Though Sony skipped out on the annual PlayStation Experience in 2018 and won’t be attending E3 this year, the company will be spotlighting its upcoming and current games with the State of Play streams. After a solid debut of the new stream in March, the next edition has been given a date: May 9. The remaster of MediEvil will lead the charge and there will also a new game reveal.
The 4K remaster of MediEvil, an action-adventure that launched on the original PlayStation, will be the focus of the State of Play for May 2019. As revealed on the PlayStation Blog, PlayStation Worldwide Studios will be showing us an extended look at the game throughout a stream that should last around 10 minutes.
With Days Gone launched, there’s a slim chance that Sony could offer up some details on another of its major exclusive titles. Gamers would surely be excited to learn more about either Ghost of Tsushima or The Last of Us Part 2, but it’s a longshot for either this close to E3. Either way, it will be interesting to see how the State of Play streams continue to evolve in importance and production.
The State of Play for this month will also include some updates and announcements for some upcoming games. The biggest one on the horizon that’s a console exclusive is Shenmue III, which launches in April 2019. PSVR titles Blood & Truth and Trover Saves The Universe both release around the end of May and may get some additional time, even though they both were shown in the previous State of Play alongside the worldwide reveal of Iron Man VR.
There are rumors floating around about the PS5, but the company doesn’t want anyone to get their hopes up too soon. The blog includes a note that no next-generation content will be shared during this episode of State of Play. It’s very likely that we won’t see any teases of PS5 content until around E3 2019. Even though the company won’t be attending or hosting a major showcase like in previous years, there’s nothing stopping Sony from releasing a State of Play E3 Edition much like Nintendo’s yearly conferences.
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.