Not a lot’s been heard about Team Ninja’s Ni-Oh, a difficult hack and slash adventure game that was expected to release for the PS4 this year after its announcement at Tokyo Game Show 2015. However, the developer finally released footage from behind closed doors at the event, showcasing Ni-Oh in all of its glory.

The project is fairly reminiscent of From Software’s Dark Souls series, though Ni-Oh takes place in a Feudal Japan-like setting (and is based off of a script by the legendary Akira Kurosawa). Considering that Team Ninja is also the studio behind Ninja Gaiden, it knows enough about making brutally difficult hack and slash titles.

At this point, Ni-Oh is still slated to release in 2016 for the PlayStation 4. More information will likely be coming at E3 2016 or even from TGS 2016 so stay tuned and let us know what you think of the gameplay footage in the comments below.

Persona 5’s delay still hurts, and it is made even more aggravating by the fact that now Atlus has chosen to broaden the dripfeed, now they are sharing more and more information on the game with us. After the blowout that the game got at TGS last week, we got some more information this week, thanks to various Persona 5 blowouts in multiple magazines.

The newest that we got in the game is a set of brand new screenshots, thanks to Japanese magazine Dengeki, that show off more of the game’s gorgeous artstyle, its exciting gameplay that seems to be a distinct step up from Persona 4, and of the mysterious new party member, Yuusuke Kitagawa, who was originally debuted in the second trailer for Persona 5, which was bundled with the Special Edition for Persona 4: Dancing All Night.

You can check out all of these new screenshots for yourself below. They look awesome, and they make the wait harder. And stay tuned to GamingBolt for more Persona information.

The Tokyo Game Show this year was a breathtaking show that seemed to mark the return of the Japanese console game industry to slow prominence. Epitomized best by the Sony TGS conference, the show this year had loads of great, high profile announcements of Japanese PS4 games, games that looked interesting, and games that were being pegged for international release at that, marking the end of the period of insularity that the Japanese market underwent at the end of last decade.

All of this is reflected in the attendance numbers too- over 268,000 people attended TGS this year, making it one of the most successful TGSs of all time. With over 270,000 people in attendance, the 2013 TGS still holds the record for the most successful year ever- but this year’s was a very close second.

The exact attendance number breakdowns were:

• September 17 (business day) – 29,058 attended
• September 18 (business day) – 29,557 attended
• September 19 (public day) – 97,601 attended (including 10,360 in Family Area)
• September 20 (public day) – 112,230 attended (including 14,517 in Family Area)
• Total attendance – 268,446 (including 24,877 in Family Area)

We also learned that the Tokyo Game Show 2016 will run from September 15 to 18.

(Famitsu, via Gematsu)

The multiplayer beta for the upcoming, highly anticipated fourth and final installment of the Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End will kick off on December 4 worldwide, Sony announced today. It will go on for over a week, and through to December 13.

The news was tucked away at the end of the newest trailer for Uncharted: The Nathan Drake Collection (which you can see for yourself here), the purchase of which is necessary if you want access to the beta. Uncharted: The Nathan Drake Collection will include all three Uncharted campaigns remastered in one package, though none of the multiplayer modes from any of the games will be included- if you want your Uncharted multiplayer fix with the Nathan Drake Collection, this upcoming beta will be your best bet.

Uncharted: The Nathan Drake Collection will launch exclusively on PlayStation 4 next month. Stay tuned to GamingBolt for more coverage and information.

We got our first bit of DLC for the just released and highly critically acclaimed Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain, and contrary to all the speculation about the cut story content being held back, this new DLC seems to be mostly cosmetic that won’t really affect your experience with the game much.

At TGS today, Konami announced that players will be able to get their hands on several Metal Gear Solid 3 themed outfits: jungle fatigues, the sneaking suit, and the tuxedo. Female soldiers get to jump in on the fun and action too, as they will get to dress up in the Boss’s or Eva’s famous costumes. Even D-Horse, Big Boss’ trusty steed, will get new costumes.

In addition to this announcement of new DLC, we also got to see some brand new footage of Metal Gear Online today at TGS. You can see all the new footage for yourself below.

From TGS came more news on the highly anticipated online gameplay mode for Metal Gear Solid 5. We already got a whole lot of new information on the game today, as well as over an hour’s worth of gameplay videos, so really, these screenshots are almost like an information overload for the senses. If you wanted to know more about Metal Gear Online, and were frustrated at a perceived lack of information about the game, you have probably changed your mind by now.

It also helps that Metal Gear Online looks like no other multiplayer action game on the market (and for a change looks compelling enough that it might maintain an active playerbase).

Metal Gear Online will be launching this October for players of The Phantom Pain on Xbox 360, Xbox One, PlayStation 3, and PlayStation 4. PC players will, sadly, have to wait till next year to get their hands on it.

Man, must Atlus be busy- not only are they working on the incredible looking Persona 5 (now launching in 2016, check out its new trailer here), but they also release almost a dozen games a year across their Shin Megami Tensei, Etrian Odyssey, and Persona spin off franchises. Currently, the company is working on Etrian Odyssey V, two Vanillaware games, and Shin Megami Tensei x Fire Emblem in addition to Persona 5, but it seems it has something else in the works too- something brand new.

During Sega’s Tokyo Game Show 2015, Atlus revealed that it has a brand new game that it should be announcing soon. No more details were given- we don’t even know when the game will be announced. For all we know, it is announced during the currently underway 40 hour long Persona stream that Atlus is hosting for TGS.

Whatever it is, we will keep you posted. What do you think it might be? Let us know in the comments below.

Persona 5’s delay is a major reason to be disappointed, but Atlus at least did their very best to soften the blow by giving us an awesome new trailer for the game. The trailer is the longest one we have had for the game so far, and offers us our most in depth look at the game yet. Showcasing the game’s graphics, which look better and more stylish each time we see them, and showing off major story elements, a new, far darker tone for the story, as well as gameplay systems such as battles, Persona summoning, a brand new open world to navigate, and the dungeons themselves at work, the game is seriously looking like it will be the biggest and best Persona game yet.

Apart from the new trailer, we also got a new development diary. It’s in Japanese, so you will almost certainly not understand a lot of what is being said, but if you want to ravenously consume any and all media for the game, by all means go ahead and check it out.

Persona 5 launches exclusively for PS3 and PS4 some time in 2016.

One of the most anticipated games of this year is now one of the most anticipated games of next year. Confirming something we had all long suspected, Atlus today confirmed at TGS that Persona 5 will now be launching in 2016 for the PlayStation 3 and PlayStation 4, in both, Japan and North America.

They didn’t give us too many specifics on the release date, beyond specifying a Summer window for Japan; the North American release should feasibly follow sometime shortly afterwards, but with this game and its protracted development cycle, it is really hard to tell anymore.

“The strengths of the Persona series are compelling characters, a moving, relatable story, and a borderline obsession with minutiae – elements which can’t be rushed or taken lightly. So while Atlus realizes the frustration and disappointment that this must cause for the JRPG-loving public, please know that we are delaying the game in order to make sure the next iteration of the Persona series lives up to the expectations of fans,” the company said in its statement announcing the delay.

Persona 5 is now due to launch for the PlayStation 3 and 4 some time next year, a full three years after its initial official announcement, six years since it first began to be openly discussed by Atlus, and eight years after Persona 4’s release.

For a company that always likes to take detours to pointless side endeavors in their conferences, such as misguided attempts at a PlayStation original TV series, or fill them up with pointless montages to pad out time and make it seem like they have more content than they really do, the PlayStation TGS conference yesterday was almost dramatically refreshing.

From start to end, the conference was tight, fast paced, and no nonsense. There was almost no break- Sony started out with showing games, continued showing games with literally no breaks and gaps in the middle, except for the requisite ones necessary to invite third party executives on stage, and sometimes, out of nowhere, we’d get a new game just casually announced via a trailer that would play on the screen without warning.

"This is precisely the kind of format that all game press conferences should strive for"

This is precisely the kind of format that all game press conferences should strive for- the TGS conference yesterday is a study in contrast, compared to the big E3 and Gamescom shows that Sony and Microsoft put up every year. Without the bloat, all we got was an avalanche of game showings and announcements- the focus was just on the games, damn it, rather than the obviously rehearsed and cringe inducing banter that company executives put up on stage, pointless video montages, or projects that only vaguely and tangentially relate to the games on hand. There was no pontificating on the future of the industry by paid presenters or executives who clearly don’t actually care about games, but are just saying so because they are paid to. There really wasn’t much of a presentation at all, honestly- from frontend to backend, it was just a string of trailers and announcements.

And what trailers and announcements they were, too. Yesterday’s TGS showing is probably the strongest denouement of the ‘Japanese games industry is dying’ narrative that has been pushed so hard over the last few years. What we saw yesterday recalled the best days of Japanese games, from the SNES and PS1 eras. Major franchises such as Kingdom Hearts, Dark Souls, Persona, Yakuza, Resident Evil, and Dragon Quest were on show, mid tier games and publishers such as Toukiden 2, New DanganRonpa 3, King of Fighters, SaGa, and Star Ocean were shown off, every major third party – from Square Enix to Atlus, Tecmo Koei to Capcom, Sega to Spike Chunsoft to From – had a major, exciting product waiting in the wings, and moreover, some extremely impressive first party games were on display too- the long awaited expansion for this year’s smash hit Bloodborne, The Old Hunters, was finally unveiled, as was the sequel to the fan favorite PS Vita game Gravity Rush.

The best part is, most of these announcements were games we will obviously see in the west- too often, in the last few years, watching a Japanese conference has felt like watching a celebration of Japan’s insularity from the rest of the world. That was not the case yesterday- obviously we will see the new Dark Souls in the west. Obviously we will see Kingdom Hearts in the west. Of course DanganRonpa and Toukiden are coming to the west. Of course will Ni-Oh get a western release.

"Yesterday’s TGS showing is probably the strongest denouement of the ‘Japanese games industry is dying’ narrative that has been pushed so hard over the last few years."

But for western gamers, if that was not enough, there was a good amount of western content on display too. From Ubisoft taking the stage to not only showcase their intriguing action game For Honor, to them announcing the Season Pass and Jack the Ripper DLC for Assassin’s Creed Syndicate, from a segment on the upcoming Call of Duty: Black Ops 3, to a brand new trailer for the eagerly anticipated Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End, there was just enough content here to keep even the most jaded and cynical western gamer interested in this very Japanese show.

In a showing that was as packed with content as this was, there was very little downtime too. Yes, for example, Sony took some time to talk about their upcoming VR initiative, but it was only a couple of minutes, and both of those minutes were packed with relevant information- the final name of the accessory (now confirmed to be PlayStation VR), as well as some of the VR enabled games that would be playable on the showfloor. We had a segment on PS Now, but it was only a brief video followed by some pricing details, and then we were done. And even this segment of the show had some major announcements- the PS4 price drop, for example.

"Sony’s TGS show yesterday is the new (old) standard- this is what all game press showings should be like."

All in all, it was an extremely strong showing, filled with an enviable amount of great content, and making a great case for the future of PS4, in Japan and worldwide, and for the future of the Japanese games industry at large. The format was amazing, focusing on just the games and nothing else (because we really only tune in to these shows to learn about the games), and there was not a single moment of downtime. In an industry that has increasingly become more and more about celebrating its own bloated and smug self, putting on three hour long shows with not enough content to fill them up, and rife with needless spectacle, yesterday’s TGS show was a reminder of what game conferences used to be like, and what they should be, going forward. Sony’s TGS show yesterday is the new (old) standard- this is what all game press showings should be like.

Better than Sony’s E3 showings? Yes, easily, for the last few years, at that, and also better than the PlayStation Experience. Better than Microsoft’s E3 shows? Another affirmative. Better than Microsoft’s Gamescom? Yeah. Even if you didn’t care much for what was announced, how it was announced is commendable and should be credited as such. Let us hope for more such shows going forward.