The Biggest News In Gaming (Week Beginning 2/12/19)
PlayStation Declares Lack of Interest In Handheld Market, Announces State of Play Event
PlayStation has celebrated its 25th anniversary this week, and was even awarded a Guinness World Record for being the “best-selling videogame home console brand ever”.
Sony, which has seen some 450,190,000 combined sales in the home console arena has confirmed this week that it doesn’t see itself as a contender in the handheld market anymore.
The company’s last handheld console was the PS Vita which was released in 2012. Previously, Sony released the PSP in 2005, but President and CEO of Sony Interactive Entertainment Jim Ryan has said: “PlayStation Vita was brilliant in many ways, and the actual gaming experience was great, but clearly it’s a business that we’re no longer in now.”
For years PlayStation figureheads have been cautioning fans about the company’s future in the handheld space, with former Worldwide Studios President Shuhei Yoshida saying in 2015 that a dominant mobile market would make the likelihood of a Vita successor very small.
In 2018, however, John Kodera, then CEO of PlayStation said: “Rather than separating portable gaming from consoles, it’s necessary to continue thinking of it as one method to deliver more gaming experiences and exploring what our customers want from portable.” This may suggest that in the future Sony could take a similar approach to the Nintendo Switch, which doubles as a handheld and home console.
This wouldn’t be the first time PlayStation adopted a strategy from Nintendo, as the success of Nintendo’s Direct streams prompted Sony to host update streams of their own which they dubbed State of Plays. The latest State of Play stream has been scheduled for Tuesday, December 10th at 2 pm GMT /6 am PST /9 am EST.
The upcoming stream will not contain any next-gen details but will offer release dates and game announcements for the future of PlayStation.
Xbox Still Working on A Cheaper, Disc-less Version of Project Scarlett
According to four sources who are aware of Microsoft’s next-gen plans, the company is working on a version of the next-generation Xbox console that will not read physical media.
The sources have said that the console has been code-named project Lockhart, which gives it a completely different codename from the mainline next-gen Xbox that was announced in June, project Scarlett.
With digital sales in the video game realm becoming more prevalent, this strategy may not come as a total surprise, especially when considering that a digital-only version of the Xbox One S was released on May 7th, 2019.
When rumours first circulated about Microsoft’s next-generation plans, people speculated that Xbox would release two versions of their console, one of which was supposedly code-named, Lockhart. A lack of news from the company about it and official word on project Scarlett had put validity about the rumour of Lockhart to bed until now.
Lockhart will reportedly have similar hardware specs to the PS5 and next Xbox, with a solid-state drive and native 4K capabilities.
However, due to the absence of a disc drive, the marketing for the console iteration will focus mainly on the digital and streaming space, with XCloud and Game Pass proving to be extremely important to the company's future plans.
When approached for comment by Kotaku, a Microsoft spokesperson wrote “We do not comment on rumors or speculation” in an email response.
Firewatch Developer Confirms Upcoming Game is “On Hold”
Campo Santo, the development studio behind 2016’s breakout hit Firewatch has confirmed that their project “In the Valley of Gods” has been put “on hold”.
In the Valley of Gods was originally revealed at the Game Awards in 2017, but no updates on the game have come since the original announcement trailer was shown.
“To fans looking forward to In the Valley of Gods, it’s probably clear that the optimistic “2019” at the end of the announcement trailer isn’t going to be accurate,” studio co-founder Jake Rodkin said.
Campo Santo was acquired by Valve in 2018, and Rodkin has confirmed that his developers are now helping with projects at Valve such as Half-Life: Alyx.
Rodkin said “In the end, Valve Time makes fools of us all. But yes, developers from the former Campo Santo team have joined other projects at Valve, including Half-Life: Alyx.”
“In the Valley of Gods development is on hold — but it certainly feels like a project people can and may return to. And when that happens, we’ll find an exciting way to let fans know,” he concluded.
Outlast Developer Announces Upcoming Co-op prequel: The Outlast Trials
The Outlast Trials, a co-op prequel to 2013’s Outlast and 2017’s Outlast 2 has been announced by developer Red Barrels.
The game has not been given a release date but has been confirmed to be set during the cold war in the same universe as the first two games. Trials will reportedly put players in the role of test subjects who are taking part in a mysterious experiment.
Outlast has been a singleplayer horror franchise since its inception, but Red Barrels has said: “The Outlast Trials will allow players to face the horrors of the trials by themselves or cooperate with up to 3 other test subjects.”
While the studio has confirmed that the game does have a multiplayer feature, they haven’t detailed what form this will take, and have said that players who wish to enjoy a traditional solo experience will be able to do so.
While not titled “Outlast 3", the developer has previously said that they will eventually make a fully-fledged third game in the series.
To check out our let’s play of Outlast 1 and 2 head on over to our YouTube channel!
