Electronic Arts announced its featured lineup for the upcoming EA Play 2017 gaming event in Hollywood, revealing that attendees will get a first look at “the next Star Wars Battlefront and Need for Speed experiences.”
EA Play will also host the playable debut of the company’s 2017 EA Sports lineup, offering hands-on demos for Madden NFL 18, FIFA 18, NBA Live 18, and more.
Launched in 2016 as an alternative to the Electronic Entertainment Expo, EA Play is a public, fan-oriented event that shows off the publisher’s upcoming lineup of games for consoles and PCs. Last year’s show gave players the chance to try games like Star Wars Battlefront and Titanfall 2 months before they hit retail, and this year’s event will follow suit with a similar lineup of upcoming releases.
While EA did not specify whether “the next Star Wars Battlefront and Need for Speed experiences” are all-new games or add-on content for existing releases, it’s likely that many sequels will be unveiled for the first time at EA Play 2017. EA notes that the event will also host “detailed gameplay deep dives, competitive events, and exclusive interviews with the development teams” for many of its featured games.
EA Play 2017 will kick off at The Hollywood Palladium in Hollywood, California, on June 10, and festivities will continue through June 12. Players who aren’t able to attend the event in person can catch up on announcements, trailers, and live panel sessions via EA’s official Twitch channel.
“Those that can attend in Hollywood will experience hands-on gameplay, live entertainment, and much more,” EA said. “For anyone joining digitally around the world, EA Play will feature live-streams, deeper looks into EA’s upcoming games and experiences, and content from some of the best creators in the community. For players, content creators, media, industry partners and more, EA Play 2017 will deliver a network of experiences to celebrate a world of play.”
Tickets for EA Play 2017 will be available for purchase starting April 20 at 9:00 a.m. PT.
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.