In The News
Blizzard and Twitch are coming together to encourage team support through a feature called Cheering. It lets “HGC fans support their favorite teams and organizations while unlocking loot for Twitch and Heroes of the Storm,” GosuGamer’s Jason “Renofox” Renau writes. “HGC Cheer is a new way for fans to celebrate HGC moments using Twitch chat to Cheer with Bits. By supporting your favorite teams, fans who Cheer earn unique Twitch emotes, as well as in-game banners and other team-specific items for use in Heroes of the Storm.” Cheering’s first event starts Aug. 1.
Less talking, more making. That’s Raconteur Games founder Nicholas Laborde‘s advice to people he sees spending a little too much time on Twitter and not enough time working or promoting a healthier discourse. His take is this: Do not channel your energy into being nasty to people you disagree with on social mediums like Twitter. Take that same energy and pour it into something beneficial, whether it be work, friendships, family or yourself. TheDW highly recommends you read the entire thing, but here’s a teaser:
“You can support or protest anyone or anything without cursing up a storm, which may come as a surprise to many. I don’t care if you’re liberal or conservative, Catholic or atheist, Pastafarian or from the church of Steve Gaynor – I do care if you’re being nice to people, productively adding to conversation, and trying to create things.”
PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds will feature microtransactions during Gamescom. Brendan Greene posted his monthly update yesterday, in which he said:
“We would like to provide more content as well as test the basic crate & key system we want to implement in the final version of the game … On August 3rd, we will be launching three new crates. All three crates will contain items inspired by the Battle Royale movie, some of which you may have seen in our older artworks. The first and second crates, named the Wanderer Crate and the Survivor Crate, will be free to open. Each of these crates will include one set of the themed clothing, on top of other cosmetic items. The third crate named the Gamescom Invitational Crate will have the most diverse pool of themed clothing.”
On top of microtransactions, PUBG will have its first esports tournament during Gamescom.
Code Vein’s director, Hiroshi Yoshimura, wants fans and potential players to know the game isn’t intended to be an anime version of Dark Souls. VG247’s Alex Donaldson interviewed him about the upcoming game, which will be released sometime in 2018.
“‘This is a post-apocalyptic world. You can see from the artwork – it’s chaos. These characters we have are vampires. They’re very strong individuals, but they have the drawback where they need blood in order to survive. Once they reach a point where they don’t have that blood supply, they turn into these ghouls called Lost.’”
Loss plays a key part in Destiny 2’s experience, according to Activision’s game blog covering the Destiny 2 panel at SDCC. Game Director Luke Smith said “Destiny 2 is a story about loss and recovery” and sharing those harder emotions and moments with players. “For me [Smith] it started with a passionate idea we had that we would create a villain that the players had a personal relationship with. We wanted Ghaul to have a reason to hate the Guardians and to hate the player as well. That meant we had to introduce the player to Ghaul very early.”
Call of Duty commentator Jack Campbell, who got harassed after an awful person leaked screencaps about him — and quit his esports career as a result — is putting the sad situation to good use.
“‘When you’re in your room, and it’s notification and notification and messages build up and build up, you sit back and go, OK. I can’t progress further because of this. You get to a point where you think, is there a point in still trying? I need to step back,’” he said, according to Kotaku’s Maddy Myers. “Campbell has decided to return to the Call of Duty scene—and to support a good cause in the process. Campbell reached out to Ditch the Label, an international anti-bullying charity, and this August, he’ll be raising money for them in a 24-hour Call of Duty live-stream.”
Best of luck, Jack.
THQNordic will be presenting 2 previously unannounced games at Gamescom 2017. It will feature 8 in total, according to a press release. A “near-to-final version” of ELEX will be available to play. THQNordic gave brief descriptions for the two games it plans on revealing:
- The first new announcement is a brand new original IP. This open world RPG is set in a unique universe and will be a post-apocalyptic kung-fu fable.
- The second new announcement is a new installment of a well-known, mysterious and horrific IP.
That was fast. Blizzard shut down a legacy WoW server just 4 hours after its launch. The server, called Felmyst, was intended to take WoW back to the Burning Crusade expansion. What makes it particularly sad is the tale behind the man who created the server. Gummy52 spent 4 years working on the project while battling unemployment and muscular dystrophy.
“‘This project gave the last four years of my life a sense of purpose that I thoroughly enjoyed,’” Gummy52 wrote in a Reddit post, according to Ars Technica’s Kyle Orland. “‘I answered the door and then basically sat around in disbelief for a few hours,’ Gummy writes of receiving the cease-and-desist letter Friday. ‘During those hours I of course checked if the law firm was a real place, then checked if the number on the paper matched the number on their website, then called them to verify its authenticity.’”
Sega Europe just did some shuffling. “Senior vice president of commercial publishing John Clark is being promoted to executive vice president of publishing,” Brendan Sinclair at GamesIndustry.biz reports. “The other promotion sees Creative Assembly studio director Tim Heaton bumped up to executive vice president of studios.” Sega Europe is still looking for a president and COO.
#Red4life. Results are in for DXRacer’s next chair in a camouflage pattern. The red pattern won with 35% percent of the vote.
Keep up with Hearthhead (@Hearthhead) on Twitter for all the new cards being showcased from the Knights of the Frozen Throne expansion.
Millennial Esports invested almost $3 million “in French online TV network Alt Tab Productions,” Dot Esports’ Thiemo Brautigam writes. “Alt Tab’s most popular brand, OGaming TV, is the go to channel for French-language esports broadcasts of international events like Riot’s Worlds or Valve’s Majors.”
Game Developers Conference’s new general manager is Katie Stern, GamesBeat’s Stephanie Chan reports.