We got a big surprise from Respawn Entertainment’s CEO Vince Zampella during Electronic Arts’ E3 2018 presentation at EA Play: There’s a new Star Wars game coming and it will take us to a dark time in the Star Wars universe. Its title gives us a hint about its content: In Jedi Fallen Order, players take on the role of a Jedi during the purge, when the budding Empire is hunting the Jedi to extinction.
Details are a little fuzzy beyond that. Zampella confirms that the game takes place between Star Wars: Episode III and Episode IV and we’ll likely see it hit store shelves around the 2019 holiday season. That’s it. No gameplay, concept art, or even a logo.
Still, these details are the first we’ve really seen from this game, which EA and Respawn Entertainment teased in early 2016.
“I have been playing Star Wars games my whole life, now I get to make a Star Wars game,” wrote game director Stig Asmussen on the Respawn Entertainment blog in early 2016. “On top of that, I get to do it at Respawn, a studio comprised of the most talented collection of game makers, creators, visionaries, and (most importantly) advocates for the player, that I have had the good fortune to work with. And we, like you all, have no shortage of Star Wars passion.”
It’s impressive that Respawn has managed to keep such a tight lid on details about the game, given the fervor that Star Wars properties are typically met with. That’s not to mention the number of pre-E3 leaks we’ve already seen this year. A part of that could be due to the way Respawn has structured its Star Wars team, starting small and growing outward.
“Now, I understand on the surface this might sound a bit dry, but developing a game within the ever-expanding Star Wars universe opens up so many paths for us to go down, and an unparalleled playground to design within,” Asmussen continued. “We have already planted the seeds by assembling a small, but incredibly talented team, ready for the amazing journey that lies ahead. With this in mind, we are looking to expand the dream.”
This blog entry reads a bit differently now that we actually have some small details about the upcoming game. We’re still in the dark here, but the prospect of a story-driven action game in the Star Wars universe is an exciting one.
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.