With the number of titles – like Borderlands 3 – that are becoming exclusive or timed exclusive to the Epic Games Store for PC, it’s interesting to see how consumers are reacting. Though many blame Epic Games, especially since it’s not saying “no” to such deals, the decision does very much fall on publishers of those games as well. Take The Outer Worlds, Obsidian Entertainment’s upcoming first person RPG, which is exclusive for one year to the Epic Games Store and Windows Store on PC.

After showcasing some new gameplay at PAX East, director of communications Mikey Dowling fielded questions about the game. Dowling started off about the Epic Games Store exclusivity and said, “I just wanted to say one question that maybe, if you’ve messaged me on Instagram, or Facebook, or Twitter, or text me, or DMed me – any kind of thing – about the Epic Games Store. We just wanted to let you know that our Private Division partners are fantastic and we love working with them. It’s a decision that they made for the game.

“We’re just excited to be working on the game with them, and we want to just talk about this awesome game that you just saw.”

The Outer Worlds will be coming to Steam, but in 2020. In the meantime, it will launch for Xbox One and PS4 along with PC later this year. Thus far, we’ve learned that the game will have a survival mode called “Supernova” and a linear story with playtime that can vary between 15 to 40 hours. Stay tuned for more details on it in the coming months.

SNK have announced a collection of their long-running fighting franchise, Samurai Shodown, during a panel at PAX East 2019, which you can check out below. The collection will include six games from the classic fighting franchise, Samurai Shodown 1 through 5, as well as V Special, an updated version of Samurai Shodown V. The collection encompasses the entire catalogue of mainline games that saw releases on SNK’s NeoGeo game system.

The collection is being handled by Digital Eclipse, who have worked on several similar collections over the past years, including the first Mega Man Legacy Collection, The Disney Afternoon Collection, Street Fighter 30^th Anniversary Collection, and most recently SNK 40^th Anniversary Collection.

While no release date was given, it was stated the anthology would launch this fall on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Switch, and PC.

Meanwhile, if you’re more worried about what lies ahead rather than looking forward to re-releases of past games, there’s more Samurai Shodown coming later this year as well. In fact, at the same panel, SNK also revealed a new character that’s being added to this year’s sequel. Check her out through here.

Pathologic 2, the follow up to the 2005 cult classic, is coming to PC soon, and it’s both a sequel and a revisiting of the original, according to producer Andrei Podoprigora, who talked in detail about the game at PAX East in an interview with Gamereactor. While the game will see you return to the same town and characters as the original game, Podoprigora promises the story of the game goes much deeper than its predecessor, to the point where it feels like a completely new game (which it is, given the “2” in its name).

“This is a revised version of the game, it’s somewhere between a remake and a sequel because […] the town and the characters in the game are more-or-less the same, but the story is so much deeper and so much more revised, so we decided to make it Pathologic 2 to avoid confusion,” said Podoprigora.

The game follows a doctor who returns to his home town to see it ravaged by plague, along with many mysterious and sinister happenings that he must investigate. The campaign is based around scavenging for food to survive in the harsh, disease-ridden town and helping out locals with quests. It will see release on PC in May, with an Xbox One version to follow later in the year.

If you’ve been keeping track of RAGE 2, the sequel to id Software’s 2010 first person shooter, then you probably know the differences from its predecessor are pretty hefty. Along with a more bombastic colour palette, there’s a greater focus on abilities, chaining them together with weapons, and performing extravagant kills. id Software studio director Tim Willits feels it’s an “evolutionary step” from the original.

Speaking to GameReactor at PAX East, Willits said, “RAGE really set the stage for things we did in DOOM 2016 and Quake Champions and this is an evolutionary step where with the special abilities, the slam and the shatter, kind of allows you to orchestrate the combat the way that you want to. And our guns are very meaty and over the top. We try to get the player into the action. So, I think, really the biggest thing is speed, the abilities, and the weapons have really come a long way from the original.”

Bethesda recently showcased more gameplay footage from RAGE 2 during a PAX East panel. We got to see what some of the underground environments are like, how the Overdrive meter works, and the ability tree that players can invest in. Suffice it to say, the sequel is looking like it’s a lot more action-packed than its predecessor ever aspired to be.

Releasing on May 14th, RAGE 2 was initially reported to be exclusive to the Bethesda Launcher on PC. Thankfully, it’s since been confirmed for launch on Steam. It will also be coming to PS4 and Xbox One.

id Software’s RAGE 2 was on display during Bethesda’s second Game Day at PAX East 2019. Though the panel went on for a couple of hours, new gameplay showcasing the first person shooter’s underground environments was showcased. Check it out below at the timestamp.

Venturing underground will give players more of a corridor shooter vibe akin to DOOM, as per Bethesda. We get a look at the Overdrive meter, which seems to dole out more damage when activated. The different abilities and skills that players can unlock are also showcased later in the video.

RAGE 2 will be releasing on May 14th for Xbox One, PS4, and PC. Developed by id Software and Avalanche Studios, it sees players roaming about the wasteland as Walker, who battles the Authority and runs into different factions with their own agendas. Thankfully, unlike Fallout 76 at launch, RAGE 2 will be releasing on Steam as well as the Bethesda Store when it arrives in May.

Before Gearbox Software got around to revealing Borderlands 3, Yacht Club Games announced the new game it was publishing: Cyber Shadow. It’s a 2D action platformer from Mechanical Head Studios that features a shinobi named Shadow fighting against a world overrun by machines. Thanks to Handsome Phantom on YouTube, some new direct feed gameplay has emerged from PAX East 2019.

If you’ve played Shovel Knight from Yacht Club, then the essentials of Cyber Shadow will be familiar. Featuring a retro 8-bit presentation with a pulsing soundtrack, players will battle across Mekacity to save Shadow’s clan-mates. There are new skills to unlock and more than a dozen bosses to battle, along with secrets to discover.

Cyber Shadow will retail for $14.99 when it releases for Xbox One, PS4, PC, and Nintendo Switch. Stay tuned for more details in the coming months. In the meantime, you can look forward to Yacht Club’s Shovel Knight Showdown, a fighting game featuring Shovel Knight’s colourful cast that’s out on April 9th.

Obsidian Entertainment was in attendance at PAX East 2019 to showcase a hefty amount of gameplay for The Outer Worlds. A demo walkthrough for the first person shooter/RPG takes us through the city of Byzantium, meant for the more well-off citizens of the frontier. Check it out below (courtesy of MrRedRivers on YouTube).

Representing the game’s alpha state, the demo showcases how quests play out and how your companions – Nyoka and Felix – act during gameplay. Dialog systems (like remaining “stoically silent” and exuding “wordless fury”), character customization, and much more are also revealed. The combat seems up to snuff, especially with the slow-mo and weapon variety.

The Outer Worlds is due to release this year for Xbox One, PS4, and PC. It will be exclusive to the Epic Games Store and Windows Store on PC for a year, releasing for Steam in 2020. For more information on the gun types and Tactical Time Dilation system, head here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ixpOzeeTZs

In the midst of disappointing releases like Anthem, it’s easy to forget about Bethesda’s Fallout 76. Releasing late last year as an online-only experience, the title saw a myriad of bugs, performance issues, and controversies. Though Bethesda Game Studios has been launching new updates with fixes and new content, many have wondered what director Todd Howard’s stance on the whole deal has been.

At a recent PAX East panel, Howard spoke out about the game’s problems, noting that the development team had “a lot of difficulties during development”. “For us, Fallout 76 is a very, very new thing, for our studio,” he said. “We knew we were going to have a lot of bumps coming out with the game, and we definitely had some, some of them much harder than even we anticipated. This was a very new and different project for us. We’re still doing other things that are more traditional, as I would call them, Bethesda games.

“But this one, to be honest, we had a lot of difficulties during development and sometimes those difficulties do show up on the screen. You never want them to. We grew the studio, we’re four different studios now in North America, the one in Rockville, Austin, Dallas, and Montreal, and this was a game that really took a ton of people across those four studios coming together to make work. And we knew launch was just going to be the beginning. We’re really excited that the game actually did very, very well.”

Interestingly, Fallout 76 isn’t a massive flop for Bethesda. Howard noted that there were “millions of players”, before adding, “We’re getting tons of feedback. Our goal is to build kind of a Fallout platform. We have tons of ideas, it’s been kind of a wild journey so far and we’re excited, there’s a ton of cool content coming.

“It’s been an incredible experience. We will do anything we can to reward that, this year, next year and in the coming years we have big things planned.”

Fallout 76 will be receiving more content in the coming months, like the Vault raids coming in the Nuclear Winter update this Summer. These are meant for parties of four players and are completely instanced. On May 23rd, the Legendary vendor “Purveyor” will also be available to let players re-roll stats on Legendary items. Then there’s the Wastelanders update arriving in Fall, which will revamp the game significantly.

To hear more about Fallout 76 and other projects Bethesda has in development, check out the full day one panel below.

Gearbox Software’s Borderlands 2 continues to see updates all these years with it and Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel receiving Ultra HD texture packs for free. Borderlands 2 VR, the company’s translation of the classic into VR, will also receive a fairly substantial update. All of the DLC will be added for free in the Summer.

There are four main story add-ons for Borderlands 2 – Captain Scarlett and Her Pirate’s Booty, Mr. Torgue’s Campaign of Carnage, Sir Hammerlock’s Big Game Hunt, and Tiny Tina’s Assault on Dragon Keep. The question now is whether packs like Ultimate Vault Hunter and the Headhunter DLC will also be added for free. We’ll have to wait for more information in the next few months.

Gearbox Software revealed the first gameplay trailer for Borderlands 3 with more details promised on April 3rd. Fans have been theorizing that the release date – apparently set for October – was hidden in plain sight with the reveal trailer. In the meantime, Borderlands: Game of the Year Edition will be out on April 3rd for Xbox One, PS4 and PC (with base game owners on PC receiving the update for free).

You might have been hoping for Bethesda to bring its two most eagerly anticipated upcoming games—The Elder Scrolls 6 and Starfield, both announced last year—to E3 this year. However, during PAX East at a panel, Todd Howard, the director of the Elder Scrolls series, confirmed that neither game will be at E3 this year, and that both are a ways out for now. 

“Before everyone asks, please be patient. It’s going to be a long time. It’s not something we’re going to be talking about at E3, either of those games, this year. And so patience, please, but you know, given the anniversary, we did want to give everybody a taste,” Howard said, before delving into a discussion of how Bethesda will be upgrading the technology and engine they use for The Elder Scrolls 6.

It’s good that they are taking their time with these games, and that the early failure of Fallout 76 has not caused them to rush either of them to the market (which would have been catastrophic for the health of the IP and their own brand). In the end, fans are eagerly awaiting The Elder Scrolls 6, but if it actually being what fans want it to be warrants time, then it’s good that Bethesda actually take that time, instead of rushing something to the market. And along the way, if they also update their now ageing technology, then that’s another win for everyone involved.

As for what their E3 may entail then, I have to imagine they’ll show us Wolfenstein Youngblood, DOOM Eternal, the upcoming expansions for The Elder Scrolls Online and Fallout 76, and maybe a couple of projects from Arkane and Tango Gameworks. It may not be the most exciting thing in the world (though hey, I would love to see more DOOM Eternal), but at least they’re actually showing up.