Publisher 2K Games will enter the virtual reality marketplace in October with the launch of its fairground-themed minigame compilation Carnival Games VR, which comes on the heels of a series of successful releases for the Nintendo Wii.
Carnival Games VR will launch first for HTC Vive and PlayStation VR headsets, with an Oculus Rift version is due by the end of the year.
Carnival Games VR is the latest entry in a popular series that dates back to 2007. The original Carnival Games, released exclusively for Nintendo’s Wii console, featured a variety of multiplayer skill games that required creative use of the Wii Remote’s motion-sensing capabilities. A 2010 sequel, New Carnival Games, introduced support for the Wii MotionPlus gyroscope peripheral, and multiple series spinoffs launched in the years afterward.
Carnival Games VR will feature motion-controlled gameplay in the vein of previous series entries. Carnival Games VR offers a collection of 12 minigames based on popular carnival and arcade attractions like Skee-Ball, Ring Toss, and Dunk Tank.
Carnival Games VR‘s included minigames also invite players to pop balloons with darts, climb virtual rock walls, and take a mine cart ride through a haunted mansion,.
“Virtual reality is an exciting, new emerging platform that has the potential to enhance the way that interactive entertainment is created and experienced,” said Sarah Anderson, 2K’s senior vice president of marketing. “As our first foray into this space, we wanted to deliver a highly accessible entertainment experience that would allow players to immerse themselves in the familiar, classic fun of our Carnival Games series. With its stylized interactive environments and all-new features, Carnival Games VR will deliver the magic of the midway like never before.”
The publisher already faces competition in the virtual realm, as hardware manufacturer Nvidia released the thematically similar VR Funhouse via Steam in July. Built for HTC Vive headsets, VR Funhouse includes many of the same minigames featured in the upcoming Carnival Games VR, and its demanding hardware requirements established the finished product as a VR showpiece.
Carnival Games VR will be priced at $20 when it launches digitally for PlayStation VR and HTC Vive headsets on October 28. Oculus Rift port will arrive “later this year,” according to 2K.
Acer’s Predator Atlas 8 finally has a US release date and price, several months after the company first showed off the handheld in May. The highlight is the Intel Arc G3 Extreme chip inside, which has been adopted by only a couple of other consoles besides the Atlas 8. This version will go on sale exclusively at Best Buy on November 1 for $1,299.99.
Acer originally said the Atlas 8 would arrive in North America in October, but left pricing open at the time. The launch came amid the ongoing DRAM crunch, which has made memory more expensive across the PC industry and complicated pricing for hardware makers.
Gaming laptops and I have a complicated relationship. One of my first gaming rigs was an Acer Predator that was already outdated when I bought it. I was a broke college kid, and that was the best I could afford. So trying out high-end gaming laptops is always fun. But ASUS' ROG Zephyrus G14 is a lot more than a laptop that can run AAA games. It is portable, so you're not lugging around a 2.5kg machine everywhere you go. It is built well, none of that plastic chassis, and can even function as a normal laptop outside of just gaming.
Google Play is borrowing one of the Nintendo Switch’s most useful little tricks. A new Sidekick tool called Playbacks captures a short clip after something interesting has already happened, sparing players from running a screen recorder throughout an entire game.
Playbacks is part of Google Play Store v53.8 and keeps saved clips on the phone. Google first announced it earlier this month, but the new Play Store update marks its arrival for players. Anyone who has watched a perfect win vanish because the record button came too late already understands the appeal.