Plus POKÉMON Day 2023 reveals a stack of new content and THE WOLF AMONG US 2 is delayed
NEWS THIS WEEK
RELEASE RADAR
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SIFTER is produced by Kyle Pauletto, Fiona Bartholomaeus, Daniel Ang& Adam Christou. Mitch Loh is Senior Producer and Gianni Di Giovanni is our Executive Producer. Thanks to Omny Studio for their support of SIFTER.
FIONA: Hi I’m Fiona Bartholomaeus
KYLE: and I’m Kyle Pauletto
FIONA: Welcome to Walkthrough, SIFTER’s weekly recap on the biggest news in video games.
KYLE: This week the Microsoft Gaming CEO promises the same experience for Call of Duty on every platform including Nintendo, Pokemon day is here with new DLC and games to look forward to and more.
Here is the news for Sunday 5th of March. Let’s go!
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PROMO: Join the SIFTER community on Discord at sifter.com.au/discord
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FIONA: Elden Ring is getting a DLC expansion called Shadow of The Erdtree, so get hyped Tarnished.
Very little is known about the expansion yet, but Elden Ring recently clocked 20 million copies sold in less than a year according to Bandai Namco and developer FromSoftware late last month.
Rumours are swirling that the demigod Mick-a-la (Miquella), who was absent from much of the base game will feature heavily in Shadow of the Erdtree, with artwork released by Fromsoft showing a mysterious long-haired figure riding Torrent - your trusty steed in the game.
Keep following Walkthrough as we’ll keep you up to date when we know more.
KYLE: Love to hear this. We knew more content was coming at some point but its still great to get that sweet sweet confirmation.
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KYLE: Phil Spencer, CEO of Microsoft Gaming says he wants Call of Duty to be the same experience on every console, and that includes Nintendo.
Microsoft just signed a ten year agreement with Nintendo to bring the games to those consoles, but the aging switch is definitely getting on in years.
Spencer says they want to take a Minecraft approach to CoD.
PHIL SPENCER: “We want to increase the places where people can play Call of Duty, I think a little bit like Minecraft. I think when we acquired Minecraft our monthly active player base was 20, 30 million, I'm doing this from memory but I think that's about the size that Minecraft was and I think it's now about maybe 120 million monthly players.”
“With Call of Duty. I think we've made some specific agreements with Nintendo and with Nvidia to ensure the game can show up in front of more places.”
“I looked the other day and we have 58 games in our portfolio that are available in the PlayStation Store today.”
“Now we've acquired a lot of those the Doom games and the Fallout games, but even things we're updating like ESO (Elder Scrolls Online), Fallout 76 and so we expect to hit a certain level of quality on all of those games.”
“That's our goal and the same thing on PC and the same thing on Nintendo and so when we say available everywhere or not exclusive, we want to make absolutely the best version of Call of Duty for any player on any of those platforms.”
It’s looking that all this regulatory pressure on the Microsoft Activision deal is having a big impact, one that hopefully ends up as a better deal for all players.
FIONA: It’s an ambitious goal. And Call of duty is a very different game to Minecraft. It’s going to be interesting to see if they can pull this off.
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FIONA: Pokemon Day returned for 2023 and there are more digital monsters to enjoy.
The Pokemon World Championships for 2023 will be in Japan for the first time ever which is pretty surprising, you’ll be able to watch the competitors online from August 11.
There are two new DLC chapters for Pokemon Scarlet and Violet, called The Teal Mask and The Indigo Disc, both of which will introduce new pokemon including reimagined paradox versions of Legendaries pokemon Suicune and Ver-iss-ee-en (Virizion).
Lets hope they fix that performance, but the games sold like crazy so maybe not…
KYLE: Pokemon cards are going bananas online, which meant getting your hands on an original set was impossible without shelling out thousands, but the Pokemon company have announced they’ll re-release some sets with an updated cardback, so you can flip that shiny charizard for hundreds of thousands of dollars.
A new tv series is coming to Netflix called Pokemon Concierge. Set at a Pokemon resort, the show will have an entirely new storyline all done with stop-motion animation.
Pokemon Sleep which was announced some time ago, will reward you for sleeping by measuring, recording and analysing your sleep. A bit like Pokemon Go, but for staying in one place not moving. That’s coming out this year.
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KYLE: The remake of the first Dead Space game was really well received and EA has started polling players to see if they’d be keen for more adventures of Issac Clarke.
A poll, which was sent out to a handful of fans, asked players how interested they would be in a similar remake of Dead Space 2 and 3, with their choice of answer ranging from not at all interested to extremely interested.
I reckon most of them would say “extremely interested”
It’s a pretty common thing to get leaks and information from these sorts of polls and research questionnaires so let's see what happens next.
FIONA: I think it’s such a cool way of gauging fans interests in another game and who doesn’t love a questionnaire.
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FIONA: Telltale Games are delaying the sequel to the popular choice-based game The Wolf Among Us.
Telltale Games CEO Jamie Ottilie said that part of the decision to delay was the fact that they needed more time to finish the game and if they put it out when it’s not ready it will be torn to shreds.
With the popularity of the game and really high expectations, it’s no surprise that they want to take their time, and prioritising their developers' health over deadlines is definitely something people will respect.
No new release date as of yet, but we’ll keep you updated.
KYLE: Delays are always a win in my books, and this is exactly why. Letting the team do what they need to do, to make the best product possible, in the time it takes to do it safely, should be the goal of every studio.
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KYLE: That’s it for news, here are the games releasing this week
FIONA: On Thursday, one of the best Metroid games in the series' long history is coming to Switch online. Originally released in 2002 on GameBoy Advance, Metroid Fusion was a massive hit, and will make a great addition to the Switch online library.
KYLE: Also out Thursday is Oni: Road to the Mightiest Oni. It’s a super cute adventure game that looks like an indie blend of Breath of the Wild and the current Pokemon games. It’s out on Switch, Playstation and PC on the 9th.
FIONA: Also coming this week, DC’s Justice League: Cosmic Chaos, an isometric brawler featuring all your favorite DC heroes. It’s definitely targeted at the younger gaming audience, but it looks like it could be a bit of fun. You can pick that up on all platforms this coming Friday.
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PROMO: Articles to read, videos to watch and podcasts to listen to on sifter.com.au
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FIONA: This has been Walkthrough by Sifter, my name is Fiona Bartholomaeus
KYLE: And my name is Kyle Pauletto. Thank you so much for listening.
FIONA: We know you love our podcasts, so why not become a monthly backer on Ko-Fi? Your support lets us keep making our shows so why not show the love and sign up to be a monthly backer. It’s easy, head to sifter.com.au/support where support starts from just $1 a month that address again is sifter.com.au/support
KYLE: SIFTER is produced by Kyle Pauletto, Fiona Bartholomaeus, Daniel Ang & Adam Christou. Mitch Loh is Senior Producer who edited this episode and Gianni Di Giovanni is our Executive Producer.
FIONA: Thanks to Brian Fairbanks from Salty Dog Sounds for composing the Walkthrough theme tune.
Thanks to both Audio Technica Australia and Omny Studio for their support of SIFTER’s three podcasts.
KYLE: Thanks again for listening, we’ll be back with more news next Sunday.
