The only thing that could make Overcooked 2 more hectic than the first game is falling out of the sky and into a sushi restaurant. Overcooked 2 has all the great elements of the original, such as yelling at your friends to chop lettuce faster, while also including dynamic levels and the ability to throw ingredients. Dynamic levels mean that your recipes and your location shift as the stage continues. Though there were some frame rate issues in our gameplay on the Nintendo Switch, the developers

Here is the Polygon video team on the final day of E3, telling you about our favorite games. After playing Insomniac’s E3 2018 demo, our own Chris Plante described web-slinging as “so effortless, so right.”The New York City of Spider-Man begs you to spend more time flying through its steel canyons, instead of bopping bad guys. Much like Polygon’s strange YouTube channel, Media Molecule has curated a community of people who are overwhelmingly good-hearted and creative. If you dug this video, perh

The Flying Courier is putting together all of the schedules for The International 8’s Regional Main Qualifiers so you can follow along every step of the way. The International 8 is upon us, and it’s time for the first step in the road to Vancouver. With eight teams already qualified, ten more need to prove themselves as worthy of the Aegis of Champions this August. Thousands of teams have played through their respective regional Open Qualifiers, and few have earned spots in their region’s Main Q

The International 8 Qualifier schedules, news and more We’re putting together all the schedules for the regional Main Qualifiers so you can keep up with the action. One of the more well-respected aspects of this event is its open and regional qualifiers. Much like golf and tennis, any player from anywhere can apply through a series of qualifiers, first through regional Open Qualifiers and then through a “Main” Qualifier. Open teams meet the cream of the crop, as the top teams that have remained

In 2015 Joan Fanise and his team at Ubisoft were given a British Academy Games Award (BAFTA) for their work on Valiant Hearts, an uncommonly thoughtful video game set during World War I. “Our game is not about war,” Fanise said. “That’s why we have two animals in the game — the pigeon and the cat. ‘Here, kitty kitty, come here!’“The pigeon is even more uplifting because, specifically World War I is down in the mud, in the trenches. “I would prefer for them to use something other than humans in t

Deracine, the PlayStation VR game that Dark Souls and Bloodborne developer FromSoftware revealed at E3 2018, is a game born of a feeling that FromSoftware president Hidetaka Miyazaki had the first time he put on a VR headset. But how could I create a game around that feeling, that could only be delivered as a VR experience? That’s really what kind of triggered the idea.”Deracine, scheduled for release later in 2018, is his answer to that question. Whereas you fight for your life in Dark Souls or

He had stolen the mascot outfit, and was waiting to meet the same driver, Sierra Knox, that I had been assigned to kill. While you could always play it straight in Hitman, there are plenty of ways to get weird, like walking down a catwalk disguised as a supermodel to get closer to your mark. “I think it’s very much about providing temptations,” said Hitman 2 executive producer Markus Friedl at E3. (Friedl was mum on if we’d see any celebrity elusive targets, like Garry Busey or Home Alone’s two

The four tiers are Good Friend, Great Friend, Ultra Friend and Best Friend, with each granting additional bonuses. You’ll also get trading benefits and access to a unique version of Pokémon trading as you become better friends with someone. Trading Pokémon in Pokémon GoFriendship is a crucial addition to the game, but trading feels like an essential one. There are no limitations on which Pokémon players can send to each other, pending approval from their trading partner. “We don’t want to devalu

Ever since the launch of Fortnite’s Nintendo Switch version back on Tuesday, June 12, the game’s in-game televisions have been acting a little weird. First of all, the Switch version was broadcasting a countdown clock in ominous red letters, which seemed to point toward the morning of Tuesday, June 18 — most likely a patch day. The most likely they are all connected to the missile inside the super-villain layer just west of Snobby Shores. But, whether the missile would be launched Tuesday, to ma

When the original Dying Light was released in 2015, critics — including those here at Polygon — were lukewarm on the game. More than anything else, said lead designer Tymon Smektala, it’s that community which helped pave the way for Dying Light 2. Dying Light is a unique creation of the Wroclaw, Poland-based studio, a potent blend of melee combat and parkour. Since 2015, he said that Dying Light has been played by more than 13 million people. #YourChoices #YourWorld #DyingLight2 pic.twitter.com/

Justin Roiland made an entire career out of being the weird, absurdist comedy guy, and that’s translated over into games. Roiland’s newest project is Trover Saves the Universe, a very funny VR platformer that turns players into a chair. Trover Saves the Universe looks like it will appeal to Rick and Morty fans or anyone looking for a very funny gaming experience. Anyone who’s seen Rick and Morty enough times knows what Roiland’s style of comedy is, and that comes through every few seconds in Tro

So what happens when an animator sees one of these elaborate trailers or demonstrations from a big game? Often, they spend serious time with it to see what they can learn. Most just never record their thoughts or release them to the public or each other. And this has the further advantage of allowing developers to comment on Lowe’s own explanation of these systems, and their appreciation for Naughty Dog’s work. “The thing here is that they are doing everything right and they are doing things tha

Capcom and Square Enix’s announcement of a rare crossover event during E3 that would put Monster Hunter: World and Final Fantasy 14 content in each other’s games left some fans disappointed in its implementation. But Final Fantasy 14’s director Naoki Yoshida said he thinks getting to the endgame won’t be too much of a challenge for veteran Monster Hunter players, whom he sees as very experienced. “So looking at that with Final Fantasy 14 and our level 15 or level 30, it’s intermediate. It’s not

The Parr family, who fly under the moniker of “The Incredibles” in Disney-Pixar’s superhero franchise of the same name, has spent the last fourteen occupying a fuzzy, nostalgic spot in our collective pop-culture conscious. More than just the requisite Pixar magic, The Incredibles and Incredibles 2 seem to have tapped into something in the superhero zeitgeist that makes them stand out, even under the looming shadow of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. In 1940, during the height of the Golden Age sup

But in Serial Box’s podcast series The Witch Who Came in From the Cold, there’s another war brewing: one between ancient magical factions, Ice and The Flame, each of which have battled for millennia over control of the world. The Witch Who Came in From the Cold offers something unusual for a podcast: the ability to not only listen to the story, but to read it as well. You can listen to The Witch Who Came in From the Cold by buying each season on either Serial Box’s website, or via its iOS app. T

Part of what makes We Happy Few so undeniably terrifying is how possible everything seems. We can tell when people are lying much of the time, Epstein said, through little giveaways that 0our brains process. “The most interesting kind of lie to me is a translucent lie,” Epstein said. The true story is in neighbors lying to We Happy Few’s three main protagonists, who are trying to figure out what’s happening. We Happy Few’s full version will be available to play on PlayStation 4, Xbox One and Win

When wrapping up any E3, it can probably be difficult for players to separate what was completely new and announced at the show, known games that were given a launch date, known games that still have no launch date, and the games we’re looking forward to that didn’t have an E3 presence. It wasn’t shown there, but then, E3 really isn’t Rockstar Games’ style.) 2018July 13Octopath Traveler (Nintendo Switch)Aug. 10Madden NFL 19 (PlayStation4, Windows PC, Xbox One)Sept. 7Spider-Man (PlayStation4)NBA

Incredibles 2’s first weekend in theaters will set an opening-weekend record for both animated features and PG-rated films. Prior to Incredibles 2, the best domestic box-office take for a feature-length animated film was 2016’s Finding Dory, at $135 million. And among PG-rated films, the live-action Beauty and the Beast (which premiered in March 2017) had the previous top opening weekend, at $174 million. The movie is a critical hit as well, drawing a 94 percent fresh rating from critics accordi

Valve Corp. has notified developers that some games available over the Steam marketplace will now be restricted to 100 achievements, and that feature will be subject to other constraints, as part of efforts to thwart “fake games” on the platform. It’s probably not going to affect many, or even any, games most players are familiar with — Valve said “an insignificant number of users were taking advantage” of inflated achievements and game counts. Under the changes (uncovered via Reddit and noticed

Talking With Chris Hardwick debuted in 2017 and was scheduled to premiere for its second season tomorrow. Hardwick has done similar “Talking” programs for AMC series like Preacher and Better Call Saul. Talking With Chris Hardwick was a general-interest show usually spotlighting a current pop culture figure. Quickly, though, readers traced the allegations to Hardwick, who founded Nerdist out of a series of podcasts back in 2012. Hardwick left the company late last year, and Nerdist, in a statemen