Fallout 76, Rage 2, and a few titles set in the world of The Elder Scrolls have been holding down the fort for Bethesda since E3 2018 and the 2019 showcase was a chance for Pete Hines and crew to show what the next wave of games will look like. One of those new games is a brand new IP from Tango Gameworks, the team behind The Evil Within. While Ghostwire Tokyo isn’t a survival horror like The Evil Within, the cinematic trailer does betray a haunting art style.
Tango Gameworks Founder Shinji Mikami took the stage to announce Ghostwire Tokyo and he described it as a game where players rid a city of a supernatural evil. In the game’s version of Tokyo, people are vanishing and players will be investigating why. Ikumi Nakamura then took the stage to introduce the cinematic trailer for Ghostwire Tokyo. Nakamura was lead art designer for both The Evil Within 2 and she’s serving as Creative Director on this new game. The synopsis for Ghostwire Tokyo, taken from the official trailer published on YouTube, is as follows:
“After strange disappearances hit Tokyo’s population, it’s up to you to uncover the source and purge the city of a strange, new evil. Armed with your own mysterious spectral abilities, you will face down the occult, unravel conspiracy theories and experience urban legends like never before. Don’t fear the unknown. Attack it.”
The Ghostwire Tokyo trailer shows off various settings in Tokyo as people begin to disappear in waves. There are a few left behind but the city’s population seems to be mostly replaced by occult beings. A hooded figure that likely represents the player character is also shown and they use magic infused arrows and powers from one of their hands when taking on an enemy. It’s not known if this will be a single-player or multiplayer experience but that will likely be revealed later this year during Gamescom or another major event.
No release window or platforms were shown for Ghostwire Tokyo but, if it follows the path of The Evil Within, it’s likely a PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC release. Bethesda is cultivating a positive relationship with Nintendo by bringing other titles to the platform, so a Switch version may make the cut as well.
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.