GYGO: Pokemon Sword and Shield, Fallen Order, Google Stadia, and More

Happy Wednesday! What are you playing lately? I bought Ghost Recon Wildlands after watching some gameplay on YouTube. So far I’ve played 10 hours and really like the campaign—it’s an open world with many optional sidequests of varying difficulty, plus you’re always with three AI companions so that you don’t feel like you’re fighting completely on your own. I also started my second story mode playthroughs of GTA V and Watch Dogs 2. Let us know on Twitter what you’re playing!

Here’s some of the news we’ve been thinking about this week:

Pokémon Sword and Shield

The long-awaited next release in the Pokémon franchise released last Friday. For those of you who are playing it, which starter did you choose? Here’s a primer on which starters might be helpful for later parts of the game, and it links to guides to many other aspects of the game.

One of the things I found most creative and cute about the new game is how the Joy-Con you see in-game are the same color as your real-life physical Joy-Con:

Oh, and you can pick your character’s uniform number:

Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order

Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order also released last Friday on PS4, Xbox One, and PC. It is a single-player only game with no microtransactions and no morality choice system. The game takes place after Revenge of the Sith. Here’s a beginner’s guide to the game, and here’s how to unlock the double bladed lightsaber. If you buy the game through the Epic Games Store, you can get a Stormtrooper skin in Fortnite.

Uncharted Movie Casting News

The movie adaptation of the Uncharted franchise, which previously announced will star Tom Holland as Nathan Drake, has cast Mark Wahlberg as Sully. If the movie’s producers want moviegoers to be enthusiastic about this movie, let’s just say this casting choice is counterproductive and disappointing to many.

Diablo 4

While no release date has been announced yet for Diablo 4, the game is already generating criticism for having no offline mode and for having microtransactions.

Google Stadia

Google Stadia, the new console and cloud gaming service, released on November 19th with 22 games available. Many are skeptical about the new service’s rollout due to a number of confusing announcements and missing features.

More News

• X019, Microsoft’s big Xbox event, was held last week. Here are all their announcements. Interestingly, the developer of Life is Strange, Dontnod, is working on a new game called Tell Me Why which will release on Xbox One, PC, and Switch, but not PS4.
• Four board game designers chose their picks for most influential board games of the decade.
• News about a subscription service for Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp was leaked, with the new service to launch on November 21st.
• Final Fantasy XV was a Jeopardy question.