During the June 2024 Xbox Games Showcase, The Initiative and Crystal Dynamics showed a new gameplay trailer for the Perfect Dark reboot. There’s no release date for it yet, but it will launch on PC and Xbox Series X/S, as well as Xbox Game Pass.
The trailer starts off with Joanna Dark in a wingsuit jumping off a ship and landing in a futuristic Cairo. Joanna is being voiced by Alix Regan, and her likeness is provided by Elissa Bibaud. The world is affected by something called “The Cascade,” where the planet suffered from a series of environmental disasters, and most places are inhospitable to human life.
The trailer shows a bit of first-person combat too, with Joanna strategically targeting enemy limbs with her close-quarters combat as well as taking them out with her pistol. It also appears that her pistol has a variety of methods of taking out enemies non-lethally, including shock and smoke rounds. The trailer ends with Joanna doubling down in pain and her vision staggered. Her point of view then transitions to a dark chamber with some sort of nebulous orb, perhaps implying a sinister dark secret.
The Perfect Dark reboot was announced back at The Game Awards 2020, but since then, there have been no other updates until now. The Initiative is the primary developer on the game, but Crystal Dynamics became a co-development partner in 2021. A recent report last year said that the game had some trouble development and is still a few years away. When Crystal Dynamics was sold to Embracer Group last year, the studio confirmed that the transaction would not affect Perfect Dark‘s development.
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 One of my first gaming rigs was an Acer Predator that was already outdated when I bought it.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.