Every new trailer from Gamescom Opening Night Live 2023

Catch up on everything announced during ONL 2023

Image credit: Rock Paper Shotgun/Inflexion/Epic Games Publishing/Bandai Namco

News by Ollie Toms Guides Editor

Additional contributions by Hayden Hefford

Published on Aug. 22, 2023

Geoffcom 2023 has crested its initial crescendous wave with Gamescom Opening Night Live. The yearly gaming show has delivered its usual tantalising (and sometimes baffling) smorgasbord of videogame announcements, trailers, updates, news, and more. And now we’ve got a much better idea of what games to expect over the course of the next, oh, seven hundred years.

Below we’ve compiled an exhaustive (oh so exhaustive) list of all 36 trailers and announcements shown at this year’s Gamescom Opening Night Live, so if you want a roundup of everything you missed, you’re in the right place. Deep breaths everyone. And away we go.

All the Gamescom Opening Night Live trailers and announcements

Starfield keeps the hype train going with a live-action trailer

Much to be expected, the evening was kickstarted with a handful of pretty sweeping shots of little-known indie RPG Starfield, accompanied by a genuinely lovely piano performance from Inon Zur on a bizarrely squished piano. We then were treated to a heartfelt live-action trailer showing off some ship-to-ship combat in an asteroid field, some fancy sand magic, and a cave full of floating rocks which will probably end up giving the main character visions of Reaper invasions or something. Not gonna lie, the excitement is real.

After that (and an unexpected interlude involving a stage invasion), Bethesda Big Boss Todd Howard was invited up onto the Keighley (that’s what we’re calling the stage from now on, deal with it), and spent some time saying a bunch of things that can be said about both Starfield and Mass Effect, though the general consensus is that he was talking about the former.

Little Nightmares 3 launches in 2024, with more creepy sidescrolling puzzles

Creepy platformer Little Nightmares is back with its third game, in which we see two new protagonists seemingly making their way through what seemed like a twisted doll house, among other locales. There seemed to be a theme of traversing a world full of goods that were used and discarded, with the trailer ending on the shot of junk pouring out of a rubbish chute.

They also announced a new podcast series, The Sounds of Nightmares, which is an original story in the same universe. It’s six episodes long, and the first two are available right now. Little Nightmares 3 itself is coming out in 2024.

Black Myth: Wukong trailer shows off some boss-bashing action

A vibrant, fascinating, and somewhat disturbing trailer for Black Myth: Wukong followed, and my goodness, is there a lot to unpick here. We begin with a headless musician singing a lovely ballad at the roots of a gnarled tree. Then there’s a strange tiger-like creature lapping at a pool of blood, a salmon-pink snake slithering through some grass, and a whole load of fantastically-designed creatures being repeatedly walloped by Wukong’s quarterstaff.

Killing Floor 3 will unleash a new wave of zombies, but we don’t know when

Next up, we got to see a trailer for Killing Floor 3, the new sequel in the zombie-wave survival franchise. This was a particularly gory clip of a zombie-like flesh dumpster being cut open and spliced with tech augmentations that soon had it wreaking havoc and tearing through walls. I’d hope this was a boss, because if that’s a look at the standard enemy type… Well, then we’re really in for it.

There was no release date for Killing Floor 3, but it’s coming to PS5, Xbox Series consoles, and PC via Steam and Epic.

Age Of Empires IV is coming to Xbox

Excellent RTS Age Of Empires IV is coming to Xbox with an overhauled control system and lots of wheel UIs that make me very happy to look upon. AOE4 is a frankly incredible follow-up and homage to one of the most successful RTS games of all time, and while the trailer was little more than lots of shots of units organising themselves into formations and bashing up against walls or castles or each other, it was enough to make me want to load it up again for another dozen losses - I mean, matches.

Rebel Moon is a Zack Snyder film, and also a game?

Zack Snyder, of Zack Snyder’s Justice League fame, is making a new movie called Rebel Moon. Tis a space adventure coming to Netflix, split into two parts, but we aren’t bothered about that. What we are bothered about (maybe), is that developer Super Evil Megacorp are also developing a Rebel Moon video game that’ll take place after the two movies. Snyder says you can "pick your rebel and go on missions", which literally tells us nothing. Thanks, Zack.

Crimson Desert shows off fights, traversal, and one cute lamb

Okay, by far the best thing about the Crimson Desert trailer we were treated to at this Opening Night Live is that second-long clip of the player character carrying a lamb on his shoulder just like I hold my cat when she wants a high perch. Beyond this, there’s a lot to pick apart in the trailer for this upcoming open-world action adventure, from castle siege scenes that wouldn’t look out of place in Chivalry, to climbing a giant tree creature and turning into some sort of weird smoky bird creature to fly through the air.

Payday 3 has a heist featuring Ice-T, for some reason?

Rapper Ice-T appeared to say that he does in fact know a lot about heists in real life, so he also has a heist in upcoming heist-fest Payday 3. We got a little look at Ice’s heist, and they definitely weren’t playing stealthy! Lots of shooting, lots of ‘splosions, a very good shot of a Cloaker drop-kicking someone in true Payday fashion. I’m very excited for more Payday, and it’s not far away! Payday 3 launches on September 21st.

Assassin’s Creed Mirage’s new trailer gives us a taste of Baghdad ahead of October release

Images of a cosy 9th century Baghdad and its citizens getting on with their daily grind quickly turns into silent, precise bloodshed in the latest trailer for Assassin's Creed Mirage. Ubisoft’s next game in the venerable action series returns both to the Middle East and to smaller, more linear stories, and reiterates its Autumn release date of 5th October 2023.

Tekken 8 has an arcade mode with chibi avatars

Tekken 8 got a new trailer in which we saw lots of fights cracking off in an epic downpour. If big, muscly types swinging fists at each other in the rain wasn’t enough for you, though, we also got to hear about a new mode that focuses on the arcade scene, with mii-esque avatars sat playing on arcade machines. I would guess they’re playing Tekken. Do we play them playing Tekken? Do we play them playing another avatar who is playing Tekken? How far does the Tekken-ception go?

They also shared that this mode will have some "AI-enthused learning" aspects, but didn’t expand further on what that actually means. We won’t need to wait long to find out, though, because Tekken 8 launches on January 26, 2024.

Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 3’s new trailer leaves us in no doubt that this is COD, once again

It’s like they’re making a game just because they want to be included in my best rain in games post. From the mission’s opening inside a leaky submarine to the climb up the slippery 4k textures of a fortress wall, everything in tonight’s glimpse of Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 3’s first campaign mission looked wonderfully wet. From there, things progress as we’ve grown to expect from every cinematic COD mission in recent memory. A series of silent, synchronised takedowns, followed by an explosion and everything going to shit in a very neat, ordered, linear manner. That sure was one of the Call Of Duty trailers of all time.

Gaslamp fantasy survival game Nightingale gets an early access release date

Every time I see a new Nightingale trailer, I’m reminded of how angry I am that I haven’t been invited to one of their closed beta playtests yet. But as it turns out, soon that won’t matter, because the game will enter early access in February next year! Tonight’s look at the fascinating fantasy survival game showed off a lot of sumptuously unusual-looking creatures and enemies, and a few punchy-looking shots with rifles and blunderbusses, along with a glimpse at the game’s innovative dimension-hopping Realm Cards mechanic.

Granblue Fantasy Relink has cool airships, but the sky is also falling

Granblue Fantasy Relink got a new trailer, showing off some flashy anime combat and some very cool airships. I’m a big fan of airships that look like pirate ships, and this had one! They remind me of Treasure Planet, which is just such a great movie.

The rest of the trailer, understandably, didn’t look like Treasure Planet. Instead, we saw some big demons that looked like they belonged on a Yu-Gi-Oh card and some big fiery fella spewing… well, fire. You can fight the big fiery fella when Granblue Fantasy Relink launches on February 1st, 2024.

Immortals Of Aveum is out now, has Gina Torres being Gina Torres

A breezy intro from Gina Torres leads into a high-octane trailer for the already-here Immortals Of Aveum, a magical action shooter where a huge amount of time is evidently spent doing flourishes and other needlessly flamboyant-looking intricacies with your fingers and hands to "reload" your spells. Check out our Immortals Of Aveum review if you’re in danger of getting excited. It’ll bring you back to earth.

Zenless Zone Zero lets you play as a wolf man, who is already the best character

This really would be one for Rebecca (RPS in peace) - hi Rebecca!! - but I shall pick up the torch to talk about Zenless Zone Zero. This is an urban fantasy ARPG from the Genshin Impact and Honkai Star Rail folks, gacha-gurus miHoYO.

The new trailer showed some of the characters we’ll meet, including a wolf man! A big wolf man! He looked cool! There was also a brief look at an arcade game that you can presumably play in ZZZ, before we got to see the player characters (including wolf man!!) fighting some big ol’ mechs.

No more news on when we can expect to see Zenless Zone Zero, but there’s more from miHoYo in the following sections.

Honkai: Star Rail is getting a PS5 technical test soon

In true MiHiYO style, a newcomer would likely finish watching the new Honkai: Star Rail trailer looking like Shrek and Donkey after the Duloc song in Shrek, because there’s just no way that anything that just happened on-screen made any sense at all. But hey, the music is great, the characters are stupidly hot, and the game is actually really goddamn good. And the important information was at the end: Honkai: Star Rail’s PS5 technical test will begin soon, and recruitment starts tomorrow.

A Genshin Impact concert series is touring the world over the next year

We also got a brief look at the gorgeous vistas of new Genshin Impact region, Fontaine, with some suitably epic orchestral music. Speaking of music, there’s also a Genshin Impact concert series touring the world between 2023 and 2024. It’ll visit Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Guadalajara, Boston, Osaka, Seoul, Los Angeles, Yokohama, Chicago, London, New York, and Dusseldorf. The series is titled Melodies of an Endless Journey.

Lords Of The Fallen’s new story trailer is vague, but shows off some enemies that scream FromSoftware

Lords Of The Fallen sequel Lords Of The Fallen (creative naming) got a new story trailer, in which we saw a hulking demon impale a man in a jagged crown (possibly a lord?) before slicing their head off. A lord no more, then. We then got to see glimpses of a bunch of the baddies you’ll fight in Lords Of The Fallen.

It’s definitely trying to give off some FromSoftware vibes, and the bosses we see, if briefly, do look gnarly and strange enough to stand alongside some of Elden Ring’s best. We’ll see whether Lords Of The Fallen can stand up against such competition, though, when it launches on October 13th, 2023.

Sonic Superstars launches on October 17th

My god, the tonal shift is giving me whiplash. From Lords Of The Fallen we glide into Sonic Superstars with a relentlessly upbeat trailer showing off its four-player co-op multiplayer. Four of them! Running around at the speed of sound! All at the same time! Knuckles, Tails, and Amy are all there with the blue boi himself in this new 3D sidescrolling platformer. The big news is that Sonic Superstars finally has a release date, and is launching on October 17th, 2023.

Sonic Frontiers is getting a free story update, which also features new playable characters

Sonic Frontiers is also a game! Remember that? Oh, how fast a year can feel in vidya games land. Geoff forgets nothing, though, and he shows off a new trailer for Sonic Frontiers which focuses on an upcoming update: The Final Horizon. In this update, you’ll unravel a new story as you take the mantle of characters such as Super Sonic (Super Saiyan Sonic) and Dr Eggman (who is obviously not very Sonic-like).

Sonic Frontiers’ The Final Horizon update is free, and will launch on September 28th, 2023, for Playstation 4 and 5, Xbox One, Series X and S, Nintendo Switch, and PC via Steam.

The First Descendant is a third-person looter shooter with gigantic bosses

The First Descendant came next, with an action-packed trailer that shifts from cinematic to explosion-filled gameplay about 50 times per second. In the final 30 seconds of the trailer we got a look at a fair few oversized bosses to battle against in this upcoming next-gen looter shooter. It all looks very sleek and Destiny-esque to my eyes, with lots of flashy science-fantasy abilities being used to wipe out groups of enemies with a single button-press.

Under The Waves sends you on a spooky underwater adventure, and you can pilot a submarine

Next up, a new look at the third-person adventure Under The Waves from Quantic Dream. In the trailer, we see a diver, Stan, exploring the murky depths of the ocean as a storm begins to rage above. Stan can’t abandon ship, though, and must weather the dangers to come as he sets out to uncover the mysteries hidden… Under the Waves! Wait, that’s the title! Under The Waves launches on August 29th, 2023.

Fort Solis has some intense corridor scenes

Troy Baker, Roger Clark, and Julia Brown got up onto the Keighley and introduced us to Fort Solis, newly released right about now. A very claustrophobic and tense trailer of corridors and panicked voices ensued, leaving viewers in no doubt about what to expect from Fort Solis. Something in between Dead Space and… something by Quantic Dream, I spose? Ah shit, that’s exactly what Edwin said in his Fort Solis review.

Expeditions: A Mudrunner Game is a terrible title, but it’ll let you fly drones

If you enjoyed the thrilling mundanity of getting stuck in the mud/snow in Mud/Snowrunner, Saber Interactive are back with another game in the franchise - Expeditions: A Mudrunner Game! That title’s a bit clunky, but Mudrunner and Snowrunner are genuinely excellent trucking-in-terrible-conditions sims, and Expeditions looks set to deliver more of the same. It expands on the formula, with drones now available to pilot, but there’s also plenty of winching on trees and perilously driving near a cliff-edge that looks familiar and ever-so-fun. Expeditions: A Mudrunner Game (seriously, what is with that name) launches in 2024.

The Crew Motorfest is a car game, with cars

I’m the wrong person to be doing the write-up for this one. Whenever cars appear on-screen, my mind goes blank, and the only thought that ping-pongs through my mind is "ooh, shiny". But that’s really what they were aiming for with this trailer for The Crew Motorfest, Ubisoft’s incredibly shiny new racing game coming in mid-September.

Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty

Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty gave us another look at Dogtown in its new trailer, which also focused on the new ways to play when the expansion launches. We saw a slew of new weapons, including a particularly slick machete with a laser component and new arm-blades, before the player started shredding through an enemy base. They gutted baddies, they blasted people in the face with a chunky shotgun, and then they got gifted a new vehicle by their lovely guy-in-the-chair friend who was speaking over a radio.

This quickly moved into a section focused on the new vehicle combat mechanics coming in Phantom Liberty, in which we spied some Watch Dogs-esque hacking of vehicles and plenty of shootouts while barreling down a motorway. This also showed off the new police system, with MaxTec carriers deploying troops to chase down V, the player character, as they unleashed carnage from the safety of their car.

Finally, they also announced that a lot of the new upgrades in the expansion will come in a free Cyberpunk 2077 2.0 update for current-gen consoles and PC. Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty launches on September 26th, 2023, alongside the free update.

Upcoming RTS Stormgate shows off its new faction, which totally isn’t the Zerg

It’s a decade ago, and Starcraft 2 is coming out soon! Except it’s not Starcraft 2, it’s Stormgate - a spiritual successor which makes absolutely no attempt to hide its inspirations. This bite-sized developer-narrated trailer introduces a new faction: the Infernal Host. They operate using Shroud, fields of "dark magic" which spread across the map much like, oh, I don’t know… Zerg creep? Ahh who cares, Starcraft is excellent, more of that please.

Last Epoch is getting a new class, the Runemaster

If you’ve been enjoying Diablo 4 but are looking for something new, Last Epoch could be for you. It’s an ARPG that’s currently out in early access, and the team joined Geoff to announce the new Runemaster class. The Runemaster has a unique mechanic that lets them use up to 40 different abilities with a single button, making it a class that favours experimenting with a wide range of skills. The Runemaster class is launching on September 7th, 2023.

Marvel Snap’s new update finally brings widescreen to PC

Ben Brode is back with Geoff and incredibly excited - and for good reason! He announced that Marvel Snap has been rebuilt for PC, shedding the shoddy mobile-esque format that it’s been running since launch for a new, refined experience that’s suited for desktop. This is really awesome news, because Marvel Snap continues to be one of the best digital card games, but the old mobile UI made it really hard to show off to pals without them going "yikes, what is that".

And, thankfully, we won’t need to wait any longer for this new Marvel Snap update, as it’s live right now on Steam! Best announcement of the show, right here.

Armored Core VI launch trailer whets our appetite with lots of mechsplosions

A nebulous and explosive gameplay for Armored Core 6: Fires Of Rubicon came next, showing off a whole hell of a lot of mech on mech action without very much context at all. Which is fine by me. FromSoftware’s stories are never frontloaded with information. They leave you to piece things together bit by bit, and this time around you’ll be doing it between pulse-pounding missions which are likely to fill the screen with missiles, laser blades, and explosions galore. Armored Core VI comes out later this week on 25th August.

Warhaven is a free-to-play multiplayer medieval deathmatch

Warhaven, the upcoming free-to-play medieval fantasy combat game, got a new trailer that showed off very little combat gameplay. Instead, we got some story details which basically featured some knights smacking each other with swords. You can also smack knights with swords! It’ll look a lot less cinematic than this trailer, of course, but you can see how it does actually look in just under a month. Warhaven launches on Steam on September 21st, 2023.

Mortal Kombat 1 shows off some brutal fatalities, because some things never change

Ed Boon strolled out to chat with Geoff next, ready to speak about upcoming fighting game Mortal Kombat 1. That’s the one with the FATALITIES, and Boon promised their "craziest trailer of all". Well, the trailer absolutely delivered on that. It introduced some of the new characters coming to Outworld, before getting into some of its bloody battles featuring a General who enjoyed slamming a big axe into other iconic members of the Mortal Kombat roster.

The General then comes face-to-face with the new Raiden, who’s looking a lot younger after the wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey shenanigans that went off in Mortal Kombat 11. The two scrap in a lightning-infused fight (thanks to Raiden), before we get to see an epic fatality in which Raiden tossed the General into the air before crashing down onto his ribcage. There were a lot more fatalities to come, because what else would you expect from Mortal Kombat? You can deliver your own fatalities when Mortal Kombat 1 launches on September 19th, 2023.

Ara: History Untold allows you to rewrite history in grand (strategy) fashion

A first look at the gameplay of Ara: History Untold gave us a first idea of how ambitious this turn-based grand strategy game has become. Of course, grand scope is part and parcel of the grand strategy genre, but Ara: History Untold looks to focus heavily on changing Earth’s history as you see fit, from blank terrain all the way to a sprawling Manhattan megatropolis, with… Wait, is that the Eiffel Tower at its centre?

Diablo 4: Season Of Blood brings vampiric powers and 5 new endgame bosses in October

Next, we got an early new trailer for Diablo 4 Season 2. In this trailer, we learned about killings that have kicked off across Sanctuary, sowing fear across the land while the church ignored the brutalities. These killings have grown twisted, though, with corpses coming back from the dead as ravenous zombies. As the plague spreads, you’ll need to step up to combat this new evil while completing a new questline, unlocking vampiric powers, and tackling 5 new endgame bosses in the Season Of Blood. Gemma Chan, of Captain Marvel, Eternals, and Don’t Worry Darling fame, will play vampire hunter Eris in the new story. Diablo 4 Season Of Blood launches on October 17th, 2023, just in time for Halloween.

Dustborn sends you on a road trip across the Divided States of America

Dustborn is a story-driven action-adventure game about hope, love, friendship, and cool robots. In Dustborn, you go on a roadtrip across the Divided States of America with your pals. The fighting in this game features a "lingual arsenal" according to the Steam page, which allows you to craft new words and wield them like actual weapons to fight your way out of dangerous situations. We didn’t get a ton of new details on what to expect here, but Dustborn is coming in early 2024.

Thank Goodness You’re Here! is an “absurd comedy slapformer”, and you absolutely need to watch the trailer

I think I’m going crazy, but also this looks excellent. Thank Goodness You’re Here didn’t really explain what it is with this new trailer, but it absolutely did sell me on its gorgeous cartoon aesthetic and wacky characters. Wacky really does seem like the perfect word, because the Steam page describes it as an "absurd comedy slapformer" (whatever that means) set in a strange little town in the North of England, called Barnsworth. You’ll explore Barnsworth as you take on weird and wonderful jobs for the locals, who all seem utterly charming if this trailer is anything to go by. Thank Goodness You’re Here! launches in 2024 on PC, PS5, and Nintendo Switch.

Creepy Alan Wake 2 trailer delves into Alan’s mind and the Dark Place

To close off the evening, Sam Lake, Creative Director at Remedy Entertainment, steps up onto the Keighley to present the latest look at Alan Wake 2, and specifically the character of Alan Wake and the sinister alternate dimension of the Dark Place. The creepy trailer that follows mixes live-action with gameplay, and leaves viewers in absolutely no doubt of the game’s horror roots.

For more of the latest news and previews from Gamescom 2023, head to our Gamescom 2023 hub. You can also find everything announced at Opening Night Live right here.