Dreams of Alice at 30 fps

Good morning. According to a recent report, the global gaming audience has reached 3.7 billion. So, in theory telling your friends about The Games Letter will make them quite happy.

Lowering our standards

Earlier this week, Arkane studio announced their upcoming game Redfall will launch with a locked 30 frames-per-second (fps) on Xbox, and fans are not happy.

Most new games launch at 60fps, a rate ideal for fast-paced action without blurriness. Reducing the frame rate means a game is trading speed for looks. New games launching with a reduced frame rate is not new. Gotham Knights and A Plague Tale: Requiem launched last year at 30 fps on console. As games get larger and graphics more detailed, more games could initially drop with a reduced frame rate.

In a tweet from the company, Arkane says “60 FPS Performance mode will be added via game update at a later date,” but no timeline is specified.

Whether this reduced frame rate is due to a rushed development cycle or is just our new reality, gamers who want to play Redfall with the best performance possible will have to wait, or play it on a beefy gaming PC.

American McGee retires from making games

American McGee, most known for his Alice games, announced his retirement after failing to get Electronic Arts to publish the last game in his trilogy.

McGee spent the last decade working on Alice: Asylum. After EA refused to publish the game, McGee asked for them to license the character. From his Patreon page:

After several weeks of review, EA has come back with a response regarding funding and/or licensing for "Alice: Asylum."

On the question of funding, they have ultimately decided to pass on the project based on an internal analysis of the IP, market conditions, and details of the production proposal. On the question of licensing, they replied that "Alice" is an important part of EA’s overall game catalog, and selling or licensing it isn’t something they’re prepared to do right now.

If this is the end for McGee, he has had an incredible career, working on the Doom, Quake and Alice franchises.

All Dreams come to an end

Media Molecule announced they are ending support for their game Dreams in September. From their statement:

You’ll continue to be able to play, create and share Dreams with others after September, but we won’t be releasing any more updates to the game or [limited] events. We’re incredibly proud of the work we’ve done in developing Dreams… we are endlessly grateful to the community for their belief and continuous contributions since launch.

Dreams allows users to make, share and play community-made games. It is a unique content creation device and game all rolled into one. Here’s hoping this is not the beginning of the end for the game itself.

Give us more trailers!

A number of notable game trailers hit the web this week:

The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom is the most anticipated game of the year. Nintendo posted their final gameplay trailer before it releases on May 12. Check it out.

For those who want to see more of Final Fantasy XVI, Sony provided a 20 minute peek into the game in their latest State of Play event. Check it out.

Is there a demand for a Call of Duty style game in the fantasy world? The creators of Immortals Of Aveum seem to think so. The first trailer for the game released this week, and looks pretty badass.

Side quests (more stories worth reading)

🐦‍ Sega is in talks to buy Rovio, makers of Angry Birds for $1 billion. That’s a lot of bacon.

🎮 Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League is delayed again, this time until February 2024. You’ll have to wait until next year to hear Kevin Conroy’s last performance as Batman.

🎮 Sony’s exclusivity games are under scrutiny from the US government, with one Senator asking to see all the PlayStation exclusive deals.

🎮 FromSoftware president Hidetaka Miyazaki, who directed Elden Ring, Bloodborne and the Dark Souls games was named one of Time magazine’s 100 most influential people.

🇷🇺 According to Microsoft, Russian Agents are trying to use propaganda to penetrate gaming communities. We can safely say, they haven’t succeeded with The Games Letter.

🎮 Call of Duty is coming under fire for premium (aka additional cost) skins that grant unfair advantages and bonuses in the game. Critics are calling it pay-to-win.

♟️Like Indiana Jones? Funko announced the upcoming release of four new games featuring the character. Which one excites you the most?

🎨 A piece of modern art inspired by a bug in World of Warcraft? Just imagine what Cyberpunk 2077 will inspire.

New Releases this week:

4/18: God of Rock (PlayStation, Xbox, Switch and PC)
4/18: Minecraft Legends (PlayStation, Xbox, Switch and PC)
4/18: Desktop Dungeons: Rewind (PC)
4/18: Disney Speedstorm  (PlayStation, Xbox, Switch and PC)
4/20: Stray Blade (PlayStation, Xbox and PC)
4/21: Dead Island 2 (PlayStation, Xbox and PC)

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