ampersandrew

I haven't seen confirmation that this is what Ubisoft has been doing, but given how many studios they have and how quickly they turn games around, it wouldn't surprise me if they used the "chase the sun" method of development, where as one team signs off, they hand development over to the next team, where it's morning, and their work day is just starting. So it would just be very likely that every Ubisoft studio touches many games that Ubisoft works on. From the credits on their games, this is certainly what it appears to be. This is the same development method that Larian used to make a game as large as Baldur's Gate 3 in only 6 years.

Digital Foundry has been looking at what tech could feasibly be in this thing for a long time now. They're going to be very comparable in performance.

I believe it has a direct lineage from a game based on The Hulk called Ultimate Destruction, and you can feel that. You're super jumping, gliding, and sort of like Venom, consuming people to pose as them. There are missions with a stealth element, but other times you're throwing tanks at helicopters. Holding the run button will have you effortlessly doing cartwheels off the tops of cars and wall running straight up skyscrapers.

I haven't played the PC version, but I expect it's the same as the console version: Prototype (from Activision in 2009; there's another game listed with the same title). The story is utter garbage, but everything about the moment to moment gameplay is great, and it definitely checks the boxes you're looking for. I never played the sequel, because it re-used the same map, and that's a lot like playing a Mario game with all of the same levels as the one before it, but this first game rules.

If you have access to something that can play Xbox 360 games, I'd also highly recommend the first Crackdown.

I hear very good things about Sonic All-Stars Racing Transformed, and there's a new one coming.

You can sideload a program called Heroic Games Launcher that lets you easily manage your GOG games, as well as Amazon and Epic.

For $50 less, you get a similarly capable machine in terms of specs but more comfortable to hold, with an immensely larger library, and an operating system far more respectful of your authority to do what you want with the machine you bought.

It's also launching day 1 on Game Pass, so Microsoft paid a pretty penny for it.

My running theory has been that the official release date is tied up in Microsoft marketing deals still. So I'm guessing we'll hear the date from Microsoft during summer game fest.

$449, $499 with Mario Kart digital.

For $80, apparently?