Welcome to another GamesBeat weekly roundup! This time, Overwatch gets a new map, Nintendo has a strong sales month, and we went hands-on with upcoming Ubisoft games like Watch Dogs 2 and For Honor.
Happy reading, and have a great weekend!
Pieces of flair and opinion
- The DeanBeat: Why Donald Trump should play Deus Ex: Mankind Divided
- Hearthstone’s One Night in Karazhan guide: How to beat The Opera
- Why Nintendo isn’t likely to use AMD’s top Zen chip design — and why Microsoft will
- LiquidSky is ready to show off its modern take on OnLive’s failed cloud gaming
- How VCs are looking at investing in VR experiences
- Google’s Lee Jones on how marketing will impact the future of mobile gaming
News
- New Prey gameplay shows the power of a coffee mug
- Path of Exile continues charting its path to China
- Red Bull adds online qualifiers to Capcom’s Street Fighter V esports event
- Innerspace VR recruits actor John Rhys-Davies for artistic VR title
- Nintendo thanks Pokémon Go for the 3DS’s sales dominance in July
- Hearthstone: One Night in Karazhan’s Opera wing is live now
- Overwatch’s adorable Bastion animated short is now live
- Paragon’s new hero is a drum-playing beast
- Augmented reality firm CastAR recruits former LucasArts chief Darrell Rodriguez as its CEO
- AMD takes biggest jab at Intel in years with Zen processor
- Sony will publish the virtual reality tank game Battlezone for PS4
- Uncorporeal and RadicalMedia team up to capture human forms in VR
- Xbox Live is down for some (updated: resolved)
- Konami announces its first post-Kojima Metal Gear game: Metal Gear Survive
- BioShock: The Collection’s remastered opening is a big upgrade from the original
- Up close with Intel’s Project Alloy open hardware AR/VR headset
- Twitch acquires Curse, its sites, tools for gamers, and databases
- University of Nevada, Las Vegas will offer a course on esports
- Overwatch is getting its first new map since launch: the castle-themed Eichenwalde
- Heroes of the Storm is adding Zarya from Overwatch
- Intel shows off the power of the 7th generation Core processor
- Intel and Microsoft will work together on mixed reality specs for Windows 10
- Intel unveils Project Alloy all-in-one virtual reality headset (update)
- Titanfall 2 gets two weekend multiplayer tests in August
- U.S. game sales to hit $25.3 billion in 2016, thanks to rapid online growth
- Oculus Rift VR launches in Canada and Europe on September 20
- Paragon is now in open beta on PlayStation 4 and PC
- Lenovo launches two compact desktop virtual reality gaming systems
- Logitech targets latest mouse at pro esports players
- Nvidia unveils Pascal-based VR-ready laptop graphics chips with 76% performance boost
- Battlefield 1’s open beta starts August 31
- Minecraft now works with the Oculus Rift
- Fallout 4’s NukaWorld theme park is revealed in a new trailer
- Final Fantasy XV officially delayed to November 29
Mobile and social
- New Pokémon Go bot ‘automates the entire game’
- George of the Jungle mobile games swings its way to iOS and Android
- Unity makes it easier to release games for Facebook
- SuperAwesome brings kids’ social app PopJam to the U.S.
- Hit show Mr. Robot gets a mobile game with a confusing name
- Armajet’s free beta brings team-based shooting to mobile
- Gamblit will put zombie and racing games into casinos
- Kabam’s Kent Wakeford on why mobile gaming is so complicated
- Pokémon Go rivals Rio Olympic Games in popularity
Previews, reviews, and interviews
- Hands-on with Skylanders Imaginators’ zany user-generated characters
- Why Teddy Roosevelt’s fat face matters in Civilization VI
- Ubisoft’s Steep brings X-Games-like skiing on December 2 to PS4, Xbox One, and PC
- Hands-on with For Honor’s brutal sword combat
- How Ubisoft game designer wants you to learn swordfighting in For Honor
- Hands-on with Ubisoft’s The Crew: Calling All Units
- Hands-on with co-op and single-player in the hacker’s world of Watch Dogs 2
- How D&D’s boss sees the role-playing game working in augmented reality
- Storm King’s Thunder stomps into D&D’s Neverwinter online game on PC
- Titanfall 2’s new grappling hooks and giant batteries transforms its multiplayer
- Creature Quest is one big nod to its creator’s first world — Might and Magic (update)
- No Man’s Sky procedural universe can’t match your imagination