PlayStation Plus subscribers can look forward to a fairly packed catalog in the Instant Game Collection. Sony has announced the free games out for various PlayStation platforms next month and they’re quite interesting.

From November 3rd onwards, PS4 users can get their hands on The Walking Dead: Season Two, Dragon Fin Soup and Magicka 2. Given the nature The Walking Dead (whose first season was actually available for free on Xbox One in October), expect plenty of hard choices, gruesome scenes and sad moments.

PlayStation 3 users will receive Dragon Fin Soup and two big name titles in the form of Mass Effect 2 and Beyond Good & Evil. If you haven’t played Beyond Good & Evil, then it’s worth a look for its clever story-telling. Mass Effect 2 is only one of Bioware’s best games ever so not much motivation needed there.

PS Vita users will also get their hands on Dragon Fin Soup along with Invizimals. What are your thoughts on the free games for PS Plus this month? Let us know in the comments.

That’s not to say the games in this aren’t fun at all. Magicka 2 offers something for people who are just looking to sit down and play a game for a couple of hours. Magicka 2 even gives the option of laying waste to entire towns if that’s what floats your boat. In the end, it’s one of the things that certainly floated mine, mainly out of some level of frustration.

The game kicks off with a narrator sporting a rather obvious impression of someone from the Carpathian mountains. In other words, someone who wants to sound like the stereo typical Dracula. This is just one of the times where the game tries to bring the funny, but ends up falling a bit short. The narrator who is in fact a vampire named Vlad also appears in the game, someone my character was supposed to meet up with at various points, but it’s not remotely clear why.

"One bonus in this game is that you can recruit your friends to help you along the way in your travels. I specifically tried to get into a few online games, and it goes without saying it's a ton of fun. "

In fact, early on, there’s literally no reason why Vlad is in the game, or why he’s interacting with my character. My character was one of the wizards that is seen quite often in this particular Paradox series. I had the same powers that have been featured in those other games. There was one aspect I was happy to see available that didn’t work for me when I was trying Wizard Wars. I was able to plug in an old Xbox 360 controller and use that instead of a keyboard and mouse. There’s a lot to be said the keyboard and mouse approach when talking about computer gaming most of the time, but I’ve found that in a game like this, a controller is the way to go.

There is just so much to control in this game that having to worry about clicking in the right spot or clicking and holding the button is just too much. If the movement of my character was a little more intuitive, then that may not be the case. Because there’s no intuition at all, I found that it was much easier to guide my little wizard around a rock than have him constantly bump into it.

The controller also makes spell casting a bit easier, once I was able to figure out the buttons that bring up different spells. Considering that the game is unforgiving when it comes to the speed of enemies, that’s a definite plus. The speed at which enemies come is something to take note of. Some of the more basic trolls and beasts look like they’re very easy to beat. It turns out that I needed to be able to figure out a spell and a defense quicker than I thought I would. That helps Magicka 2 stand out among the crowd when it comes to these games.

"The story mode just isn’t good enough to be all that enticing. That’s why the game never really gets off the ground as a sequel."

One bonus in this game is that you can recruit your friends to help you along the way in your travels. I specifically tried to get into a few online games, and it goes without saying it’s a ton of fun. There are slots to invite friends from my friend list and that seems like a very cool feature, when getting through the puzzles and ever growing baddies that I encountered along the way. I can invite my friends along for the admittedly less than flushed out story mode, or I can bring them along on something called the Challenge mode. This is basically Magicka 2’s version of an endless wave mode. You can go to any of the settings that you’ll see in the story mode and see just how long you can last.

Because this game struck me as one that very much wants to be a title people pick up and play every now and then, but don’t sit down and play for hours, this particular mode was a pretty good idea. Being able to shoot my death beam at as many enemies as could come at me, while also freezing them and every once in a while swallowing up an enemy in a plume of fire was a ton of fun. The issue is that this isn’t really supposed to be the kind of game where you spend all your time just blasting wave after wave of enemies.

The story mode just isn’t good enough to be all that enticing. That’s why the game never really gets off the ground as a sequel. Magicka 2 actually falls short of its immediate predecessor in Wizard Wars and that’s not something to brag about.

This game was reviewed on the PC.

Magicka 2 is almost, almost, almost here, and ahead of its launch, Paradox is showing us more of the gleeful mayhem and witty charm that made the original game such a hit among gamers. They couldn’t have done a better job of that than this new trailer, which shows off co-operative play of the title, and is, as Paradox reminds us, completely unscripted.

The result can honestly be a bit overwhelming and hard to follow, but as a fan of the first game, I found that it had elicited a fair few chuckles from me at a lot of points, and it made me want to get my hands on Magicka 2 already. That said, your own mileage may vary.

Magicka 2 is due out on PC (including Windows and Linux platforms) and PlayStation 4 later this month; for more coverage on the chaotic co-op shooter game, stay tuned to GamingBolt, and we will keep you updated.

Nonetheless, there’s plenty to look forward to in May, whether you’re gaming the PC or consoles, interested in a little space murder or some ol’ fashioned World War II era murder. Can every game on this list deliver? Maybe they will and maybe they won’t but they’re well worth looking forward to. Here are our picks for the top 5 games releasing in May 2015.

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt

CD Projekt RED’s open world action RPG is easily the biggest release of May, if not the entire year. And we don’t mean that in terms of just hype – The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt boasts a huge, expansive world filled with roughly 100 hours of content. You can bed several women, enter relationships, take up monster bounties, hunt bandits, slaughter bar patrons over a verbal slight, take part in blood rituals, race horses, sail on the wide open sea and maybe play the story too if you’re in the mood.

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt will also feature some of the prettiest visuals we’ve seen in a medieval fantasy game with zero loading times while travelling the continent of the Northern Realms. Whether you’ve played the previous games or not, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt will easily demand your attention when it releases on May 19th for Xbox One, PS4 and PC.

Destiny: House of Wolves

House of Wolves isn’t a full retail release for Destiny. In fact, some would strain to even call it an expansion. Nonetheless, it brings a wide range of changes and new additions to the world of Destiny. Aside from a new Social Space, new story missions and new bounties, the launch of House of Wolves will serve to make all equipment relevant. Vault of Glass, Crota’s End and even starting Legendary gear from the game’s release in September can now be levelled to the new damage and light cap. But that’s not all.

There will be plenty of new Exotics, new Vendor gear, new Crucible Legendaries, a new daily objective system for PvP, the Prison of Elders mode, Trials of Osiris and much more. Sure, the unique content won’t rival the likes of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, much less Tiny Tina’s Assault on Dragon Keep for Borderlands 2 but it should easily add a few months of playtime to Destiny’s end game. House of Wolves is out on May 19th for Xbox One, Xbox 360, PS3 and PS4.

Project CARS

Finally, after delay upon delay upon delay, Slightly Mad Studios’ Project CARS is finally releasing for current gen consoles. It’s amazing to think the racing simulator has been delayed so many times, especially when you consider how the previous gen versions had been cancelled in the process. Now that we can look forward to its release on May 7th, we can focus on the features being offered.

Project CARS will have an impressive 52 tracks and 67 cars in the initial release (or at least in the first DLC after launch). There will be a variety of different paths to take and tons of events of events including some that can stretch for multiple days. Physics simulation also looks to be top-tier with Slightly Mad enlisting the help of Ben Collins, who worked as the “Stig” on the popular Top Gear show. There’s a lot of hope riding on Project CARS and we can’t wait to see what it offers in this era of Gran Turismo and Forza Motorsport.

Magicka 2

Co-op wizarding hijinks return in Magicka 2, except this time you’ll be in a world without magic and have to work from the ground up to wipe out evil. Be careful though – all the other remaining wizards have pretty much lost their minds and begun attacking each other. Luckily, there will be a dynamic spell casting system to allow you and your allies to take on any opposition while cracking appropriate wisecracks.

Though Magicka 2 may not seem like the biggest game of May, especially compared to some of the other heavy-hitters, it looks to be a strong follow-up to its surprisingly successful predecessor. If you had even a smidgeon of fun smiting enemies in the original, then Magicka 2 warrants a look when it releases on May 26th for PC.

Wolfenstein: The Old Blood

MachineGames’ Wolfentein: The New Order wasn’t meant to overwhelm us with its quality. However, if you let it, the intense dual-wielding and murdering of alternate World War II history was a fun exercise in first person shooting. Wolfenstein: The Old Blood will be going backward in several ways, focusing on two episodes leading up to the events of the first game and explaining how Wilhelm “Deathshead” Strasse acquired the technology needed to rule the world in The New Order.

The second episode focuses on a Nazi archaeologist and several different artifacts that could possibly contain dark and ancient powers. Various teasers have indicated that this includes Nazi zombies. And how can you say no to Nazi zombies? Wolfenstein: The Old Blood is out on May 5th digitally for Xbox One, PS4 and PC with a retail release on May 15th onwards Europe.

Magicka: Wizard Wars, the riff on Paradox’s popular series which sees players duel each other, will be leaving Steam: Early Access for an official release later this month, Paradox has confirmed.

The full version of the game will be far more full featured than what we have right now in Early Access- will have a new Soul Harvest game mode with new maps, longer rounds and more potential spell-based accidents, among other things. There will be an update to the Early Access version on April 14th that adds a few new things, including a new progression system, a revamped in-game economy and a new spell trial system.

The game itself is free to play, and will remain free to play, so you can go on and check it out right now, if you wanted to, without giving up a dime.

Magicka: Wizard Wars is not Magicka 2- that game is a more traditional sequel to the original, and it will be launching on May 26 on PC and PlayStation 4. Stay tuned.

When Magicka first arrived on the scene in 2011, I don’t think anybody would have expected it to become as popular as it did. Now Paradox Interactive have announced the launch date and the pre-order details for the next instalment in the Magicka series.

Set to launch on PC and the PlayStation 4 on May 26th of this year, the latest iteration of the popular magic mixing game will be available for pre-order on the PlayStation 4 soon. PC players however can get their pre-order in now. The announcement of this was accompanied by a nice little 60FPS trailer which you can watch above.

Going on sale at the low price of $14.99 across both platforms, players that pre-order the game will be granted access to the game a little bit earlier than others. You and three of your friends will get into a sneak peek version of the game on May 5th on both PS4 and PC. For European gamers on PlayStation, that will be set for May 6th.

Players that pre-order the game will also be given a unique in game robe as part of the “Game of Robes” which will be available in both Magicka 2 and Magicka Wizard Wars, the PvP counterpart of Magicka.

Paradox Entertainment are following up on the success of the original Magicka, the creative and quirky take on the co-op action RPG genre that Blizzard birthed with its decidedly more somber Diablo games, with a sequel. Magicka 2 is supposed to release not only on PCs, like the original, but also on the PlayStation 4. To make sure you stay in the loop about the game, Paradox have released a brand new trailer for the game, and in typical Paradox and Magicka style, it’s sharp, funny, and incredibly self aware.

Today’s trailer is a very special interview with absolutely not a vampire, as the series’ famous guide Vlad – sorry, “Brad” – opens up and shares his inner demons with the world. It’s heart-rending stuff. Try not to judge until you’ve walked a mile in his gothic boots, Paradox reminds us. We agree, and even if we didn’t the new trailer is great, so just go ahead and check it out.

We’ll keep you posted.

The team at Paradox Interactive and Pieces Interactive are hard at work on developing the PlayStation 4 and PC versions of Magicka 2. In our interview with the game’s Associate Producer Peter Cornelius, we asked his thoughts on the PS4 and whether it is safe to assume that the console is basically a gaming PC with potential for high end capabilities.

Peter’s reply was short but upto the point. “That’s a pretty good way to put it,” he said to GamingBolt. We also asked about how Paradox’s partnership came about with Sony, to which he replied,”How did chocolate ice cream come about? Some combinations are just meant to happen.”

He was also all praise for the DualShock 4 and explained how he prefers it over a mouse and keyboard. “I know many think of Magicka as a mouse and keyboard game and it still is for those who want to play that way. I however have completely converted to the game pad.”

“The game pad works incredibly well. One stick is for moving around, the other for directing ones’ spells. It makes magic casting simple without making it easy. But the difficulty is in the game–the wave of long toothed beasts coming at you, making you stressed and accidentally trying to heal yourself with death magic. The game pad is your friend, not an extra obstacle.”

“I will personally not go back to mouse and keyboard,” he added.

Magicka 2 is due this year for the PlayStation 4 and PC.

GamingBolt got in touch with the game’s Associate Producer Peter Cornelius to know how the game’s development is shaping up, reasons behind the PS4 exclusivity deal, gameplay mechanics and more. Check out Peter’s response below.

Rashid Sayed: To begin with, can you please introduce yourself and tell us how you got into the games business?

Peter Cornelius: Hello! I’m Peter Cornelius, Associate Producer on Paradox Interactive’s Magicka 2 team. I’ve always made games; simple mods, pen and paper role-playing scenarios, and then I learned some scripting and made even more. Unfortunately I had this idea that maybe working with games wasn’t a real job, and so I continued my psychology degree. During my studies I found a great job in localization-QA. I was just gonna do it for the summer… Some years of QA, design, and production later here I am at Paradox working with Magicka. I still haven’t finished my Psych degree.

Today I live in Stockholm, Sweden, where I make sure to celebrate National Cinnamon Bun Day (October 4th) each year and never leave home without a pen. Who knows when a good idea needs writing down?!

Rashid Sayed: Why is Magicka 2 a console exclusive to the PlayStation 4? Why is the game not coming to the Xbox One?

Peter Cornelius: We had a few meetings with Sony and realised we agree on a lot of things; what makes a good game, our attitude towards our fans, etc. It’s a great partnership, and we’re really excited to bring this game to PlayStation. Blowing up a friend with a homemade spell-salad is 16 times more fun when you’re within punching distance of said friend.

"Combine Fire and Water to make steam. Combine the Shield element with Lightning and Arcane to create a deadly barrier, or imbue your sword with Life and voila - you've got a healing sword to quickly heal a friend (and doing just a little damage - we call it acupuncture)."

Rashid Sayed: The original Magicka was developed by Arrowhead Game Studios and now the sequel is being developed by Pieces Interactive. So how do you plan to maintain the original vision of the series?

Peter Cornelius: Arrowhead laid a great foundation, creating a still unique spell system and defining competitive co-op. We’re proud to have developed Magicka with them, and wish them all the best on their new adventures. Pieces made several DLCs together with Arrowhead, and several more with Paradox afterward; Pieces have created some of our best Magicka memories. It was just logical to let them take the step from DLCs to making a full game. We have part of the original Magicka team at Paradox, though, guiding the vision. But honestly, we (Paradox and Pieces) have lived and breathed Magicka for such a long time now, we sometimes feel awkward in reality.

Rashid Sayed: Tell us from a top level, what kind of gameplay changes are you bringing to Magicka 2?

Peter Cornelius: Fans will feel right at home. There are still 8 elements. 5 elements at a time can be combined into a spell, and then cast in 4 different ways: Force cast, Self-cast, AoE, and weapon imbuing.

Combine Fire and Water to make steam. Combine the Shield element with Lightning and Arcane to create a deadly barrier, or imbue your sword with Life and voila – you’ve got a healing sword to quickly heal a friend (and doing just a little damage – we call it acupuncture). While the same foundation is still there, we have learned from several years of spell casting and are improving a few things.

The first new thing you’ll notice is that you can now move and cast spells at the same time. This makes Magicka 2 more fast paced, with more chaos and new challenges: Friends running into your beams, healing enemies, crossing beams – making them more powerful or creating an explosive anti-matter… Still you are always in control. When something goes wrong it’ll have been your own fault. Magicka is fair. Cranking up the speed simply enhanced everything we already loved about Magicka.

We’ve also worked hard to balance the spell system. For instance we put Lighting over Arcane in the spell hierarchy. This changes some spell combinations but made the whole system more balanced. We’re proud to say there is no one über spell combination. Different enemies are weak and strong against different elements, but also require different tactics. Magicka 2 will keep challanging you to find the best spell combo and tactics throughout the game. Not that there really is one.

How would you deal with fire demons? I’ve seen players ward themselves against Cold (so cold heals them) then go bananas with Cold AoE spells, destroying the demons and healing their friends all at once. Others put up barriers to slow the demons and combine Life, Cold, and Earth – knocking down the horned beasts with a comet loaded with their two nemesis elements. There are many ways to play Magicka 2. And that brings us to the third big thing you’ll notice…

Artifacts! Artifacts are powerful game mutators that are unlocked by playing the campaign and challenges. Artifacts let you tweak Magicka to enhance what you like most about it. Want the game to be harder? Double enemy HP, nerf healing, or remove it altogether. Why not crank up friendly fire damage 100% or 1000% while you’re at it? It’s quite a different game when friends can be one shot killed.

If hardcore isn’t your cup of tea, feel free to do the opposite by boosting wizard HP and damage. I personally like adding an extra layer of humour. I’ve talked all summer about the Sitcom artifact that adds a laugh track. Hearing “the audience” cheer you on, or boo you out, just cracks me up. We have loads of these mutators. I mean it when I say that one playthrough isn’t enough to see all that Magficka 2 can be.

We’ve also improved the whole multiplayer experience. We have working netcode. 😉 You can easily hot join a friend’s session at any time and leave just as easily. The game also scales to the number of players, making sure each encounter is what it should be.

Rashid Sayed: The story of the original was some of sort of let down. What can you tell us about Magicka 2’s storyline? How closely will it tie up with the gameplay?

Peter Cornelius: The story is quite a ride. Yes, it is a linear ride, but so are all the best rollercoasters.

Vlad is back. He is still not a vampire and still throws world saving quests the wizards’ way.

While we’ve put a lot of effort creating a memorable and meaningful narrative, we’ve put just as much effort into filling the world with life. The narrative doesn’t just happen in cut scenes. There are people to talk to, rune stones to read, and lots of secret areas, all of which add something to the lore and the story in its own way.  

"You can do everything from summoning help wearing hockey helmets to responsibly filling the screen with dragon fire. That should give you a good idea of the flavor and range of the Magicks."

Rashid Sayed: And it won’t be a Magicka if there are no Magicks. What can you tell us about those?

Peter Cornelius: You can do everything from summoning help wearing hockey helmets to responsibly filling the screen with dragon fire. That should give you a good idea of the flavor and range of the Magicks. Magic casting will be quicker in Magicka 2, making them a lot more useful and a more viable tactical choice.

Rashid Sayed: The original Magicka had four player co-operative mode. How will this change in the sequel?

Peter Cornelius: Just as the original, Magicka 2 is a 1-4 player competitive co-op game where friendly fire is always on. That’s not changing, but it is improving. We’re making it easier to find multiplayer sessions, letting people from all over the internet play with each other. There are nearly plenty of upsides to this. Not only is it a way to find great people to play with when all your friends are away visiting their grandparents but it’s also a fun way to see and learn new tactics, spell combinations, and at least (temporarily) steal gear.

Of course, all game modes can be played by all parties whether you’re a party of one or a party of four.

Rashid Sayed: Are there any other modes you have been planning for Magicka 2?

Peter Cornelius: Apart from the Adventure mode (Campaign) there are Challenges and Trials. We’re currently looking into ways to create a never-ending flow of challenges…

Rashid Sayed: Can you tell us how did your partnership with PlayStation came about?

Peter Cornelius: How did chocolate ice cream come about? Some combinations are just meant to happen.

A note on the PlayStation version:

I know many think of Magicka as a mouse and keyboard game and it still is for those who want to play that way. I however have completely converted to the game pad.

The game pad works incredibly well. One stick is for moving around, the other for directing ones’ spells. It makes magic casting simple without making it easy. But the difficulty is in the game–the wave of long toothed beasts coming at you, making you stressed and accidentally trying to heal yourself with death magic. The game pad is your friend, not an extra obstacle.

I will personally not go back to mouse and keyboard.

Rashid Sayed: The original Magicka had awesome lighting effects. Having said that, how are you finding the PS4 GPU to handle some of the heavy graphical effects of Magicka 2?

Peter Cornelius: Every platform has its own challenges. I played an early PS4 version just the other day and it’s gorgeous.

Rashid Sayed: Are you targeting 1080p and 60fps on the PS4? Furthermore, do you think most games should running at that standard?

Peter Cornelius: Yup. Life starts at 1080p.

Rashid Sayed: As some who is also working on a PC version, what is your take on the PS4 as a whole? Is it safe to assume it as a gaming PC with potential for high end capabilities?

Peter Cornelius: That’s a pretty good way to put it.

Rashid Sayed: Are there going to be any differences between the PC and PS4 versions?

Peter Cornelius: Nope, we’re making one game for two platforms. All features will be available to all players.

Rashid Sayed: Is there anything else you want to tell us before we let you go?

Peter Cornelius: Thanks for the interview and you have a great site! Thanks for letting us share something we love, your excitement fuels us during our dark winter days.

And just to sum up:

Magicka 2 is a 1-4 player competitive co-op action game, where friendly fire is always on. It’s where you get to play as the most unpredictable, irresponsible and powerful wizards known to fantasy. Make your own spells by mixing up to five elements at one time out of eight available and then cast your spells in four different ways. Prepare for unforgiving hilarity!

Magicka 2 is an upcoming action adventure console exclusive for the PlayStation 4. Given that most games run on at 1080p on the PlayStation 4, will it be a fair expectation that Magicka 2 will achieve the same?

We raised the same question to the game’s Associate Producer Peter Cornelius and he seemed pretty confident of achieving that benchmark. “Yup. Life starts at 1080p,” he said in an interview with GamingBolt. It must also be added that the original Magicka had awesome lighting effects so how is the development team coping with the PS4 GPU to handle some of the heavy graphical effects of Magicka 2 and how are they dealing with the latency of the GDDR5 memory?

According to Peter there are challenges but regardless the game is looking awesome on the PS4. “Every platform has its own challenges. I played an early PS4 version just the other day and it’s gorgeous.”

Paradox Interactive will be publishing the game on PC and PS4 and Pieces Interactive are handling the development duties. Stay tuned for more news and updates regarding Magicka 2.