Payday 3 will hold an open beta on Steam and Xbox from September 8 to 11, Deep Silver and Starbreeze have announced.
Starbreeze said the open beta is designed to stress test servers for the co-op heist shooter ahead of the launch on September 21.
The open beta requires no key access and includes the same content as the recent technical closed beta test. Starbreeze mentioned the open beta build is based on a build from April 2023 and is not a final representation of Payday 3, but it will let the studio identify potential issues with the servers before launch.
Here’s what the open beta offers, from Starbreeze:
The original gang: Dallas, Hoxton, Chains and Wolf. The iconic clown-masked characters that made the Payday franchise infamous are all playable.
No rest for the wicked is a Payday 3 bank heist, that charges the players with relieving a small bank of the cash cluttering up their vault. It’s their own choice to go stealth without anyone noticing how the cash evaporated or go loud to really experience that NYC robbery feeling.
All difficulties will be playable, level cap is Infamy Level 22 and Weapon Level Progression is at eight.
Payday 3 launches on PC via PC Game Pass, on Steam and Epic Games Store, as well as Xbox Series X and S Game Pass, PlayStation 5 and GeForce Now on September 21.
Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.
Armored Core 6: Fires of Rubicon now has an unofficial easy mode on PC, courtesy of a modder who made mech design and gameplay more forgiving and rewards more generous.
As reported by Eurogamer, the aptly named EZ-Core mod posted to the NexusMods website changes key aspects of Armored Core 6’s mech design process, which ordinarily places significant restrictions on what parts you can use based on their weight and energy requirements.
The EZ-Core mod lessens this burden by reducing these energy and weight loads by half, thus making it easier for struggling players to build a relatively overpowered AC. It also increases the amount of starting ammunition for each weapon by 300 percent.
The effective range of weapons has also been increased by 300 percent, which means the rounds fired from your weapons and those of your enemies are far less likely to ricochet harmlessly away. The mod also increases the amount of credits earned for successfully completing both standard missions and arena battles by 200 percent, and adds new camera options, along with the ability to make manoeuvring around with boosters more energy efficient.
However, the mod’s creator has warned players against using the unofficial version of the game in multiplayer out of fear it could result in a ban. While Armored Core 6: Fires of Rubicon is an entirely different beast compared to other FromSoftware titles such as Elden Ring, it still features the same hard as nails gameplay players have come to expect from the Hidetaka Miyazaki-led studio.
The frenetic nature of the gameplay plus the lack of invincibility frames has led many players to have a hard time against early bosses, including Chapter 1’s Balteus, who is capable of firing off a kaleidoscope of missiles that can initially feel impossible to avoid. From there, things only get more intense, which will make the mod a welcoming prospect for players who need a helping hand to progress further into Armored Core 6’s dystopian world.
In IGN’s 8/10 review we said every sortie in Armored Core 6 “is a satisfying combat puzzle to solve thanks to fantastic mission design, intense boss encounters, an extremely wide assortment of weapons and parts”, which kept our attention throughout the 15-hour campaign, and beyond.
Anthony is a freelance contributor covering science and video gaming news for IGN. He has over eight years experience of covering breaking developments in multiple scientific fields and absolutely no time for your shenanigans. Follow him on Twitter @BeardConGamer
EA and Respawn Entertainment have released the biggest patch yet for Star Wars Jedi: Survivor across all platforms: PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X and S, and PC.
Patch 7 “makes sweeping improvements to Quality and Performance modes” on console, EA said, while its PC counterpart is headlined by the addition of NVIDIA DLSS support.
PS5 and Xbox’s Performance Mode has received a complete rework that has disabled Ray Tracing to guarantee a consistent 60 frames per second performance alongside other improvements. Other technical improvements have also boosted Quality Mode across both consoles and added Variable Refresh Rate support on PS5.
Jedi: Survivor launched in April to positive critical reception and commercial success but some users were left with a buggy, broken version of the game, even after a big day one download. The studio released plenty of patches in the weeks following launch, though has been quiet for a while as it presumably worked on this bigger performance-boosting update.
In our 9/10 review of the running well version, IGN said: “If Respawn makes a third game like Star Wars Jedi: Survivor and Fallen Order, it’ll complete the best Star Wars trilogy in 30 years, hands down.”
Star Wars Jedi: Survivor Patch 7 Notes
This patch introduces several performance-related improvements* on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X and S including:
Performance mode has been completely reworked to substantially improve player experience.
A number of GPU and CPU optimizations – along with disabling Ray Tracing – has resulted in a better player experience, including a solid 60 FPS in Performance mode.
Quality Mode has also received optimizations to help reduce FPS fluctuation and introduce other visual improvements.
Variable Refresh Rate support added for PS5
Additional performance and optimization improvements for PC, including DLSS support.
Save system tweaks to help prevent save game corruption.
Fixed issues where players could not retrieve their XP after dying under certain circumstances.
Various crash fixes
Various bug fixes and improvements across all platforms, including fixes for cloth, lighting, and UI.
* Note: cinematics in Star Wars Jedi: Survivor are locked to 30 frames per second.
Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelance reporter. He’ll talk about The Witcher all day.
Nintendo has today announced a new range of Switch bundles that will be coming our way next month including two brand-new Animal Crossing: New Horizons-inspired Switch Lite editions.
The Isabelle’s Aloha Edition and Timmy & Tommy’s Aloha Edition will be available from Target and Walmart respectively in the US from 6th October for a suggested retail price of $199.99, while Nintendo of Europe has confirmed that each will be receiving a wider release on 20th October.
For those of you who have already started the epic journey into Starfield in early access I hope you’re having a blast, and for those of you joining on day one with Game Pass, your time starts very soon! I am so excited to finally add Starfield to our list of games “Coming Soon.” Space, feelings, souls-like – we have amazing games for you to explore (not to mention a reminder of some surprise shadow drops last week!). Let’s get to it!
Available Today
Gris (Cloud, Console, and PC) Gris makes a return to the Game Pass library today! Gris is a hopeful young girl lost in her own world, dealing with a painful experience in her life. Her journey through sorrow is manifested in her dress, which grants new abilities to better navigate her faded reality.
Coming Soon
Starfield (Cloud, PC, and Xbox Series X|S) – September 6 Available on day one with Game Pass: Starfield is the first new universe in 25 years from Bethesda Game Studios, the award-winning creators of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim and Fallout 4. In this next generation role-playing game set amongst the stars, create any character you want and explore with unparalleled freedom as you embark on an epic journey to answer humanity’s greatest mystery. To help get you started on your epic journey, the Xbox Wire team created Starfield Starters – a four-part guide covering the basics. Check out the first part here.
Solar Ash (Cloud, Console, and PC) – September 14 From the creators of the award-winning Hyper Light Drifter comes the high-speed and gravity-bending world of Solar Ash. Set amidst a surreal dreamscape filled with long-abandoned ruins of great civilizations past, you play as Rei, a Voidrunner determined to stop at nothing to save her planet from falling prey to the Ultravoid’s path of eternal hunger.
Lies of P (Cloud, Console, and PC) – September 19
Available on day one with Game Pass: Lies of P is a thrilling soulslike that takes the story of Pinocchio, turns it on its head, and sets it against the darkly elegant backdrop of the Belle Epoque era. You must adapt yourself and your weapons to face untold horrors, untangle the unfathomable secrets of the city’s elites and choose whether to confront predicaments with the truth or weave lies to overcome them on the journey to find yourself.
In Case You Missed It
Age of Empires IV: Anniversary Edition (Cloud and Console) – Available now For years you’ve battled armies and made history your story. Now it’s time to make history once more with a new breakthrough in strategy gaming – introducing Age of Empires IV: Anniversary Edition, now available on Xbox consoles. Includes native inputs for Xbox controller, console-specific user interface, and a new tutorial designed for first time players to help achieve easy setup and success.
Call of the Wild: The Angler – Available now Be free to fish where you choose in this unique and approachable open world fishing game. Explore the great outdoors on your own or with friends, engage in a variety of fishing activities, experiment with different baits and lures, and find the catch of a lifetime!
Humankind (Cloud and Console) – Available now Humankind is a historical strategy game in which you’ll be combining cultures to create a civilization that’s as unique as you are. Re-craft the narrative of human history as you lead your people from the Ancient to the Modern age. How far will you push Humankind?
DLC / Game Updates
No Man’s Sky: Echoes Update – Available now Meet a secret society of robotic aliens in update 4.4, Echoes! Furthering the narrative introduced in Interceptor, explore the mysteries of the Autophage, perform their rituals, learn their language, and assemble your own ceremonial staff. In deep space, confront huge outlaw dreadnoughts, sweep through their trenches and destroy vulnerable components in new tactical space combat – and much more. Learn more on Xbox Wire.
Sea of Thieves: The Legend of Monkey Island – The Quest for Guybrush – Available now The next chapter of Sea of Thieves: The Legend of Monkey Island has arrived! A plan has been devised to rescue Guybrush from his prison, but to succeed you’ll need to conquer three Legendary Trials! Play the new Tall Tale now with Xbox Game Pass.
Xbox Game Pass Ultimate Perks
Minecraft Realms Plus Subscription – September 5 Game Pass Ultimate members can get access to a 3-month subscription to Minecraft Realms Plus! Share your world, build with friends, and play across all of your devices with your own personal server. This Perk requires a payment instrument to redeem. Terms apply.
Xbox Game Pass Quests
September Game Pass Quests launch today. Game Pass Ultimate and Game Pass Console members can earn points by playing their favorite games.
Human Fall Flat (250 points – Ultimate only) – Climb 30 meters
Among Us (5 points) – Play
Earn an Achievement (50 Points – Daily) – Earn an achievement in any Game Pass game
Leaving September 15
The following games are leaving the library soon, so make sure to dive back in before they go! Remember to use your membership discount to save up to 20% to keep them in your library.
Amazing Cultivation Simulator (PC)
Aragami 2 (Cloud, Console, and PC)
Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony Anniversary Edition (Cloud, Console, and PC)
DC League of Super-Pets: The Adventure of Krypto and Ace (Cloud, Console, and PC)
Fuga: Melodies of Steel (Cloud, Console, and PC)
Metal Hellsinger (Cloud, Console, and PC)
Sid Meier’s Civilization 6 (Cloud, Console, and PC)
Tainted Grail: Conquest (Cloud, Console, and PC)
Train Sim World 3 (Cloud, Console, and PC)
Thanks again for tuning in for the latest Game Pass updates. We’ll be back before long with more updates, more perks, and (most importantly) more games. Keep an eye for the latest on when games are playable on @XboxGamePass and @XboxGamePassPC or Instagram. Cheers!
Former chairman of PlayStation Studios Shawn Layden has Thoughts and somewhat dire warnings about the videogame industry’s future, though what exactly he means by “the videogame industry” is a little open to guesswork.
Charles Martinet, the now former voice of Mario, has discussed his new role as “Mario Ambassador” for Nintendo, saying: “I don’t know what that is yet.”
Nintendo has yet to announce Martinet’s replacement, but did say he will assume the new role of “Mario Ambassador”.
But what does “Mario Ambassador” mean? It seems Martinet himself is unsure. Speaking during a Q&A panel at GalaxyCon Austin 2023, Martinet said: “I am now a Mario Ambassador. I don’t know what that is yet. I’m not retired as it were, but I’m an ambassador. As we step forward into the future, we’ll all learn exactly what that is.”
It sounds like Martinet is in the dark about his new role for Nintendo, but, as he stresses, he is not retiring. As for his replacement, during a recent interview with IGN, Nintendo of America boss Doug Bowser said fans will have to wait until the release of Super Mario Bros. Wonder on October 20 to find out, as the company will keep the new voice of Mario under wraps until the game’s credits are public.
“Charles has obviously been a voice actor with us for quite some time, and as we look for ways to keep Charles involved in Nintendo’s business, we thought this was a very nice transition for him,” Bowser said.
“And Charles is very excited about it. I’ll let Charles speak to it himself if he’d like to, but we look forward to having him continue to represent Nintendo and importantly the Mushroom Kingdom as we go forward. I think people have recognized this when they see Super Mario Bros. Wonder, they’ll hear a different voice and we’ll let that play out and that’ll be within the credits, and people will learn who the new person is at that point in time, but we don’t plan to make any announcement in advance of that.”
Image credit: Tales From The Collection: Autographs & Fan Mail YouTube channel / GalaxyCon Austin 2023
Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.
Among the feats a new player of FromSoftware’s Souls or Souls-adjacent fantasy games must perform is conquering your fear of giants. From the Stray Demons of Dark Souls through Bloodborne’s Cleric Beast to the dragons of Elden Ring, you must learn not to be awed by creatures who look they could kill you with a sneeze. You must learn to run towards that titanic knight with the enormous shield, rolling between its colossal ankles, using its stature against it. You must learn to see past the visual overkill of a swing that would surely fell a skyscraper, registering only the effects on your poise and health bar. It’s a learning curve, for sure, and that makes the modding of mechs from Armored Core 6: Fires Of Rubicon into Elden Ring a little more than the usual act of mischievous fanservice.
Somehow, it has been almost a whole year since Splatoon 3 was released and Nintendo is gearing up to mark the occasion in the most appropriate fashion — with a Splatfest, of course. To make the upcoming event that bit more special, the weekend’s splatting will not take place in a unique location as usual, but will instead see all eight Tricolor stages from previous Splatfests make a return.
The news was shared in a post on the Nintendo Japan website, before being shared to the website formally known as Twitter in a translated form by @OatmealDome. The full lineup of eight different stages even includes the special Scorch Gorge variant used for the earlier Zelda Splatfest, so this will be the perfect time to see the sights if you missed out on getting to visit the locations previously.
You may have seen that Alice Bee has started a “land on every planet” run of Bethesda’s Starfield. By total coincidence – I promise you it’s accidental, I was so pleased – I’ve been working on a “land on no planets” run of Starfield. The reasoning for this is as follows: people say that outer space is the worst part of the game, because it’s just an irritating interval between the maps where the majority of quests, loot, intrigues, etc are found. It’s a fast travel loading screen you can fly about in. But what if you double-down on the space stuff?
What if you never descend from orbit, not even to repair, modify or upgrade your ship and offload inventory? What if, rather than buying new ships or building them, you progress exclusively by boarding other captains and making off with ship and cargo? How well does Starfield scrub up as a thoroughbred space sim that leans towards bloodthirsty piracy? Here to answer these questions is Mary Read, my custom character and budding astral freebooter. She’s named for her distant ancestor, the legendary 18th century English buccaneer Mary Read. She’s had a crack at life on shore, setting foot most recently on Earth’s Moon, but from this point on, her fate and fortune lies amid the stars. Arrr!
