A new State of Play is upon us! Join us this Wednesday March 9 at 2 PM Pacific / 5 PM Eastern / 11:00 PM CET for new reveals and eye-catching updates for PS5 and PS4 titles. Note: We won’t have any updates on PlayStation VR2 titles or hardware in this broadcast.

The show is clocking in around 20 minutes, give or take, with a special focus on highlighting great games coming from some of our beloved Japanese publishers, though we’ll have a few updates from other developers located around the world, too.

You can of course watch our broadcast live on Twitch and YouTube. See you Wednesday!

Regarding Co-streaming and Video-On-Demand (VOD)

Please note that this broadcast may include copyrighted content (e.g. licensed music) that PlayStation does not control. We welcome and celebrate our amazing co-streamers and creators, but licensing agreements outside our control could interfere with co-streams or VOD archives of this broadcast. If you’re planning to save this broadcast as a VOD to create recap videos, or to repost clips or segments from the show, we advise omitting any copyrighted music.

Strategy RPGs are gonna get a serious punch in the throat with Disgaea 6 Complete, which will make its explosive debut on PlayStation 5 and PlayStation 4 June 28! This installment marks the continued legacy of the Disgaea series on PlayStation consoles and is a must-have for long-time fans, while the auto-assisted gameplay and customizable features make this the most exciting and accessible entry yet for new players.

Also, if you pick up Disgaea 6 Complete on PS4, you can upgrade your copy to PS5 at no additional cost. What a deal, dood!

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Meet the cast, Dood!

Zed – A zombie boy who uses a powerful spell called Super Reincarnation to travel across Netherworlds on his quest to defeat the God of Destruction. Once a kind zombie, he became rude and violent due to continuously losing to the God of Destruction.

Bieko – Zed’s zombie little sister, who has a kind and innocent heart. She adores Zed, who she affectionately calls “Bubby,” and is inspired to never give up because of him. Bieko aspires to be a doctor someday.

Cerberus – A zombie dog with the brain of a genius who supports Zed. He apparently carried out too many experiments while he was alive, and teaches Zed the forbidden spell, Super Reincarnation. He accompanies Zed on his journey across the many Netherworlds.

In addition, several familiar faces from throughout the Disgaea series join this explosive installment as DLC characters, complete with cosmetic recolors:

Valvatorez (Disgaea 4: A Promise Unforgotten) – A Vampire who works as a Prinny Instructor in Hades, the Netherw

Lost Judgment’s star investigator Takayuki Yagami’s brazen, catch-all sidekick and former Yakuza muscle Masaharu Kaito takes center stage in the upcoming DLC release of The Kaito Files, which goes live on PS4 and PS5 March 28. Taking place after the events of Lost Judgment, this story expansion has Kaito facing a bitter past he thought he’d left behind years ago.

Yagami is out of town and Kaito is left to take on the remaining work at the Yagami Detective Agency. Everything changes when Kaito is offered a case with a lucrative reward: 20-million yen to find a CEO’s missing wife. Things take a twist when it’s revealed that the missing person in question is Kaito’s ex-lover, Mikiko. Left to put back together the pieces of his past and discover the fate of a woman presumed dead, Kaito won’t stop until he’s cracked the case for good.

Unleash Kaito’s brutal fighting styles

If Yagami is the master of graceful, acrobatic fighting styles, Kaito is the king of unforgivingly brutal strength. Choose between unstoppable offense and overpowering defense with Kaito’s two signature battle styles: bruiser and tank. One combines aggressive punches and hooks with rapid evasion skills. The other allows Kaito to endure enemy hits with sheer strength and come back with a counterpunch, as well as grapple and throw foes to the ground. Paired with a unique skill tree of over 70 abilities, Kaito’s fighting style is roaring and suited to his fervent temperament, standing in stark contrast but equal standing to Yagami’s practiced precision.

New modes of investigation

While Yagami relies on his gadgets, Kaito puts faith in his primal instincts to conduct investigations. In addition to Primal Eye and Primal Ear, Kaito also has the hunting sense of a wolf on the prowl, allowing him to track down imperceptible odors with Primal Nose. But outside of investigations, his senses are just as keen. Scavenge the city through the new lens of Primal Focus to find rare hidden items that would otherwise elude the average person amid the bustling cityscape.

Kaito has learned much from watching Yagami conduct stealth operations, but his ways come with a twist. Rather than quietly choking out enemies on stealth missions, he pummels them unconscious and does the same if discovered. Because he finds picking locks too tedious, Kaito uses his Primal Ea

Dolmen is set in a fictional universe where humans have colonised distant planets across the galaxy; expanding empires, federations, commerce companies and mining colonies. In order to survive the inhospitable conditions, they genetically engineered humans who are vastly different; those descendants are referred to as Xeno species.

The player controls a mercenary – hired by Zoan Corp to intervene on the planet Revion Prime – where Driller Xeno humans were performing a scientific and mining operation. Things got catastrophic and the player is the first to arrive to contain the problem and retrieve sensitive data and materials for Zoan Corp. 

Saving the Drillers is not mandatory… even if some of them survived. As you play through the mission, you’ll discover that the Zoan Corp have been covering up some horrifying secrets and dangerous technology. 

The name – Dolmen – is used to describe megalithic constructions used in funeral rituals and portals to the afterlife; on Revion Prime, it was used to describe the red crystal found on the planet. This crystal is the focus of the Drillers and they used the name to refer to its capacity to revolutionise travel using portals.

To the fans of the genre, Dolmen is an action RPG with Souls-like mechanics and to progress through the game, players must learn how to control their character, timing the enemy’s attacks at the same time he or she manages the resources as energy bar, stamina bar, hit points, block, parry and so on. 

The game offers a large spectrum of armor and weapons to fulfill different game styles, including ranged, melee and mixed combat. 

To craft equipment, players need to gather different material found in Revion Prime, combining technologies in different designs to boost character skills and understand how each piece of gear can help to overcome your enemies. 

The game uses a rock, paper, scissors system, with each enemy being resistant against two el

We’ve teamed up with PlayStation and the legendary Astro is tumbling into the Blunderdome. Yes, that’s correct – you can now be PlayStation’s cutest robot right here in Fall Guys.

And because so many of you have asked how our incredible art team put together these designs, we thought we’d give you a crash course on the making of a Fall Guys costume. Enjoy!

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The making of an Astro Bot bean  

Creating a Fall Guys costume is about more than transformation. Our talented team of artists believe that you need to really feel like you’re wearing the costume, not just becoming a totally different character. We think of a Fall Guys costume like real clothes made for your bean’s bulbous body. It’s like a fashion designer’s dream!

We pour all of our crazy, silly, clumsy personality into every single one. From the iconic Astro to something cute and cuddly (and also a bit terrifying) with the T-Rex. Without blowing our own trumpet too much… we think we’ve nailed it.

Concept art created by the Fall Guys team as they began to imagine how Astro and T-Rex could look as cute little beans.

Bringing Astro and T-Rex to the Blunderdome 

As well as being fun and cool, our costumes are picked because they feel like a marriage made in madness. For example, Astro has become a famous face. But he’s just got so much cute charisma that we took one look at him and knew he slotted seamlessly into our world of wacky. It was the fastest yes we’ve ever said. You couldn’t say anything quicker than how we said yes.

The cute vibes, the round bod, the absolutely unmistakable design. It all works.

I wouldn’t be here writing this blog if I hadn’t had an original PlayStation growing up. I liked games just fine before getting one but titles like Resident Evil and Metal Gear Solid changed my life and set me on a path to a career in the videogame industry. So it gives me huge joy to be able to announce we’re releasing Paradise Killer onto PlayStation 5 and PlayStation 4 this month – March 16 to be exact!

Paradise Killer is an open-world murder mystery set on a bizarre island ruled by a secret society that worship goat headed alien gods. Monolithic crystal statues rise up from the ocean and gaze down on an island full of secrets, demons and shrines dedicated to unspeakable cosmic beings. 

We knew it would look fantastic on PS5 —  withall our gleaming black marble, golden temples, and towering crystal statues were just screaming out to be blanketed in glorious ray-tracing. It also feels very fancy and surprising every time I boot up the game and the PS5’s SSD loads the whole world stupidly quickly. Besides it looking super nice and flying along at 60fps, the DualSense wireless controller’s haptic feedback adds immersive touches to the likes of ladder climbing, turning your torch on, and buying drinks from vending machines (my personal favorite addition). I wasn’t sure what haptic feedback would add to Paradise Killer but now friends, I can tell you it adds a whole lot. So on PS5, you’re looking at 4k, 60fps with ray tracing. The PS4 Pro version is 4k at 60fps, and the PS4 version targets 60fps at 1080p. 

We were already hard at work on our next game when we got the opportunity to work on the PlayStation version of Paradise Killer so we needed some help. We have been fortunate enough to work with our friend Harry on the port and couldn’t be happier. We wanted to handle the ports of Paradise Killer ourselves but we didn’t have the resources in house. Fortunately Harry came highly recommended by our art director Rachel and could thankfully join us for the project, handling the porting and implementing PlayStation 5 only features like the haptics.

It is scary giving something so personal to someone else to work on but Harry has done an amazing job working with our technical director Phil to bring the game to PlayStation. Rachel has now joined the team full time as art director and helped us balance new lighting to improve the game but also keep the style of the original release. Rachel had worked on areas of the original version of the game and the PlayStation release gave her the chance to revisit her work, balancing new lighting that was still in keeping with the original’s style.

Here’s what she has to say about the new version: 

“When we heard that we had the chance to bring Paradise Killer to PlayStation we got really excited about the potential of some of the visual improvements we could add to the game. Now that it’s all ready to go, we can’t wait to show you the new-and-improved Paradise Island. We were conscious not to lose the charm of Paradise Killer’s visual style however, it’s still the nostalgic Paradise Island that players know and love, but with some visual tweaks to polish it up and make a new, shinier version of it. My favorite change is the new and improved lighting and ray tracing, it really makes those sunset island views come alive that little bit more!”

– Rachel Noy, Art Director

Salutations! This is going to be a tough one — I can only fit three games in that image up top, but there have been some quality releases these past few weeks. Are you finding time to play everything you want to, or are you having to make some tough decisions?

Hit the comments and let us know what’s claiming your gamin’ time… after voting in the poll, of course.

How does it work? At the end of every month, PlayStation.Blog will open a poll where you can vote for the best new game released that month. Soon thereafter, we’ll close the polls, tally your votes, and announce the winner at PlayStation.Blog. PlayStation Store will also showcase some top Players’ Choice winners throughout the year.

What is the voting criteria? That’s up to you! If you were only able to recommend one new release to a friend that month, which would it be? In keeping with our long tradition in the Game of the Year Awards, remastered or re-released games won’t qualify. Ambitious, larger-scale rebuilds and remakes like Demon’s Souls and Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy will.

How are nominees decided? The PlayStation.Blog and PlayStation Store editorial teams will gather a list of that month’s most noteworthy releases and use it to seed the poll. Write-in votes will be accepted.

Grand Theft Auto V and Grand Theft Auto Online arrive for PlayStation 5 on March 15 — delivering the action-packed, blockbuster Story Mode adventure and the dynamic, ever-evolving world of GTA Online to PlayStation 5 with a host of improvements for new and returning players.

These new versions of GTAV and GTA Online make the experience richer, more detailed and more immersive than ever with new graphics modes delivering improved fidelity and performance including up to 60 FPS frame rates and 4K visuals plus ray tracing and improved texture quality, as well as utilizing the technical advancements of PlayStation 5 for faster loading times, immersive 3D audio, advanced haptic feedback, and much more.

Grand Theft Auto V

Experience the interwoven stories of Franklin, Michael, and Trevor across the sun-soaked metropolis of Los Santos and the backwoods countryside of Blaine County in greater detail than ever before with stunning all new levels of visual fidelity.

Choose from one of three detailed new graphics settings to tailor your gameplay experience for what matters most to you. Fidelity Mode is tuned for the highest visual quality and targets 30 FPS. In this mode the PlayStation 5 supports native 4K resolution with ray tracing enabled. Performance Mode is tuned for the most responsive gameplay experience and targets 60 FPS. In this mode the PlayStation 5 supports upscaled 4K resolution. In addition, the PlayStation 5 has Performance RT mode, a hybrid of the Fidelity and Performance modes supporting upscaled 4K resolution with ray tracing enabled and targeting 60 FPS.

These new versions also offer across-the-board improvements including faster loading times, increased population and traffic variety, increased vegetation density, improved lighting quality across shadows, water reflections, and other elements. Plus improved anti-aliasing, motion-blur, highly detailed new explosions, fire, and much more.

Grand Theft Auto Online

The massive and unrivaled experience of GTA Online — with an unprecedented 8+ years’ worth of gameplay additions delivered across over 40 unique updates — will continue to evolve with the power of PlayStation 5. This new generation of GTA Online includes a range of new vehicles and a new addition to the Los Santos Car Meet: Hao’s Special Works.

Hao’s Special Works encompasses best-in-class vehicle upgrades, a new class of Races using specially modified vehicles, and a weekly rotation of Hao’s Special Works Time Trials, along with a Premium Test Ride, where you can get behind the wheel of these newly modified vehicles for free.

In addition to access being included as part of GTAV, GTA Online will also now be available for the first time as a standalone title for PlayStation 5. Plus, for the first three months from launch, GTA Online will be available to download and keep for free,* an exclusive offer for PlayStation 5 players — making it easier than ever before for new players to experience everything GTA Online has to offer.

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Gran Turismo 7 races onto PS4 and PS5 tomorrow, March 4. Polyphony Digital’s driving simulator is a celebration of car culture built to be enjoyed by new drivers and existing fans alike.

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Watch the intro part of GT7’s opening movie for compact history of cars, starting from the very first proposal of cars by Carl Benz, to the latest EV, the Porsche Taycan.

Race, collect, unlock, tune, photograph… the game’s features* are tailored to let you express your love of cars however you like. Yet if you’re new to the series, Gran Turismo 7 is remarkably easy to get into. If you’re considering taking the game for a test drive, here are some basic tips that’ll get you rolling.

Music Rally gets you on the track right away

When you first launch Gran Turismo 7, you’re asked a handful of questions about how you’d like to drive. Analog stick, directional pad, or motion steering? Do you want any auto-drive features turned on? Any on-track visual indicators to help you brake appropriately?