It was heartbreaking when, after the entire Konami-Kojima fallout, the promising looking Silent Hills, best known thanks to the short playable demo that was put on PSN exclusively for PS4 last Gamescom to generate some early hype for it, was canceled. A lot of players wanted to see how the game would pan out- a lot of them wanted Sony to come in and negotiate and mediate, and revive the project.

That hasn’t happened, but something else has. According to Rooster Teeth, an anonymous source has told them that Microsoft has stepped in and revived Silent Hills, purchasing the title for the Xbox One as an exclusive, and are planning to reveal it at E3 this year. The source goes on to say that the complete pulling of P.T. from PSN was done by Konami as a show of good faith to Microsoft, which makes sense, I guess.

Whereas that sounds like an entertaining (and desirable- no matter how it happens, one would want such a promising project to be revived) premise, there are certain aspects of this leak that raise some flags- for instance, the source seems to claim that the game is 80% complete, and could release as early as March of next year. That sounds unlikely, given that the game was only in the earliest stages of pre-production when it was canned, and that it was supposed to enter development after Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain was released later this year. The source also claims that Microsoft has spent ‘billions’ on acquiring and securing the title, which sounds like an exorbitant amount to spend on a niche game (albeit might just be an embellishment of reporting).

Could this still be true? Sure. Is it? Hard to say. The source did say that Microsoft would officially announce the deal at E3 this year, so we’re going to have to hang on tight until then. We’ll keep you posted though.

Microsoft shocked the world when it revealed that Crystal Dynamics’ follow-up to Tomb Raider 2013, Rise of the Tomb Raider, would be debuting exclusively on the Xbox One and Xbox 360. Of course, Xbox division boss Phil Spencer later clarified that this exclusivity was only for a certain duration.

Now Crystal Dynamics has revealed its own stance on the matter in an official FAQ, stating that, “Our goal is to build the best game that we possibly can, and our relationship with Microsoft will help us realize our vision for the game. The Microsoft Gamescom stage was a great place to make the initial announcement, but not necessarily to go into details.”

The developer further added that with regards to exclusivity, Microsoft, Square Enix and Crystal Dynamics “certainly didn’t intend to cause any confusion with the announcement.”

Regardless, you’ll only be able to get it on Xbox One and Xbox 360 in Holiday 2015. Sound good? Let us know below.

Ninja Theory seemingly returned to Sony’s side at Gamescom 2014 last week when it revealed Hellblade, a hack and slash action title for the PlayStation 4. This being Ninja Theory, the same developer behind Heavenly Sword, it was argued that Hellblade was a successor to the former.

However, Ninja Theory’s Dominic Matthews told Eurogamer that, “It’s a brand new IP. Senua is a new character. It’s not tied to Heavenly Sword at all.”

And don’t think Matthews isn’t aware of some of the jokes people have been making about the name. “I saw someone describe the name as someone just putting Heavenly Sword into Thesaurus.com and going, oh it’s Hellblade. It’s not something where we’ve gone, yeah, let’s make people think it is this.

“We really like Heavenly Sword. We loved making that game. So it’s actually more just we like making female protagonists that look in a certain style. And we like swords. And we like hell. It’s more that.”

Despite there being many similarities between the two games, Matthews says Hellblade is not a spiritual successor either. “No. I wouldn’t say it’s the spiritual successor to Heavenly Sword, because that has certain expectations. I think it’s safer to say if people enjoyed Heavenly Sword, then the aim is they’ll enjoy Hellblade, too.

“If we said it was the spiritual successor, there would be an expectation there is a story link or a certain type of gameplay or level design. It’s a new IP. It’s a brand new game. It’s brand new characters. It’s a brand new world. It’s not linked at all. But if you like Heavenly Sword, like Enslaved and like what we did, then the aim is you’ll like this, too.”

What are your thoughts on the game? Let us know below.

That being said, with Ubisoft not holding a dedicated press conference this year, Microsoft was clearly the star.

"No TV shows, very little Kinect – just games, games and more games. More importantly, they were games we would have liked to buy and no shortage of variety at all."

It’s hard to believe that the company which faced so many controversies over DRM, indie gaming, eSRAM, resolutions and so on could have had not one but two great conferences in a row. It began at E3 2014, shortly after Phil Spencer took over head of the Xbox division and promised nothing but games at the biggest show of the year. No TV shows, very little Kinect – just games, games and more games. More importantly, they were games we would have liked to buy and no shortage of variety at all.

This was the scenario at Gamescom as well. While Microsoft wasn’t announcing new projects left and right, it still stood out with a few indie game announcements, Rise of the Tomb Raider’s timed exclusivity, in-depth gameplay for Quantum Break and new details regarding Halo: The Master Chief Collection and Halo 5: Guardians.

It was a good 1.5 hours’ worth of gaming information and relatively important reveals to keep us hyped about the console well into the New Year. Heck, we even got to see more of Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare’s single-player campaign and received an open beta date for Evolve.

"Sony seemingly forgot about the PS Vita and Project Morpheus, marking a royal snub to the former and a rather baffling absence of the latter."

By contrast, Sony seemed to have been determined to shine the spotlight away from its major AAA releases and on to its indie games. Yes, we’re excited about WiLD and Alienation, and even slightly intrigued about Hellblade, but it’s a shame that games like The Order: 1886, LittleBigPlanet 3 and Bloodborne received a decreased focus at Gamescom.

Not only that but Sony seemingly forgot about the PS Vita and Project Morpheus, marking a royal snub to the former and a rather baffling absence of the latter. With all the mutations that the PS Vita has been going through – from an overpriced collection of gimmicks to portable PS3 to “portable” PS4 (via Remote Play) to indie machine to cross platform medium – it’s utterly amazing that Sony chose to ignore it like this.

The handheld isn’t doing badly either as it still competes fairly well against the Nintendo 3DS in Japan. By not emphasizing games, much less acknowledging the handheld’s existence (unless you count the stupendously stupid Vita TV), Sony risks telling existing consumers that they simply don’t matter.

We’re not exactly big fans of EA’s presentation either. This time around, we thankfully received more gameplay footage of upcoming titles and a decreased presence of sports titles (though FIFA 15 and NHL 15 still took up a significant amount of time).

"The real tipping point was Battlefield: Hardline. Unlike Sledgehammer Games, Visceral didn’t choose to do a separate multiplayer reveal followed by some campaign footage."

Dragon Age: Inquisition looked great but Bioware’s Shadow Realms felt like an extremely damp squib. All that hype for a free to play multiplayer title with bland visuals? Again, we’d like to play it before judging it but the whole “four versus one” mechanic is being done a lot better somewhere else.

And as much as EA wants us to get excited about The Sims 4, it just doesn’t make for great presentations. It didn’t help that we witnessed the birth of a virtual Peter Moore, shirtless and tattooed, whose sole goal in life was to be consumed by a horse plant. Is this how we’re wasting time at conferences now? With jokes that only the company men and women will find funny?

But the real tipping point was Battlefield: Hardline. Unlike Sledgehammer Games, Visceral didn’t choose to do a separate multiplayer reveal followed by some campaign footage. No, we got an extended – and I mean extended – look at Battlefield: Hardline’s single player mode. On the one hand, it introduced some much needed mechanics to the experience. On the other hand, we weren’t impressed. Would it have been so difficult to showcase an extended look at the multiplayer, especially the new modes that were announced, since everyone will be buying the game for this anyway? You could then probably do a small smidgeon of highlights from the campaign. Regardless, EA’s conference was a vast improvement over E3.

Microsoft still “won” the contest at Gamescom and impressed us not only with their ability to market upcoming titles but by introducing new efforts, generating headlines and somehow finding a way to balance it all out – with nary a mention of Kinect, motion gaming or TV shows in sight. We’ll see how Tokyo Game Show 2014 pans out, especially since the Xbox One will be entering the Japanese market this September, but hopefully this momentum will continue into 2015.

Sony is revealing some more information on PS4 SharePlay, a rather interesting feature coming in system update 2.0 that lets you remotely play single-player games on a friend’s console or join them in a multiplayer game.

According to GameSpot, SharePlay sessions will only last for an hour. You can start a new session and resume progress – which is possible since you can save game data on your own PS4 – but you’ll still have to deal with the pain of being interrupted one hour in. For some games like Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn, which require a good solid hour (at least) for raids, it can be highly inconvenient.

Regardless, just about any DualShock 4 game will be supported by SharePlay which gives you a wide range of titles to try out. SharePlay will be out later this year – are you looking forward to it? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.

In between showing off the game’s snazzy combat and awe-inspiring visuals, BioWare producer Cameron Lee talked about the same sex relationships in Dragon Age: Inquisition. Lee admitted to being baffled that this was still an issue for many people.

“It’s an important topic. It goes back to fantasy fulfilment. Your fantasies may be different to mine in terms of gender, sexuality, race, class, how you look, all these things. We’re not going to force you to be a fixed character, that you have to be this male guy that runs through the world and looks a certain way, walks a certain way. We even give you choices of voices.

“So why picking a gender or sexuality is an issue is beyond me. We have the technology to do it, and we have for a long time, so why not let your fantasy be different?”

Dragon Age: Inquisition will be out this November for Xbox One, Xbox 360, PS3, PS4 and PC, and will apparently feature more avenues for different kinds of relationships than before.

(Source)

Microsoft may have made the biggest news at Gamescom with its announcement of timed exclusivity for Rise of the Tomb Raider but Sony isn’t worried. PlayStation Europe head Jim Ryan told CVG that third party partnerships with publishers like Activision for Destiny and a large network of studios insured the publisher wouldn’t need to procure exclusivity for third party titles.

“When you complement those two things we think that gives us a pretty complete position in the market. So do we feel the need to go out and buy outright exclusivity? Probably not.

“You saw last night [at Sony’s press conference] that before the media briefing we showed updated videos of games that we had revealed at E3. That’s because we wanted to keep the show itself full of new, fresh things. We think that gave us a good, strong, convincing portfolio of exclusive stuff and we’re happy with that.”

What are your thoughts on the matter, especially since Sony only really showed off indie titles at Gamescom? Let us know below.

Remedy Entertainment’s Quantum Break was finally showcased in all its glory during Microsoft’s Gamescom press conference and the gameplay has us heavily intrigued. But what about the live action TV show that was to run parallel to the game and focus on the villain Paul Serene? Xbox Entertainment has been shut down so clearly the TV show won’t be happening.

The live action sequences will still serve a purpose though, acting as junction points for players to make important decisions while playing as Serene. This will influence the timeline you ultimately take part in, according to creative director Sam Lake.

Speaking to Digital Spy, Lake said that, “Both the game and the show ship on the same disc and are tied together in multiple ways that the player can affect with their choices.

“You will be playing him – our equivalent of action movie scenes [where a villain is] planning and making his moves, but interactive. You play that scene, you see those glimpses of the future, and you make a choice – that this is the future I want to become reality in my game.

“You make a choice, and it’s kind of an interactive player-generated cliffhanger at the end of the act. And then you watch an episode of the show and immediately you start seeing consequences of the choice that you make.”

Quantum Break will be releasing in 2015 for the Xbox One. Are you looking forward to it? Let us know below.

Of all the big name games to be showcased at this year’s Gamescom – which was full of surprises like Rise of the Tomb Raider, new IPs from Michel Ancel and Housemarque and the announcement of Hideo Kojima’s Silent Hills – it was rather odd to see Rockstar’s Grand Theft Auto 5 absent. The open world title will be releasing later this year for Xbox One, PC and PS4.

However, according to vice president of Sony Worldwide Studios Europe Michael Denny in conversation with VG247, “I don’t think you should read anything into it. GTA is coming to PlayStation 4. It’s going to be fantastic for everybody. We just had nothing new to update on last night.”

It’s interesting because Rockstar has yet to reveal a definitive release date for the game which will be out in Q3/Q4 of 2014. Nonetheless, Rockstar isn’t known for making announcements at conferences, this year’s E3 being the sole exception, so we’ll need to stay tuned for more details.

The Creative Assembly’s Alien: Isolation was playable at this year’s Gamescom and Sega released a new CGI trailer, simply titled “Improvise”. Check it out above.

Alien: Isolation offers quite a lot in terms of gameplay – aside from survival, you’ll also have the option to craft various items, use a flamethrower and keep track of Xenomorphs using the motion tracker. You’ll be playing as Amanda Ripley and facing the same nightmares that took down her mother 15 years ago. It’s a harrowing journey and will help attendees be prepared for when the full game releases this October.

Though you’ll have weapons, Alien: Isolation is very much in the tone of the original film which means you’ll need to use your wits to survive. It will be releasing on Xbox One, Xbox 360, PS3, PS4 and PC on October 7th. Are you looking forward to the game? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.