PlayStation.Blog |
- Tools Up! announces Garden Party, a trio of DLC episodes
- Flip, grind, and bust tricks through your own adventure in OlliOlli World this winter
- Creating Returnal’s otherworldly enemies: VFX-driven tentacle tech and deep-sea inspirations
- The official Drone Racing League Simulator launches today
| Tools Up! announces Garden Party, a trio of DLC episodes Posted: 14 Apr 2021 10:00 AM PDT
 The DLC consists of three, separately-released episodes, each with 15 unique levels, new tools, and mechanics, as well as a challenging opponent. While episodes 2 and 3 are coming soon, Episode 1: The Tree House is ready to play now. What is waiting for you in Episode 1? What is one of the most important things in any garden? Beautiful and lush green grass of course! It’s so nice to lie on it and look at the blue sky, right? Tools Up! Co. love it too, but there's lots of work to be done before anyone can rest. In Tools Up! Garden Party you'll grow grass from seed. To get the best results though, you'll have to first pull up any old grass and prepare the soil well for planting. And of course you'll have to water your seedlings too. Have you been getting a lot of rain? Because it looks like your lawn is completely out of control! No big deal, just start the lawn mower and give the grass a trim. Wait—we said no big deal, but you know to not run over your friends right? Right? If you find a lawn mower to be too difficult a tool, get back to the basics and use scissors or even your hands. Experiment to discover all the ways different tasks can be completed. Not only does Tools Up! Garden Party introduces a lot of new mechanics and tools to the game, now, some tasks can be completed in more than one way. Anything goes when you're in the wilderness of the great outdoors! On top of all your gardening duties, you'll have to solve the mystery of the tree house before you can call the job done. Work your way through all three episodes and uncover the truth hidden in the treetops on PS4.   |
| Flip, grind, and bust tricks through your own adventure in OlliOlli World this winter Posted: 14 Apr 2021 09:27 AM PDT Hey PlayStation friends, Simon here from the Roll7 team. It is great to be back to talk about our new game OlliOlli World. Some of you may remember us back when we launched OlliOlli and OlliOlli2: Welcome to Olliwood on the PS Vita, PlayStation 3, and PlayStation 4. It was amazing to see the reception to our games, and, not going to lie, it wasn't bad winning a few awards along the way. While we've released other games, we've always wanted to return to our roots with another OlliOlli. One that really nails that feeling of laying down a perfect line of seemingly endless tricks while lofi tracks beat in the background creating a harmony of euphoria and endorphins. We knew if we were to make a new OlliOlli, it would have to be bigger, better, and stronger, err I mean brighter than before. We've been working on OlliOlli World now secretly for years, and it is so great to finally be able to show it off. Real quick recap for everyone: OlliOlli World is an action platforming game in which you bust tricks with both sticks through a bizarre and whimsical world attempting to achieve high scores, unlock various customizations options, meet wacky and peculiar friends, and ultimately search for the skate gods of Gnarvana. You will need coordination, timing, and some practice to lay down monster combos. Skateboarding can be difficult and while we didn't want to shy away from that, we wanted to make sure that it is approachable, and you are comfortable cruising around. There is this exhilarating feeling that comes when you stick a hardflip over an especially massive stair set and we want everyone to enjoy that. We hope you get that same feeling in OlliOlli World; the only difference is here those stairs might be over a gushing rainbow river that is home to a colossal squid. Because of course it is… If you are a fan of our previous games, one of the first things you will notice is the big shift in the art. We loved the retro-pixel feeling of our previous titles, but we knew with OlliOlli World we wanted to pursue a bolder, more vivid, animated style. The world is a bit quirky, and we wanted to take the game in a new visual direction that really allowed us to show it off while also emphasizing this is not a sequel, but a totally new game. A major inspiration was to pull in skate culture, street art, and all the unique crossroads that develop around skating. There is a fascinating intersection of psychedelic elements and trippy influences across these communities. We wanted to create a world in which embodies and shares that essence, yet also feels purposeful despite all its oddity. You'll see walking ice cream people, business frogs, Milk Shake pools, tubing Grizzly Bears, and other bizarre inhabitants. The locations have some real-world influences but then we injected a heavy dose of offbeat humor that we hope brings a chuckle. Another big addition to OlliOlli World is the ability to take multiple different paths through levels. We wanted to provide a new level of freedom to explore this weird and wonderful world so now certain paths will branch off into separate directions. This means you'll be able to cruise down different paths discovering new side quests and more epic trick opportunities really adding to both the variety and replayability of the game. There are hidden ramps, sneaky jumps, quarter pipes, and other spots in which you can just take a moment to carve as you build up your score or practice your moves. We wanted to emulate that feeling of finding a secret skate spot and figuring out what is the best trick to land there. One major requested feature in previous games was the ability to personalize your character, and we are super stoked to see what you will come up with in OlliOlli World. We've designed a ton of customization options: you can wear a bunch of gear and wild accessories, select from different skateboards, and can even change your physical appearance. Over your journey, you will face some wicked challenges which can net you that sweet, sweet swag. You can also alter your characters tricks and gain new moves. Are you more of a method grab kinda dude? We got you. Do you like 360 flips over varial heelflips? Do it up. We always wanted our game to be about how you can really express yourself both visually and how you skate. OlliOlli World will feature a full single-player campaign with multiple locations, tons of levels, side quests, challenges, and more. Then after you've trekked across Radland, there are still plenty of spots to master as OlliOlli World features the ability to create and share procedurally generated levels in sandbox mode. We are also packing on high score leaderboards, and if you are truly one of the baddest skaters in the lands check out Leagues, a global competition to decide who is the most gnarly of them all. We hope that with this whole new world we built, ridiculous new art style, creating branching paths and hidden spots to skate, all new mechanics to combine and master as well as other new features, to really make this next iteration in the series extra special. Be sure to take a trip with us this winter when OlliOlli World launches for the PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 5.   |
| Creating Returnal’s otherworldly enemies: VFX-driven tentacle tech and deep-sea inspirations Posted: 14 Apr 2021 07:00 AM PDT Hi everyone! We are very excited to be approaching the launch of Returnal, on April 30, and we wanted to share a few more details on Selene's journey. This time we wanted to talk about some of the hostile forces she will encounter on Atropos.  The planet of Atropos is a dark and mysterious place, and each environment will provide its own unique set of enemies to overcome: from the organic and parasitic creatures inhabiting the Overgrown Ruins, to the cosmic or corrupted entities roaming the sands of the Crimson Wastes, and the mechanical automatons that endlessly patrol the haunting Derelict Citadel… Players will encounter a large variety of different foes, which aside from their unique aesthetics will also provide their own unique gameplay flavor and special attacks. When creating the organic enemies of Returnal, one of the biggest sources of inspiration for me was looking at bioluminescent deep-sea creatures. In many ways they felt like the most alien lifeforms one could find here on Earth. There is something inherently unsettling and foreign about the deep-sea as an environment for us. The way these creatures move deep underwater, with their long tentacles and bioluminescent highlights, can often appear majestic, beautiful and downright terrifying. It's also not uncommon for these creatures to use their luminous beauty to allure or distract their prey (for example, with a dazzling display of bioluminescence), and suddenly strike when their prey is least expecting it. This combination of chaotic beauty and nightmarish aggression was something we aimed to capture with our organic creatures' aesthetic. Towards this purpose we ended up creating our own special VFX-driven tentacle tech and used it very liberally. These fully dynamic elements bring that chaotic beauty to the enemies we were after, and also created some really satisfying feedback for players as well. For instance, the bioluminescent emissives on tentacles are strongly highlighted to telegraph oncoming attacks and provide satisfying hit reactions when enemies are shot (or when an enemy is killed, where they blow up in a glorious explosion of severed tentacles). The strong emissive highlights also connect back to our Bullet Hell attacks, where our projectiles naturally inherit this vibrant "energy signature" from our enemies, to create a cohesive aesthetic that strongly reinforces our gameplay intent as well. For our creative process, we wanted to make sure that our enemies looked otherworldly and unique, but also wanted them to provide great gameplay of course. In a few cases, our enemy ideas would start from a particular aesthetic or story we were trying to tell – for example our Mycomorph (pictured above) was the idea of a parasitic organism that festers on Selene's corpses, so you would see her fractured skull and ribcage amidst the tree-like parasitic growth of the enemy up close. But usually, we followed a very gameplay-first approach when crafting our enemies in Returnal: we'd devise various key roles and archetypes that we wanted to fill for each biome, and start prototyping them not only by themselves, but also in different combinations with each other. While many of our encounters will provide a projectile challenge from afar, some enemies can provide close range attacks that demand precise avoidance timing as well. One example is the aggressive Titanops you can see in the video. This large bipedal creature has one arm completely made of tentacles, while the other is a cleaver-like extruded bone that it uses to land devastating blows. The Titanops takes a lot of damage to defeat, and will chase you relentlessly, often closing the gap on you by leaping large distances directly into melee range. But most other creatures prefer to keep combat at a distance. For example, in the Overgrown Ruins the Mycomorph has a strong emphasis on shooting aggressive homing projectiles from afar. It will often teleport to new locations to find better vantage points, and will also throw out a grenade-style attack that releases a cluster of vines, which will inhibit player movement when within proximity. In the Crimson Wastes, the Gorgolith is a crab-like creature with a penchant for ambushes. This predator is able to fire a barrage of fast-moving projectiles, a direct laser from its tail, and an expanding shockwave blast, but can also surprise you with a tentacle-style melee attack if you get in close and personal. Protected by a hard shell, its only weak spot is the head, so you will have to balance good defensive manoeuvring with a consistent offense, for example by utilizing our Focus Aim, which highlights enemy weak points and also increases accuracy. Ultimately though most of our encounters will rely primarily on highlighting our signature projectile and Bullet Hell gameplay, and our bosses especially will provide a vast array of challenging patterns to showcase this. For example, soaring in the skies of the Crimson Wastes, Ixion has a large variety of different layered attacks to avoid, ranging from patterns that populate the playfield with hundreds of slow-moving bullets to carefully weave through, to fast-speed attacks that provide more reactive dash-focused gameplay, to expanding shockwaves that compartmentalize the space and demand your continuous attention, to majestic bursts of countless homing missiles with long trails which bring some extra intensity to our combat. While many of these combat encounters will prove very intense on their own, it is really when they're combined that they showcase Returnal's unique gameplay. While each enemy has its own distinctive personality and its own uniquely identifiable attacks patterns, we have also tried to find the best synergies and pairings between enemies to ensure they work together gracefully. We want to ensure our combat scenarios feel consistently challenging and deeply rewarding, but also avoid veering into the unfair or incomprehensible. On that note, your spatial awareness will be put to the test in Returnal. You'll need to keep moving and make full use of Selene's moveset in order to prevail, while staying fully alert of the myriad threats incoming from all directions. Our level layouts have lots of verticality, so you'll need to be constantly traversing the environment to avoid the onslaught of projectile attacks and try to reach better vantage points to dispatch the enemies. Effective use of Dash will be critical, as it can be used freely as a navigation tool, but also to dash through our projectile attacks without taking damage, and also avoid last-minute melee attacks with some split-second timing. We've covered our wide array of weapons and upgrades that Selene can find in a previous post, and players will need to use every tool and navigation option they have in order to survive on Atropos. This is just a small glimpse of some of the various encounters and combat scenarios you'll find in Returnal. We are very excited and proud for PS5 users to experience Returnal very soon on April 30.   |
| The official Drone Racing League Simulator launches today Posted: 14 Apr 2021 06:00 AM PDT The Drone Racing League Simulator, the official game of the Drone Racing League (DRL), the #1 drone racing property in the world, is now on PlayStation 4. If you've ever dreamed about flying FPV (First Person View), DRL SIM is the fastest, easiest, and most cost-effective way to get the drone skills you'll need to soar while experiencing the most immersive, out-of-body sensations only FPV drones can provide. DRL drone and simulation engineers built the simulator with true-to-life drone components, physics, and aerodynamics, enabling players to fly, build and race drones exactly the same as in real life (IRL). The world's best pilots fly in DRL and train, compete and win professional contracts in the DRL SIM — as seen on NBC, Twitter, Facebook and other premier sports networks around the globe.  And now you can, too! Download the DRL SIM today to master these drone skills: Learn to flyThe DRL SIM features 54 training missions that'll teach you how to hover, pitch, yaw, and other skills you'll need to learn to navigate a drone without crashing and breaking the bank on your new drone. Each mission takes only a few minutes and you can hop around the training as you like, but be prepared: the challenges get harder as you advance. You'll get real-time feedback to help you improve and once you complete the tutorial, you'll be able to fly high-speed FPV drones IRL nice and smooth — because as DRL pilots know — slow is smooth and smooth is fast. Design a supercharged droneWith the game's interactive workbench, you can choose from real DRL drones flown by the best pilots in the world or design your own supercharged drone through tens of thousands of different combinations, customizing everything from the drone's size, weight, thrust, prop colors, and more. Choose from thousands of motors, batteries and props, licensed from top drone manufacturers, to control the air flow, set top speeds, and control launch-to-flight acceleration rates. Plus, you'll get to unlock over 50 epic drone skins to cover your quad with a sleek canopy. Make your one-of-a-kind drones public to share with other players in the DRL SIM community too, or keep them private and hog that quad for yourself. Race like the prosRace like the DRL pros through a real-time multiplayer mode, battling it out against friends and competitors across more than 20 unique maps — including 18 replicas of real DRL courses as seen on TV — like the sports and entertainment arena, Allianz Riviera in France, U.S. Air Force Boneyard map of a deserted airport, and Hard Rock Stadium, home to NFL's Miami Dolphins in Miami Gardens, Florida. Navigate nonstop obstacles including diamond-shaped gates, tight corners and real-world forces like gravity and turbulence. Watch your performance in the advanced replay system and compare your times against players and pros on the leaderboard. And take your new drone skills for a spin offline to feel what it's like to fly like a bird, soaring through the world from a drone's eye view.   |
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