Light Start – God of War, Death Stranding, Xbox One S, and Blood Dragon

God of War is back and looking… a little different

How do you make one of the most hardcore of gaming heroes (for a given value of ‘heroes’) even more hardcore? You give him a beard. And an axe. And some trolls to fight. While protecting what seems to be his… son? That’s right, God of War and Kratos are back and Kratos seems to have taken some anger management courses in the 10 minute gameplay trailer revealed at E3 this week. He’s a familiar character, even as enbearded as he is, and a familiar-enough setting but the gameplay looks a little different. The over-the-shoulder view and the various on-screen popups put us in mind of the new Tomb Raider titles, with a dash of The Last of Us thrown in. We can’t wait to get our hands on the new, still-brutal, Kratos when God of War launches. Although… the trip through the Norse pantheon might not even involve the series hero – at this point it seems equally likely that we’ll play as the Ghost of Sparta’s son. We’re waiting on a release date – hopefully it’ll be soon.

Source: PlayStation

Hideo Kojima’s first post-Konami game is Death Stranding, with Norman Reedus

Hideo Kojima, the mind behind the Metal Gear Solid series of games and a whole lot of other video game weirdness, has struck out on his own, first forming Kojima Productions – which has one the funniest Twitter accounts we’ve seen in a while – and now announcing the very weird-looking Death Stranding. All we know for sure is that The Walking Dead‘s Norman Reedus will be starring in the game, and that everything around not-Daryl seems to be dead. Beyond that… eh. Who knows with Hideo, but it’ll probably be good when it’s not messing with your head. Death Stranding is going to be a PS4 exclusive, which sums up the rest of the concrete evidence we have so far. We’re waiting for some gameplay, which will go a long way towards explaining what is going on.

Source: IGN (YouTube)

The Xbox One S is indeed a thing (but we still don’t know when it arrives here)

Yesterday the Xbox One S leaked. As it happens, we got the pricing for the console all wrong (thank goodness) but everything else that was leaked ahead of time, from the 40% smaller size to the white colour to the 4K streaming and HDR upgrades for Netflix and other services, was spot on. Now, it’s just official. The console will start at $299 (R4,570), but that’s the American pricing. Here at home, we won’t be seeing much of a price change for the base hardware but the $300 pricing is for the 500GB Xbox One S. The first to arrive will be the 2TB Xbox One S special edition, slated for international release in August – at a sum of $400 (R6,090, plus tax and markup, etc, etc). After that, the $350 (R5,335) 1TB console and the 500GB Xbox One S will launch. Local pricing and availability hasn’t been confirmed yet.

Source: Xbox.com

Trials of the Blood Dragon is the most 80s thing ever

If you’re a fan of the Far Cry series of games, you might remember the odd standalone expansion to Far Cry 3, called Far Cry: Blood Dragon. The neon-lit action add-on had all of the elements from (bad) action films from the days when VHS was king and it… kinda kicked ass. Now there’s Trials of the Blood Dragon, a combination between the retro game and Trials, the motorcycle stunt series Ubisoft is so fond of. If you were a kid in the late 80s or early 90s, you’ll be hit with a wave of nostalgia by the trailer above, as it embodies pretty much every kid’s toy commercial from that time period. But there’s also some gameplay of the varied side-scrolling action game, which is actually available now, as long as you want to play it on PC, PS4 or Xbox One.

Source: Ubisoft