Battlefield 4 will feature five-man squads over the series' staple four-man grouping.

"They've been asking for bigger squads," DICE producer Aleksander Grondal told Joystiq at E3, referring to the Battlefield community's insistance on larger squad counts. "We believe five is a good figure. It allows for more team-based gameplay, basically. You have more options and you can spawn in more places."

In previous Battlefield games, DICE made a purposeful design decision to limit the number of players per squad. "It was a design choice back then – forgive me, I don't exactly remember why it was chosen four. You know, it feels like light years ago from previous games," Grondal joked, rubbing the tired from E3's first day out of his eyes. "But five is a little better; it gives a bit more flexibility and more interesting choices."

Battlefield 4 launches on October 29 for Xbox One, PS4, Xbox 360, PS3 and PC.

There have likely been more articles devoted to the constant reaffirmation of life in The Last Guardian than to detailed description of its contents. The latest round comes from PlayStation's Scott Rohde, Software Product Development Head for Sony Worldwide Studios America.

"So, we're not talking about when The Last Guardian is coming out, but it is still a game that there's a lot of love for inside PlayStation walls, because everybody sees how emotionally driven that the entire fan base of PlayStation always responds with when we talk about The Last Guardian," Rohde said in an interview on Tuesday. "That's something that's very important to all of us, but we're not announcing any details on it."

The exact status of The Last Guardian has become a mystery, exacerbated by a leadership shakeup and a long, unprompted absence from the public eye. Sony America CEO Jack Tretton was recently quoted as saying the game was on "hiatus," which Sony Worldwide Studios head Shuhei Yoshida countered, saying it was "in active development." Meanwhile, Scott Rohde puts it in simpler terms:

"It is alive."

Saints Row 4 is being shown at E3 and if there's anything those rascally Saints know how to do it's self promotion. These two thespians of marketing pictured were seen on the show floor promoting Saints Flow, the energy drink available at your local Steelport convenience store and Planet Saints.

Ubisoft had a few surprises in store during its 2013 E3 press briefing, teasing a bold new direction for its Rabbids series and introducing the post-pandemic online RPG, Tom Clancy's The Division, among other notable announcements.

Alice in Chains' Jerry Cantrell kicked off the conference with a guitar-shredding demonstration of Rocksmith 2014's Session Mode, in which budding guitarists can customize backing music tracks in real-time using voice commands. A trailer for the online PC RPG The Mighty Quest for Epic Loot followed; afterward, Ubisoft revealed that it is accepting signups for a closed beta.

Ubisoft assured that Obsidian Entertainment's RPG South Park: The Stick of Truth is alive and well, narrowing down its release date to Holiday 2013. Ubisoft previously acquired the project from THQ following the troubled publisher's dissolution late last year. Ubisoft Reflections and Ivory Tower's The Crew was up next, showcasing its unique brand of destructive multiplayer racing across a persistent online world. A release is planned next year for the PS4, Xbox One, and PC platforms.

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The Walking Dead's next episode, 400 Days, stars five different characters in five separate stories of survival during the zombie apocalypse, all tied together by a geographical locale: A truck stop. These newcomers offer a fresh perspective on the events in season one of The Walking Dead, but overall, Telltale's tone hasn't changed much.

"Aw, fuck."

Those are the first words that Vince, one of the five characters highlighted in 400 Days, says. He spits the phrase into a dark alley as he searches for a spot to stash his gun, police sirens blaring from down the street. The player gets to decide where Vince throws the pistol – the garbage, his pants, the roof – but it doesn't appear to affect where he ends up: chained to the floor of a prison bus, with a heartbroken statutory rapist in front of him and a white-collar, former millionaire behind, all latched on the same line.

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We snagged some photos of the PlayStation 4 hardware and accessories at E3 2013. Just try to look at that console without thinking of "Also Sprach Zarathustra." Also, try not to look too close – it's pointy.

The Batman: Arkham Origins 'Knightfall' content for the game's PS3 version consists of challenge maps tied to the Knightfall storyline, as well as the Azreal-themed suit and the "early television show skin" revealed in Sony's E3 conference. Origins Senior Producer Ben Mattes told Joystiq the maps are "specific to the Knightfall storyline" and will include "appropriately themed characters and enemies."

The piece of Knightfall content developer Warner Bros. Montreal is "really excited about" is the early television show skin, AKA the 60s Batman skin of the KAPOW! and BLAM! era. So, did Warner Bros. Montreal consider bringing in a certain Adam West to provide vocals tied to the skin? When asked about that possibility, Mattes took a long pause before simply restating, "Early television show skin." Holy skirting the question, Batman!

On the subject of specific versions, Mattes also confirmed to us the Origins will have specific functionality on the Wii U, but he wasn't prepared to go into details.

"We're not talking about specific features but we're encouraging people to imagine," Mattes told us, "We obviously paid to attention to the Wii U platform and what sort of functionality makes sense for that platform."

We also asked him about whether or not the Wii U would receive the same DLC as other versions, given the speculation about the system possibly not receiving the Deathstroke content. Mattes told us WB Montreal is "not yet talking about" DLC and its relationship to the different platforms.

Deus Ex: Human Revolution Director's Cut will launch on Xbox 360, PS3 and PC/Mac later this year, Square Enix announced in a press release. The version was initially announced for Wii U in March, and Eidos Montreal said the Director's Cut improvements were not planned for other platforms as of April.

The touchscreen features seen in the Director's Cut version developed for the Wii U version will translate to Microsoft's SmartGlass app and the PlayStation Vita.

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The new episode for Telltale's The Walking Dead, 400 Days, is set to launch in July for $5 on PC, Mac, XBLA, PSN and iOS. It'll hit Vita one month later, in August. That version will be bundled with the entire first season, for the first time ever on Vita.

That bundle is a good deal for fans of continuity – the decisions players made in the first season of The Walking Dead will show up in 400 Days, and the choices in 400 Days will impact season two, Telltale marketing man Richard Iggo said at E3. Players can start 400 Days without having played any of season one, but Iggo warned against it for those who want the full effect.

The DLC features five new characters in five separate stories, with a truck stop as their connective tissue. The truck stop is near events in season one of The Walking Dead, making it easy, geographically at least, to include previous player choices in 400 Days and beyond.

"Who knows, some of the characters that you meet might end up in season two," Iggo teased.

Electronic Arts outlined its plans for the next generation of consoles during its E3 press event yesterday, showcasing a slate of upcoming releases ranging from tech-driven sports games to crowd-pleasing PopCap franchise sequels.

EA hit the ground running with a trailer for Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare, a third-person action game in which players control squadrons of zombie-destroying plant life. Afterward, PopCap's John Vechey took the stage to announce Peggle 2, which is expected to reignite many long-forgotten addictions when it launches later this year.

Electronic Arts then offered a glimpse at a new Star Wars Battlefront game developed by DICE, capitalizing on its recent exclusivity deal with franchise owner Disney. Dragon Age: Inquisition was next up, as developer BioWare showed off a new trailer and announced the game's release had been pushed back into next year, with versions planned for Xbox One, PS4, PC, PS3, and Xbox 360.

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After some confusion, we've clarified Kevin Conroy doesn't feature in Batman: Arkham Origins at all. Origins Senior Producer Ben Mattes told Joystiq, "We've got Roger Craig Smith, he's our Batman. Troy Baker, he's our Joker. Kevin Conroy, he's not part of this game."

Initial reports indicated long-time Batman voice actor Conroy wasn't in Origins. He then announced at the recent Dallas Comic Con that he'd been working on "the next Arkham" game. Shortly after, Craig Smith was officially unveiled as Origins' younger Batman, leading to speculation Conroy might be involved in some kind of retrospective role.

However, it now emerges Conroy was apparently talking about another Arkham game in development, perhaps at series dev Rocksteady Studios - Warner Bros. Montreal is the studio behind Origins.

That would seem to be backed up by Spong's report from last month, which noted a Twitter account ascribed to Conroy tweeted "Confusion in Dallas! I am in new ARKHAM GAME coming soon, NOT ARKHAM ORIGINS coming this fall." The tweet was deleted shortly after being posted - we're not sure if the world's greatest detective is needed for this one.

During an E3 demo today, Skylanders executive producer Scott Krager announced that the newest entry in the series, Swap Force, will launch "day and date" for both the XBox One and PlayStation 4 -- though the specific release date (or dates) for these consoles is still unknown.

In the meantime, some good news: in keeping with the series' tradition of cross-platform compatibility, the next-gen versions of Skylanders: Swap Force will use the same figurines as the current-gen titles, due to release for 3DS, Wii, PS3, Xbox 360, and Wii U October 13 in the United States.

Magic 2014: Duels of the Planeswalkers, the next installment in the Magic: The Gathering – Duels of the Planeswalkers series, is set to launch on Steam June 26, according to the game's product page.

Magic 2014 is priced at $10, which falls in line with every other entry in the series. A special edition, which includes the game, soundtrack, five desktop wallpapers, a "Return to Ravnica" eBook and ten foil conversions, is also listed on the Steam page. Magic 2014: Duels of the Planeswalkers will launch on PC, Xbox Live Arcade, PlayStation Network, iOS and Android this summer – this marks the first time the series will be available on Android.

[Thanks, Mitch]

Our News Editor Alexander Sliwinski and Engadget Senior Associate Editor Ben Gilbert have a difficult task. They have to break down every bombshell dropped during Sony's gasp-filled E3 press briefing. No draconian always-online policy? Used games that work just like ... used games? That price?

It's going to be a loaded conversation. Watch it all live, right here, after the break!

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Sony's new cloud service will launch in 2014, Sony Computer Entertainment president Andrew House announced during the company's E3 press briefing. The service will allow players access to a library of "critically acclaimed" PlayStation 3 games using Gaikai streaming technology. It will initially be available on PlayStation 3 and PlayStation 4, and will launch on Vita sometime later.

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Update: The briefing is running late, but we've taken our seats and started the liveblog. Join us!

You've made it to PlayStation's E3 2013 media briefing, starting at 9PM EDT (6PM Pacific, 2AM UK). We started the day learning more about Xbox One, heard from EA and Ubisoft in-between, and now close it with Sony's second round of PlayStation 4 presentations.

We'll flip this post to liveblog mode once the event gets underway, so keep an eye out for the evening's final barrage of announcements, demonstrations and exquisitely rendered, painstakingly motion-captured porpoises.