Bard Mustard


This week on Zed Games, Maylee, Paul, and Peter talk couch party games. Then the team chats the week in Gaming News where Paul talks Xbox Layoffs, Pepper Grinder release, and other new releases. Then Paul goes to the MAX in VR to talk Max Mustard developed by Toast Interactive, before Maylee tries to romance the big bad as a bard in Bard Harder! from indi developer Shark and Pelican Games.

NASA Launches, Playdates Missing, and More

Tabletop in SPAAAAACE

NASA has developed and launched a tabletop roleplaying game called ‘The Lost Universe’, which is available for free.

“A dark mystery has settled over the city of Aldastron on the rogue planet of Exlaris. Researchers dedicated to studying the cosmos have disappeared, and the Hubble Space Telescope has vanished from Earth’s timeline. Only an ambitious crew of adventurers can uncover what was lost.”

The mystery supports 4-7 players using level 7-10 characters, and is supposed to be easily adaptable to your preferred TTRPG system. It is available on NASA’s website.

GTA 6 Might Be Delayed

Grand Theft Auto 6 is set to release in early 2025, and might be one of the most highly anticipated games in history, with fans desperate for any scrap of news. Unfortunately, the initial release date may no longer be possible, with a late 2025 or 2026 release looking more likely, allegedly due to production slipping behind.

Employees have reportedly been mandated to return to work five days a week in April, rather than allowing employees, including those hired remotely, to work from home. This shift in policy has been attributed to improving security and quality. There are rumours however that this change is also to help avoid production slipping further behind.

Rockstar are still aiming for an early 2025 release, a late 2025 release seems more plausible, with the 2026 release being a “fallback plan”.

How Many Playdates Are Missing??

Two pallets of the handheld yellow consoles have reportedly gone missing from a shipping centre in Las Vegas. A simple stocktake revealed that $400,000 worth of Playdates aren’t where they’re supposed to be.

FedEx claims that they were delivered but “we have no trace of them”. A few weeks later, a different set of pallets of Playdates were delivered to the construction site next door to the shipping centre.

Those pallets were successfully recovered, which is good, as Playdate aims to start earning a profit this year.

More Help For Game Help

The PlayStation 5 has a feature called Game Help, that developers can use to provide hints for various games, assisting players who might be struggling with a game. Community Game Help will be added as a feature, allowing users to submit gameplay that is automatically captured during specific activities in the game. Once this footage is approved, it will be published as a hint.

This means that players who are stuck can easily access the relevant footage to use as a guide. Players can rate the quality of the hint, so only the most helpful hints are used.

News Nibbles!

A trailer for Sonic Toys Party, an unannounced battle royale party game from Sega, has been leaked, and it looks uncannily like Fall Guys. The trailer got taken down due to a copyright claim however.

Elder Scrolls 6 is playable and sounds fun, according to Bethesda. Yay.

 

And now for some upcoming games!

March 28 – that’s today!

  • Open Roads – PC, PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch, Xbox Series X
  • Pepper Grinder – Nintendo Switch

That’s it this week in gaming news!

I wish I was playing Stardew Valley Right Now but instead I made some News for you

.-.-.-.-.

Apex Legends Live Hacking

During the regional finals of the Apex Legends Global Series two of the players (Genburten and ImperialHal) were hacked live, right in the middle of the tournament.

ImperialHal was given an aimbot (a cheat which helps a player aim more accurately) and Genburten was able to see the positions of all players.  Rumors abound as to who or what caused this but there has been no definite source as of writing.

 

Due to this incident the finals of the tournament have been postponed and on the site formerly known as Twitter the Apex Legends Esports account has stated that they will have more information on the state of the finals soon.

 

https://www.gamesradar.com/major-apex-legends-tournament-postponed-as-pros-fall-victim-to-hacks-mid-game-leading-voluntary-cheat-watchdog-to-warn-others-off-ea-games-for-now/

 

Changes to Overwatch 2 

At the time of writing this, Overwatch 2 is sitting as the 3rd worst-reviewed game on steam, with an average score of 1.71, possibly due to the scrapping of the promised PVE mode, the prevalence of microtransactions (with some skins costing the in-game currency equivalent of around $39), the downsizing of PVP teams from 6 to 5 and perceived issues with the balancing.  Possibly also contributing to its poor reputation is the required purchase of the battle pass or intense amounts of grinding to unlock new heroes, unlike the original, where any new heroes were simply available to everyone.

 

Blizzard has announced with their most recent Developer Update Stream that they’ll be making several changes to the game, one of them being the return to having all heroes available for play.  All new heroes introduced to the game will be free to play and any heroes that could be purchased or unlocked will also be made available.  Blizzard has also stated in an interview with GamesRadar that there will be no compensation for players who previously spent money to acquire these characters.

 

https://news.blizzard.com/en-us/overwatch/24062312/developer-update-hero-releases-mythics-and-gameplay-updates

 

https://www.gamesradar.com/as-overwatch-2-pivots-to-free-heroes-for-all-blizzard-confirms-you-wont-get-anything-back-if-you-already-bought-heroes-through-battle-passes/

 

Stardew Valley 1.6 Update!

And the greatly anticipated 1.6 update for the farming time sink that is Stardew Valley has been released on PC, and to tell you the truth I’m writing this here news as my character is standing outside Sebastian’s door waiting for him to wake up so I can give him this sardine he wanted.  The update went live on the 20th of March at around 4.50 in the AM’s for us Australians and has already received a patch to fix a variety of bugs that came with it.

 

The update has added an extensive list of new content, balance changes, visual improvements, quality of life changes and bug fixes (alas now you can no longer equip a staircase to your pants slot to receive trimmed lucky purple shorts).  New festivals, dialog, crops, items, fish, achievements, quests, secrets and a new farm type are just a small fraction of the content that is packed into this update.

 

And you can now drink mayonnaise.

 

https://steamcommunity.com/app/413150/allnews/

 

GAME RELEASES

 

March 22 

Dragon’s Dogma 2- PC, PS5, Xbox Series X

Rise of the Ronin- PS5

Princess Peach: Showtime! – Nintendo Switch

 

March 26

South Park: Snow Day! – PC, PS5, Nintendo Switch, Xbox Series X

 

And that’s all this week in gaming news!

 

(I’m going to go water my crops now)

Old Guys Talking


This week on Zed Games the team covers the week in Gaming News including a tribute to the late Toriyama. Cameron then old man drools over the retrospective game Llamasoft: The Jeff Minter Story from Digital Eclipse Studios, and Paul clowns around in Penny’s Big Breakaway developed by Private Division.

Toriyama Tribute, Layoffs and Shutdowns, and some Gaming Bytes

Thank you, Toriyama.
This week the world of manga and gaming bids farewell to a creative luminary. Akira Toriyama, the writer and illustrator most known for his beloved Dragon Ball series, has passed away. However, Toriyama’s legacy extends far beyond the pages of this iconic manga. His artistic genius also leaves an indelible mark on the gaming industry. From the legendary Dragon Quest series where he worked on every instalment of the series, to the time-traveling epic Chrono Trigger. Toriyama’s character designs breathed life into the pixelated heroes we have grown with and love.
On the 8th of March Toriyama’s production company, Bird Studio, published the sad news that he had suffered a subdural hematoma earlier this month that claimed his life. Fans worldwide will remember Toriyama for his boundless creativity, his iconic art style, his Saiyan warriors, and the Dragon Quest slime.

Image Credit: Runeimus – https://www.reddit.com/r/dbz/comments/1b9irl1/my_tribute_to_akira_toriyama/

Layoffs and Shutdowns
This week Deviation Games, a company which was working on a new AAA IP in partnership with PlayStation, has been caught in the wake of SIE’s downsizing. The company is trying to find jobs for the roughly 130 employees who are now added to the 900 odd employees searching for work that were cut late last month by PlayStation. In stranger news, Warner Bros. Discovery has reached out to developers of their Adult Swim Games to tell them that their Adult Swim titles will be removed from digital services. While the developers desperately search for ways to keep their games online, Warner reps state they are unable to transfer ownership to the developers due to “logistical and resource constraints.” Developers of games such as Soundodger+ and First Puncher have been advised that the games will be removed from sale within the next 60 days. For a full list of games that may be affected, click here.

And now for the Gaming Bytes
In the wake of the monetarily successful release of The Super Mario Bros. Movie, it would behove Nintendo to do another one. So, they are. On March 10, or MarIO day, Miyamoto announced on Nintendo’s X account that a new “bright and fun” Mario movie will be coming to the big screens April 3rd, 2026.

Earlier this week Dragon’s Dogman 2 released its character creator ahead of its March 22nd release date, and it’s got more sliders than sense… in a good way. People have moulded characters in their own likeness and some more famous ones, such as; Emo Spiderman Tobey Maguire, Walter White, Scooby’s Shaggy , William Dafoe, Handsome Squidward, and even a cursed Pikachu. Click through to see them… if you dare.
In an interview with GAME FILE, CD Projekt RED’s Game Director Gabe Amatangelo confirmed that Cyberpunk 2077’s development cycle after the disastrous 2020 release is finally over with the recent 2.12 patch. And now the team is ready to move onto bigger and better things.

And now finally, some upcoming game releases.
Friday March 15, save some future aliens in Outcast: A New Beginning coming to PC and next gen consoles.
Tuesday March 19, farm the future in Lightyear Frontier on PC, and Xbox Series S & X, or alternatively, play and manage a baseball team in MLB The Show 24 coming to consoles.
Wednesday March 20, play as your favourite horror daddy (David Harbour) in a Lovecraftian horror love letter to the original Alone in the Dark, coming to PC and next gen consoles
And Thursday, March 21st, grab your mobile because Call of Duty Warzone: Mobile is coming to iOS and Android, and speaking of ports, Horizon Forbidden West: Complete Edition is coming to PC.
Midnight Ghost Hunt for PC is coming out of early access. And lastly, facing horror with a faithful doggo Shines Over: The Damned is coming to PS5.

 

 

Zed Book Club


This week on Zed Games, Hazel, Zahra, and Paul talk Gaming News and the Yuzu fallout, Paul takes the historian approach with Cricket Through the Ages developed by Free Lives, Zahra brings in actual pages of the book Legends & Lattes by Travis Baldree, then Paul jumps in before the final roll call with a review of The Mobius Machine from Madruga Works.

Legal Troubles Abound

 

Helldivers 2 Players Scammed by Fake Steam Listings:

On the 2nd of March, a warning was sent out on discord from the Helldivers 2 team. Several steam games had been imitating Helldivers 2 to trick unlucky shoppers. This included changing
their name, the game art, and even the developer/publisher tags. Similar fakes have popped up for Palworld and Last Epoch – so it seems popular multiplayer games are the best target for this scam. Buyer beware. All of the games involved in this have been removed, but the developers behind them are still operating on steam, which is…questionable.

Australian Studio Torus Games ceases production

On the second of March journalist Jack Ryan reported that Torus Games would be ceasing production and had laid off eight staff members. Torus Games is a Melbourne studio founded in 1994. Their website boasts of producing or contributing to 146 video games over its 28 years of operation. They’ve worked on franchises like Duke Nukem, Doom, Barbie, and Sonic. Studios closing their doors has become awfully common in the past year, but it’s particularly sad to see another Australian studio fall victim, especially one with such a long history. Thankfully, founder Bill McIntosh says it isn’t for good. In a statement to Game Developer he said “Torus isn’t being wound up. We’re basically hibernating until we work out what our next opportunity will be. It’s a good chance for us to rethink what we should focus on.”

 

Switch emulator creator settles Nintendo lawsuit for $2.4m

At the end of February, Nintendo sued the developer of Switch emulator “Yuzu” for facilitating piracy. Yuzu doesn’t actually provide pirated games, but it is the most common way people will
access them. For example, Nintendo claims that more than 1 million people used Yuzu to access Tears of the Kingdom illegally and before its release date. On March 4th, we found out that Tropic Haze, the company behind Yuzu, reached a settlement with Nintendo, and now owes them $2.4 million. Additionally, Yuzu is being discontinued and they must surrender information about its development to Nintendo. They announced this on their discord server, saying: “Yuzu and its team have always been against piracy. We started the projects in good faith, out of passion for Nintendo and its consoles and games, and were not intending to cause harm. But we see now that because our projects can circumvent Nintendo’s technological protection measures and allow users to play games outside of authorized hardware, they have led to extensive piracy.” This post also said they would be shutting down their related Patreon, Discord server, and websites.

Balatro removed from sale over ratings mistake:

Popular, poker-inspired game Balatro was temporarily removed from the switch store in several countries including Australia and New Zealand. A statement from Playstack Games attributed
this to an overnight change in rating from 3+ to 18+ due to a mistaken belief that the game promotes and provides instruction about gambling. They state emphatically that “Balatro does
not allow or encourage gambling. Balatro was developed by someone who is staunchly antigambling, and painstaking care has been taken to ensure that the game does not feature
gambling mechanics of any kind.” They have been working hard to resolve this issue and expect the game will return to all stores by the 9th of March.

Upcoming Game Releases:

•March 8: WWE 2K24 comes to PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, PC
•March 8: Unicorn Overlord comes to PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo
Switch
•March 12: Contra: Operation Galuga comes to PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox
Series X/S, PC, Nintendo Switch
•March 13: Llamasoft: The Jeff Minter Story comes to PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One,
Xbox Series X/S, PC, Nintendo Switch

Layoffs, Nintendo Announcements, and Science Tech Headlines

This week in gaming news, more layoffs hit developers, Nintendo Announcements, and the week in published tech science headlines.

Layoffs: More of them.

The trend continues with more layoffs and studio closures hitting game developers this week.
Deck Nine, the developer of Life Is Strange: Before the Storm and True Colors, have laid off 20% of its staff due to “…worsening market conditions.”
Cloud Imperium Games, developer of Star Citizen currently in ‘alpha’, are also reportedly undergoing “mass layoffs” under the banner of relocating to its new UK office.
Disruptive Games, the team behind bringing Diablo 2 to Battle.net and Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 1+2 to everything, has laid off an undisclosed number of staff, even after advertising for new staff only a month ago via LinkedIn.
Thunderful Games, creators of Steamworld games, the more recent Planet of Lana and others, have announced a restructuring program with a 20% cutback in staff – over 100 people.
Supermassive Games, developers of The Dark Pictures Anthology, announced layoffs with 150 at-risk employees lined up for the chopping block.
Indie developers Die Gute Fabrik, makers of Saltsea Chronicles, have made the hard choice to close their doors.
Electronic Arts is also restructuring, putting about 670 people or around 5% of its workforce on notice. EA’s CEO Andrew Wilson stated this due to the companies move away from licensed intellectual property.
And finally, Sony Interactive Entertainment CEO Jim Ryan has penned a letter to the company (and a media release) announcing that 8% or around 900 employees will be laid off. This includes all the London Studio, and some of Firesprite Studio (cancelling the Twisted Metal Live-service game in development), as well as others around the world. But hey, at least you might be able to use that PSVR2 with your PC later this year.

Nintendo Announcements.
This week’s Pokémon Direct in honour of Pokémon Day started soft with several basic updates and events planned over a range of Android and iOS Pokémon games. Then came the big two announcements. Firstly, Pokémon Trading Card Game is getting an Android and iOS app under the original name Pokémon Trading Card Game Pocket. Pocket is being developed by DeNA Co. Ltd., makers of Fire Emblem Heros, Pokemon Masters, Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp, and many others, and features trading, card pack opening, and duelling. But it manages to maintain the most important part of the franchise, exclusive foils, which will now be reproduced and expanded upon as immersive visual effects. And second, the next Pokémon game has been tentatively announced with the teaser displaying little to no visuals and only exposing few details. Those being the place name, Lumoise City in Kalos of X & Y fame, the game’s name, Pokémon Legends: Z-A, the game’s power system, mega evolutions, and a tentative release year, 2025. Interestingly the same release year as the Switch 2.
In other news, Tropic Haze LLC, the developer of Switch emulator Yuzu, is being sued by Nintendo. The company is claiming that Tropic Haze “…facilitates (sic) piracy at a colossal scale.“ and “…is thus secondarily liable for the infringement committed by the users…”

(Insert Last Post Music Clip)

And now for some industry, science and technology.
In tiktok viral science, Doom can now be played on cellular technology. And by that I don’t mean apps on your phone, rather a 32 by 48 pixel display lit up by fluorescent Escherichia Coli cells. The display was developed by MIT biotech PhD student Lauren “Ren“ Ramlan, inspired by the numerical displays of Shin et al. 2020. The cells were induced with plasmid BBa_K3893028 which respond to stimuli to essentially display fluorescence. Utilising this on off difference Ren was able to create a very simple 1bit (black -off or white-on) display. However, the frame rate is lacking, with it taking 70 minutes to display a frame, and eight hours and 20 minutes to go back to its resting state. Making the 5-hour game last approximately just under 600 years.
On the other hand the “big boy” in storage science has been designed by professor Min Gu from the University of Shanghai for Science and Technology. The technology packs 100 layers of data in 54 nanometers on a DVD sized disc. Effectively replacing a 2 meter stack of Blu-rays with a single disc that can fit up to a petabit or 125,000 gigabytes of data. The 3D writing system uses dye-doped photoresist with aggregation-induced emission luminogens with nanoparticle scale resolution lasers on the optical disc, which essentially allows the possibility of stacking the technology into exobit-level data storage facilities.

Now for some upcoming games.
Tuesday March 5th brings us The Outlast Trials and WWE 2K24 both coming to PC, PlayStation and Xbox. And on Thursday March 7th As Dusk Falls comes to Playstation and Snufkin: Melody of Moominvalley comes to PC, Switch and both next gen consoles.

And that’s all this week in gaming news.

Rolling Boxes


This week Maylee presses the buttons while Zahra and Peter delve deep in this weeks Gaming News and the difference between physical and digital. Zahra then takes it easy in visual masterpiece puzzle game Boxes: Lost Fragments, Maylee tries to love Roller Drama, and then team talks their recent TTRPG gaming and experiences.