Amazon Games branches out, announces it will publish the next Tomb Raider

Amazon's games division will publish the next big Tomb Raider sequel, a press release revealed today.

The game will be developed by Crystal Dynamics—the same studio that made the reboot trilogy that included 2013's Tomb Raider, 2015's Rise of the Tomb Raider, and 2018's Shadow of the Tomb Raider.

Crystal Dynamics used to live under the umbrella of large, Japan-based international publisher Square-Enix, but the parent company sold Crystal Dynamics and the Tomb Raider intellectual property to Swedish holding company Embracer Group earlier this year. That sale also included the Deus Ex, Thief, and Legacy of Kain franchises and associated studios—in other words, most of Square-Enix's Western studios and properties.

It's a surprise to see Amazon publishing the next Tomb Raider game because Embracer owns its own publishers of games. But Crystal Dynamics studio head Scot Amos said in a statement that Amazon Games is "uniquely positioned to rewrite what publishing and development collaborations are" and that they share the Tomb Raider team's "vision, ambitions, and values." To be clear, though: Amazon is not acquiring Tomb Raider or Crystal Dynamics, it's just publishing the next game in the franchise.

Amazon Games has made some waves in the past couple of years, but it has largely been in the multiplayer space. Amazon has either developed multiplayer titles in-house (like the MMO New World) or published other studios' multiplayer games. Previous hits from the company, like the hugely successful localization of the South Korean title Lost Ark, have targeted the same sorts of players who spend their time connecting with multiplayer communities on Twitch.

Given that history, this is the first single-player title announced by Amazon Games. Since Amazon's previous entries have focused so much on synergizing with Twitch, Tomb Raider is a clear departure. There are popular streamers who play a variety of single-player games (they often go by the label "variety streamers") but they are far from dominant; Twitch's most-viewed channels are dominated by players who focus on just one or two online games, like World of Warcraft or Call of Duty: Warzone.

The press release describes some of what we can expect from the next Tomb Raider game, and it sounds like Amazon Games and Crystal Dynamics are looking to give fans of the recent reboot trilogy more of the same. It won't be another reboot, and it will give players "control of the confident and multidimensional hero Lara Croft in an environment that rewards exploration and creative pathfinding, with mind-bending puzzles to solve, and a wide variety of enemies to face and overcome."

The game will be developed in Unreal Engine 5 and is purportedly early in development, suggesting that we won't see a release in the next two years.

Comments

Genshin Impact: Best Nahida Build Guide

The best build for Nahida in Genshin Impact is quite complicated as players need to balance her stat out. So far, Archons in Genshin Impact have not been disappointing. Venti is still a top-tier crowd controller, Zhongli is the best shielder in Genshin Impact , and Raiden Shogun is a tremendously powerful Sub-DPS and battery. Sadly, while many expect Nahida to take a whole new role, she, like Raiden, is also a Sub-DPS. For the Dendro Archon to become a powerful Sub-DPS, players must be familiar with Nahida’s best build in Genshin Impact . The best build for Nahida in Genshin Impact highly relies on her team composition and how good players’ artifacts are. To put it simply, Nahida has an obvious diminishing return, so Travelers must consider all sorts of stat buffs from Nahida’s team before determining her best build . This is because Nahida’s fourth-ascension passive (A4) allows her to buff her Skill DMG based on her Elemental Mastery (EM), but this is only effective until 1000

Warzone 2.0 Is Ditching 2v2 Gulags For Boring 1v1 Showdowns

First came the much-requested changes to loadout drops , now Warzone 2.0 is messing with the gulag. With season two’s arrival on February 15, the gulag will no longer make players team up in pairs of two after suffering defeat on the battle royale map. Instead, as in the original Warzone , it will now focus on 1v1 skirmishes. Unlike in other battle royales, Call of Duty ’s Warzone allows players a chance to jump back into the action after dying. If you’re killed by another player early enough in the game, you’ll get sent to the gulag (there had to have been a better name for that). Here, you’ll square off in a quick deathmatch mode to earn your place back on the main map. Warzone 2.0 ’s gulag has two teams of two face off, with both members of the winning team rejoining the game. Around halfway through the gulag match, a high-damage-output, bullet-spongey NPC called “the Jailer” will emerge. If the Jailer is defeated, both teams redeploy. If time runs out or the Jailer

Pokémon Dev Job Listing References R&D For Next-Generation Hardware

It seems the Pokémon developer Creatures could already looking toward the future of the long-running series. A new job listing at the Japanese company for a 3DCG modeler references "research and development for other next-generation hardware". The same application also mentions the use of Unity and Unreal Engine for project development. Creatures Inc. is one of the major Pokémon developers alongside Game Freak and Nintendo. It previously helped out with Pokémon Sword and Shield and Pokémon: Let’s Go, Pikachu! and Let's Go, Eevee! on 3DCG modelling. It also worked on Detective Pikachu and is currently developing a sequel. In September, a senior programmer job profile at Creatures referenced work on "one unannounced project" and Detective Pikachu 2 which is apparently "nearing release".

NASCAR Heat 5 2022 Season Update available as of 22nd June

An update to NASCAR Heat 5 that includes the 2022 NASCAR Cup Series season and the NASCAR NEXT Gen car released in DLC form on 22nd June for $9.99. The long-awaited 2022 Season Update to NASCAR Heat 5 has finally released as of Thursday (22nd June). Links to the DLC were made public on Steam and the PlayStation Store earlier in the week and the content unlocked around 10:00 pm BST / 5:00 pm EST on PlayStation, Xbox and PC via Steam. Originally planned to release in October of 2022, the update to the title from 2020 was delayed for quite some time. The predecessor to NASCAR 21: Ignition has been the base for the last two releases from Motorsport Games, in the NASCAR Heat Ultimate+ and NASCAR Rivals releases on the Nintendo Switch the last two years. Here’s what is included for the price point of $9.99. This DLC will be playable in Race Now, Career and Online Multiplayer modes. What this DLC will include is, first and foremost, the 2022 NASCAR Cup Series in terms of the cars. That’s a

Gran Turismo 7’s Next Update is Coming This Week, With Four New Cars

Gran Turismo series founder Kazunori Yamauchi has taken to Twitter to announce and tease the next update to Gran Turismo 7 , which will arrive on consoles this coming week. It’s coming a little sooner than anticipated, landing around three weeks after the previous content update on September 29. That’s the shortest interval between content updates yet, with most coming four or five weeks apart — and, with the exception of 1.15 and 1.17, on the last Thursday of each month. Another unusual facet is that the update, which we’re temporarily dubbing 1.25, will bring four new cars instead of the three we’ve seen teased for every update thus far: This set of cars looks relatively easy to identify, although with some qualifiers. Probably the most straightforward is the one in the bottom-left, which looks to be a 1973 Nissan Skyline GT-R. Often dubbed “Kenmeri”, due to a promotional campaign featuring a couple named Ken and Mary, Nissan only produced 197 examples of this car — the last Nissa

Search This Blog