Good news for gamers anticipating Starhawk: Sony has not only announced the game’s release date, but also has released a new trailer for the public beta and some details about it as well.
Sony announced that the game will be released on store shelves on May 8th and also revealed a couple of details about what the beta will include.
The beta includes the following features:
- The classic arcade flight mode from Warhawk returns.
- If the option is checked, when a host leaves a game, hosting duties are changed to a different player.
- European and Japanese language support is included. Also, they say that “Korea, China, Latin America and Brazil will be in English…but these will include the appropriate languages for the full game.”
- Players will be able to unlock unique gameplay skills based on their performance.
- PSN integration of Friends includes friends’ status, messages, and friend requests.
- “Lots and lots” of bugs have been addressed for the Public Beta.
The trailer for the Public Beta reveals a great number of gameplay details as well:
- Players will be able to fight on foot, in mechs, on land in vehicular combat, or in air as hawks.
- The “Build & Battle” system allows players be able to deliver weapons, vehicles, and structures on the fly.
- Players can drop buildings to build bases or drop them on mech enemies.
- The game takes place in a brutal sci-fi universe where two factions — Rifters and Outcasts — fight over a resource known as “Rift Energy.”
- Each game of Starhawk revolves around gathering, protecting, or stealing Rift Energy.
- Players can use Rift Energy to summon dropships, which drop structures onto the ground below so that players can attack enemies or defend their positions.
- The Public Beta has two environments: The Acid Sea (a rocky world surrounded by pools of acid) and Space (giant orbital platforms where players will need to use jetpacks and hawks to control the skies).
- Teams can construct their bases with defensive walls to create kill zones.
- Supply bunkers can be used to refresh troops with new weapons.
- Players can call down vehicles for quick deployment or base raids.
- Weapons like beam turrets can shoot down attacking aircraft.
- As for the full game, additional modes, maps, weapons, and vehicles will be added. The full game will also contain a robust single player campaign centered around Emmett Graves’ quest to defeat the Outcasts.
- The trailer closes by asking Public Beta participants to please send feedback to help improve the Starhawk experience for the full game and showing the May 8th release date.
As a reminder, here are the beta dates, as originally posted on the PS Blog:
- January 17th: All PlayStation Plus subscribers and previous Private Beta participants who haven’t erased their original Private Beta files.
- January 31st: All gamers who received a Starhawk public beta voucher with Naughty Dog’s Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception.
- February 7th: Gamers can visit GameStop and PlayStation’s Facebook page to learn how to win beta voucher codes.
- February 14th: All the listing says is IGN.com. The post doesn’t say if it’s relative to a giveaway or how the codes will be distributed, but that more details will be coming soon.
- February 21st: All PSN users.
To view the “Public Beta Welcome Video” trailer, click on the video below:
Will you be picking up Starhawk on May 8th? Excited for the beta? Let us know in the comments below.
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