Warframe: 1999 may reimagine a classic Digital Extremes game

By Ash Parrish, a reporter who has covered the business, culture, and communities of video games for seven years. Previously, she worked at Kotaku.

Yesterday, game engine company Unity announced changes to its pricing plan that will see developers charged each time someone installs their game after certain revenue and installation thresholds are met. Unity has been around since 2005 and is one of the most popular platforms for game creation, used for big-budget titans like Genshin Impact as well as games like Vampire Survivors, Pokémon Go, Cuphead, Among Us, Subnautica, RimWorld, BattleTech (2018), and Hollow Knight.

As we heard earlier this summer, Microsoft’s venerable Xbox Live Gold service is going away, to be replaced with Xbox Game Pass Core and the company has now revealed the transition is coming… tomorrow! Xbox Game Pass Core will essentially be the same as Xbox Live Gold, but will also come with a select library of games – a smaller lineup than the one you get with a regular Game Pass subscription, but there’s still some worthwhile stuff on the list. Gears 5, Halo 5, Grounded, Psychonauts 2, Fallout 4, Vampire Survivors, and more. There’s also a nice emphasis on fun, evergreen multiplayer stuff like Among Us, Overcooked, and Unpacking, to name a few. You can check out the full list, below.

Greetings, Adventurers!

The future of E3 is continuing to look bleak, but the games industry has seen the emergence of another major summer event in the form of Summer Game Fest. The event has been running for four years at this point and seen quite a bit of success, and unsurprisingly, it will be returning for its fifth year in 2025.

A brand new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles game has been revealed, and it follows on from the events of surprise hit TMNT: Mutant Mayhem, with painterly visuals inspired by the film’s striking art style.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem is getting a video game sequel – and it's set to release sooner than you might think. Outright Games, the publisher behind family-friendly titles such as PAW Patrol: Grand Prix and Jumanji: The Video Game, announced the adaptation will be launching on consoles and PC in 2024. 

Platforms have been locked for side-scrolling beat ’em up Mayhem Brawler II: Best of Both Worlds. Following its announcement in June 2022, the sequel is coming to PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, Nintendo Switch, and Steam. The digital launch is still penciled in for sometime in 2024. 

This week's free Epic Game Store giveaway is a small slice of gaming history: Cave Story+, an enhanced version of what the publisher calls «arguably the most well-known indie game of all time.» Cave Story comes from solo developer Daisuke Amaya, and the original game was released for free in 2004 after five years of work (and is still available). A Metroidvania about a robot trying to save a bunch of oppressed rabbits, it's an unforgettable ride, brutally tough, and can ultimately be a pretty heart-rending journey.

We review Frostpunk: The Board Game, a city building board game published by Glass Canon Unplugged. In Frostpunk: The Board Game, players are trying to guide their group of survivors in a frozen wasteland.

Seeing as Gamescom is now over and fans still haven’t gotten any news about Hollow Knight: Silksong, it’s looking like metroidvania enthusiast still have a while to wait until they can get their hands on what many suspect will be the genre’s next top-tier release. That’s not necessarily the case though. Blasphemous 2 hit a few days ago to great effect, and now Fearie Afterlight is on its way to PC and Switch sometime next month.

Microsoft has stopped offering its $1 trial for Xbox Game Pass as the company gears up for one of the biggest video game releases of the year in the form of Starfield. According to XGP, the option has been removed from the sign-up page for Xbox Game Pass.