It emerged in a report this week that Sony appears to be asking developers to create time-limited trials for certain games for the new PlayStation Plus Premium service. It was initially unclear how much support Sony would offer studios for this purpose, but, according to Ethan Gach of Kotaku, the PlayStation Store team will actually set up the trials on behalf of developers.

This would put less strain on studios and prevent them from having to dedicate precious resources to create trials. However, Gach said some developers expressed worry that Sony will not share revenue related to game trials with them. Engadget has contacted Sony Interactive Entertainment for clarification.

Earlier this week, Game Developer reported that studios were informed about the new policy through Sony's developer portal. It appears that games with a wholesale price of at least $34 will need to have a time-limited trial that runs for at least two hours and must be available to PS Plus Premium members for at least a year. The measure reportedly won't apply to previously released games or virtual reality titles. Developers are said to have the option of offering custom game demos instead, as long as Sony gives them the green light.

Although there's no E3 this year, you can still expect a ton of gaming news to emerge in the coming weeks. Microsoft has announced an Xbox and Bethesda games showcase, which will take place on June 12th (yes, that's a Sunday) at 1PM ET.

The event will include information on games from Xbox Game Studios, Bethesda and some of Microsoft's partners. It sounds as if it'll be pretty comprehensive, with the promise of details on "everything you need to know about the diverse lineup of games coming soon to the Xbox ecosystem." That includes projects on the way to Game Pass for both Xbox and PC.

As for what to expect, it's a safe bet that we'll get a fresh look at Starfield. I'm hoping to hear more about Redfall, a vampire shooter Bethesda showed off last summer and hasn't said a whole lot about since. There will surely be trailers and teasers for previously unannounced games too.

The event will be broadcast in 30 languages (including American Sign Language) on platforms including YouTube, Twitch, Twitter, Facebook and TikTok. 

In terms of other gaming events, Summer Game Fest will return this year. THQ Nordic has also set a showcase for August 12th.

The time has come to say farewell to Bethesda’s PC games launcher. Starting today, players can transfer their games library, as well as DLC, virtual currency, in-game items and their friends list to their Steam account. Users still have until May 11th to play their heart out on the Bethesda PC launcher. On that date, the PC launcher will no longer allow access to any games. But users can still access their Bethesda.net accounts and transfer their games over to Steam after May 11th.

Players who are ready to migrate should make sure to read the detailed instructions on Bethesda’s website first. Any games users already own or purchases they’ve made will be available free on Steam. But keep in mind that the transferring process could get a bit hairy. While most game saves will automatically transfer, some will require players to manually transfer them over to Steam. For example, DOOM Eternal players will have to manually copy their saved files to their Steam folder. Bethesda has some updated instructions for DOOM Eternal players here. Fallout 76 players should note that there's a special tool available to help make the migration easier, as well as an extensive FAQ they should read first. Wolfenstein: Youngblood at present isn’t available for transfer, so players won’t be able to carry over their progression on that game to Steam. But in-game skins and DLCs should transfer normally.

While migrating your library may seem annoying, Bethesda is sweetening the pot by making a number of new games available on Steam for the first time. These include The Elder Scrolls Arena, The Elder Scrolls Daggerfall, Creation Kit for Fallout 4 and Skyrim Special Edition, and Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory. Fallout 76’s Public Test Server is now available on Steam as well.

When Sony's expanded PlayStation Plus service starts rolling out next month, it will fold in PlayStation Now, which offers access to hundreds of games from older console generations. Now, it seems the company is getting even more serious about game preservation.

According to Twitter and LinkedIn posts spotted by Video Games Chronicle, Sony has hired at least one engineer (Garrett Fredley, a former build engineer for mobile developer Kabam) to work on a new preservation team. "Today is my first day as a Senior Build Engineer at @PlayStation, working as one of their initial hires for the newly created Preservation team! Game Preservation was my first career passion, so I'm ecstatic that I get to go back to those roots," Fredley wrote. "Let's go and ensure our industry's history isn't forgotten!"

It's not entirely clear what the preservation team will be working on or what Sony's goals are for it. Engadget has contacted Sony Interactive Entertainment for clarification.

Sony historically hasn't done an incredible job with preserving games. Aside from the original PS3 models being able to run many PS1 and PS2 games, backward compatibility seemed like an afterthought until the PS5, which supports all but a few PS4 titles.

The company shut down the digital PSP storefront last summer, though it backtracked on a plan to close the PS3 and Vita stores after a significant backlash. There's no guarantee that every PS3 and PSP exclusive will be added to the new PS Plus service, which won't include Vita titles, so some games will be lost to the sands of time.

In a 2017 interview, Sony Interactive Entertainment CEO Jim Ryan talked about seeing Gran Turismo titles on PS1, PS2, PS3 and PS4 at an event, and said something that has dogged him ever since: "The PS1 and the PS2 games, they looked ancient, like why would anybody play this?" Ryan clarified last year that he was trying to make a point about how good the more modern entries in the series look and that he didn't intend to be disrespectful to the history of PlayStation. Still, many took his initial comment to mean that Sony didn't care about older games.

It's good to see Sony putting more emphasis on game preservation. Non-profits and fan-led projects have led the charge on that front. PC gamers, of course, have access to titles dating back several decades (for instance, I've been dipping in and out of Half-Life recently). 

Microsoft understands that folks still want to be able to play old games on modern platforms and has put more emphasis on backward compatibility in recent years. Xbox Series X/S can run games from as far back as the original Xbox.

Like Sony, however, Nintendo hasn't exactly been great at game preservation. It will shut down the 3DS and Wii U stores next year, and likely won't port every game from those consoles to Nintendo Switch. Many of those games will be inaccessible to future generations of players.

Sony is gearing up to roll out the revamped PlayStation Plus in the coming weeks. Ahead of the new tiers being introduced, the company is reportedly placing more demands on certain developers. According to Game Developer, it's asking studios working on games with a price point of at least $34 to create timed trials that last at least two hours.

The report suggests that Sony informed studios of the directive through its developer portal and without advance warning. They can reportedly release their timed trial (which will need to be available for at least a year) up to three months after their game hits the PlayStation Store. The policy is said not to apply to previously released games, titles that will be sold for less than $34 or PlayStation VR2 games.

The highest tier of the overhauled subscription service, PS Plus Premium, will include access to time-limited game trials. Sony started testing such trials on PS5 in October. It granted players access to Death Stranding: Directors Cut for six hours and Sackboy: A Big Adventure for five hours at no extra cost.

While many folks appreciate game demos and being able to try out a title before paying for it, this move will require studios to dedicated precious time and resources to create the timed trials. That'll surely put more strain on smaller developers. 

It's not clear why Sony decided on a $34 threshold for this policy, but there's a case to be made that developers selling games at a higher price point are more likely to be larger studios with more resources. Engadget has contacted Sony Interactive Entertainment for comment.

Sony will be aware it has to make sure PS Plus Premium delivers good value to users. That tier will cost $18 per month, $50 per quarter or $120 per year (the lowest tier is the same as the current version of PS Plus and won't have a price increase).

The new PS Plus service is different from Xbox Game Pass in that none of the tiers will offer first-party games on their release day. Offering trials of many new and recent games on top of a library of several hundred games from every generation of PlayStation may make up for that, at least to some extent.

Elden Ring is famous for its rich open world, but it just got turned into an 8-bit rolling adventure demake that's... kind of amazing? It was created by Reddit user Shintendo, who showed off an early demo set in Elden Ring's Chapel of Anticipation. There, a Tarnished faces off against the infamous Grafted Scion boss (and loses, again). Gameplay is still pretty rough, but it captures the spirit of the game along with the nostalgic feels of the Game Boy era. 

The rolling animation style is a chef's kiss, with the main character doing adorable little rolls through terrain just like in the big game. Meanwhile, the "press B button to attack" and other screens prompts are pure Game Boy callbacks. It also captures the battle style from iconic GB titles like Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening.

Shintendo explained that the demake was created using GB Studio 3.0 and said that it would be playable on real hardware. He's aiming to release a demo by the end of May on Itch.io, the same storefront that hosts the Bloodborne PC demake that reimagines the game as a PS1 title. 

All the way back at BlizzCon 2018, Blizzard revealed Diablo: Immortal, which would fill in the gaps of the story between Diablo II and Diablo III. However, the fact it was announced as a mobile-only game didn’t exactly go over well with the publisher's hardcore fans (to put it mildly). Fast forward nearly three and a half years and not only does the game have a release date, but Blizzard announced it’ll be available on PC after all.

Diablo: Immortal will arrive on PC, iOS and Android in most parts of the world on June 2nd. Folks in some Asia-Pacific regions will need to wait a few extra weeks. It's a free-to-play title with some optional in-game purchases. The PC version will initially be in open beta, but will have all content and features. All progress and purchases will carry over too.

It will feature cross-play and cross-save support for all platforms, so you should be able to switch between PC and your mobile device with ease. The MMORPG allows players to take on challenges with eight-person parties and it has a faction-based PvP system.

In a blog post, Blizzard says it was of two minds about creating a PC version, which it calls "an experiment." Ultimately, because a large section of fans would likely try to play it through an emulator anyway, the development team decided to create a dedicated PC build.

Unusually for a Diablo game (which are usually point-and-click titles), Diablo: Immortal will have the option of directional keyboard controls. The mobile control system allows for simultaneous movement and attacks, which Blizzard says wouldn't be possible solely through mouse control alone. There's also controller support on PC.

Diablo: Immortal was originally supposed to be released last year. However, Blizzard delayed it to 2022 to add some extra polish, including, evidently, on a PC port.

Word of the Diablo: Immortal release date comes at a particularly busy time for Blizzard. Last week, it announced the next semi-annual expansion for World of Warcraft, while the first closed PvP beta test for Overwatch 2 starts tomorrow.

Parent company Activision Blizzard announced this morning that its Q1 revenue was down 22 percent from the previous year. The company, which is facing lawsuits and accusations alleging harassment and misconduct, is the subject of a pending takeover by Microsoft.

Many publishers and developers are very protective of their intellectual property (what's up, Nintendo?). But Paradox Interactive and World of Darkness are taking things in a slightly different direction. As part of the Unbound project, they'll let anyone make a Vampire: The Masquerade fan game as long as they abide by certain rules.

Developers need to get their games approved by Paradox and can only offer them through the Itch.io storefront. They can charge for their creations if they want, but they'll need to give Paradox a 33 percent cut of revenue.

The developers will own all game assets that don't use World of Darkness intellectual property and can sell them in art books, soundtracks and so on. They can't run crowdfunding campaigns for their project, however, and aren't able to use science fiction, steampunk or cyberpunk settings. Beyond those (and a few other restrictions), developers can let their imaginations run wild.

The Unbound program stems from a successful game jam that took place in 2021. “Following the Vampire Jam last year, we realized how passionate our community is about creating Vampire: The Masquerade games," World of Darkness community developer Martyna Zych said in a statement. "While we could only award one grand prize to Heartless Lullaby, we knew we had to create a platform that empowered our community to work on the projects they love while giving them the support they need to be successful.”

Developers created more than 80 games during Vampire Jam and six of those are available through Unbound at the outset. They include survival horror game Descent, puzzle project The Chantry Trials and strategic card title The Game of Elders. There's a first-person shooter called The Autumn People. You can also check out point-and-click adventure Prodigal as well as 4x strategy and roleplaying game Praxis. All are free to download.

It's neat to see a publisher and transmedia brand approve fan-made games. The fact that all of those six titles are in different genres is fascinating as well, since it shows the breadth of what developers can do when they have the freedom to be creative with a notable IP. 

As it happens, these titles might be the only way for fans to play a new Vampire: The Masquerade game for a while. Last year, Paradox parted ways with Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 2 studio Hardsuit Labs and delayed the game indefinitely. The publisher said in November it was happy with the progress made by the game's new, unnamed developer, but the release window remains unknown.

2022 is shaping up to be an exciting year for Borderlands fans. Gearbox CEO Randy Pitchford has announced at PAX East that the developer will be releasing a new entry in the Tales from the Borderlands series this year. While it's technically a sequel to the first Tales game, it will feature all new characters in a brand new story and adventure. 

According to Kotaku, the game will be created "in-house" by Gearbox, unlike the first title that was developed by the now-defunct Telltale Games. It will also be published by 2K, which is the same publisher behind the main Borderlands titles. Pitchford's announcement kept details about the game to a minimum, so we've yet to know what kind of adventure we can expect. 

The first title was an interactive graphic adventure game with five episodes released over the course of a year. In it, players can make choices that significantly impact the story. It centers around Hyperion employee Rhys and a con-artist named Fiona who worked together to accomplish a common goal, but the new game having all new characters means we may not be seeing more of them.

Gearbox released the Borderlands spin-off Tiny Tina's Wonderlands, a first-person shooter, in March. The Borderlands movie, which finished filming in 2021 and features a star-studded cast that includes Cate Blanchett and Jack Black, is also expected to hit theatres this year. Gearbox doesn't have an exact release date for the new Tales from the Borderlands game yet, but it promises to make a full announcement for it this summer. 

Meta hid a heck of a surprise up the sleeve of its boiler suit for the end of its Quest gaming showcase. A Ghostbusters VR game is in the works for Meta Quest 2. Sony Pictures Virtual Reality (SPVR) will publish the four-player co-op game, which is being developed by Far Cry VR: Dive Into Insanity studio nDreams.

Ghostbusters VR (as the game is called for the time being) shifts the action from the franchise's home base of New York City to San Francisco. No prizes for guessing that you'll hunt down and trap ghosts with the help of your proton pack and particle thrower. SPVR says the game will have an "extensive and engrossing campaign" that you can experience solo or with up to three friends. No release window was announced, but SPVR says more will be revealed in the coming months. 

It's not the only Ghostbusters title in the pipeline either. Friday the 13th: The Game developer Illfonic is making Ghostbusters: Spirits Unleashed, which will pit a team of four players against someone else who controls the ghost. That game is scheduled to arrive on PC, PlayStation and Xbox later this year.