It’s nearly the end of the month, which means it’s time for Sony to announce the free games PlayStation Plus subscribers will receive in June. This time around, you get access to a brilliant turn-based strategy game, as well as an underrated squad-based shooter from the last generation.
Beginning June 5, PlayStation 4 owners will be able to download XCOM 2 for free. Firaxis’ excellent sequel to XCOM: Enemy Unknown is even tougher than the original, with much more difficult and intelligent enemies who will exploit your every weakness. It expands on bizarre features, such as mind-control, and its guerilla warfare story has stakes even higher than the previous game.
Also free for PlayStation 4 is Trials Fusion, the motorcycle racing game from RedLynx and Ubisoft. The excellent physics-based title adds a futuristic twist to the series’ tried-and-true formula, and with the addition of special trick-based courses, there are plenty of ways to enjoy it. User-created tracks also give you nearly endless racing opportunities, and you can challenge your fellow PlayStation Plus members to beat your high score.
PlayStation 3 players get a treat this month, as well. Free in June is Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon: Future Soldier. The squad-based tactical shooter takes a far more linear approach than its follow-up Wildlands, but the game’s excellent level design and streamlined mechanics make it satisfying and replayable. The competitive multiplayer portion sees the game at its absolute best, with objective-based modes that force players to work together.
Also free for PlayStation 3 is Zombie Driver HD, a top-down driving game similar to the first few Grand Theft Auto titles, but with an undead twist. Vita owners get Atomic Ninjas, a 2013 2.5D competitive platformer, as well as the puzzle game Squares, which uses a simple tile-based interface and is a perfect fit for the system.
Sony certainly offers a better selection of free games in June than Microsoft, which revealed its own lineup of Games With Gold titles earlier this week. Sony’s program will undergo a radical change next March, as it will stop giving away free PlayStation 3 and PlayStation Vita games in favor of only supporting the PlayStation 4. Occasionally, we’ve seen bonus PlayStation VR games given away, as well, which will likely continue after the change is made.
Remember when transparent gadgets were the coolest things you could own? Sony is bringing that late '90s aesthetic back with its new PS5 Prism Collection. The gorgeous lineup gives your DualSense controller and PS5 console a glossy, see-through makeover in three eye-catching colors.
https://twitter.com/PlayStation/status/2115459064981512662?s=19
For years, Call of Duty’s campaign mode has used big, scripted set pieces to tell the overarching story amid all the adrenaline-pumping action. The 2023 Modern Warfare 3 tried to shake up the established formula by introducing a handful of short open combat missions, and I genuinely liked the idea, but the game's overall negative reception seeped into how those missions were received.
I feared the next iteration might abandon the idea because of the backlash, but I am glad it didn't. MW4’s “Stranded” mission uses the same approach, but instead of fragmenting it across the campaign, it puts it all in a single large-scale open-world mission.
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.