Horizon Forbidden West: Burning Shores is right around the corner, but Guerilla rendered the expansion a PS5-exclusive because of clouds — literally.
Senior community manager Narae Lee wrote on the PlayStation Blog that the developers upgraded the clouds system so that the game’s open-world cloudscape would look more realistic — but only as much as the PS5 can handle.
Principal FX artist Andrew Schneider and tech programmer Nathan Vos expanded on the cloud system they developed for Horizon Zero Dawn in 2015 with voxel technology, which supports not only changes to the time of day and realistic animations, but now in Horizon Forbidden West: Burning Shores it will allow players to fly through the clouds and complete side quests on their Sunwing as if they’re on Cloud 9.
“The cloud systems that we developed for Horizon Zero Dawn and Horizon Forbidden West were fast because they didn’t store clouds as 3D objects, but rather instructions on creating 3D clouds from limited 2D information,” Schneider said. “The PlayStation 5 can handle larger datasets. So, after Forbidden West wrapped, we set to work writing a voxel cloud renderer prototype that could live up to our standards for quality, and actually allow the player to fly through highly detailed cloud formations.”
The devs achieved this by creating what Schneider called “Frankencloudscapes,” which contain large cloud formations that behave both as a background element and an explorable environment. Then they tested their quality and performance by compressing huge quantities of voxel data to expedite the cloud rendering process, and balancing them by optimizing the PS5 code to make the output less than or equal to the current cost of the cloud system.
The PS5 has the hardware that can handle that much cloud power, so don’t be too disappointed about the DLC’s absence from the PS4. It’s a 10-year-old console, after all.
Horizon Forbidden West: Burning Shores comes to the PS5 on April 19.
Cristina Alexander is a freelance writer for IGN. She has contributed her work to various publications, including Digital Trends, TheGamer, Twinfinite, Mega Visions, and The Escapist. To paraphrase Calvin Harris, she wears her love for Sonic the Hedgehog on her sleeve like a big deal. Follow her on Twitter @SonicPrincess15.
There are a lot of reasons to love Resident Evil 4, but something that jumped out at me while playing through the remake is how it feels like a medley of homages to some of the greatest horror movie monsters and antagonists of all time. There’s no way of telling how many of these actually are deliberate nods to other fiction, and how much it’s my own brain jumping to conclusions, but it’s still fun to dissect the many weird parts that make up this masterpiece of a game.
It’s pretty safe to say The chainsaw-wielding burlap sack-wearing Dr. Salvador takes some inspiration from The Texas Chainsaw Massacre’s Leatherface, and quite possibly Jason Voorhees’ baggier, less athletic look from Friday The 13th Part 2. Del Lago might be more salamander than shark, but that whole boss fight would be right at home in the third act of a Jaws movie. The lumbering El Gigante bears a striking resemblance to the cave troll in The Fellowship of the Ring. This seems even more apparent in the remake, as the later El Gigante encounters have the giants wearing armor that would absolutely fit the dress code of Sauron’s ranks. That one might not seem quite like an iconic movie monster, but bear in mind the Lord of the Rings movies were on everyone’s minds around the time RE4 was in development.
Las Plagas, the parasites that act as the connective tissue of Resident Evil 4’s menagerie of monsters, look like distant cousins of the face-hugging larvae made famous in Alien. We see the Plagas genetically engineered into all sorts of critters throughout the game, but a couple of them are especially Xenomorphian. The insectoid nature and hive-based society of the Navistadors mimic the bugs in Aliens, but there’s also the sleek, black, whip-tailed Verdugo, whose appearance and behavior bear more resemblance to the sole monster in the first Alien.
Video games have been cribbing beats from action movies since forever.
Meanwhile, every time one of Resident Evil 4’s Ganados reveals its inner plaga, there’s an explosion of flailing flesh, teeth, eyes, and claws, which is straight from the playbook of the titular critter in John Carpenter’s The Thing. Much like how The Thing has several increasingly imposing forms, so do RE4’s bad guys, both eventually taking massive final forms that are towering masses of tentacles that don’t even try to appear human.
Video games have been cribbing beats from action movies since forever, but Resident Evil 4 steering the series from tense, survival horror to faster-paced action horror feels a lot like James Cameron’s approach to sequels. Aliens turned Alien’s haunted house into a rollercoaster ride, and Terminator 2: Judgment Day is more fight than flight compared to the first film. Leon Kennedy utilizes quite a few tactics from T2, freezing the Verdugo with liquid nitrogen and dropping Los Gigantes into a vat of molten metal. On the other hand, Regenerators might not be able to turn into molten metal or impersonate members of the LAPD, but they’re almost as hard to kill as a T-1000.
Stephen Sommers might not be quite as well-known a filmmaker as James Cameron, but a few of his action-horror movies seem to have informed Resident Evil 4. The 1998 film Deep Rising features a phenomenally gross tentacled monster that at one point gets fended off with a shotgun blast to the eyeball, and the explosive climax involves a guy and a girl fleeing a collapsing structure on a jet ski. Sound familiar?
No matter where in the individual parts of Resident Evil 4 come from, the way they come together creates something wholly unique and wonderfully nightmarish.
One horrifying boss that unfortunately (or maybe thankfully) didn’t make the cut for the remake is U-3, a chimera that blended human and scorpion anatomy, much like Dwayne Johnson’s first big screen performance as The Scorpion King in The Mummy Returns, another Stephen Sommers joint with CGI that might as well be pulled from a GameCube game. Coincidentally, the third Mummy installment, The Tomb of the Dragon Emperor, has Brendan Fraser’s character sporting a fleece-lined leather jacket a lot like Leon’s and armed with a Thompson submachine gun, which Resident Evil fans might know better as a Chicago typewriter.
The influence of horror writer H.P. Lovecraft in pop-culture can’t be overstated, though the feature film adaptations of his work have rarely achieved more than a cult status (which is fitting, considering how much Lovecraft’s work involves cults.) One such adaptation, the 2001 Stuart Gordon film Dagon, seems to be the single biggest inspiration for Resident Evil 4.
Despite being named after the short story Dagon, it more closely follows the novella The Shadow Over Innsmouth. The film follows a guy trying to rescue his girlfriend, who’s been kidnapped by members of a cult that worships an ancient sea monster — many of whom are mutating into sea creatures themselves. Though the novella was set along the coast of New England, the movie takes place a Spanish fishing village named “Imboca” (which is cute, as boca is Spanish for mouth) which makes sense, as it was produced in Spain. Why the game also takes place in Spain is unclear, but hey, it works. That said, it would be funny to see Leon accosted by a bunch of longshoremen with thick Maine accents.
Without grilling the original development team about what was going through their heads while making the original 20 years ago, it’s impossible to say what parts of Resident Evil 4 were rooted in other works of horror fiction. Ultimately, it doesn’t matter, because no matter where in the individual parts of Resident Evil 4 come from, the way they come together creates something wholly unique and wonderfully nightmarish.
Hogwarts Legacy soared high on the charts as the best-selling game of February 2023, while The Last Of Us sales rose with it.
The sales numbers were shared by Mat Piscatella, executive director and games industry analyst at Circana (formerly known as NPD), showing Hogwarts Legacy ranked first in February sales for PlayStation, Xbox, and Steam. Not only is the game last month’s best-seller, but it is also the best-selling game of 2023 year-to-date, surpassing Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, the Dead Space remake, Madden NFL 23, and FIFA 23.
The sales of The Last Of Us games climbed up the charts last month as well, but still trailed behind the Wizarding World title. The Last Of Us: Part 1 ranked 6th on the sales chart (up from 11th in January), besting Wild Hearts, Like A Dragon: Ishin!, and Octopath Traveler 2 — all of which are new releases. Meanwhile, The Last Of Us: Part 2 ranked 18th (up from 41st in the previous month), trailing just behind Sonic Frontiers, which was released in November.
Hogwarts Legacy’s sales success was due in no small part to the PS5, which drove hardware spending up to 29%. It was also named the best-selling console of the last month.
Hogwarts Legacy is available now on PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and Steam. It will be released on PS4 and Xbox One on May 5, and on Nintendo Switch July 25.
Cristina Alexander is a freelance writer for IGN. She has contributed her work to various publications, including Digital Trends, TheGamer, Twinfinite, Mega Visions, and The Escapist. To paraphrase Calvin Harris, she wears her love for Sonic the Hedgehog on her sleeve like a big deal. Follow her on Twitter @SonicPrincess15.
2023 might finally be the year where 2TB PS5 SSDs might actually be worth the upgrade. Last year, prices for 1TB PS5 SSDs averaged around $150, whereas 2TB SSDs hovered closer to $300. This year, we’re seeing 1TB SSDs trickle below the $100 price point and 2TB SSDs are under $200. The reason PS5 SSD upgrades are pricey is that you can’t use any old SSD and expect it to perform well on the PS5 console. You’ll want to pick up an PCIe Gen4 x4 M.2 solid state drive with a rated 5,500MB/s read speed to match the PS5’s internal drive. That means, for better or for worse, picking a top-shelf SSD.
Note that Sony recommends a heatsink attached to your SSD. Not all SSDs listed here have pre-installed heatsinks. For the ones that do, we’ll be sure to mention it. For the ones that don’t, all you have to do is purchase your own heatsink (we recommend this one for $10) and install it yourself. It’s very easy.
Adata Premium 2TB PS5 SSD for $112.50
This is easily the lowest price we’ve seen so far for a 1TB PS5-compatible SSD. The Adata Premium SSD boasts transfer speeds of up to 6,100MB/s, which is more than fast enough to surpass the PS5’s recommended minimum speed threshold of 5,500MB/s. It includes a thin aluminum heatspreader that will work fine with the PS5 console, but you can easily get a beefier heatsink (we recommend this one for $10) if you’re concerned about the heat.
Crucial P5 Plus 2TB PS5 SSD for PS5 for $131.99
Crucial’s newest M.2 SSD meets all the requirements for your PS5 SSD upgrade. It supports transfer speeds of up to 6,660MB/s which is well above the 5,500MB/s minimum threshold. Yes there are faster SSDs out there, but if your intention is to put this in your PS5, then that extra speed is worthless because you’re bottlenecked by the original PS5 SSD. If you’re worried about opening up your PS5 case, don’t worry it’s very easy. Crucial has an official YouTube PS5 SSD install guide to see you through the process.
Samsung 1TB PS5 SSD for $75
Samsung SSDs need no introduction. They’ve made some of the most popular and reliable PS5 SSDs on the market. The 980 Pro has been out for a while now, but it’s still one of Samsung’s fastest M.2 PCIe SSD, with only the newly released 990 Pro being faster. It is fully PS5 compatible in terms of form factor and performance, with blistering speeds of up to 7,100MB/s. It goes toe to toe with other well-known options like the WD Black SN850 and the Seagate Firecuda 530.
WD 2TB PS5 SSD from $159.99
Amazon is offering a 2TB WD Black SN850X with preinstalled heatsink for only $179.99.The SN850X is the successor to the SN850 SSD. It has newer flash chips (BiCS5 vs BiCS4) and an updated firmware, which combined offer improved sequential and random read/write speeds. For PC gamers, there’s also an updated Game Mode 2.0 utility that’s designed to tune the SSD for better performance during gaming sessions.
Corsair MP600 PRO LPX 2TB “Optimized for PS5” SSD with Heatsink for Only $154.99
Corsair is a very well known brand for DIY PC builders. Corsair makes some of the best gaming products on the market, and that includes solid-state memory like RAM and SSDs. The MP600 Pro is the same super-fast M.2 NVMe PCIe x4 Gen4 SSD that’s marketed for enthusiast gaming PC builds. This one is “optimized for PS5” because it includes a rugged preinstalled heatsink that is slim enough to fit in the PS5 bay without any issues. Performance wise, the MP600 Pro matches the best SSDs out there with its 7,100MB/sec sequential read and 6,800MB/sec sequential write speeds.
Patriot Viper VP4300 2TB PS5 SSD for $142.99
Amazon is offering the Patriot Viper VP4300 2TB M.2 2280 PCIe Gen4 x 4 Internal Gaming Solid State Drive, which is compatible with the PS5 console, for only $142.99. This makes it definitely the lowest price we’ve seen for a brand name 2TB PS5 SSD, especially since this one even includes a slim aluminum heatshield. The VP4300 is an M.2 2280 PCIe Gen4 x4 solid state drive with rated transfer speeds of 7,400MB/s read and 6,800MB/s write. That makes it well above the PS5’s recommended 5,600MB/s speed requirement.
More PS5 SSD Deals
There may be other SSD deals out there, but these are the PS5 SSDs we’ve tried ourselves and highly recommend. They also double up as outstanding boot drives for your gaming PC, in case you don’t need additional storage for your PS5 console.
How easy is it to install the SSD?
It’s extremely easy! Removing the case cover is completely toolless. In fact, the only screw you have to remove is the one that keeps the cover for the SSD bay in place. You don’t even put it back when you’re done. Sony has a quick and easy YouTube video guide.
What if the SSD I bought doesn’t have a heatsink?
Sony recommends you install an SSD that has an attached heatsink. If the SSD you purchase doesn’t include one, it’s simple enough to buy one for about $10 on Amazon and add it yourself. Most of these heatsinks are just attached using an adhesive like thermal tape.
For more deals, take a look at our daily deals for today.
We’re back with another exclusive Magic: The Gathering reveal – this time, a first look at six cards from the upcoming set March of the Machine, including one that’s part of a potential two-card combo to instantly kill your opponent in Magic’s Standard format. We also spoke with Set Design Lead Dave Humpherys from Wizards of the Coast about the designs behind each card and the brand new “battle” card type.
Flip through this slideshow to see all the new cards, and read on to hear Humpherys’ thoughts on them:
Potentially the most notable of these cards is Invasion of Tarkir, which is a battle card – the first new permanent type in Magic since WOTC introduced the now-ubiquitous planeswalkers nearly 16 years ago. When you play a battle you get an immediate effect, but you then choose an opponent to defend it – dealing enough damage to the battle (either with attacking creatures or direct spells) will allow you to flip it over into a new card, in this case a very angry dragon. Humpherys says they discussed whether battles could simply be enchantments or lands, but that “conceptually what we were aiming for just didn’t really make sense as any existing card type.”
WOTC hopes that battles will be playable right out of the gate, with Humpherys also telling us that other design teams have already expressed interest in potentially using them as part of future sets. “If they play as well as we’re hoping,” he explains, “they should show up from time to time in worlds where they make sense for the current story, but I doubt they’ll ever be in every set.” To help enable that, March of the Machine’s battles all have the “siege” subtype, providing some flexibility for WOTC to change or iterate on their design down the line.
“Voldaren Thrillseeker with Yargle and Multani was a very intentional interaction”
Two more of our reveals today are part of card cycle in March of the Machine that partners previously individual legendary characters from a given plane onto a single card – in this case, Baral and Kari Zev from Kaladesh and Rankle and Torbran from Kaldheim. Humpherys says “it’s great when we can find a way to fuse together abilities that the characters are known for to create a twist that would otherwise look cohesive enough for a new creature card we might make.”
A previously revealed team-up was the somewhat comical Yargle and Multani, which is simply an 18/6 creature with no abilities, but another of our reveals that uses the new Backup mechanic recontextualizes that legendary team-up to deadly effect. Creatures with Backup can give +1/+1 counters and temporary abilities to another creature when they enter the battlefield, and Voldaren Thrillseeker’s ability enables a two-card one-turn-kill combo within March of the Machine as a result. While it takes 10 mana of three different colors to pull of in a single turn, using Voldaren Thrillseeker to buff Yargle and Multani allows you to immediately have a 20 power creature that you can sacrifice to theoretically kill your opponent outright.
“Voldaren Thrillseeker with Yargle and Multani was a very intentional interaction that we believed would be fun content given the mana costs of those cards and ways to disrupt that combo with removal or life gain,” Humphreys assures. He also explains that he led set design for Ikoria, which had a way to give other creatures new abilities in the Mutate mechanic, indicating that they were confident about using a similar idea here.
Our last two cards are the first Phyrexian “lord” (Magic’s colloquial term for a creature that buffs other creatures of the same type) we’ve seen, as well as a Phyrexianized version of the fan-favorite enchantment Shark Typhoon. Notably, the latter is one of the cards in March of the Machine that creates Magic’s first transforming token, creating what is essentially an egg you can pay mana to hatch into a real creature. Humpherys even says that the idea for Chrome Host Seedshark came about because the concept art for those Incubator tokens looked a bit like shark eggs.
You can read my full interview with Dave Humpherys below with plenty more interesting tidbits about these cards, but this is far from the only thing Magic has cooking right now. While March of the the Machine will release early next month, we also had the exclusive first reveal of its Lord of the Rings crossover set arriving later this year.
IGN: Battles are the first new permanent type since Planeswalkers, and we’ve seen how big of an impact those had on Magic. Do you expect Battles to be similarly impactful, showing up in every set from now on?
Dave Humpherys, Set Design Lead for March of the Machine: We intentionally framed these as Battles as opposed to something more like Planes so that they could be used in a large variety of future settings. Other design teams have expressed interest in using them. If they play as well as we’re hoping, they should show up from time to time in worlds where they make sense for the current story, but I doubt they’ll ever be in every set. For now, we’re eager to see what players enjoy the most about them so we know how to deliver on future designs.
Why make a new permanent type at all? Was this simply the best way to express a new design you had in mind, or were you consciously looking to shake up the game in some new way?
Conceptually what we were aiming for just didn’t really make sense as any existing card type. We certainly discussed whether they should be lands or enchantments as the mechanic was evolving. A danger of new card type is a lack of ways to interact with it. Fortunately, the game engine allows interaction via attacking and blocking for them and the rewards for winning the battle are in casting card types already in the game. A new card type is cool though. We just need to be sustainable in when we do it.
“Conceptually what we were aiming for just didn’t really make sense as any existing card type.”
Mark Rosewater spoke on his podcast once about how it’s tricky to dial in the balance of a new thing like this – specifically the very first Equipment cards, in that instance. Are you looking to play it safe with the first run of Battles so that they don’t cause balance issues, or are you hoping these will be played competitively right out of the gate?
While we know creating a new card type like Battles that there would be risks, we approached it more from a standpoint of determining how we could mitigate those dangers systematically rather than by aiming under on power level. We do hope these will be playable right out of the gate.
Is Siege the only current type of Battle? Was part of the intent with introducing subtypes right away to leave you more design space in the future?
Siege is the only current subtype for Battle. As I noted earlier, there were other future teams exploring the design space of Battles, so we knew we wanted to set things up in a way that would be compatible for other functionality and keep design space open for future iterations of Battles.
When it comes to character choice, what goes into making the perfect legendary team-up?
I don’t think there’s any one formula for the perfect team-up. I think they are a lot of fun when the two characters share overlap in identities but also stark contrasts. It’s great when we can find a way to fuse together abilities that the characters are known for to create a twist that would otherwise look cohesive enough for a new creature card we might make.
Is there a particular pair you thought about giving a card that you were sad didn’t make the final cut?
I believe all the pairs we were most excited about made it to print. We kept adding more to the set and made yet more for the prerelease. There were some pairs we just didn’t come up with satisfying mechanical designs for, but not for any that I didn’t feel like didn’t eventually land on a significantly more satisfying design for from that plane.
“I believe all the pairs we were most excited about made it to print.”
Was there ever a time when these team-ups were two cards using the “partner with” mechanic, or was the idea always to merge their abilities onto one?
The idea for these was always to merge two characters into one card. “Partner with” is also mechanically something we’re more likely to use in non-Standard-legal products.
The Backup mechanic on Voldaren Thrillseeker seems like it could result in some pretty unexpected combos depending on what abilities are linked to it – for example, just within this set, you can use it with the previously revealed Yargle and Multani to deal 20 damage. Did you have to come up with any rules when designing backup abilities given the three-decades of creatures they could interact with in eternal formats, and do you have any thoughts about that two-card combo specifically?
Voldaren Thrillseeker with Yargle and Multani was a very intentional interaction that we believed would be fun content given the mana costs of those cards and ways to disrupt that combo with removal or life gain. There weren’t any rules we felt we needed to make other than just testing out designs. I led the set design for Ikoria and thus also the mutate designs in that set, which means that I especially enjoy combining of abilities like this but also felt confident we could do so again with this mechanic.
We’ve already seen iconic characters be compleated and how that affects their mechanics, but it’s fun to see Chrome Host Seedshark, which is basically the compleated version of the enchantment Shark Typhoon. What were some of the challenges or joys of compleating certain iconic Magic concepts and tropes in addition to characters?
The joys of the process were largely in looking around our entire multiverse and finding what we’d love to see in phyrexianized form. Seeing what our artists can create with that is then immensely satisfying. The idea of the Chrome Host Seedshark in part came from my thinking that some the Incubator tokens in concept art push looked a lot like shark eggs to me and suggesting this concept. I also loved that we compleated some of our creature in forms that were callbacks to some past iconic Phyrexian creatures. There weren’t many challenges other than running out of space in the set to do all the creatures we otherwise might have wanted to see.
Phyrexian Butcher is the first proper “lord” for Phyrexian creatures. Why did you decide to wait until March of the Machine for that instead of introducing it on the Phyrexian’s home plane in All Will Be One?
There were just so many Phyrexian creatures in All Will Be One that having a card that cared about them felt almost too easy, at least in the context of sealed and draft where over 90% of the creatures had that creature type. We realized the desire for cards that cared about them though and knew that March of the Machine had them as a percentage of the set that was more fitting for limited and would still be soon enough for constructed.
Tom Marks is IGN’s Deputy Reviews Editor. He loves card games, puzzles, platformers, puzzle-platformers, and lots more. You can follow him here.
Nintendo fans looking forward to The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom are already dreaming up a ton of wild and wacky weapons to use in the Breath of the Wild sequel.
Following yesterday’s gameplay presentation where Zelda producer Eiji Aonuma introduced us to Link’s new Fuse ability — where he can take just about any two objects and merge them together to create something new — fans have taken to social media to share their dream combinations.
While some of the suggestions do seem a bit out there, some of the examples shown in the gameplay presentation are somewhat wild themselves, like combining a monster’s eyeball and an arrow to create a homing device.
Reddit user Capable_Afternoon687 proposed a “spinning Beyblade of death”, created by fusing four fans and four logs, alongside attaching food to an arrow to fire and distract enemies or a puffshroom to create “a flying smoke bomb”.
SlayAndDecay wants to add a little more bite to their sword, literally, by attaching the head of a Cursed Bokoblin to the end of it, while texellation wants to combine a stick and one of the giant spiked balls to create a mace.
It’s not all about offense though, or even about fighting at all, as some fans are getting creative with the shields too. Using them in fights is an afterthought though, with SpiritedWillingness8 hoping to fuse a shield with butter to improve its surfing capabilities.
The creativity prize perhaps goes to Successful_Slippy though, who wants to take shield surfing to a new level. Taking inspiration from the 1989 Zelda animated series, they look to fuse an explosive barrel to their shield and then shield surf to propel themselves across the map.
Pushing the possibilities
Breath of the Wild already had a ton of room for creativity, but Tears of the Kingdom seems to be pushing the possibilities even further. Fuse is just one of several new abilities alongside Recall, Ultrahand, and Ascend.
Square Enix and Luminous Productions have revealed the story expansion In Tanta We Trust will be released for Forspoken on May 26.
The DLC expansion takes place 25 years before the events of Forspoken, with Frey continuing on her quest to eradicate the Break from Athia permanently. She follows a mysterious voice and ends up being transported into the past during the Purge of the Rheddig, the battle that destroyed Athia and led to its current state in the present.
Frey will team up with Tanta Cinta as well as unlock brand-new magical abilities to fight off the invading Rheddig forces and save Athia again.
Forspoken: In Tanta We Trust launches May 26th for PS5 and PC.
The DLC shows that Square Enix is still supporting Forspoken despite its underwhelming sales and the fact Luminous Productions is being folded back into Square Enix on May 1. The studio was made up of developers at Square Enix who worked on Final Fantasy 15 and was responsible for creating new projects using the Luminous Engine, the same engine utilized for Forspoken.
In IGN’s Forspoken review, we said: “Forspoken’s flashy combat and parkour can be fun, but they aren’t enough to make its cliche story and barebones open world very interesting to explore.”
George Yang is a freelance writer for IGN. He’s been writing about the industry since 2019 and has worked with other publications such as Insider, Kotaku, NPR, and Variety.
When not writing about video games, George is playing video games. What a surprise! You can follow him on Twitter @Yinyangfooey
The three million number references worldwide sales of the highly anticipated remake, and also across all consoles (PlayStation 4 and 5, Xbox One and Series) and PC.
In our 10/10 review, IGN said: “The Resident Evil 4 remake is the series’ most relentlessly exciting adventure rebuilt, refined, and realised to the full extent of its enormous potential.”
Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelancer and acting UK news editor. He’ll talk about The Witcher all day.
The Last of Us Part 1 is finally available on PC… if you can get it to work. Steam have slammed the PC version of the PlayStation classic due to crippling performance issues and crashes.
In fact, it currently has “mostly negative” reviews. “Crashes every 20 minutes,” said one review. “Game is badly optimized. Game looks great just needs to be better optimized.” Naughty Dog is currently investigating the issues, however, and has promised it’s team is working on resolving them.
“The Last of Us Part 1 PC players: we’ve heard your concerns, and our team is actively investigating multiple issues you’ve reported. We will continue to update you, but our team is prioritizing updates and will address issues in upcoming patches.”
The Last of Us Part I PC players: we’ve heard your concerns, and our team is actively investigating multiple issues you’ve reported.
We will continue to update you, but our team is prioritizing updates and will address issues in upcoming patches.
At the moment, only 33% of The Last of Us’ 6,015 user reviews have reported having a positive experience, leaving a staggering 67% underwhelmed.
“I waited for almost 2.5 hours for the game to build shaders while crashing in the main menu every five or so minutes, [it’s] one of the most frustrating experiences I’ve had with a game,” said another review. “To clarify, if the game didn’t crash every five mins while in the main menu, it would’ve taken half the time to build the shaders and actually start playing.”
One of the main problems seems to be that shader compiling takes a long time, especially on PCs that only just meet the game’s requirements. That said, users seem to be experiencing issues across the board, and complain that the game simply hasn’t been well-optimized.
One user even reported a massive 14 crashes within 4.8 hours of playtime. The Last of Us was ported to PC by Iron Galax, the same company that recently served up Metroid Prime Remastered on the Nintendo Switch, as well as the Uncharted: Legacy of Thieves Collection.
Atlas Fallen may have just received its release date a few weeks ago on March 1, but developer Deck13 has now delayed the game by three months to August 10.
Announced in a tweet (below), Deck13 seemingly just needs extra time to deliver the version of Atlas Fallen it has always wanted to.
“We’d love to give the game some extra time which will allow us to deliver the best possible version of Atlas Fallen,” it said in the tweet. “To achieve this, we have made the difficult decision to delay the worldwide launch of Atlas Fallen to August 10, 2023. We apologise for this disappointing news.”
— Deck13 | Atlas Fallen – coming August 10th! ? (@Deck13_de) March 29, 2023
Deck13 added in a subsequent tweet: “Besides a lot of polish and optimisation this delay will bring, we’re super happy to be able to now also include a full German voice-over.”
Atlas Fallen was previously meant to launch on May 16, though it’s unclear what changed in the 28 days between its initial release date reveal and this delay announcement.
The developer did mention showing the game at PAX East in its delay announcement, so perhaps feedback from preview events led to the delay, though it did receive a fairly positive reception.
In IGN’s preview we called Atlas Fallen a “scrappy open-world action RPG that introduces several fresh ideas in an often unexplored setting,”
Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelancer and acting UK news editor. He’ll talk about The Witcher all day.
