Gaming News Roundup – May 23: Black Ops IIII, Boss Key Shuts Down, Rage 2

Gaming News Roundup – May 23

Black Ops IIII‘s Reveal

We got a wealth of new information on this year’s Call of Duty: Black Ops IIII this week, so let’s recap.

No Campaign

There won’t be a single-player mode in this year’s Call of Duty, to the vexation of some who aren’t all that into the multiplayer or zombies modes. It’s a bit unfortunate due to how long the Black Ops story has been going and how many people enjoyed them, but Treyarch states that it wasn’t something they had any focus on this time around. The time that would’ve been used for the campaign has apparently gone into an all-new battle royale mode and further developing of the multiplayer modes.

Blackout Mode

Blackout is Call of Duty‘s new battle royale mode. Battle royale is the current trend right now, so it’s not too big of a surprise to see Treyarch trying to capitalize off of it. We don’t have too much information on it besides the fact that you’ll be able to drive a variety of vehicles, but it’s a battle royale and you should be familiar with them by now. Set number of players drop into a map, but only one becomes the victor, so think that, just with Call of Duty mechanics. You can see the trailer for it here.

Zombies

Black Ops‘ long-running zombie mode is making a return with 3 maps instead of one this time around. It looks to be the closest thing to a campaign we’ll be getting. You can see the trailer for the ‘Voyage of Despair’ here, which is zombies on the Titanic, a very interesting choice. Another map, called ‘IX’, looks to be very melee focused and takes place in a gladiator arena, which looks awesome. You can see that trailer here. The third trailer shows basically nothing, it’s for the ‘Blood of the Dead’ map, and you can watch that trailer here.

There’s a few other interesting details about the gameplay, such as health bars being added and counting how much input you had on a kill instead of just the kill itself, similar to Overwatch. If you want to watch the full community event in its entirety and catch everything, you can watch the full hour-long presentation here.

Rage 2 Officially Announced And Revealed

One of the games leaked from Walmart’s big screw up was Rage 2, possibly the most questionable game on the list. It’s gotten officially revealed now that the word is out, and it looks a lot more vibrant, loud, and colorful than the original Rage. It looks pretty awesome, hopefully it doesn’t disappoint like the original did whenever it gets released. It’s being worked on by Avalanche Studios and Id Software, the people who worked on Mad Max and Doom. You can see the trailer for it here, no release date yet, but I believe they’re waiting for E3 to announce it.

Metro: Exodus Delayed

Unfortunately, Metro: Exodus has been delayed to Q1 2019, missing its intended release window of Fall this year. Very disappointing for fans in anticipation of this sequel to the Metro series, because its trailer from last year’s E3 looked incredible, but hopefully it results in a well-made, well-optimized game when it finally releases.

Boss Key Shuts Down

This past week we saw the unfortunate announcement that Boss Key Studios, Cliff Bleszinki’s start-up studio, has been closed down. Both of the studio’s games, Lawbreakers and Radical Heights, failed to gain traction, which leads us here.

Cliff released a statement on his Twitter.

Wishing all the best for everyone that worked at Boss Key.

No Man’s Sky‘s Xbox Date

You’ll be able to pick up No Man’s Sky for your Xbox One on July 24th and with this news came some details on its multiplayer update. You’ll finally be able to work together or fight over resources in No Man’s Sky, something players have been waiting on since its release. It’s good to see Hello Games still trying to maintain its community after how negative the initial reception was. It’s still in the process of becoming the game it was meant to be, but it’s moving at a good pace right now.

That’s the news for this week! Excited for the new direction for Rage 2? Disappointed that Black Ops isn’t including a single-player campaign with this iteration? Let us know below! In case you missed last week’s roundup, you can click here to get caught up. I also put out an analysis on how Kratos has aged in the new God of War, which you can read or watch here. I should mention that God of War has had mature and emotional scenes in it before, but it’s more often pushed to the forefront in the new game, unlike before. As always, be sure to come back next for another gaming news roundup.