hangs out alone, not really able to trust anyone else. The game's main storyline begins when he encounters Jada, a girl just wrapping up her sophomore year in high school. She initially tries to have him arrested after he steals her brand new expensive phone, but the two end up bonding over a conversation, and she starts visiting him from time to time. Meanwhile, Ben overhears some police who have been trying to catch him called away because of a robbery in progress. He decides to use his powers to stop the robbery and become a hero (and also swipe some money for himself when everyone's distracted), but he ends up causing a space-time disruption and nearly gets an innocent old man killed. In the course of fleeing, he bumps into Dr. Johnson, who manages to capture him, though at first, Johnson seems like he only wants to help. Ben manages to escape with the help of a homeless guy he helped out before, and later, he spends some time with Carol and her family, forming a bit of a bond with them, but fleeing after his powers start to go haywire. It's around this time that he deepens his relationship with Jada, and also learns to trust a few other kids his age. We learn that Ben wants a normal life, but that his trust issues and now his powers threaten to screw that up. He and Jada, along with some of their friends, end up having to flee some mercenaries, and we meet the game's other primary antagonists, a man named Cole (voiced by Ricci Harnett) and a woman named Tressa (voiced by Claudia Black), a pair of mercenaries, the latter of which has acquired time/space powers of her own, though to a lesser extent than Ben's. Ben ends up fighting and defeating Cole, but is forced to flee both of them after their reinforcements arrive with heavy artillery. Ben learns that Cole and Tressa had formerly been employed by Dr. Johnson and experimented on by him, but escaped his lab and are now seeking revenge. Ben learns that he acquired his powers after accidentally being pricked with a discarded needle that had some experimental DNA inside it, DNA that was intended for Dr. Johnson to create a supersoldier. Dr. Johnson now wants to get a sample of Ben's blood to use to continue his experiments, while Cole and Tressa learn of this and want to sell Ben to the highest bidder. Ben turns down an offer from another government agency to hide him (both because he doesn't trust the government and because he wants to use his powers to defeat his enemies himself), and instead decides to learn more about his powers with the help of his friends. Though this does work for a while, and Ben actually manages to become a superhero in the game's second major arc, things soon begin to spiral out of control after Ben accidentally hurts a bunch of innocent people. He manages to find comfort in Jada, and the two even end up kissing in a fairly emotional scene, but soon afterwards, Jada gets kidnapped by Cole and Tressa and Ben is forced to surrender himself in exchange for her safety. Cole and Tressa go back on their word, but Jada is able to break free on her own, while Ben is rescued with the help of some of his friends, along with Carol, and ends up defeating Tressa in a dramatic boss fight. Meanwhile, Dr. Johnson is seemingly killed by Cole, who injects himself with an experimental serum that transforms him into a monster that Ben has to defeat. Dr. Johnson, who survived Cole's assassination attempt due to having already injected himself with a perfected version of the serum, then launches an attempt to take over the world, and Ben has to stop him. Eventually, Ben defeats Dr. Johnson by seemingly giving up his powers in order to overload Dr. Johnson with a transfusion, which causes him to mutate out of control before exploding. Ben, his powers seemingly gone, is then adopted by Carol and her family. He starts going back to school again, and also starts dating Jada. In the end, it's revealed that Ben still has his powers, but now has perfect control of them, and won't start using them again until the world is ready.
Ben Breaks The World is released on June 22, 2020, to considerable critical acclaim. Praise is heaped on the game's graphics as well as its innovative control scheme and combat, while the storyline and characters also get a lot of praise, as well as the game's voice acting. Ben Brochner becomes one of the most popular new video game characters in recent memory, immediately becoming one of Rare's most iconic, and probably their most highly critically praised since Joanna and Velvet Dark. Thanks to the excellent critical reception and promotion for the game by Nintendo, it achieves excellent sales, over two million in its first month, though sales do drop off quite a bit once the Hyper Nintendo is released. Though it's not immediately clear if Rare plans to release a sequel (the game doesn't even get any DLC, as Rare instead focuses on Battle Buddies and the Hyper Nintendo), the popularity of both Ben and his game ensure that Rare will likely get around to it eventually.
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Other Significant Titles For June 2020:
Super Mario All-Stars Zero: The Game Boy Zero's 35th anniversary Mario collection is released this month, with Super Mario Dimensions 2, Super Mario Flip, and Super Mario World 4 all included and slightly enhanced in graphical fidelity (with Mario Dimensions 2, previously a Supernova title, getting the biggest boost). The collection sells quite well, and, unlike IOTL's 35th anniversary games, remains on store shelves and on digital download stores indefinitely.
Velvet Dark Artifice: A Rare-developed FPS for the Game Boy Zero that has players control the AI construct Velvet Dark in both the real world and in cyberspace, hunting down fragments of an AI's deadly army consisting of computer virus constructs in cyberspace and robots and possessed humans in the real world. The game takes place some ways back in the series timeline (before Velvet was confined to the cyberworld), and fills in some gaps in the series' chronology that have thus far been left unanswered. It's a very, very good FPS, with outstanding graphics and excellent characterization for Velvet, giving the player an in-depth look into her mind. While it doesn't do much to advance the plotline of later games in the series, it's a great standalone title, and even has online multiplayer, making it a must-play for both Velvet Dark fans and FPS fans alike.
Lotus: Ubisoft releases this 3-D adventure title, which features a rose whip-wielding female protagonist, in June 2020, slightly earlier than expected, with the shorter development time due to the game's shorter than expected length, featuring only four major dungeons and a smaller than expected world to explore. The combat is quite fluid and fun, with the protagonist's whip able to perform all sorts of different moves, as well as being enhanced by magic. The game also doesn't fall prey to "Ubisoft open world" syndrome, with most objectives either forwarding the main story or providing an important upgrade. It's a good game despite the relatively short main quest, averaging around an 8/10 with most reviewers, and leaving players wanting more. It's released on the Reality, the Virtua, and the Stadia, and does solid sales numbers, making back its budget and a little extra.
CrossCode: This indie JRPG from OTL with a throwback graphical style makes its way to nearly every TTL platform, and while it doesn't change too much from its OTL counterpart, it does cut out some of the puzzles in favor of more boss fights and combat, which improves its standing in the eyes of some players but disappoints others who expected a more intellectual game. Like OTL, it's mostly seen as a fun throwback RPG with plenty of twists and turns, and does decently well, becoming one of the year's more acclaimed indies.
