Xbox Live Gold subscribers are gearing up for a busy month in April, as Microsoft will give away free copies of standout games like Buy Now and Buy Now to service members through the end of the month.
Xbox One owners can also expect to see The Walking Dead: Season 2, continuing an episodic zombie apocalypse narrative that many players first experienced when The Walking Dead: The Complete First Season was given away to Xbox Live Gold subscribers in 2015.
Originally a launch title for the Xbox One, Ryse: Son of Rome is a third-person, hack-and-slash action game that borrows its mechanics from classic arcade brawlers. Assuming the role of Roman general Marius Titus, players slice their way through hordes of attackers as they attempt to breach enemy strongholds.
Though Ryse: Son of Rome won praise for its impressive graphics, its gameplay ultimately didn’t measure up. Critics slammed Ryse over its inconsequential quick-time events, repetitive gameplay, and tacked-on microtransactions, making it what many consider to be one of the most disappointing launch titles of the last console generation. If nothing else, its upcoming Xbox Live Gold giveaway will allow curious gamers to sample its gameplay without committing to a purchase.
Xbox One owners with an active Xbox Live Gold subscription can also download Telltale’s The Walking Dead: Season 2 free of charge between April 16 and May 15. Spreading its gameplay across five playable episodes, The Walking Dead: Season 2 features a narrative that branches sharply depending on choices players make throughout the adventure.
Microsoft will additionally deliver a pair of free Xbox 360 games next month, both of which are also playable on the Xbox One via the platform’s backward compatibility feature. THQ’s The Legend of Zelda-inspired action-RPG Darksiders will be up for grabs between April 1 and April 15, while Ubisoft’s Assassin’s Creed: Revelations will be free to download for Xbox Live Gold subscribers from April 16 through the end of the month.
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.