After a long wait, Sony has finally revealed the design of the PS5 during its June 11 livestream but it seems there might still be more to see. 

A user on ResetEra (via VG247) recently shared a range of close-up images of the console and its peripherals which reveal that the textured areas, far from being random lumps and bumps, are actually comprised of lots of the x, square, circle and triangle symbols that are tied to the PlayStation brand. It’s a design touch that's reminiscent of what Sony did with its limited-edition 20th Anniversary PS4 console released back in 2014.

It’s not something you would notice straight away and we had to visit the official PlayStation Flickr account to zoom in and squint at it for ourselves just to make sure that our eyes weren’t playing tricks on us. 

The symbols are certainly more obvious on some of the images than others—the PS5 camera offers the most clear view—but they were even briefly visible during the recent livestream (pictured below). 

Look closer

Perhaps it’s details like this that Eric Lempel, Head of Global Marketing and Consumer Experience at Sony, was referring to when he mentioned the “nice, surprising features” that emerge when viewing the console in person during a recent interview with PlayStation Blog. 

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Although some in the ResetEra thread and on social media have expressed appreciation for this texturing, it’s safe to say that the PS5’s overall design has divided opinion. Even on the TechRadar team, there are those who love what Sony has revealed and those who hate it. 

Now that Sony has revealed the design of the PS5, as well as some of the games that will be available to play on it, the big questions that still need answered are with regards to its price and its release date. 

Sony hasn’t given any indication as to when it will reveal these things but given we’re fast approaching that holiday 2020 release window it’s unlikely we’re going to have to wait too much longer to find out. 

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We still don’t know what the PS5 will look like but a recently published patent for its dev kit suggests that Sony is taking cooling and ventilation very seriously in this upcoming generation. 

The utility patent, filed by Sony in late 2019 but published on the World Intellectual Property Organisation Database in June 2020, highlights the dev kit’s “plurality of cooling fans” which work with a heat sink in order to improve airflow and keep the console cool. 

Although this patent appears to be for the PS5 dev kit—which is unlikely to resemble the final console if previous PlayStation dev kits are anything to go by—previous reports on the PS5 have suggested that its cooling system will be something special.

Keeping cool

Earlier this year, Bloomberg reported that the PS5’s cooling system is “unusually expensive at a few dollars per unit” as Sony has “opted to lavish more on making sure heat dissipation from the powerful chips housed inside the console isn’t an issue.” 

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Shortly after that, Sony itself touched on the console’s cooling solution with Mark Cerny noting during the console’s spec deep-dive that the team had to tackle the “engineering challenge of a cost-effective and high-performance cooling solution, designed for” the console which will be running “at essentially constant power” with variable frequencies for its CPU and GPU. Cerny stopped short of revealing specific details of the cooling solution, noting they were being held back for a future teardown. 

With all of that considered, while there’s no guarantee that the PS5 dev kit or the cooling system shown in this patent will match up with the final consumer console, it seems likely that Sony has devised a similarly robust solution.

Sony’s PS5 gameplay event that was scheduled for earlier this week was postponed in order to “allow more important voices to be heard” amid the ongoing protests following the death of George Floyd in police custody in Minneapolis. However, it has since said that a new date will be announced “soon”. 

Whether or not this event will give us a closer look at the design of the PS5 is unknown but with the end of 2020 and the console’s release window fast approaching it’s unlikely we’ll have to wait much longer to see it. 

Via LetsGoDigital

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After weeks of pleading, Infinity Ward has finally added duos mode to Call of Duty: Warzone battle royale—and it’s available to play now on all platforms. 

The news was announced in a tweet from the official Infinity Ward account, which confirmed that, thanks to the new playlist update, Warzone now has solos, duos, trios, quads and plunder quads all at once. That still leaves plenty of choice for those who can't settle on just one battlefield buddy. 

In a blog post that gives a little more detail, Activision explained that the new duos mode will see players drop into the Battle Royale’s Verdansk map paired up with either a friend or with another random player. Overall, the mode plays in much the same manner as Warzone’s trios and quads, but naturally a smaller team increases the pressure because everyone has to pull their weight if they want to survive and win:

It takes two

“Duos is quite possibly the ultimate test of friendship and teamwork; with only one other teammate to rely on, you’ll have to coordinate your strategies, make good callouts, and most importantly, hit your shots if your fellow Operator’s life is at stake.”

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The other good news is that it looks like the mode could be sticking around for a while as Infinity Ward hasn’t given an indication of when, or if, it’ll be disappearing. 

Players tired of fighting in a trio with a stranger or in an incomplete trio have been requesting a duos mode since Warzone Battle Royale’s launch. Although Infinity Ward had previously promised it was coming and even briefly added duos to Plunder mode, the developer also said (via VGC) it had to iron out some bugs and find “the right time” to launch. 

The right time has come shortly before the launch of Modern Warfare and Warzone’s Season 4 on June 3. Although we’re not entirely sure what changes the new season will bring just yet, a recent trailer has hinted Captain Price could be stepping into the Warzone as a new operator.

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Halo Infinite developer 343 Industries has confirmed that the Xbox Series X title will be making an appearance during the Xbox 20/20 stream taking place in July.

In a post on the official Halo Waypoint blog, 343 Industries kept its confirmation short and sweet, writing: “You may have seen people talking about this lightly before, but we’re extremely excited to confirm that Halo Infinite will be one of many first-party titles included in the Xbox 20/20 event in July. Get ready.”

Following the cancellation of E3 2020, Microsoft has been forced to change its approach in the lead up to the launch of Xbox Series X, promising monthly Inside Xbox streams that will give fans an idea of what they can expect from the next generation. 

What to expect

While May’s stream focused more on third-party titles, like Assassin’s Creed Valhalla, that are coming to Xbox Series X later this year, the July stream is going to be dedicated to giving us a closer look at the first-party titles being developed by Xbox Game Studios with promises of “first looks at new gameplay, insights from development teams being optimized for Xbox Series X, and brand-new game announcements.”

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In its confirmation 343 Industries hasn’t explicitly said what we’ll see of Halo Infinite during the event so we can’t be absolutely certain there will be gameplay shown. 

However, Halo Infinite is still scheduled to be a standout launch title for Xbox Series X later this year and given some of the disappointment around the May stream’s lack of gameplay, a first look at some next-gen Halo gameplay could be just the thing to raise excitement levels. 

The July stream hasn't been given an exact date just yet and beyond Halo Infinite, it's not entirely clear what will be on show—Xbox has 15 game studios and "a number" of them are expected to share what they've been working on during the event. Perhaps we'll see some more from Hellblade 2, or maybe those Fable 4 rumors will finally be cleared up. Regardless, we now know we don't have too long to wait for a fresh look at Master Chief. 

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Microsoft is revealing more details about the Xbox Series X than ever but one thing it hasn’t confirmed yet is its next-gen console’s price. According to reputed industry analyst, Michael Pachter, it could be surprisingly low. 

Speaking on a recent live episode of Geoff Keighley’s Bonus Round (via PushSquare), Pachter suggests that Microsoft could consider taking a significant loss on its next generation console in order to launch it at $400.

Launching at this price point could potentially allow Microsoft's console to undercut its main competition—Sony’s PS5—which, Pachter points out during the episode, is rumored to have a launch price closer to $500. 

Getting the price right

It’s a bold strategy but according to Pachter “Microsoft has a big balance sheet” which means that “If they want to cut the price by $100, just price below and subsidise the first 10 million, they will." 

As a result, Pachter believes that Microsoft is waiting for Sony to "blink first, and then they’ll reveal the price and launch date. It’s going to be Holiday, so very likely sometime in November and very likely $400.”

Fellow guest on the episode Peter Moore, who has previously held prominent roles at Sega, Xbox and EA before becoming CEO of Liverpool F.C., agreed with Pachter’s view:

“What both companies are going through right now is how much we can afford to lose in the first 12 to 18 months? What is our attach rate of software to hardware? What is our revenue we can drive from services? What are we willing to do in year 1, 2 and 3 to hit 10 million?”

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Moore went on to explain that "from the perspective of each company, Microsoft right now… the stock price, the market cap, everything is flying for them. Does Satya [Nadella, Microsoft CEO] say, ‘This is our opportunity right now as we did with Xbox 360, let’s get in, let’s price it right … Let’s dare Sony to come in at $500.'"

If Pachter’s scenario played out it would see Microsoft flip what happened at the launch of the PS4 and Xbox One in 2013, when Sony undercut Microsoft’s launch price and reaped the rewards. 

Microsoft has previously said that it’s learned from this launch mistake, with Phil Spencer saying that this time around “we will not be out of position on power or price.” 

Spencer's words don't, of course, mean the Xbox Series X will have a price point as low as $400—which would actually be lower than the launch price of the Xbox One—they do at least suggest that Microsoft is aware the price of its next console should better align with the price of its competition. 

It's worth pointing out, though, that Sony is also no stranger to the problems caused by a high launch price following the PlayStation 3's release in 2006, so both companies are likely to be taking great care with the pricing of their consoles given these previous missteps.

That said, until Microsoft and Sony officially confirm the launch prices for their consoles themselves all of this remains conjecture. Both consoles are scheduled to release in Holiday 2020 so it’s unlikely we have too much longer to wait to find out. 

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Respawn Entertainment has confirmed that Apex Legends Season 5 will be starting on May 12, a week later than originally planned. 

The developer confirmed the date through an official blog post in which Design Director, Jason McCord, also details the team’s plans for wrapping up Season 4 with a brand new Limited-Time Mode. 

According to McCord, the decision to push the start date of Season 5 back slightly was driven by a desire to give Apex Legends players a little more time to “grind out their Battle Pass or try and hit that next level of Ranked”.

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Next steps

That extra week will also allow for the final two-week event of Season 4: Battle Armor. 

The Battle Armor event will kick off on April 28 and run until May 12, when Season 4 will make way for Season 5. 

Battle Armor will take place on the game’s World’s Edge map with rotations happening every few days which will see players limited to only one armor type. McCord states that in this mode every player will drop into matches with the same armor type as well as a P2020 and will find that, aside from Shield Cells and batteries, no other kind of armor will spawn. 

When the event starts on April 28, those taking part will be limited to White Armor. On May 2, the armor allowed will upgrade to Blue and then to Purple on May 6. Finally, on May 9, players will be restricted to the recently introduced Evo Armor—which grows stronger with damage dealt—until the event ends and Season 5 begins on May 12. 

McCord says that this event is just one way Respawn is planning to experiment with the game’s “core gameplay”, adding that it’s “excited to introduce even more twists in Season 5 and beyond.” 

Other than this tease, it’s not entirely clear what Season 5 will hold for players just yet. New seasons usually mean map changes and a new Legend but Respawn is yet to give official confirmation of what it has up its sleeve. Given the run up to Season 4 of Apex Legends was fairly entertaining and surprising we're sure players are looking forward to seeing things unfold over the next couple of weeks. 

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Valve may not have had much success with its original Steam Controller but a recently published patent suggests that the company could be considering another version. 

The original Steam Controller launched in 2015 but, after four years of struggling to find its feet, it was discontinued and finally sold out at the tail end of 2019. In our review for the controller we rated it three stars out of five and praised its innovation and customisation capabilities but found its awkward design a real drawback.

The patent for this new version, originally filed in late 2018 before being published in 2020, was tweeted out (Via PCGamesN) by Valve News Network’s Tyler McVicker who pointed out an intriguing aspect of the controller's design: swappable components. 

Complete control

In the vein of the Xbox Elite controller, the patent details that this new Steam Controller would feature changeable parts, though it appears it would take this customizability even further. 

The patent says that the controller would allow for the “dynamic swapping of controls for changing the configuration of the controller to meet the needs of different applications”. It goes on to describe specific scenarios where a user might swap a joystick for a D-pad, depending on what their game calls for, or even swapping a tall joystick for a shorter one simply to suit personal preference and comfort. 

It seems that the controller would be customizable front and back, too, with the patent describing instances where the controller may have “one or more joysticks, one or more D-pads, one or more track pads, one or more buttons, one or more accessibility controls” on its front as well as “one or more detachable top-surface controls, back-surface controls”.

The patent also mentions software with the ability to detect which input is being used in the controller and even communicate this to the platform the user is playing on, saying that “if a controller currently couples to a back cover having four buttons as opposed to two, then a gaming application or platform may recommend games that are compatible with …the four-button back cover.”

As with any patent filing, however, it’s worth pointing out that there’s no guarantee that Valve is actually going ahead with the product detailed. Even if it was, there's also no guarantee that this new product would take the form it does in the design drawings—things can change a lot between patent filing and production, if production happens at all. 

At the moment, Valve hasn’t made any official announcements with regards to plans for a new controller but if something was in the works it’d certainly be interesting to see whether it can get it right a second time around. 

• Speaking of controllers, Sony has officially revealed the DualSense for PS5. This is what you need to know about it

The Entertainment Software Association has announced (via GamesIndustry.biz) that E3 2021 will be taking place and that it will occupy its traditional June slot, specifically running from June 15 to June 17, 2021. 

This announcement comes only a month after the ESA confirmed the cancellation of E3 2020 in response to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. 

The organizer has said it’s planning a ‘reimagined’ event for next year, though what this will involve isn’t entirely clear just yet. The ESA's wish to do something different is not entirely surprising though, given it's been robbed of its opportunity to ‘shake things up’ in 2020 as it had wanted and E3 itself has, in recent years, had its relevancy called into question. 

Planning ahead

Before its cancellation, this year’s show  was proving particularly troublesome with Sony announcing that it wouldn’t be attending for the second time, retail and production partner iam8bit resigning and industry veteran Geoff Keighley saying that he would not be producing his E3 Coliseum event. 

At the time of E3 2020’s cancellation, the ESA said it was “exploring options” to attempt to “coordinate an online experience to showcase industry announcements and news in June 2020.” At the moment, there’s no update on this digital event taking place. 

Phil Spencer has, however, said on Twitter that Microsoft will be hosting some form of Xbox digital event instead and Ubisoft has also said it's looking into some kind of digital event. Nintendo, which traditionally broadcasts a livestream for E3 announcements anyway, has said it’s “considering various ways to engage with our fans and will have more to share as the year continues.” 

Meanwhile, IGN has announced it plans to host a “Summer of Gaming” event in early June 2020 with publisher partnerships that include Square Enix, Sega, 2K, Amazon, Google, Devolver Digital and THQ Nordic. The event, which should fill the gaming news hole, will include "publisher presentations with IGN pre- and post-discussions, remote developer interviews, hands-on demos and preview impressions, gameplay, and news segments recapping the biggest announcements."

Those in mourning for E3 2020 now, at least, have something to put in the calendar for next summer.

• Why E3 2020 being cancelled might actually be good for game developers

Square Enix has announced that the 2013 Tomb Raider game, the first in the reboot trilogy, is available for free to keep on Steam for a limited time. 

The offer is part of Square Enix’s Stay Home and Play campaign, started in the midst of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. Warmed by the global efforts being made to keep people in their homes to reduce transmissions and contractions of the virus, Square Enix has said this is "a gift" to the community. 

In a blog post, Square Enix confirmed that both the 2013 Tomb Raider and Lara Croft and the Temple of Osiris are free on Steam now and will remain so until Monday, March 23, 23:59 PDT/ 6.59 am GMT on Tuesday, March 24. Once you’ve got the games, they’re yours to keep forever.

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A virtual adventure

“We’re warmed by stories of communities banding together to support those in need during uncertain times, and by honoring directives intended to protect the most vulnerable among us,” Square Enix writes.

“Gamers are part of a global community. We regularly rally together online to return balance to fantasy kingdoms, recruit crew to save the universe from sci-fi threats, and indulge in healthy competition through high-octane action games. For others, shifting to both online work and play is unfamiliar territory.”

Neither of these games is exactly brand spanking new but between them they pretty much hit the mark of what anyone could need at the moment; while the 2013 reboot is a great way to go on a thrilling solo adventure, Temple of Osiris is a chance to play with up to three others if the isolation is just becoming too much. 

It’s offers like these that are probably helping Steam break its concurrent user records—recently the platform hit 20 million for the first time ever. 

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CEO and founder of Epic Games, Tim Sweeney, has declared that Epic is standing behind Nvidia’s GeForce Now cloud streaming service, calling it “the most developer-friendly and publisher-friendly of the major streaming services”.

This support comes at a challenging time for Nvidia’s service; since leaving its beta period only a few weeks ago, GeForce Now has seen dozens of games from big publishers like Activision Blizzard, Bethesda and, most recently, 2K, withdrawn from its catalogue. 

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In a recent thread of tweets, however, Tim Sweeney has confirmed that Epic Games will not be following the trend. Not only will Fortnite be staying on Nvidia’s service, Epic will offer support for Epic Games Store titles (including exclusives) if developers are willing, with plans to improve integration even more over time. 

Sweeney support

According to Sweeney, GeForce Now is “the most developer-friendly and publisher-friendly of the major streaming services, with zero tax on game revenue”, and he believes that “Game companies who want to move the game industry towards a healthier state for everyone should be supporting this kind of service!”

Sweeney goes on to say in his tweets that he thinks cloud streaming services like Nvidia’s will play an important role in ending what he calls "the iOS and Google Play payment monopolies and their 30 per cent taxes", adding that "Apple has decreed that these services aren’t allowed to exist on iOS, and therefore aren’t allowed to compete, which is megalomaniacal and won’t stand.”

“Just waiting till later this year", he concludes, "when Google is lobbying against Apple for blocking Stadia from iOS, while Google blocks GeForce NOW, xCloud, and Fortnite from Google Play, and this whole rotten structure begins collapsing in on itself.”

After so many high-profile publisher departures, support like this is likely to be at least a small amount of relief for Nvidia. Whether it’ll be enough remains to be seen. As we pointed out in our hands on review, “Nvidia GeForce Now is the best game streaming service around right now, but only because its competition is so weak”, so lasting success isn't guaranteed and its next steps remain crucial.

• In more good news for GeForce Now, it's getting Cyberpunk 2077 on launch day

Respawn Entertainment enthralled Apex Legends fans earlier this year when, prior to the launch of Season 4, they announced a new Legend called Forge but promptly had him killed by the actual new Legend, Revenant. 

It was a nice bit of storytelling that proved to be an appropriately dramatic and surprising way to introduce the sinister character of Revenant. But Respawn has now revealed that it wasn’t just trying to entertain the community with this bait-and-switch, it was also trying to mislead data-miners. 

In an interview with Dot Esports, Respawn Design Director, Jason McCord, revealed that the Forge forgery was the idea of designer Rayme Vinson, who was looking to “misdirect” data miners after they had leaked the character of Revenant months before Season 4 was due to begin and “ruined [their] surprise”. 

It's all in the name

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“We actually purposefully leaked fake concept art and details of Forge’s kit in patches,” McCord explained, “so there would be a breadcrumb trail by the time we announced him. It’s pretty insane, really. I can’t think of any other game that has gone through such hijinks.”

It worked well, distracting data-miners and fans who began to believe that Forge, not Revenant, would be the next addition to the game. The Forge set up was so convincing that even after his death, some players thought he might come back into the game eventually. McCord shut this down, stating that Forge is “super dead”, adding that the developers didn’t actually make a model or a kit for him in the first place.

Although this move had positive results and allowed Respawn to regain the element of surprise, it came from a place of frustration. 

Apex Legends has always been subject to leaks and the developer has previously told players that data-mines are “not a source of truth”, asking them to wait for Respawn to announce real information. Shortly before leaving his role as executive producer for Apex Legends, Drew McCoy tweeted that leaks are the “absolute worst” and ruined the “insane amounts of time and energy” that the team put into creating surprises for players. 

At the very least, Respawn managed to make the best of its situation and we’re keen to see what it does next. 

• We've got all the latest Apex Legends news

EA Sports has announced that it is planning to introduce an in-game button overlay for some FIFA 20 players as part of its efforts to improve the game’s responsiveness.

FIFA 20 has received criticism from its community for its unresponsiveness during online matches, with players feeling that there’s a noticeable delay between when they press the button and when their desired action happens on screen. 

In a recent Pitch Notes article published to the EA site, the developer has described its “live study methodology” whereby, following internal testing, it tests potential changes with a small number of real players in order to garner feedback and real-world data.

Live studies

The upcoming in-game button overlay is part of this and is intended to measure the real-world impact of a “small backend change related to button responsiveness”. 

According to EA, in the coming weeks a select number of players will see the overlay (pictured below) added to the top right-hand corner of their game, though it notes that the image depicts an in-progress view which is subject to change. 

EA explains that this button will allow players to see their inputs in real-time as well as “the impact the connection with the data center has on those inputs.” The hope is that this will help EA analyze matches more efficiently as, it says, it “can get clips of players sharing their experience and raw input.” 

EA plans to share its findings from the study at some point in the future, though it points out that “like any real-world study”, it can take time to get “actionable results”. That means we don’t know exactly when we’ll find out what the developer’s next steps are but given the short lifecycle of FIFA titles and the fact that, based on previous release patterns, late 2020 is highly likely to herald the release of FIFA 21 we imagine players are hoping to see improvements sooner rather than later.

EA stresses in the article that this is just one part of its efforts to tackle connectivity and responsiveness issues in the game and that as progress is made it may roll out more changes using these live studies. 

• Everything we know about FIFA 21

In a fresh blow for Nvidia's fledgling GeForce Now cloud streaming platform, Bethesda has removed its games from the service.

In a post on the Nvidia forums, an official representative listed exactly which games are being withdrawn and it seems to be all of them but one: Wolfenstein Youngblood. The full list of removed titles is as follows:

• Wolfenstein: The Old Blood
• Wolfenstein: The New Order
• Wolfenstein II: The New Colossus
• The Evil Within 2
• Rage 2
• Quake Champions
• Prey
• Fallout: New Vegas
• Fallout 76
• Fallout 3
• Everspace 
• Doom
• Dishonoured
• Dishonoured 2
• Dishonoured: Death of the Outsider
• Elder Scrolls Online: Elsweyr
• Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
• Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim Special Edition

Teething problems

The exact reason for Bethesda's withdrawal is unclear but it's not a great look for GeForce Now, especially so soon after Activision Blizzard removed its games from the service just over a week ago.

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Activision's withdrawal turned out to be due to a "misunderstanding" on Nvidia's part, with Nvidia stating “Activision Blizzard has been a fantastic partner during the GeForce Now beta, which we took to include the free trial period for our founders' membership. Recognising the misunderstanding, we removed their games from our service, with hope we can work with them to re-enable these, and more, in the future.”

It's not been confirmed if Bethesda's decision has been made for similar reasons.

As GeForce Now has launched for everyone after many years in development, it now has two tiers available to users. One tier is free while the other, called the Founder's Edition, costs £4.99 / €5.49 / $4.99 per month following a 90 day free trial period. It seems to be the transition from a free beta-mode service to a paid one that's causing issues with publishers.

Though Nvidia hasn't addressed the removal of Bethesda's titles specifically just yet, it has already warned users in another blog post that they might see some games leave GeForce Now as it shifted from free to paid, though it expected instances of this to be "few and far between".

"This trial is an important transitional period where gamers, developers and publishers can try the premium experience with minimal commitment while we continue to refine our offering," Nvidia explained.

"As we approach a paid service, some publishers may choose to remove games before the trial period ends. Ultimately, they maintain control over their content and decide whether the game you purchase includes streaming on GeForce NOW. Meanwhile, others will bring games back as they continue to realize GeForce NOW’s value."

Regardless of the warning, many users aren't exactly pleased with the news that so many big name titles are suddenly unavailable to them, especially those who have purchased these games specifically to use on the GeForce Now platform.

Nvidia, for its part, is requesting that its users be "patient" as it works through the teething period, stating that it aims to make "as many games available as possible". 

It's not all bad news for GeForce Now, though. As we noted in our review, at the moment Nvidia has an accessibility advantage over its competition in that it already has a free tier available to players without the need for any upfront cost. In addition, although games are being pulled, GeForce Now is still getting some big wins like the recently announced support for Cyberpunk 2077 when it launches in September. 

• How to play unsupported games in GeForce Now

Respawn is taking Apex Legends players back in time this weekend by bringing back the game's original Kings Canyon map for a limited period. 

Apex Legends may only be just over a year old but across the game’s first two seasons we watched the Kings Canyon map evolve before it was replaced in October 2019 with a brand new map, World’s Edge, which is still in play now. 

One of the best things about live service games like Apex Legends is that they keep things fresh with regular updates that herald new challenges, items and even maps. But sometimes you can’t help but get nostalgic for the old stuff, the original game that grabbed your attention in the first place.

Long live Kings Canyon

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So those that have missed the Kings Canyon map will be glad to know that for a limited period, between February 21 and February 24, it's returning to Apex Legends in its untouched Season 1 form for unranked matches. 

Unlike previous restorations of the Kings Canyon map, this one isn’t in a different form or part of a themed event, it's just the old map you remember. 

Those who don’t miss Kings Canyon at all or are more than happy with the current set up will be glad to know that World’s Edge is still available across this weekend as well. Players are able to access it as part of a separate playlist. 

This could actually be a good opportunity for ranked players to refresh their memories before Kings Canyon comes back as the setting for the next half of the game’s Ranked Series Split which will run from March 24 until May 5.  

• All the latest from Apex Legends

Activision Blizzard has announced that it’s planning to release “several” more “remasters and reimagined experiences” in 2020. 

The news comes from a recent financial call Activision held with investors and analysts. Although the majority of the call was spent going over the company’s financial performance for Q4 2019, Activision did take some time to talk about its plans for the year ahead. 

CFO Dennis Durkin said that while there will be new games and IP for players to look forward to, like a brand new Call of Duty for 2020, Activision “will continue to tap into our portfolio of beloved IP to bring several remastered and reimagined experiences to our players in 2020”.

More details to come

It’s not entirely surprising that Activision would want to continue down this route; while Warcraft 3: Reforged has, to put it lightly, had a tough time of it, Activision has had significant success remastering its Crash Bandicoot and Spyro franchises as well as rebooting Call of Duty: Modern Warfare.

Which franchises will be receiving the remaster and reimagining treatment remains unclear at the moment, with Durkin stating that they’ll “announce closer to launch”. 

Activision has plenty in its back catalogue that players would undoubtedly be happy to see given a fresh coat of pixels, from Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater to Diablo 2. It was also mentioned that Activision’s mobile developer, King, is working on a few “promising new titles” and it’s possible that one of those is a leaked Crash Bandicoot endless runner. 

Between this trend in remasters and remakes and the next generation of consoles coming in the form of Xbox Series X and PS5, E3 2020 looks like it could be a curious and exciting mix of old and new.

• Remakes vs Remasters: what's the difference?