Hello, readers! Sony’s State of Play kicked off a slate of incredible gaming events to come in June. While I honestly wasn’t expecting much (since they had stated the event would focus on PSVR2 games and third-party games), I was very pleasantly surprised.
Here are my top five announcements/reveals from the event!
5) Insomniac’s Spider-Man is Swinging to PC
Modding community, I know your first task will be to bring back Peter’s original face from the game (probably). However, this gal would love it if I could play as Andrew Garfield’s Spider-Man.
4) Horror Games Get Spring Love
Resident Evil was a significant presence at the event, showing off a trailer for a remade and “reimagined” Resident Evil 4, and WHOA, was it impressive. It was a game that I tried playing on the Wii but could not stand the motion controls. (Husband was a big fan, though, and I’ve watched him play the Wii version and the version brought to the Xbox One/Series consoles.) However, with the graphics update and promises of modernizing the game for the new systems, I might dive back into it.
The Callisto Protocol already has me shaking in my shoes. They showed off a small snippet of gameplay during the event, which was terrifying, but the follow-up post to the PlayStation.Blog from studio head Glen Schofield raised my interest even more than it had been.
“Creating terrifying moments in games is hard. To bring the world of The Callisto Protocol to life, the team uses a process we call Horror Engineering to hand craft unforgettable scares. It’s about blending atmosphere, tension, brutality, helplessness, and humanity to thrill players … and hopefully scare the crap out of them.”
Between Resident Evil 4, The Callisto Protocol, and the Dead Space remake, the Winter months will be very kind to horror fans.
3) Eternights Comes Out of Nowhere
I looked at my TV during this trailer going, “wut?” But by the end of it, this was a game I had to know more details. I feel like I’m a relative newcomer to the Persona games; I played Persona 4 Golden on the Vita, then Persona 5 on my PS4, and I’m still working through Strikers on my Switch. (It’s the curse of playing too many games at once.)
They’re almost like comfort food in a way – I’d hop on, play a couple of in-game days at a time, and hop off. Eternights looks like it’s taking that slice-of-life parts of Persona and mixing it with an apocalypse and a dating sim, and that wild premise has me interested.
2) Stray Gets a Release Date!
I have a soft spot for orange tabby cats, and I have since I was young. Growing up on a farm, cats always seemed to randomly show up, and they hung around. (Lots of old buildings with mice. And we’d feed them. I told them I never played favorites, but I totally did, doting on the orange cats more.)
Seeing the orange tabby in Stray melted my heart right away, and I indeed had a “SHUT UP AND TAKE MY MONEY” moment. Knowing that Annapurna Interactive was publishing the game made it even more so because they have a track record for publishing absolute bangers.
In the week or so before the State of Play, it looked like a July release date for Stray had leaked. The trailer shown at the event confirmed the rumor! I haven’t decided if I’m playing on PC or PS5 yet, but it will be a day one purchase for me!
And finally…
Drumroll…
My top reveal from this State of Play was:
1) Horizon Forbidden West’s Mega-Update
This was the update I’ve been waiting for. I loved Forbidden West; it was a damn near-perfect game in my eyes.
(While the Call of the Mountain reveal was fun, VR can bring on migraines for me, which stinks. I look forward to watching the game on Twitch or YouTube, though. If you deal with something similar and have been able to play VR games, hit me up with your remedy!)
The significant part of the update was New Game+. Now, I’ve already maxed out on levels (50), but I’ve been making it a point to max out each of the skill trees. While I’m only about an hour into my New Game+ run, it’s been exciting to use all the rare and legendary loot I got in and near the endgame at the beginning around Chainscrape. It was also a great choice that you had the option of playing the opening hour of the game (exploring with Varl and going to Meridian) or going straight into the title sequence and boarding the lift for Chainscrape.
The update also included an Ultra-Hard difficulty, tons of quality-of-life features, the ability to re-spec your skill points, and the ability to transmog Aloy’s outfits. Not going to lie; I’m tempted to see if I can transmog my Nora Valiant outfit into Elisabet’s Rainment.
The Rest of June
I know my list won’t match up with many people just from the simple fact I didn’t have Street Fighter 6 or Final Fantasy on my list. (I’m jazzed for people who are excited about them, that’s just not my jam.) What did you love about Sony’s State of Play? What are you looking forward to in the events to come this month?