Tag Archives: Ghost of Tsushima

Technology

An Open-World Game With Ghost of Tsushima Vibes, Tight Combat

Leave a comment

Five months after I posted about a Chinese action game featuring aerial combat, I’ve got another cool one to show you. Despite the silly name, Project: The Perceiver is a melancholy political drama that gives me some Ghost of Tsushima vibes. But Project: The Perceiver moves beyond the standard Soulslike combat. And when I saw the main character running up the wall—that’s when I really started to pay attention.

Project: The Perceiver – Debut Trailer | PS5 & PS4 Games

Most of the enemies are human, which means that the initial focus is on knowing how to parry attacks and smash their heads in with a rolling kick. As you accumulate experience, the protagonist can transform into flower blossoms and wall-jump his way across rotating platforms. I’m eager to see the full range of abilities when the game gets closer to launch.

Wuxia is a Chinese literary genre in which wandering heroes travel across China in order to fight for justice, and Project: The Perceiver fits well into that genre. The protagonist, who is later known as the Mask of Devotion is killed in a battle, his ruler is murdered, and he returns to life as a masked phantom, which makes it feel a bit like The Ghost of Tsushima. Devotion goes on to fight against the Mask of Umbra, a rebel who seems to enjoy indulging in a bit of moral philosophy. “This land belongs to all of its inhabitants,” the villain would say while battling the hero in a field of flowers. “Be it Liangs or Tangs, does it matter what the regime is called?” Like dang. We’re having ethics class in the middle of a life-or-death battle. I love it.

There’s just one problem—the localization is atrocious. The descriptions are flowery in a way that feels like they were translated too literally from Chinese. It’s difficult for me to parse what the translations are trying to tell me. The trailer is perfectly comprehensible, so I’m hoping that this was just a marketing flub.

Project: The Perceiver does not yet have a release date, though it’s confirmed for PlayStation 4 and 5. It’s unclear whether or not it will come to other platforms in the future.

 

Read original article here

Technology

Ghost Of Tsushima Dev Not Making Infamous Or Sly Cooper Sequels

Leave a comment

Video game companies are notoriously cagey about sharing their plans. In a market saturated with sequels and spin-offs, developers nevertheless treat every new project with extreme secrecy. They’ll rarely even be up-front about what they aren’t working on, but today the PlayStation studio behind Ghost of Tsushima did just that.

As it approaches its 25th anniversary, Sucker Punch took the unusual step of letting fans know what not to expect from its next game, killing rumors of a potential sequel to superhero sandbox series Infamous, or stealth platformer Sly Cooper, happening anytime soon.

Sucker Punch wrote:

As our games continue to grow in scale and complexity, they require the full attention of our studio. With our focus on our current project, we have no plans to revisit inFAMOUS or Sly Cooper right now, and no other studio is currently working on projects related to those franchises either. These characters are very special and near and dear to our hearts, so while we’d never say never to re-opening those doors down the road, for now there are no inFAMOUS or Sly Cooper games in development.

Previously, some PlayStation fans were eager to believe the opposite. On the heels of rumor mongering by self-proclaimed insider Twitter accounts and mysterious updates to various web pages, it seemed like the fan-favorites might resurface. But rather than let false hope spring eternal, like some game studios have been known to, Sucker Punch came clean with fans.

In the meantime, the studio said that following some upcoming maintenance it will keep Infamous 2‘s level editor servers alive for a little bit longer and it plans to make the Infamous Second Son DLC Cole’s Legacy purchasable separately from the Collector’s Edition. The Sly games, on the other hand, remain completely inaccessible on modern platforms. While previously available as part of PS Now, none of them are currently included in the revamped PS Plus library.

Founded in 1997, Sucker Punch’s first game was the underappreciated, physics-based platformer Rocket: Robot on Wheels for Nintendo 64. It later entered into a publishing agreement with Sony and released the first Sly Cooper on PS2 in 2002, and the first Infamous on PS3 in 2009. Sony bought the studio outright a couple years later, and in 2020 it delivered Ghost of Tsushima, which catapulted it into the top tier of PlayStation studios.

While Sucker Punch didn’t come out and say it’s working on a sequel to Tsushima, it seems like a good bet considering the first one has sold over eight million copies and several LinkedIn pages and job postings have referenced an upcoming project with similar attributes. The bigger question is whether it will remain focused on a single-player narrative, or branch out even more deeply into multiplayer combat.

Ghost of Tsushima’s online mode called Legends added co-op quests, horde survival, and end-game raids. It was a cautious but successful initial foray into a new way to play the game, and something Sucker Punch might pivot to in the future. Earlier this year, following the announcement it was acquiring Destiny 2 maker Bungie, PlayStation laid out big plans for a raft of 10 new live-service games by 2026. A new online-only The Last of Us spin-off will be one of those. Time will tell if Ghost of Tsushima 2 ends up being another.

Clarification: 7/1/22, 4:36 p.m. ET: The online content being preserved in Infamous 2 is its community level editor, not a full multiplayer mode.



Read original article here

Technology

Ghost Of Tsushima Receives Final Patch After Two Years

Leave a comment

Screenshot: Sony

No art is ever “done,” but there comes a point where it has to exist on its own merits, untethered from its creators. That time has come for Ghost of Tsushima, which has now received what appears to be its final significant post-release update.

First released in July 2020, Ghost of Tsushima is an open-world samurai game about looking at sunsets and flowers and going, “Ooooohhhh pretty.” Though it initially launched on PlayStation 4, it looked—and felt—like a next-gen game, sporting load speeds so fast the studio had to slow them down. When the PlayStation 5 came out a few months later, many cross-gen games received free PS4-to-PS5 upgrades. Ghost of Tsushima was not among them; it received a paid upgrade to PS5 in Ghost of Tsushima: Director’s Cut, released last summer. (Director’s Cut also introduced a solid if unremarkable expansion.)

But Ghost’s arguably most significant update came in the form of Ghost of Tsushima: Legends, a separate, cooperative multiplayer mode that rolled out free, and out of nowhere, for all players of the main game. Sucker Punch made Legends available piecemeal (not free) last summer, and it anchored one of the more stellar monthly PS Plus lineups in recent memory.

By the numbers, the most recent patch, 2.18, is fairly slight, and mostly addresses minor issues in that Legends mode, stuff to do with adjusting item functions and balancing abilities. The patch also adds a “PS4 Save Import” function to standalone versions of Legends. For campaign-focused players, it fixes some dialogue and cinematics, and makes it so a merchant in new-game plus will sell more silk. Annnnd scene.

“While we aren’t actively working on any additional patches at the moment, we will continue to monitor feedback on the community-run Gotlegends subreddit and messages sent to @SuckerPunchProd on Twitter for any high priority bugs or issues that emerge,” the studio wrote.

Sucker Punch did not say what it’s working on next. Representatives for Sony did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

 

Read original article here

Technology

PlayStation Plus March Lineup Includes Ghostrunner, GoT Legends

Leave a comment

So you’re just gonna scroll past without saying こんにちは ?
Image: Sucker Punch

While many of you are no doubt champing at the bit for the release of this totally unknown game called Elden Ring that’s coming out this week, PlayStation Plus members who don’t feel the irresistible urge to hurl themselves into the unforgiving gauntlet of a new Soulsborne game have some new games to try out for free, as a treat. That’s right, a new month means a new lineup for PS Plus games, and this time around Sony has announced a pretty impressive lineup. As is tradition, the following games are only “free” to players that have an active PlayStation Plus membership.

Here’s everything coming to PS Plus in March:

PS4

  • Ark: Survival Evolved
  • Team Sonic Racing
  • Ghost of Tsushima: Legends

PS5

  • Ghostrunner
  • Ghost of Tsushima: Legends

While I personally didn’t bite back when Ark: Survival Evolved was initially released back in June of 2015, I can’t deny that my desire to ride a dinosaur (which totally never in the history of ever had feathers!) is still burning strong. Now might be as good a time as any to give Ark a whirl. In this MMO survival game, players are pitted against one another in a prehistoric battle of the fittest all while harnessing dinosaurs to help them traverse and conquer the deadly world.

Team Sonic Racing comes to PS Plus at a convenient time considering Sonic the Hedgehog 2 hits theaters the following month. In this 2019 release, Sonic and his friends duke it out in, you guessed it, a team-based kart racing game generously littered with items and power ups. I assume Sony wanted to take advantage of Idris Elba fans’ enthusiasm by providing them an outlet to fantasize about his sultry voice as Knuckles while he drives circles around Sonic. Which begs the question, why does Sonic even need a car in the first place if he’s so fast?

However, the heavy-hitters of this line up come from Sony double-dipping in some ghostly titles with the duo of Ghostrunner and Ghost of Tsushima: Legends.

Ghostrunner is a first-person platforming cyberpunk action game developed by One More Level that was released on Xbox One, PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch, and PC back in October of 2020. A key component in this free-running action game is wallrunning across buildings while you hack and slash your way through waves of enemies with your katana. You might find that the game’s story gets a bit lost as you lean forward in your seat and your eyes glaze over at all the breakneck-speed cyberpunk ninja feats you perform.

Ghost of Tsushima: Legends is a standalone co-op multiplayer game that developer Sucker Punch included as a patch update to the base game back in October of 2020. In Legends features two-player cooperative story missions with gradually more difficult enemies and rewarding bonuses, a four-player survivor mode where you defend bases with your friends, and a three-part raid with some sweet loot waiting for you at the end of each challenge.

Here’s what’s leaving PS Plus on February 28:

  • UFC 4
  • Planet Coaster: Console Edition 
  • Tiny Tina’s Assault on Dragon Keep: A Wonderlands One-shot Adventure

 

Read original article here

Technology

Sony Saw Days Gone As A Disappointment, Former Director Says

Leave a comment

Maybe a Days Gone sequel would’ve improved upon its myriad flaws.
Image: Sony Bend Studio

While developer Sucker Punch Productions celebrates the massive success of Ghost of Tsushima, which recently sold more than eight million copies, not everyone is reveling in the excitement. Case in point: Former Bend Studio director Jeff Ross, who used the opportunity to take a stab at Sony for how it handled the reception of the open-world zombie game, Days Gone.

Ross took to Twitter to air out some grievances, particularly regarding the sales of Days Gone and Ghost of Tsushima. See, with Days Gone having been out for approaching three years now, the game has sold more than nine million copies to date, especially with its PC release on May 18, 2021. Unfortunately, Ross said “local studio management” made Bend Studio “feel like [Days Gone] was a big disappointment,” despite the game selling well. Even before Ross left Bend Studio at the end of 2020, Days Gone wound up selling the same 8 million Ghost of Tsushima recently has.

We’ve reached out to Sony for comment and will update if we hear back.

Many in Ross’ mentions think the determining factor for Sony positioning Days Gone as a “big disappointment” was its score on Metacritic, a review aggregate site that collects critic and user scores from across the internet. Looking at Days Gone and Ghost of Tsushima, it’s clear the latter reviewed much better, with Ghost of Tsushima receiving a score of 83 and Days Gone a 71.

G/O Media may get a commission

Best Seller

Nintendo Switch OLED

Save games to your system with 64 GB of internal storage.
Enjoy vivid colors and crisp contrast with a screen that makes colors pop.

Read More: Ghost of Tsushima Director’s Cut’s Iki Island Expansion Is Just Fine

According to BenjiSales, a YouTuber who focuses on gaming industry sales, Days Gone was the best-selling PlayStation 4 exclusive on PSN in 2019. It also made the top 10 best-selling digital games of that year, despite Sony allegedly refusing to “do PR” on the game’s sales success. And even though it was a commercial success, Bloomberg reported in April 2021 that Bend Studio couldn’t get Sony to pick up a Days Gone sequel pitch.

I’ve got some ideas for why that is, having played both Days Gone and Ghost of Tsushima, but my best guess is that Days Gone just wasn’t fun. It wasn’t an enjoyable experience to sit down and play. The controls were clunky and cumbersome. Hunting resources was a chore. I enjoyed riding the motorcycle in the beautifully apocalyptic Oregon, but the novelty wore off after incessantly running out of gas. And on top of all that, Days Gone dropped in an oversaturated genre, whether that’s open-world games, zombie survival games, or both. Wrong place, wrong time.

Read More: Days Gone Mod Makes Zombie Hordes Ludicrously Large

When asked if there would ever be a Days Gone sequel, Jeff Ross reiterated one “won’t happen anytime soon” but that fans should never say never. Ross told another Twitter user that the reason the sequel pitch got canned “wasn’t ever explained well.” All will likely get covered later today when Ross appears on David Jaffe’s podcast at 7 p.m. ET.

 



Read original article here

Technology

Ghost of Tsushima: Director’s Cut Solves PS5 Save Transfer Woes

Leave a comment

We’d had some indication from the likes of Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order and Saints Row The Third Remastered that Sony had solved the PlayStation 5’s curious save transfer system, but Ghost of Tsushima: Director’s Cut puts any scepticism beyond doubt. In order to move your progress from the PS4 version to its next-gen counterpart, you’ll simply need a save stored locally on your system.

So, for example, if you’ve played Ghost of Tsushima through backwards compatibility in the past, then you don’t need to do anything: just boot the Director’s Cut and select Transfer PS4 Console Save. That’s it: you’ll load into your game exactly where you left of – and, yes, all of the Trophies that you’ve unlocked previously will pop.

If, however, you last played Jin’s heroic adventure on a PS4, then all you need to do is download your data from the PS Plus cloud onto your PS5. And if, of course, you don’t have Sony’s subscription, then you can just use a USB stick to move the data to your new console. But that’s it: you don’t need to install your PS4 copy and upload your save data within the game or anything like that.

Sony was roundly criticised at launch for its complicated save transfer procedures. Effectively, the PS5 couldn’t read PS4 save data, so the only solution was for developers to implement upload protocols into their last-gen games, so that the information could be unpacked and then converted online. This wasn’t ideal because it meant installing the PS4 game just to transfer the data.

But that problem, like many other PS5 teething troubles, appears to be a thing of the past. It’s not ideal that the console launched in somewhat of a half-baked state, but the most important thing is that these issues are being eradicated relatively promptly. Hopefully we never have to deal with this particular drawback again.



Read original article here

Technology

Legends Gets Competitive ‘Rivals’ Horde Mode

Leave a comment

Screenshot: Sucker Punch / Sony

Last October, Ghost of Tsushima received a surprise multiplayer expansion called Ghost of Tsushima: Legends, which pit teams of players against waves of enemies in various cooperative scenarios. Nearly one year on, Legends is on the edge of some big changes, including a new competitive mode and a standalone release, Sucker Punch announced in a blog post today.

Read More: I’m Going To Play The Shit Out Of Ghost Of Tsushima’s New Co-Op Mode

On September 3, Legends will receive a competitive mode called “Rivals.” Rather than a traditional battle—in which you’d straight up fight against your human opponents—Rivals sees two teams of two face off via indirect means, kind of like how Russia and the United States did for several decades last century. As you defeat waves of enemies, you’ll gain an in-game currency called Magatama. You can then burn that to afflict the opposing team with various debuffs. Spending enough Magatama triggers a final wave of enemies. Whichever team defeats their final wave first wins. Here’s a trailer:

Alongside the release of Rivals, Sucker Punch will roll out an update that allows players to level up some of their highest-powered gear to Ki levels of 120, opening up a second perk. And the length of Survival mode sessions will apparently be shortened somewhat, though Sucker Punch didn’t specify by how much. (Hopefully this means Gold runs won’t last an hour anymore!)

What’s more, Ghost of Tsushima: Legends will be made available as a standalone release for $20. The way today’s blog post is worded, a specific release date remains unclear. Sony, Ghost of Tsushima’s publisher, did not immediately respond to a note from Kotaku seeking clarity.

Later this month, Ghost of Tsushima: Director’s Cut comes out on PS4 and PS5, offering PS5-specific enhancements and a new expansion, alongside a baffling PS4-to-PS5 pricing scheme. Through early October, Legends will receive new content based on Ghost of Tsushima: Director’s Cut, including Survival maps based on the forthcoming Iki island region setting for the expansion. You don’t need to own the Director’s Cut to get access to the new stuff in Legends.

G/O Media may get a commission

When Legends dropped out of the blue last year, I played…well, let’s just say my headline wasn’t lying. But Legends isn’t designed to be an infinite timesink, as there is a ceiling to how much gear you can earn and level up. The new additions should be as good a reason as any to hop back in. Hell yeah.

 

Read original article here