Hello everyone. Welcome to another issue of Emmen Weekly, our new twist on gaming news.
It’s been another interesting week of updates and surprises.
With no further ado, let’s dive right in.
Halo TV Show to Reveal Master Chief’s Face
It was recently revealed that the upcoming Halo TV show will reveal the Master Chief’s face for the first time ever.
Halo’s executive producer and 343 Industries’ Studio Head of Transmedia, Kiki Wolfkill spoke at the IGN Fan Fest event and stated that revealing the Chief’s face was important to the story they wanted to tell.
She went on to say that for some people, this moment will be 20 years in the making and for others, unthinkable or difficult to imagine.
Wolfkill stated that the team respects both sides of the argument and that “for the nature of the story, it felt really important to connect with the Master Chief in a different way, and that meant showing the face.”
The Halo TV show has an interesting development history with plenty of twists and turns. We’ll touch on that one day soon.
For now, just note that the series comes out on March 24, 2022 on Paramount+ in the US.
EA Blames Battlefield 2042’s Messy Launch on Halo Infinite
Speaking of Halo… Electronic Arts, a company that won an award for being the worst company in America twice, has apparently blamed the failure of the latest iteration of its Battlefield franchise on the success of Halo: Infinite.
EA made its position known during a special “town hall” meeting held with staff from across the company.
The company is reportedly chalking up the failure of Battlefield 2042 to the pandemic, developers working from home, and the “unexpected” success of Halo: Infinite.
It went on to add that the number of bugs in the game had reached historic high levels for a DICE game.
EA also had some blame to put on the Frostbite Engine, which is what they use for a majority of their games.
The company is now going to be restructuring the Battlefield 2042 team for a “more streamlined development process”. That doesn’t sound too promising for the hard working devs at DICE but only time will tell.
So to sum things up, according to EA, the myriad of problems plaguing Battlefield 2042 such as missing features and numerous bugs is the fault of COVID-19, Halo: Infinite, and the Frostbite Engine.
Not corporate mismanagement. Nope.
Never corporate mismanagement.
Bioshock Movie Announced
Let’s cleanse our palette with some potentially good news.
Netflix recently announced that it will be partnering with 2K and Take-Two Interactive to produce a Bioshock film.
The news was announced by one of Netflix’s many official Twitter handles. You can see the original tweet below.
As you can see, we’ve only gotten the announcement so far.
There’s not much in the way of details such as casting, a director, or even concept art, much less a release date.
This news comes after some speculation due to the fact that Netflix was seen to have been picking up many trademarks this year, one of which was Bioshock.
Looking at online response, it seems split between “What an unexpected surprise” and “I never asked for this”, which… yeah. Generally tracks for most of these announcements.
Whether this project will bring in new fans or be a massive flop that is forgotten soon is something only time will tell.
Cyberpunk 2077 PS5 and Xbox Series S/X Upgrades Released
The long-awaited PS5 and Xbox Series S/X upgrades for CD Projekt Red’s Cyberpunk 2077 have finally been released.
This upgrade came with a free trial version, free DLC, and a 50GB 1.5 patch. The patch was applied to all versions of the game but the upgrade comes with it.
The next gen versions of this game will offer performance modes that prioritize 60FPS or ray-tracing modes.
Here’s a breakdown of what each version has to offer:
One of the more popular DLCs for all the versions seem to be the ability to alter your character’s basic appearance.
When the game launched, the face you picked at the start was what you were stuck with until the end.
At the time, this was seen as a bizarre exclusion considering how CD Projekt Red’s own game, the Witcher 3, had appearance-altering options to some degree.
Plus, let’s be real… body modification is synonymous with the cyberpunk genre. It should go beyond just slotting chips and devices into your cyber brain for mechanical benefits. So its exclusion was strange to say the least.
That aside, the game has had a long and difficult history since the day it was released. It has become synonymous with over-hype, the ongoing decay of the AAA games industry, and fan vitriol.
It was so bad that some of the good aspects of the game (and there are many good aspects) got overshadowed.
Since then, CDPR has been updating the game and patching it over and over again.
If you are interested in checking out our review of Cyberpunk 2077 at the time of release and… about three patches deep, you can check it out here.
Wii U & Nintendo 3DS eShop to be Discontinued
It’s the end of an era as Nintendo announced that the Wii U and Nintendo 3DS eShops will be discontinued.
According to an official statement released by the mega corporation, the closure will be going into effect throughout this year with features being phased out over time.
Nintendo said that by March 2023, it will no longer be possible to download free content, including demos from the specified eShop.
It went on to elaborate that as of May 23, 2022, it will no longer be possible to use credit cards to add funds to an account in the Nintendo eShop on the Wii U or Nintendo 3DS family of systems.
Additionally, it said that as of August 29, 2022, it will no longer be possible to use Nintendo eShop Cards to add funds to an account in the eShop on the Wii U or Nintendo 3DS family of systems.
That being said, download codes can still be redeemed until March 2023.
Nintendo went on to add that it will still be possible to redownload games and DLC, receive updates, and enjoy online play on the Wii U or Nintendo 3DS family of systems after the aforementioned date.
In their Q&A about this update, Nintendo stated that it was the normal part of any product’s lifecycle after it becomes less used by consumers over time.
These changes apply to Nintendo 3DS, Nintendo 3DS XL, Nintendo 2DS XL, Nintendo 3DS, Nintendo 3DS XL, Nintendo 2DS, Wii U Deluxe, and Wii U Basic.
Sony to Plant a Tree for Every Player Achieving a Certain Horizon: Forbidden West Trophy
Now let’s switch gears and talk about something positive; planting trees.
Sony has introduced a “Pay and Plant” program for the US where it will plant a tree for every player that earns a specific trophy in Horizon: Forbidden West.
The company partnered up with the Arbor Day Foundation and will donate one tree to a forest restoration program for every player that earns the “Reached the Daunt” trophy.
The initiative will cover three different reforestation projects across the US, located in the Douglas County Forest in Wisconsin, Sheep Fire Private Lands in California, and Torreya State Park in Florida.
The promotion will go on until March 25 or until all three reforestation projects are completed.
The current estimated number of trees needed to complete the projects is around 288k.
The trophy is unlocked automatically near the beginning of the game so it’ll be hard to miss.
The game launched recently and we streamed it on Friday.
Our VOD will be coming within the week so stay tuned to get a taste of Horizon: Forbidden West!
Emmen Gaming 