The best Bethesda games of all time
There are way more Bethesda games than The Elder Scrolls that are just as good. That's why we've rounded up this list of the best Bethesda games of all time.
Community Download: Is Microsoft’s Purchase Of Zenimax Good For VR?
Community Download is a weekly discussion-focused article series published (usually) every Monday in which we pose a single, core question to you all, our readers, in the spirit of fostering discussion and debate. For today’s Community Download, we want to know what you think about the Microsoft purchase of Bethesda parent company ZeniMax!
Today a huge bombshell dropped when Microsoft announced that it was purchasing ZeniMax, the parent company of Bethesda. This grants ownership of developers like Bethesda Game Studios, id Software, Arkane Studios, and more to Microsoft making them the owners of The Elder Scrolls, Fallout, DOOM, and many others.
That’s huge news!
But what does it mean for VR? We all know Microsoft doesn’t have the best track record with supporting VR as a platform, so could this theoretically limit these studios in terms of their VR support? We’ve already gotten VR entries for The Elder Scrolls, Fallout, DOOM, Wolfenstein, and Prey from Bethesda properties so it makes you wonder if any future VR projects are at risk of changing or being canceled.
However, you can’t deny this absolutely does mean there is more funding at the hands of these teams. inXile is working on Frostpoint, a VR-only shooter, that’s coming this year and they’re owned by Microsoft, so it’s not a deal breaker at all. If Microsoft continues to fund and publish ZeniMax games on multiple platforms then it’s a net positive for everyone, really.
What do you think? Is this going to end up being a good thing for VR? Let us know down in the comments below!
Fallout TV series coming to Amazon from Westworld creators
The series is a collaboration between Kilter Films and Amazon Studios
Survival VR FPS Into The Radius Leaving Early Access, Full Release June 20
Developer CM Games announced that its VR debut survival horror FPS game Into The Radius is leaving Early Access on June 20. The game initially launched on Steam and other platforms in 2019 in Early Access with less content, but now the game will enjoy a full release with all the content added during the development cycle over the last several months.
Set in an open-world Soviet wasteland, Into The Radius is a survival shooter with a sprinkle of horror as well. When we interviewed Brandon Marsh from CM Games earlier in the year, he described the game as “much more of a survival / stealth game, not a straight forward guns blazing FPS.” You need to use your navigation skills and prepare the right equipment for each mission, using modifiable weapons that will also need to be maintained to avoid jams.
The Early Access build started with just the open map and a handful of missions, leading some players to note that it had a slow pace and felt a bit unfinished. However, Marsh also noted to us back in February that a lot of content was being added during Early Access, such as more maps, voice acting, the full storyline and special missions, as outlined in the Early Access milestones. Once the game reached Milestone 6, it was ready for a full launch, which is now set for June 20. There’s even a new gameplay trailer to celebrate the launch, which you can view embedded above.
It’s clear that Into The Radius has come a long way since the beginning of Early Access. It launches for PC VR on June 20 on the Steam and Oculus stores, plus it will also be available through Viveport Infinity.
The post Survival VR FPS Into The Radius Leaving Early Access, Full Release June 20 appeared first on UploadVR.
How Into The Radius Combines STALKER And Onward For A Hardcore Post-Apocalyptic Shooter
Into The Radius is an open-world hardcore post-apocalyptic story-driven VR shooter with heavy influences from a wide gamut of entertainment media properties. It released on Steam Early Access last November and is dropping on the Oculus Home Store in Early Access today.
Game developers that work in VR often cite very different influences than the ones that work on non-VR games. If you ask a developer what got them into traditional game development you’ll likely get a list of old-school retro games, maybe some movies and TV shows, or books that they wanted to emulate. But in the case of VR, since the medium is so new, a lot of developers cite modern, contemporary games as key influences. In the case of Into the Radius, it’s a bit of both.
Taken from the game’s store page description:
Into the Radius is a single-player survival shooter developed exclusively for premium Virtual Reality headsets. The game is a dark mix of eldritch horror, open-world exploration, realistic weapon handling and intriguing storyline that will make you feel like you’re in the middle of the post-apocalyptic Pechorsk Radius zone.
Life and death intertwine inside the Radius, lurking somewhere in the middle of everything is the answer to a question you can’t quite remember. Through the flickering memories of your tarnished life as a former resident of Pechorsk and now UNSPC specialist, your only means of survival is to stalk the strange and threatening zone and complete the missions assigned to you.
We spoke to Brandon Marsh from CM Games about the game’s release, early reception, and future plans. These questions and answers were conducted over email in late November, but due to a busy release season, holidays, and packed schedules we’re just now publishing it to coincide with the Oculus Home release.
UploadVR: Tell me more about some of the main inspirations for Into the Radius, both VR and non-VR inspirations.
Brandon Marsh: The source material the game is based on is ‘Roadside Picnic’ by the Stugatsky Brothers. The S.T.A.L.K.E.R series and their mods share the same source material, it has a diehard community and we see Into the Radius as following in that tradition.
Other Non-VR inspirations include Myst (solo exploration with a narrative) and Darksouls (Hardcore gameplay, subtle / cryptic story, Death is included as a mechanic).
VR inspiration would be Onward, which was one of the first games that showed that free locomotion shooters have commercial appeal.
UVR: Many of the main complaints about the game early on seemed to be about the slow pace and “unfinished” feeling — are these things you plan on addressing.
BM: Early Access was a major milestone for us, the primary focus was to implement the systems with placeholder assets, make the game more immersive and focus on playability and functionality over style and cosmetics. We’ve been able to quickly test everything and got a lot of feedback from the community on what is working and what needs improvements.
Right now the game has its core mechanics fully playable. There is a big open terrain map to explore, a hub to pick missions, along with buying and selling of a basic arsenal of firearms and helpful items.
Regarding the game’s pacing, Into the Radius is much more of a survival / stealth game, not a straight forward guns blazing FPS. We strive to provide tension via player decisions, skill and exploration of the unknown rather than an overwhelming sensory stimulation.
UVR: What are some of the major ways you plan to update/improve the game while in Early Access?
BM: We’re still finalizing the development roadmap from now until launch. When it’s ready we’ll be sharing it out with the community. Next week we are releasing to Oculus Store Early Access as well as setting up a HTC Viveport ‘Coming Soon’ page.
Since the release, the team has been doing a lot of bug fixing and patching getting the game in a stable, playable state for everyone. We are working on the balance especially for starter players to make the difficulty more manageable, same with improving the tutorial (which is iterated every release.)
We’ve made a quite complex systemic game with an indie sized team, there are a lot of placeholder assets to be replaced, textured and finalized over the next few months. Things like additional content (maps, weapons, anomalies and artifacts), replacing the cassette tape subtitle and text-to-speech placeholders with voice actors, the storyline and special missions will start to be inserted into the game.
UVR: How has the reception been so far in terms of sales? You probably can’t give specifics, but if you could describe the reception versus expectations that would be great.
BM: We knew getting into this that the VR games market is very niche and our game is even more niche (catering to single player hardcore). Very few premium VR games even manage to surpass 5000+ copies sold, so our expectations were pretty tempered.
That being said, initial sales have been slow, we’re launching on more platforms and continuing to do a strong marketing push to build up momentum for the full release.
UVR: What other games have you worked on before?
BM: As a group we’ve all been in the industry with an average 6-12+ years experience. Starting from PC-console game outsource to development of top mobile games.
Some of those titles include: Nitro Nation, Mushroom Wars, The X-Files: Deep State, UFO: Resistance (Android), ZooCraft, Digger HD and Hot Wheels Infinite Loop.
Into The Radius is available on both Oculus Home for Rift and Steam for all major PC VR platforms for $29.99. The Steam page states an expected Early Access duration of 6-10 months, meaning a planned full release sometime later this year. The price will increase when it comes time for full launch.
The post How Into The Radius Combines STALKER And Onward For A Hardcore Post-Apocalyptic Shooter appeared first on UploadVR.
5 Reasons Why The Outer Worlds VR Support Could Be Amazing
We often write lists of reasons why big, prominent non-VR games should absolutely get official VR support. Examples of ones we’re still crossing our fingers for Metro Exodus, Kingdom Come Deliverance, and Destiny 2. With that being said, it does happen. Just look at No Man’s Sky, Hellblade VR, Skyrim VR, Fallout 4 VR, and Borderlands 2 VR as examples.
First, a bit of background: What exactly is The Outer Worlds? Basically, Obsidian Entertainment is an RPG-focused development studio that has created on games like Neverwinter Nights II, Fallout: New Vegas, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II, Pillars of Eternity, Tyranny, and many others over the years and was founded by people that originally created the Fallout franchise. The pitch here is that, this is a lot like a new Fallout game in every way but name, but instead of taking place after a nuclear apocalypse it puts you as a boisterous captain of a spaceship as you make your way across various planets with your rag tag group of NPC companions. Think of it as a combo of several key tenets of both Bethesda and Bioware games and you’re pretty close.
Usually there is some sort of key justification for it all beyond just “this would be cool!” and this time with The Outer Worlds is no different. Consider this article my formal plea to either Obsidian Entertainment to add at least head tracking support, if not a full VR update, as well as a list of reasons an intrepid would be praised for doing some of the dirty work.
Fallout 4 VR As A Point Of Comparison
Let’s get it out of the way first: if Fallout 4 can work in VR, I absolutely think The Outer Worlds can. Obviously a full-on VR adaptation with roomscale movement support and motion controller tracking would be glorious, but I’d honestly settle for head-tracking only as well. Head-tracking mods have done wonders to make games like Alien Isolation and GTA V feel new again in VR and that would be great here as well. Something like VorpX will probably get updated soon, but direct VR support within the game would be better.
Immersive Atmosphere
The Outer Worlds is one of those kinds of games that is very easy to lose yourself in. The landscapes are vast and beautiful, the characters are rich and full of interesting things to say, and the regions are both wide and deep with tons of things to do and see. While not quite an open world game, there is so much to do in The Outer Worlds with a litany of ways to build your character you won’t be pressed to find things to do. Within the first hour it’s tough to walk for more than a few minutes without finding something fresh and new going on.
Gorgeous And Appropriate Setting
Like, just look at it. Look at The Outer Worlds. This is a screenshot I took yesterday (also embedded above) immediately after exiting my landing pod following character creation and stepping foot into the game world for the very first time. Not only is it just a drop-dead gorgeous game, but it’s got an incredibly immersive atmosphere that really evokes that same sense of discovery you get from VR games like The Solus Project, Skyrim VR, No Man’s Sky VR, and Fallout 4 VR. Not to mention the setting is all about exploring strange worlds that feel ripped out of a sci-fi film or graphic novel.
Unreal Engine And Planned Mod Support
Since The Outer Worlds is an Unreal Engine 4 game and not based on a custom platform, that at least leaves the door cracked to the potential of VR support of some kind. At the very least hopefully VorpX will work in time or can be achieved by tweaking settings from an existing UE4 game’s profile. But going even beyond that, Obsidian are intending to add mod support sometime after launch which could theoretically make it possible for more bespoke VR solutions. Again though, even just basic head-tracking and 3D would be enough to make me try it in a VR HMD.
Single-Player Focused RPG Shooter
There aren’t enough games like The Outer Worlds in VR. Other than the big examples I’ve listed already like Fallout 4 VR, Skyrim VR, No Man’s Sky VR, and maybe The Solus Project for a survival-focused angle, it’s a genre that most developers haven’t had the funding, resources, or time to tap into much yet for immersive content. Adapting a game like The Outer Worlds would be a great stop-gap solution. Stormland is coming up soon and should scratch the itch a bit, but it’s less narrative-focused overall and has an emphasis on co-op. The Outer Worlds, on the other hand, is deeply narrative focused, single-player, and is oozing with great RPG elements.
Let us know what you think of this article down in the comments below! Would you play The Outer Worlds in VR?
The post 5 Reasons Why The Outer Worlds VR Support Could Be Amazing appeared first on UploadVR.
Bethesda’s Fallout 76 subscription plan costs an eyebrow-raising $100 per year
Bethesda has announced a new service called Fallout 1st coming to Fallout 76 that includes access to private servers. The service's high price is not being received well by players.
Here is what Bethesda showed during its E3 2019 press conference
Bethesda held its fifth annual E3 press conference on June 9. Here is everything the publisher had to announce, including two new IP and new features for its existing lineup of games.
Fallout countdown video spotted in Amazon placeholder for Bethesda game
Amazon placeholders for a Bethesda game were spotted, and they included a countdown video in the style of Fallout. A new Fallout game may be in the works, but with Fallout 76 just released last year, remasters may be more likely.
The post Fallout countdown video spotted in Amazon placeholder for Bethesda game appeared first on Digital Trends.
Get an Xbox One X with ‘Fallout 76’ for a huge discount at Walmart
Don't have a powerful Xbox One X console yet? If you're looking for a great deal, Walmart currently has it bundled with Fallout 76 for just $399. Also included are one-month trials to Xbox Game Pass and Xbox Live Gold.
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