Watch Xbox and Bethesda’s showcase here in under 20 minutes

This weekend’s Xbox and Bethesda showcase was jam-packed with news, trailers, updates and announcements about games that are already on Xbox or coming to the platform over the next year. If you don’t have a spare hour and 40 minutes or so to watch the entire event, don’t worry. You can catch up on the highlights with our supercut, which runs less than 20 minutes.

Freshly announced games include Forza Motorsport, Minecraft Legends, Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty and Rick and Morty co-creator Justin Roiland’s typically wacky High on Life. You’ll get also your first in-depth look at gameplay from Starfield, along with news on Diablo IV, Grounded, Microsoft Flight Simulator and a tonof titles that are coming to Game Pass. The highlights for me were the first peek at co-op vampire shooter Redfall in action and the Overwatch 2 release date, but there’s at least a little of something for just about everyone here.

Netflix confirms ‘Squid Game’ is returning for a second season

It was never truly in doubt that Netflix would bring its most popular show of all time back, but the company has at last officially greenlit season two of Squid Game. It hasn’t been revealed when the next batch of episodes will hit the streaming service.

Squid Game became a word-of-mouth phenomenon when it debuted last September. Netflix said that, in the first 28 days it was available, viewers watched a little over 1.65 billion hours of the first season. Money Heist: Part 5, which arrived that same month, is in second place with 792 million hours watched over the same timeframe — less than half the overall viewership time of Squid Game.

The show scooped up Golden Globe and Screen Actors Guild awards this year. It’s likely to feature heavily among the Emmy nominations when those are announced next month.

Last October, creator Hwang Dong-hyuk said he wasn’t sure whether there’d be more episodes but that he would hold talks with the company because he wanted to make a film first. Netflix said in January a second season would “absolutely” happen, but it’s not clear why it took quite so long for a formal announcement.

Not too many details have been announced for season two of Squid Game just yet. Hwang confirmed protagonist Seong Gi-hun (Lee Jung-jae) will return, as will villain The Front Man (Lee Byung-hun). In addition, Hwang promised to reveal the “boyfriend” of Young-hee, the giant animatronic doll that monitored competitors during the show’s first deadly game, Red Light, Green Light.

First ‘Redfall’ gameplay trailer shows a whole lot of vampire slaying

Microsoft opened its not-E3 Xbox and Bethesda showcase with a deeper look at Redfall. The co-op vampire shooter from Arkane Austin was supposed to be out this summer but it has been delayed until the first half of next year. In the meantime, many more details about the game have been revealed.

The first gameplay trailer begins with one of the playable characters, Layla, exploring a blood-drenched church by themselves. In an attic space, they hear a voice muttering. A vampire attacks, followed by a couple more. Sharpshooter Jacob, one of Layla’s teammates, shows up to help out. 

Redfall is set on an eponymous island off the coast of Massachusetts. It’s filled with vampires and cultists who want to be turned (i.e. familiars). The vampires blocked out the sun and caused the tide to recede, making it impossible for those on the island to escape. 

There’s a brief look at the two other playable characters: engineer Remi, who has a killer robot companion, and Devinder, an expert on all things creepy (or a cryptozoologist, if you’re fancy). Layla, meanwhile, has telekinetic powers and Jacob has a cloaking ability. The characters’ various abilities can be upgraded.

As with the Dishonored games, playing stealthily will be to your advantage. “A huge emphasis for Redfall has been the solo experience, in keeping with Arkane’s passions,” explains Arkane Austin studio and creative director Harvey Smith said. “Redfall is an open world game, but it can be soloed with any of the heroes. The pace becomes more exploratory; you can use recon and stealth to gather info on encounters and avoid enemies or get the drop on them.”

The vampires have a hierarchy, seemingly ranging from grunts to powerful bosses. There will be nests to clear out. The cultists, meanwhile, are willing to lay down their lives to protect the vampires. They will shoot on sight. 

Luckily, you’ll have an extensive arsenal with which to battle your enemies as you try to purge the island of evil. Some of the weapons have unique traits. Along with regular ol’ guns, you’ll have slightly more traditional vamp-vanquishing weapons, including a stake launcher and a UV beam. 

Redfall is coming to PC, Xbox consoles and Xbox Cloud Gaming in the first half of 2023.

‘Overwatch 2’ is going free-to-play with early access starting on October 4th

Activision Blizzard isn’t owned by Microsoft just yet, but the publisher still had a presence at Sunday’s Xbox and Bethesda showcase. There was a trailer for Overwatch 2, along with some major news. The game will be free-to-play and early access will begin on October 4th on all platforms (the Overwatch blog calls this the game’s launch). There will be at least one more beta before then, with details to be announced at a reveal event on Thursday.

The clip showed a glimpse of a new hero that’s been part of the game’s lore for years, the Junker Queen. It seems likely that the character will be playable as part of the next beta. They have a shotgun and a melee weapon, and it appears that one of their abilities involves rampaging forward. Junker Queen is a tank character. The sequel already had one confirmed new character, damage hero Sojourn. 

The trailer also included a quick look at a new Zenyatta ability, which allows the omnic to knock back an enemy with a melee attack. Naturally, it invokes the movie 300, since you can kick an opponent into the Ilios well. In addition, there was a glimpse of a mysterious fox that was leading a team into a fight.

Given that Blizzard will move all current Overwatch players to Overwatch 2, the original game will be going free-to-play as well. Those who own the game before June 23rd will receive a founder’s pack, with a special icon, two skins (General Doomfist and Jester Sombra) and more goodies. You’ll need to log in by December 5th to receive the pack.

It’s worth noting that only the player-vs-player (PvP) side of Overwatch 2 will be available on October 4th. The co-op missions will arrive later. The PvP overhaul will feature new maps and heroes, the Push mode, reworks of current heroes, an upgraded game engine and a move from teams of six to five vs. five.

It’s unclear whether the player-vs-environment side of the sequel will be free too. Overwatch 2 will herald a shift to a seasonal content format, which suggests there will be a battle pass of some kind. That means there should finally be content updates on a regular cadence. Blizzard also says there will be premium cosmetics and (at last) cross-platform progression. 

“We can’t wait to roll out the beginning of the Overwatch 2 experience on October 4 and introduce an exciting new competitive vision, featuring a reimagining of the iconic heroes, maps, and gameplay that made the original game so compelling,” Mike Ybarra, president of Blizzard Entertainment, said in a statement. “This is the beginning of an always-on and always-evolving era for the franchise, and a recommitment to serving players with frequent and substantial updates planned well into the future to keep Overwatch 2 fresh and fun for many years to come.”

Meta’s Horizon Home social space will arrive on Quest 2 headsets next week

Starting next week, Meta will add a more social-oriented home space to Quest 2. Horizon Home, which the company announced at Oculus Connect last year, will appear when users slip on the virtual reality headset. They can invite friends to come over and hang out, watch videos and play games together. It’s part of Meta’s vision of the metaverse, a shared virtual space where folks can do all kinds of things together, along with Horizon Worlds and Horizon Workrooms.

One of those, as demoed in a video shared by Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, is the option to watch 360-degree footage with friends. Zuckerberg showed off the feature with climber Alex Honnold of Free Solo fame. They watched The Soloist VR, a film that features Honnold free climbing the Dolomite Mountains. If you thought Meta’s torso-only avatars looked strange on the virtual ground, just wait till you see two of them floating 1,000 feet above northern Italy.

Quest 2 users can check out Horizon Home and its miserable-looking virtual home office starting today if they are comfortable using the Public Test Channel. Meta will roll out the v41 Quest update, which includes Horizon Home, more broadly next week, a Meta spokesperson told Road to VR. We’ll likely learn more details about Horizon Home then. Meta will add more customization options for the home space later.

‘Alto’s Odyssey’ studio Snowman’s next game is bound for Netflix

As part of its Geeked Week event, Netflix is spending the day announcing a bunch of titles that are coming to its games service. One of those is the latest effort from Snowman, the studio behind Alto’s Odyssey and Alto’s Adventure. Lucky Luna will be available to Netflix subscribers on mobile devices this summer.

It’s a vertical scrolling platformer in which you’ll explore temples and dungeons while learning about the past of protagonist Luna. One key quirk is that there’s no jump button. You’ll fall from one platform to the next and use creatures and parts of the environment to help move around.

Snowman is making Lucky Luna without the core development team behind Alto’s Adventure. Lead artist and developer Harry Nesbitt, programmer Joe Grainger and composer Todd Baker opened another studio in 2020 called Land & Sea. That team is making “folk” games centered around “artful, hand-crafted experiences.”

Long-awaited RTS ‘Homeworld 3’ is delayed until 2023

Homeworld 3 won’t be coming out this year after all. Gearbox Publishing and developer Blackbird Interactive have delayed the sci-fi real-time strategy sequel until the first half of 2023, meaning it will arrive 20 years after Homeworld 2.

“Delivering Homeworld 3 at the highest quality is the top priority for Gearbox Publishing and Blackbird Interactive because we recognize the special place this series holds in the hearts of players,” a statement posted on Twitter reads. “This passion from players fuels the work and the additional time will allow us to make good on our commitment to quality in a healthy and sustainable way for all those involved.”

While the delay might come as a disappointment to fans, it seems the team is looking to avoid crunch (i.e. nudging developers to work long hours) by taking a few more months to polish the game to the expected level of quality. Blackbird took other steps to improve the work-life balance of its team members earlier this year when it permanently adopted a four-day work week.

You can expect to learn more about Homeworld 3 in the not-too-distant future. Gearbox and Blackbird have promised to show off “the deepest look yet” at the game during Gamescom in August.

Some members of the Blackbird team previously worked at Relic Entertainment, the studio behind the original Homeworld games. Rob Cunningham, a Relic co-founder and art director on the first two entries, is among them. Blackbird previously made Homeworld: Deserts of Kharak, a prequel to 1999’s original Homeworld.

Meta has reportedly shelved its rumored dual-camera smartwatch

Reports over the last couple of years have suggested that not only was Meta working on a smartwatch, it was developing one with two cameras. However, that project is on hold, according to Bloomberg, as Meta is focusing on other wearables instead.

The long-rumored smartwatch was pegged as a possible Apple Watch competitor and the report suggests it was expected to go on sale next spring for around $349. A prototype was said to have features including activity tracking, a calendar, photo gallery and heart rate monitoring. It’s believed to have had an 18-hour battery life.

Apps included Spotify, as well as ones for Meta’s own WhatsApp and Instagram Stories. The prototype reportedly did not have a native app store. Instead, the idea was that you’d manage the device using your Facebook account. Naturally, you would have been able to post to Facebook and Instagram from the watch.

The device reportedly had WiFi, GPS and eSIM support and a removable watch face with two side buttons, one of which was a circular control (it’s unclear if this was an Apple Watch crown-style dial). It was said to feature a five-megapixel camera on the watch face and a 12-megapixel one on the rear. The latter was designed to be usable after the watch face was removed.

That second camera appears to have caused issues during development — its positioning reportedly interfered with sensors that turned feedback from the wearer’s nerves into digital signals. The company has mulled the idea of using smartwatches as input devices for its take on the metaverse, with users being able to control avatars or engage with VR spaces through gestures.

Along with technical complications, it seems that broader issues at Meta played a role in the device being put on hold. A report last month suggested the company has killed off some Meta Reality Labs projects as it looks to rein in spending. Meta has shaken up its leadership team in recent weeks as well.

Still, the work of the engineers who were on the dual-camera watch project may not be in vain. Meta may use some of the features in other wearables. There’s a possibility of the project being revived at a later date too.

Meanwhile, Meta is also said to have scaled back on its ambitions for augmented reality glasses. According to The Information, the company is no longer expected to release its first-generation augmented reality glasses in 2024. That device is now said to be earmarked for use as a demo product. The report suggests Meta is instead focusing on the second-gen AR glasses, meaning it could be several years before the device hits the market. 

In addition, the report suggests Meta will no longer make Portal devices for consumers. The company is said to be planning to turn Portal smart displays into a product line aimed at businesses.