Sony revealed February’s PlayStation Plus freebies and we think this might just be one of the best slates of offerings in quite some time, especially for PS4 owners with an interest in adventure.
PlayStation 4 users can snag Rime, the 2017 puzzle-adventure game that we called gorgeous and moving in our review. In Buy Now , you play as an unnamed boy who has washed up on a strange island. Rendered in eye-catching cartoonish visuals, you explore the wondrous island, solving puzzles and completing platforming sequences throughout the game’s five sections. Rime tells an emotional story that remains a clever mystery until the very end. It’s rare that a game as new as Rime finds itself on a PS Plus list, so PS4 owners should certainly give it a go.
Balancing the new with the old, the second PS4 game takes users all the way back to the PS4’s 2013 launch in Knack. The first-party exclusive doesn’t have the best reputation (although Knack 2 fared a bit better), but if you haven’t played the family-friendly platformer, it’s definitely not the worst way to spend a rainy (or snowy!) day.
Thanks to cross-buy, PS4 users can also nab the tactical RPG Grand Kingdom, designated as one of the PlayStation Vita’s February freebies. Set in a fantasy world populated by humans and demons, Grand Kingdom features turn-based combat, a single player campaign, and online multiplayer that works across Vita and PS4. Vita users can go back in time with Exile’s End, a side-scrolling action adventure that pays homage to the Commodore 64 with its gameplay and aesthetic.
PS3 users can pick up Spelunker HD, a remake of the 1985 NES version of the arcade game. The game includes 110 caverns to explore, each of which is filled with an array of bats, ghosts, spiders and other enemies, as well as oodles of treasure to unearth. Mugen Souls Z, an anime RPG, rounds out February’s free games on PS3.
In addition to the six new games, the PSVR title Starblood Arena remains free until March 6. If you haven’t already, make sure to claim January’s free games before February’s lineup takes over on February 6.
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.