Author: Danielle

Madden NFL 20’s first closed beta is going live on June 14 and will last through June 16, giving football fans a hands-on with the next game in the franchise ahead of the game’s full release on August 2.

Just a heads up for all the football fans out there: EA Play attendees can get access if they stop by the Madden booth, but everyone else will have to find codes as they’re sent out on EA and Madden social media accounts from June 10 to June 14, according to EA’s blog post.

What’s playable in the beta? Everything but fan-favorite Madden Ultimate Team and the new solo mode, Face of the Franchise: QB1 Campaign, which replaces the Longshot mode from the previous two games. You’ll only be able to play with a quintet of powerful teams: Kansas City Chiefs, Los Angeles Rams, New England Patriots, and New Orleans Saints.

(And sadly, any progress made in the beta won’t carry over to the full game.)

 What’s new in Madden 20? 

Aside from Face of the Franchise and an expanded Madden Ultimate Team, there are still a slew of new things coming to Madden 20 that you’ll be able to play with in the beta. Pro Bowl makes a triumphant return, and the regular Franchise mode is back and better than ever with the below additions.

An elite group of players also get a new category to reflect their phenomenal real-life abilities. 50 players will be considered Superstars: once you satisfy certain conditions on the field, their X-Factor special abilities activate to give you an edge – though other X-Factor abilities might counter them.

There are other quality-of-life improvements too, like 220 new run pass options, new unique formations, and signature animations coming to players and teams that mimic their real-life iterations, down to the specific way some carry the ball. Madden plans to update playbooks and animations during the regular season, so if you see a wild new play, it might be coming to Madden 20 thereafter.

While it’s a shame not to get access to two of the more exciting additions to Madden 20, perhaps they’ll come in a later beta. Until then, keep your eyes on social media for a code to this one.

E3 2019 is the biggest gaming event of the year. TechRadar is reporting live from LA, telling you all about the biggest announcements of the week, from epic game trailers to shocking release date reveals. Follow our expert analysis of the keynotes and what we see on the E3 show floor. 

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The Madden NFL 20 release date is August 2 and, at E3 2019 today, we learned about the fact that it’s debuting fresh modes, player-exclusive moves, and bringing back old favorites game types like Pro Bowl, according new details revealed by EA Sports.

Technically, you won’t have to wait for the official August 2 release date to play this game. Madden 20 early access begins July 31, and you can get on the field even earlier with the Madden NFL 20 closed beta – that runs a single weekend, from June 14 to June 16, according to EA. In this close beta, however, your progress will reset to give every a fair chance at launch.

Face of the Franchise is the big highlight to Madden for 2020. For the first time, you can create and develop your own quarterback who goes from of one of ten D1 schools to the road to the next NFL superstar. Scenario Engine brings dynamic challenges to games to improve your player’s stats along the way.

X-Factor abilities are the reason you’ll still want to play as real-life superstar players. For example, Kansas City Chiefs QB Patrick Mahomes is the Madden NFL 2020 cover athlete and he has the exclusive Bazooka Superstar X-Factor ability. It stretches his normal reach by 15 or more yards when he’s in this special zone. This is on top of normal Superstar moves of Escape Artist, Dashing Dead eye, Red Zone Deadeye.

Madden NFL 20 X-Factor abilities branch out beyond quarterbacks, too. Los Angeles Rams defensive tackle Aaron Donald has an X-Factor move called Fearmonger, and it’s designed to intimidate and overcome blockers when he’s in the zone. New Orleans Saints wide receiver Alvin Kamara has a zone-enabled ‘Satellite’ X-Factor that allows him to perform better in key one-on-one situations.

Pro Bowl is back in this year’s football game, and it’s been expanded to include these new superstar X-Factors, according to EA Sports. And since the Pro Bowl features the best non-Super Bowl players, it should be an over-the-top special-skills-based game.

There are X-Factor counters, of course. Madden NFL 20 is turning into a chess game of sorts, so putting pressure on a quarterback like Mahomes in the game will prevent him from getting into the zone and executing Superstar X-Factor moves like Bazooka. New mechanics like pump fake and the ability to cancel throws is really changing the game and mixing things up.

Playbooks are getting reworked in meaningful ways. There are new run pass options – 220 RPOs to be exact – being added to the game, as well as unique formations. Signature animations are coming to players and teams, and so are popular new plays like the renowned trick play Philly Special that was pulled off by the Philadelphia Eagles in the last football season. Best of all, as the real-life season is happening, your team’s Madden 20 playbook can change.

Previous Madden NFL 20 news…

Madden NFL is EA Sports’ long-running football franchise, and like clockwork, another one is headed our way with new features and improvements from last year’s game. 

Madden NFL 20 is almost certainly shipping later in 2019 with a few tweaks to the time-tested formula. Here’s what the new game might bring to the table after last year’s much-loved entry in the series.

Cut to the chase

• What is it? The latest entry in EA Sports’ long-running football simulation series
• When can I play it? August 2 is the release date, but early access starts on July 31
• What can I play it on? Again, no official word from EA yet, but we would expect it to be playable on PS4, Xbox One and PC

Madden NFL 20 release date and special editions

Madden NFL 20 will officially be released on August 2, 2019, and will retail for $59. Pre-ordering will grant buyers five Gold Team Fantasy Packs as well as their pick of one out of 32 Core Elite Players from your favorite NFL team.

There will indeed be not one but two special editions. The first, Madden NFL 20 Superstar Edition, costs $79. For that extra cash, you get 12 Gold Team Fantasy Packs and one small Training Quicksell Pack in Madden Ultimate Team. Buyers also get early access to play the game on July 31, 2019, a full three days ahead of the standard launch date.

The $99 Ultimate Superstar Edition of Madden NFL 20 starts players off with 15 Gold Team Fantasy Packs, one large Training Quicksell pack in Madden Ultimate Team, one Past and Present Elite Player Pack, one Madden Championship Series Pack in Madden Ultimate Team, and your choice of one unique Legend Superstar Ability for your created player in Face of the Franchise: QB1.

Madden NFL 20 trailers

Madden NFL 20 news and rumors

EA Sports has already revealed a lot of the new features coming to Madden NFL 20. 

Face of the Franchise: QB1 is the big new single-player mode: craft your player, pick their college, guide them through a draft and begin their big career. Thereafter, Madden’s new Scenario Engine generates personalized playable scenarios, events, and dynamic challenges, per the game’s website.

The regular Franchise mode is back, and features the return of Pro Bowl. The whole mode has been refined with new scenarios and tweaks all around, from ratings spread to player progression.

There’s also a new category for elite players: Superstars. 50 players in the game will fit the bill, and at certain points of play, they’ll enter “the zone” and get bonus Superstar X-Factor abilities. These aren’t ratings boosts or modifications, the game’s site clarifies: “These are behaviors, characteristics, and situational outcomes, aspects of football, and it will be very clear to our players what impact they are having on the game by complimenting the player ratings, not modifying them.”

The popular Madden Ultimate Team (MUT) mode returns as well, and it’s got a couple new features. Missions is a new feature that acts more like guidelines than a task-and-reward system. “Think of it as a roadmap to upgrading your squad with the items you want, with a clearly laid out path of how to earn those items or rewards,” explains the game’s website. 

In MUT, Solo challenges have been replaced by Ultimate Challenges, and the Superstar abilities and X-Factors are also supported. Only some chemistries have been brought over from Madden 19 to Madden 20, though new ones have been added. The mode will include player archetypes, a reorganization that clarifies player strengths with their roles on the field, and a return of House Rules.

We’re also curious how the game will change given this is the first in the series without creative director Max Dickson, who left six months before the release of Madden NFL 19. 

Madden 20 will be the third in the franchise running the Frostbite engine, and given the smoother action in last year’s entry with Real Player Motion, we’re keeping an eye out for how this version has been tweaked.

What we want to see from Madden NFL 20

Madden NFL 20 for Nintendo Switch

We’ve put this on our wish list for years, and we’re still hoping the next Madden game comes to the Nintendo’s fantastic hybrid console. 

EA has released a Switch version of the past couple FIFA games, and while they haven’t had the full list of features and modes that are present in their PS4 and Xbox One counterparts, owners of the Nintendo console did get to play a mostly intact port. We’re hoping Madden NFL players get to do the same.

Longshot’s return

Perhaps Madden 19’s next chapter of the single-player mode introduced in Madden 18, Longshot: Homecoming, was underwhelming. But it was still a favorite experience when it appeared two years ago, and we’re hoping EA Sports has course-corrected to tell better chapters in the stories of underdogs Cruz and Colt. Or maybe just start from scratch and give us a couple (or handful) of new characters to invest in.

Alas, Face of the Franchise: QB1 seems like the single-player story/campaign mode that’s set to take Longshot’s spot, but as the internet wisdom goes, ‘Why not both?’

Project Atlas

Okay, this is a bit greedy given EA only announced its cloud-based, stream-to-any-device service Project Atlas last October. But we’d love to see this Google Stadia-before-Stadia-was-announced service start showing up somewhere, somehow in Madden NFL 20. 

How could it help? All that compute could give players much more context to their plays. In a Medium blog post introducing Atlas and explaining AI applications, EA CTO Ken Moss explained it this way: 

“Imagine that you’re playing Madden, and you’ve just thrown your second interception of the game against the same cover 2 defense that caused the first turnover. Instead of the commentator simply stating that you threw a pick, the AI enables contextual, real-time commentary to reference the fact that you’re throwing to the sideline against a cover 2 defense and should have thrown against the weak zone over the middle to your tight end, who was open on the route. 

“This would certainly push the game into a greater level of contextual and experiential realism. The AI is working with your gameplay. It’s responding to your needs as a player.”

• Here’s everything we’re looking forward to at E3 2019

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EA announced Battlefield V Chapter 4: Defying the Odds, adding four new maps to the shooter. All of these maps will center around the Mediterranean front, with all the lush vegetation and beautiful beaches that go along with that region. 

The first of these maps, Al Sundan, will come in June and will be based on the “Under No Flag” single player mission. It will feature the same multiplayer action Battlefield fans have come to know and love, with plenty of space to get your vehicles on. 

A little bit later, there will be the Marita map in July. This will be a more infantry-focused arena, where alleys and side streets will funnel your enemies right into your gunfire. 

There will be two more close-quarter maps added later on, apparently also focused on infantry gameplay. These will be the Lofoten Islands and Provence. More details for these maps will come out later this summer. 

Chapter 4: Defying the Odds is more than just the maps, though. There are more elite characters, weapons and, of course, skins to tide players over until Chapter 5. And, for those of you that have been capped at Rank 50 for the last year, you’ll be happy to know that the the cap just got boosted all the way up to 500, and you will get new dog tags every 50 ranks. 

Wait a little longer

Battlefield V doesn’t end in the Mediterranean, however. Battlefield V Chapter 5 will take players to the Pacific front to battle in some of the most iconic theaters of World War II. 

We don’t have specific details yet, but EA hinted at Iwo Jima being playable. And, of course, we’re sure Battlefield V Chapter 5 will feature a ton of new maps, weapons and skins to collect. 

EA did show off Operation Underground, a beloved map from Battlefield 3, that will come to the game between Season 4 and Season 5 in October 2019. Beyond that, though, we’ll have to wait to see what the game will look like later this year. 

• This update should solidify Battlefield V among the best PC games

E3 2019 is the biggest gaming event of the year. TechRadar is reporting live from LA, telling you all about the biggest announcements of the week, from epic game trailers to shocking release date reveals. Follow our expert analysis of the keynotes and what we see on the E3 show floor.

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It wasn’t that many years and bits ago that ‘companion’ was a dirty word in videogames. The promise of being tethered to an NPC filled me with dread. Even in the PS3 and Xbox 360 era, a companion usually exposed itself as one of two things: at best, inept fire support from a character who mostly faced in the right direction; at worst, the protectee in a – shudder – escort mission. 

If you really wanted to see a game in the mid-2000s crumple to its knees with a guttural heave of gears and motor oil, conscript a side character to your cause and marvel as they jog into battle, pull out their weapon, put away their weapon, heal themselves for no reason, then wedge themselves in a doorway. Forever.

Companions are still a few fries short of a Happy Meal, but at least in this console generation they’ve moved from being a hindrance to guardedly welcomed company. And it’s Sony which has best rehabilitated them, through its PlayStation exclusives.

Ellie, your sparky and sarcastic teenage ward in The Last of Us, was a turning point. A mixture of clever storytelling and competent AI that built a father-daughter relationship in between moments of stabbing zombies in the eye. 2018’s God of War tried to foster a similar unlikely bond between Kratos (albino God-rilla) and Atreus (pubescent history nerd). Most recently, Days Gone squeezed both brotherly and romantic love into one weather-beaten motorbike satchel. 

These three games are wholly different experiences, but there’s a narrative throughline that unites them: responsibility. And also zombies, to a lesser degree.

Burden of Bill

A companion in a videogame has to keep a lot of plates spinning. As in any story, there has to be a point to their being there. They need an arc of some sort. They need to change, somehow, as your character does – whether you have a choice of actions or the writing tricks you into feeling like you’re growing with your protagonist. 

But unlike their counterparts in other media, they also have to react to the things you do: no matter how stupid or obstinate. They need to hold their own in challenging situations. 

Nothing sours a relationship quite like a ‘Game Over’ screen appearing when you’re at full health, henpecking you that, ‘Bill died’. Or the more creepingly entitled admonishment, ‘You failed to protect Bill’. Or the very limpest of videogame fail-states: ‘You went too far away from Bill’, like you lost him in a supermarket and he’s been found crying by the self-checkout. Screw Bill. Game developers: you can never go far enough away from Bill.

“If Bill decides the best reaction to a zombie horde is to rout it from the centre with a bent set of salad tongs, why should you have to live and die by that decision?”

Bill in all his forms is an obvious way of compensating for AI that can’t be trusted to follow the whims of every mercurial player. But they’re sloppy solutions that put gameplay above character-building. There are other solutions that are arguably worse – the way Bethesda’s Fallout and Elder Scrolls companions can get belted off a cliff by a dragon or a nuclear hand grenade and recover after a minute-or-two’s sit-down is the coppiest of cop-outs there is – but they’re all the more irksome because you’re being punished for what is usually an NPCs incompetence. 

If Bill decides the best reaction to a zombie horde is to rout it from the centre with a bent set of salad tongs, why should you have to live and die by that decision? The moment you start worrying for a character’s safety because you’ll be booted back to a checkpoint – rather than because you, you know, want them to be safe – is the moment a character turns from flesh and blood into ones and zeroes.

The Ellie method

Sony has attacked this problem from multiple angles. In The Last of Us, Ellie reacts to danger by jumping on its back with a knife and shanking it, or (if sneaking) turning magically invisible to everyone in the room except you. In God of War, your son, Atreus, is actually magic and can take almost infinite thumping by Norse monsters without ruffling his mohawk. And Days Gone (mostly) either segregates its NPCs from its zombie hordes behind fences and walls or puts them on motorbikes full of guns. 

They’re three distinct methods that, critically, don’t rely on companions seriously fending for themselves, but merely create the illusion that they are. They don’t all work all the time, but as experiments they’re commendable efforts in creating sidekicks you don’t want to murder or dump in the nearest bin to protect them from their own ineptitude (which we’ll call the ‘Resident Evil 4 Solution’).

The Ellie method works because it’s clear from cutscenes and comments in quieter moments that, as a character, she’s vulnerable. Not weak, but not an unkillable god-child (like Atreus – who we’ll get to). Out of gameplay, she reacts the same way as protagonist Joel does to a screeching horde of fungus-people – by swearing lots and running away. She is, also, just a kid: with a childlike fascination with giraffes, a teenage skepticism of a world that once contained ice cream trucks and one particular outburst where the mask slips and we see that the defining moments of her life have been loss and death. 

We can overlook that when we’re controlling Joel, Ellie is rarely in any actual danger, because the story beats show threats to her on two fronts: Ellie the NPC being chased by monsters, and Ellie the child disappearing in a monstrous world.

Atreus angst

For contrast, God of War’s Atreus (your experience may differ) is an example of how to take that same approach, badly. Atreus is the anti-Ellie: a parallel universe Ellie that looks superficially the same but reveals itself as a improperly-programmed Stepford child. In a weird reversal, Atreus only skulks about in cutscenes – and only when scolded by his growling bodyguard-cum-pack-mule dad, Kratos. In a fight, what he makes up for in enthusiasm he lacks in ability, which in turn he makes up for by doing lots of high-pitched shouting – usually about how nearly dead you are.

He’s also a reverse image of Ellie in that, in a world of Norse mythology far removed from whatever Kratos left of ancient Greece, Atreus is the authority. A swot, if you’re being unkind. He knows all the gods. All the stories. He even speaks Rune. Paired with a lumbering, retiree God of War – who’s been Metal Gear Solid 4-d into a state of wheezy dad bodish-ness – it’s a relationship that strains, then grates. Every. Bloody. Door in ancient Scandewegia is locked with a riddle rune or a birdbath of magic sand that Atreus has to translate or poke at, while Kratos (you) looks about impotently for something to smash with his axe. 

I’ve tried to think of something nice to write about their dimension-hopping, mountain-climbing escape-the-room, but questing with this pair feels like being stuck with the two worst people on a European stag weekend: the one who knows the names of all the cathedrals and insists on ordering off the locals’ menu in an accent that’s probably racist, and the guy who takes his shirt off at the start of the night and ends up punching a policeman.

But if The Last of Us and God of War are two sides of the same coin, Days Gone is the third side. Strange. Unexpected. Not legal tender. Yet somehow brave and brilliant.

No more Mr. Nice Guy

While The Last of Us and God of War succeed or fail on what is linear storytelling, Days Gone protagonist Deacon St. John has to juggle all the same plates (still spinning) while navigating an open world: doing in bandit camps, looting houses, picking flowers for RPG-crafting-herbology – the lot. 

This is where open-world games usually lose grip on story and motivation. You’ll abandon a glorious Far Cry revolution to hunt leopards or go paragliding. You’ll reschedule the Joker situation ‘til tomorrow to flap after Riddler trophies as Batman. In Fallout 4, you will forget your abducted son’s name five minutes after you leave the Vault, and that he exists at all in the first half hour.

But not in the zombie-road-movie-world of Days Gone. Days Gone’s masterstroke of writing is so simple. So elegant. Like Tinder, bread knives and probably the comb, it’s a solution so perfect and seemingly obvious that you can’t help but wonder how nobody thought of it before.

“Bend Studios hits the nail on the head through the nut and into the coffin on the first swing.”

The radio chirps. Deacon clicks it on. Some local incapable yells that someone’s gone missing or they need someone murdered or that they know something world-savingly important about the plague of not-zombie Freakers terrorizing wasteland Oregon, and want him to do something. It cannot be stressed how important it is that Deacon do this thing immediately (although they’ll certainly try). 

To which Deacon nonchalantly replies: “Maybe/probably/at some point/if I can be bothered.”

How has it taken the AAA game scientists this long to crack the open-world-quest-giving-quest-doing formula? Decades of side-questing, weapon-crafting and flower-picking while the lives of our assigned plot devices hung in the balance, and Bend Studios hits the nail on the head through the nut and into the coffin on the first swing. Open world players are always going to behave in ways that, narratively speaking, make them look like dicks. So why not let them roleplay as a guy who is – much as I love him – a massive dick?

Friendship formula

Early in Days Gone, your motorbike gang buddy, Boozer, gets badly injured. You put him to bed to sleep it off. He could probably use some medicine, but – meh – he’ll probably be fine. You’ll get to it. Meanwhile, you’re half-heartedly looking/mourning for your dead wife. But she’s dead – she doesn’t need more mourning right this second. Or at all. Get to it if and when you can be bothered. In the meantime: raid this bandit camp and paint your motorbike.

You’ll do all these quests eventually, of course. Because as you faff about in the post-apocalyptic biker wasteland, Days Gone’s writing will push its claws through your leathers and into your soul. NPCs will radio you and slowly, subconsciously, you’ll decide for yourself that they’re worth your time and investment. There’s no stick: no-one dies if you don’t screech into camp with the Advance Plot Macguffin just in time. 

Days Gone, like The Last of Us (and God of War, too, if you can overlook its estranged-father-son Odd Couple dynamic) is carrots all the way down. Do something nice for a person, that person is nice to you back, repeat until you realize six hours later that you’ve accidentally become a better person.

Sony, obviously, isn’t the first or only developer to work that feeling of attachment to what is, stripped down, a magic trick of pixels, semi-reactive code and pre-recorded dialogue. But as de facto winners of the last console war, and in putting characters and relationships front and centre in its biggest hitters, it’s pinning down a formula for mainstream games that evokes more than a contractual obligation to care about NPCs that games dictate we care about. We should – and now can – remember our companions for their stories. And never for the times they got stuck in a doorway.

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China’s WeChat is a site for social interaction, a form of currency, a dating app, a tool for sporting teams and deliverer of news: Twitter, Facebook, Googlemaps, Tinder and Apple Pay all rolled into one. But it is also an ever more powerful weapon of social control for the Chinese government.

I’ve just been locked out of WeChat (or Weixin 微信 as it is known in Chinese) and, to get back on, have had to pass through some pretty Orwellian steps – steps which have led others to question why I went along with it.

One reason is that life in Beijing would be extremely difficult without WeChat. The other is that I could not have written this piece without experiencing the stages which have now clearly put my image, and even my voice, on some sort of biometric database of troublemakers.

I was in Hong Kong to cover the enormous candlelight vigil marking 30 years since the People’s Liberation Army was ordered to open fire on its own people to remove the mostly student protesters who’d been gathering in and around Tiananmen Square for months in June 1989.

• Taiwanese ‘Tank Man’ marks Tiananmen
• Leica Tiananmen video angers China

This moment in history has been all but erased from public discourse on mainland China but in Hong Kong, with its special status in the Chinese-speaking world, people turn out every year to remember the bloody crackdown.

This time round the crowd was particularly huge, with estimates ranging up to 180,000.

Naturally I took photos of the sea of people holding candles and singing, and posted some of these on my WeChat “moments”.

Media playback is unsupported on your device

The post contained no words – just photos.

Chinese friends started asking on WeChat what the event was? Why were people gathering? Where was it?

That such questions were coming from young professionals here shows the extent to which knowledge of Tiananmen 1989 has been made to disappear in China.

I answered a few of them, rather cryptically, then suddenly I was locked out of WeChat.

“Your login has been declined due to account exceptions. Try to log in again and proceed as instructed,” came the message on the screen.

Then, when I tried to log back in, a new message appeared: “This WeChat account has been suspected of spreading malicious rumours and has been temporarily blocked…”

It seems posting photos of an actual event taking place, without commentary, amounts to “spreading malicious rumours” in China.

I was given time to try and log in again the next day after my penalty had been served.

When I did I had to push “agree and unblock” under the stated reason of “spread malicious rumours”.

So this rumour-monger clicked on “agree”.

Then came a stage I was not prepared for. “Faceprint is required for security purposes,” it said.

I was instructed to hold my phone up – to “face front camera straight on” – looking directly at the image of a human head. Then told to “Read numbers aloud in Mandarin Chinese”.

My voice was captured by the App at the same time it scanned my face.

Afterwards a big green tick: “Approved”

Apart from being creepy you can only imagine the potential use of this type of data.

No doubt I have now joined some list of suspicious individuals in the hands of goodness knows which Chinese government agencies.

In China pretty much everyone has WeChat. I don’t know a single person without it. Developed by tech giant Tencent it is an incredible app. It’s convenient. It works. It’s fun. It was ahead of the game on the global stage and it has found its way into all corners of people’s existence.

It could deliver to the Communist Party a life map of pretty much everybody in this country, citizens and foreigners alike.

Capturing the face and voice image of everyone who was suspended for mentioning the Tiananmen crackdown anniversary in recent days would be considered very useful for those who want to monitor anyone who might potentially cause problems.

When I placed details of this entire process on Twitter others were asking: why cave in to such a Big Brother intrusion on your privacy?

They’ve probably not lived in China.

It is hard to imagine a life here without it.

• Are you one of the WeChat billion?
• Students graded on number of ‘friends’

When you meet somebody in a work context they don’t given you a name card any more, they share their WeChat; if you play for a football team training details are on WeChat; children’s school arrangements, WeChat; Tinder-style dates, WeChat; movie tickets, WeChat; news stream, WeChat; restaurant locations, WeChat; paying for absolutely everything from a bowl of noodles to clothes to a dining room table… WeChat.

People wouldn’t be able to speak to their friends or family without it.

So the censors who can lock you out of Wechat hold real power over you.

The app – thought by Western intelligence agencies to be the least secure of its type in the world – has essentially got you over a barrel.

If you want to have a normal life in China, you had better not say anything controversial about the Communist Party and especially not about its leader, Xi Jinping.

This is China 2019.

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EA surprised many with the sudden announcement of Apex Legends back in February, a free-to-play battle royale shooter that sees the publisher going toe-to-toe with genre mammoths PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds and Fortnite Battle Royale.

Developed by Respawn Entertainment and set in the Titanfall universe, Apex Legends is a squad-based battle royale shooter where teams of three go up against 57 other players to try to gather loot and be the last person (or squad) standing.

However, unlike Fortnite and PUBG, Apex Legends sees players take on one of eight classes, each represented by a unique character (imagine Fortnite mixed with Overwatch and you’ll be on the right track.) 

Whether that sounds like your kind of gaming or not, Apex Legends hit the ground running. It managed to reach a million players in its first eight hours and amassed 10 million players in three days.

That’s good going. Really good going. Particularly when you consider that it took Fortnite two weeks (a fortnight!) to reach those same numbers. Similarly, it took Fortnite 24 hours to accrue a million players, compared to eight hours for EA’s shooter. 

However, things seem to have slowed down for Apex Legends with revenue dropping and Respawn opting to implement less-frequent, more meaningful updates in lieu of constant, smaller updates.

Do we have another Fortnite on our hands or just a passing fad? Let’s not get ahead of ourselves and instead take a look at everything we know about Apex Legends.

Apex Legends: the TechRadar verdict

Apex Legends is an engrossing, revamped take on battle royale that as it stands cannot be beat for its attention, detail and care:

Hold on to your lightsabers: there’s a new Star Wars game on the way, and it’s called Jedi: Fallen Order. And we’ve now got the first concrete gameplay details about it, thanks to E3 2019.

In development by Respawn Entertainment (the studio behind Apex Legends and Titanfall), Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order was announced during E3 2018 but we didn’t get a proper look at the game until early in 2019, during a special panel at the annual Star Wars Celebration in Chicago, before EA lifted the covers completely at E3 2019.

While the official reveal only gave us a glimpse at a story trailer, it was more than enough to get us hyped for the upcoming game. E3 2019 has given us a far more meaty look at the game, with lightsaber-fuelled gameplay at its core.

While fans of the galactic franchise have seen official tie-ins in the form of Star Wars Battlefront I and II, the new entry takes on a different tack, focusing on a single-player experience more in line with 2008’s The Force Unleashed – and we have all the concrete news and wild speculation you could want below. 

Cut to the chase

• What is it? A new single-player Star Wars game from the creators of Titanfall
• What can I play it on? PS4, Xbox One, and PC
• When can I play it? November 15 2019

Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order release date

EA has now confirmed Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order will release on November 15, 2019, just in time for Christmas and the long-awaited release of Star Wars Episode IX: Rise of Skywalker.

Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order trailers and story

You’ll take the role of Cal Kestis, a former Jedi padawan (AKA, a student of the Force). The game is set in the period following Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith – the fateful time when the evil Emperor Palpatine executed Order 66, which saw the Jedi ambushed and killed by their own supporting Clone Trooper soldiers. Few survived and were forced into hiding.

And that seems to include Cal! A youngster only partially through his training, Cal has been forced into hiding, working construction sites and trying to keep a low-profile as the Jedi-hunting Imperial Inquisition continues to track down any remaining survivors.

The story trailer shows Cal having to use his Force powers to defend himself against rogue troopers, and to save a friend from falling from an accident. The trailer suggests the game will have some lavish set-pieces and environments, and hinted at a very-story-driven experience to enjoy.

Check it out below:

Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order gameplay

EA Play 2019 showed us a 15 minute slice of gameplay from the game, roughly 3 hours into the game.

We were shown Chewbacca’s homeland Kashyyyk, where Jedi Cal is trying to kickstart the rebirth of the Jedi order. But the poor Wookies are enslaved by the Empire! So Cal has to try to help them out.

Walking through a tech-filled jungle corridor, gameplay at first doesn’t look unlike Uncharted 4, with a tool that lets you swing from beams, and some wall-running ala Respawn’s other game, Titanfall. Cal’s pretty nimble, able to clamber up walls and climb as if he was Assassin’s Creed’s Ezio. He moves weightily.

After meeting up with some resistance fighters, he carves his way through a door and comes across a burning refinery, using his lightsaber as a torch in the darkness. A battle ensues below and Cal needs to reach a troop of Stormtroopers , so force-pushes a tree below to make a path to them.

Here we see our first glimpse of lightsaber action. Cal can force pull and push troops, as well as throwing his lightsaber at them for a ranged attack. Combat is lock-on focussed, not unlike Dark Souls for one-on-one combat, but seems massively more forgiving. There also seems to be finishing animations that trigger when you’ve took a baddie to low health. Lightsaber combat, thankfully, looks weighty and measured – this will be a tactical fighting game, rather than a hack and slash, with the classic ability to slash blaster bolts back at an enemy.

Cal also seems to have the ability to focus the force and slow time, letting him take on dangerous foes, like flamethrower stormtroopers with a little more ease, as well as avoiding environmental hazards like spinning blades. One cool moment had him slow time, and force pull a stormtrooper towards him in time to use it as a human-shield against the very same blaster bolt it had fired at Cal moments earlier. The same technique can be used to halt a foe momentarily in its tracks – very Kylo Ren.

So far, levels, though expansive, seem fairly linear – you’re very much set along a path from one action scene to another, although the densely-designed levels prevent it from appearing too much like a series of corridors, back to back. Each scene has lots of AI interactions between NPCs, too – you’ll see stormtroopers battling the native, giant-beetle-like creatures of Kashyyyk, and timing your attack against them could help to swing the odds in your favor.

Cal acquires upgrade points as he defeats enemies, and also seems to be able to complete side missions if he goes off the beaten path and explores levels in detail. C

The timing of the story, set after Revenge of the Sith, also means there was a familiar face or two turning up. Rogue One’s Saw Gerrera, aka actor Forest Whitaker, was present, as was a bot that looked like K2SO. You’ll have to fight this one, though.

Skill points will go into your force abilities, letting you upgrade force pulls and push, double jumps and force slowing tricks. You’ll get a droid, too, BD1, to help you on your way, offering the ability to hack terminals, heal your player and manage your hologram map, as well as being your buddy. You won’t be able to turn to the Dark Side though – Cal’s good to the core.

So far then, so good. This is a classic-era Star Wars game, giving you a taste of the most-loved period in Star Wars history. Rather than the original reveal’s suggestion that Cal will be a weak newbie Jedi, he’s going to be fairly advanced in his training. And, it’s all cannon – these characters are going to turn up in the wider Star Wars universe.

It looks visually impressive… except for the Wookies. They looked like the plastic figures from the 70s. A bit more free-flowing, walking-carpet Wookie hair please, EA!

Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order news and rumors

Retail box art
EA has revealed the retail box art for both the Standard and Deluxe editions of Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order.

Here’s what the Standard edition look like:

And the Deluxe edition:

Gameplay reveal at EA Play and E3 2019
In a tweet on May 4 (May the Fourth be with you), it was revealed that we’ll be getting our first look at Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order gameplay at EA Play and E3 2019 in June.

So far we’ve only seen a reveal trailer for Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order and Respawn Entertainment has been light on the details of how the gameplay will actually work.

Check out Respawn’s tweet below: 

Mark your calendars, your first look at #StarWarsJediFallenOrder gameplay will be next month at EA Play and E3! More details to come. #MayThe4thBeWithYou pic.twitter.com/NZhVEpJG7mMay 4, 2019

EA doesn’t plan to release Fallen Order on Switch
Soon after the game’s official reveal, fans were wondering if Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order will ever be making its way to Switch. Well, according to EA community manager Jay Ingram, there aren’t any plans to do so currently.

You can check out Ingram’s reply to a fan tweet below:

As amazing as the Switch is, no such plans.April 16, 2019

Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order was livestreamed – check it out
We already know that on April 13 we got our first proper look at Respawn Entertainment’s Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order, as part of the annual Star Wars Celebration event in Chicago.

But luckily for fans that couldn’t make the trek to the event, EA livestreamed it.

Check out EA’s announcement tweet below for a chance to replay it:

“Join the head of Respawn Entertainment, @VinceZampella, and Game Director, Stig Asmussen […] to be the first to learn about this holiday’s highly anticipated action adventure game, #StarWarsJediFallenOrder.”1:30 PM CT on April 13th! And yes, there will be a livestream. https://t.co/tLPDJVZ7WfMarch 22, 2019

The galaxy-wide premiere saw the head of Respawn Entertainment, Vince Zampella, and game director, Stig Asmussen (whose previous work includes God of War 3), revealing the much-anticipated details of Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order.

Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order toys -confirmed
Disney has announced that Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order merchandise will become available in October 2019 suggesting, not only that the game will release around that time, but that the company expects it to be a title (or series) with a long life-span within Star Wars fandom. We now know that Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order will release in November, just a month after the toys release.

Development is well underway
“It’s very far along in development, and having spent time with it recently myself, it plays spectacularly well,” EA CEO Andrew Wilson revealed during a quarterly earnings call (via Seeking Alpha). “This game truly captures the fantasy of becoming a Jedi, and we will have a lot more to share soon.”

A Padawan called Cal? Confirmed
According to rumored information from a Star Wars marketing day (which obviously made its way to Reddit) the story will take place roughly five years after Revenge of the Sith and will follow surviving Padawan Cal (via GamesRadar). This rumor also states that one of the game’s main plot points will revolve around Cal’s mentor figure – a woman named Ceres. Both these names are now confirmed.

It’s set after Revenge of the Sith
We don’t know the specific time in which the game is set, but we’ve heard that it will take place at some point between Episodes 3 and 4, after the end of Revenge of the Sith but before Luke Skywalker’s appearance in A New Hope.

This places it after the Galactic Empire hunted the 10,000-strong Jedi Order practically to extinction, leaving only a small fraction of Jedi alive (aka Order 66). With the promise that the game will be set ‘in the dark times’, it sounds like our Jedi protagonist may be more the hunted than the hunter.

Could famous Jedi appear?
Playing as “a surviving Padawan”, technically meaning a Jedi apprentice rather than a fully-fledged master of the Force, Cal could do with some extra training. Given the dearth of living mentors left to train you, it’s possible Obi-Wan Kenobi or Yoda – or some less high-profile Jedi, like Quinlan Vos – will appear in a supporting role. 

The single-player mode comes first – and there will be no microtransactions
Respawn co-founder Vince Zampella tweeted about the upcoming game, describing it as an ‘SP’ (single-player) story. 

It looks like a multiplayer component won’t be available at all in the game – surprising given EA’s focus in recent years on games that extend beyond a single play session. Even more surprising is the fact that there will be no microtransactions at all, ever, in Fallen Jedi. It’s great news considering the industry falls over itself to offer chunks of games piecemeal these days – but don’t be surprised if that means there will be an aggressive DLC system instead.

I find your lack of faith disturbing
2018 was a been a bit of a fallow year for Star Wars, with Star Wars: A Solo Story struggling in cinemas and the negative player response to EA Dice’s Star Wars: Battlefront 2 – largely in reaction to its prevalent use of microtransactions – still in recent memory.

Jedi: Fallen Order has been handed to a different studio, albeit one that’s still a subsidiary of EA. But Respawn has garnered a lot of respect as the studio behind Titanfall and Titanfall 2, two critically acclaimed sci-fi action games that pit players against each other in giant mechanized suits, and which both came with strong single-player and multiplayer offerings. 

(Image credits: Respawn Entertainment)

Keep checking back here for all the latest Jedi: Fallen Order news 

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