Hello friends, and welcome back to the WIRED Games newsletter! How are you holding up this summer? It's been remarkably hot in some parts of the world, so I hope you're staying cool and playing lots of video games. Xenoblade Chronicles 3 came out for Switch this past week, and I hope to give it a shot soon. For now, I've been chilling with my usual comfort game. That's right, Destiny 2. But this week we have more interesting stories to share than me grinding the solstice event in Destiny 2. First of all, you may have seen that "hidden level" that a few folks "discovered" in Nier: Automata last week. It looked pretty cool, and it was pretty believable that it was an unfinished level that got scrapped or something like that—even Yoko Taro didn't answer questions about it—but we finally got to the bottom of the whole thing. So yes, it's a hoax, but it's one that fired up the modding community for the game, so you never know. We may see more soon! In this week's Casual Gamer column, Swapna Krishna makes an excellent point: Just buy the Steam Deck if you want one. You have permission. Sometimes you don't need to justify to yourself that you should buy a thing, especially if it's something you want and would enjoy using. Is it a "must have" gaming device? No. Is it nice to have? Absolutely. If you don't believe me, trust Swapna—she explains it really well. If you're a mobile gamer (and I definitely am), Google's new Google Play Pass subscription service may look appealing to you. Simon Hill takes a look at the service and explains how much it'll cost you and your family, what the benefits are, and what great games you'll be able to play once you sign up. Of course, it's not for everyone, so give the piece a read before committing. Some of the games do look fun, though, like Stardew Valley, Terraria, and Dead Cells. And speaking of mobile games, our Gear Team just updated our list of the best mobile game controllers, either to attach to your phone directly or just to hold while you have your phone mounted somewhere else. Some of them are even familiar options, especially if you're a subscriber to something like Xbox Game Pass, where you can remote-play Xbox games on your phone. Oh, and if you read anything this week, check out Will Bedingfield's deep dive into predatory monetization in gaming. He starts off by noting the UK government's decision to not regulate loot boxes as a form of gambling, and moves on to explain that game publishers have already moved past loot boxes as a form of monetization anyway, so it's a bit of a moot point. From battle passes to in-game currencies, publishers are pushing more live service games with more aggressive monetization schemes that players are becoming more and more desensitized to. And as that happens, indie devs who can't bring in the money, or who don't care for those monetization methods, are left behind. Finally, from our colleagues over at Ars Technica, this great piece on the disagreement between Microsoft-owned Mojang Studios (which makes Minecraft) and NFT Worlds, a company that wanted to bring NFTs to Minecraft. Long story short, Mojang doesn't want NFTs in Minecraft, and NFT Worlds said that if they couldn't bring NFTs to Minecraft they'd make their own Minecraft-like game and put NFTs in it. Both groups say they just want to give players what they want. So, what do you want? Let us know at Games@WIRED.com. That's a pretty wide range of stories, don't you agree? If there's one article in particular you love or have feedback on, get in touch! We love getting your letters. (We see you, person who adopted a cat and then played Stray!) Now then, I'm back to finish out the solstice event, then maybe play some Escape Academy. Or maybe the demo for Affogato, a super-stylish card-based strategy game I caught the trailer for a little while ago, and promptly fell in love with. See you back here next week! |
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