You’ve played the role of the Empress’ protector, and now you will experience Dishonored from the other side of the coin. Watch our newly released trailer for Dishonored: The Knife of Dunwall, which puts you in the role of Daud — the assassin responsible for Empress Jessamine’s death.

Those that have played through Dishonored know Daud possesses the Mark of the Outsider — granting him supernatural abilities. But don’t expect to be playing as a Corvo clone — Daud can call for help with ‘Summon Assassin’, track down runes and bone charms with “Void Gaze”, and his variation on Blink allows him to stop time — even in mid air.

You’ll needs these powers, as well as stealth weapons like Daud’s custom wristbow and arc mines to survive some of the most challenging areas in Dunwall — including the Rothwild Slaughterhouse, Legal District, and a return to Daud’s hidden base in the Flooded District. Nothing you can’t handle, right?

As with Dishonored, we encourage you to play The Knife of Dunwall in whatever play style suits you best — be it action or stealth focused, or somewhere in between. Daud’s redemption (or turn towards darkness) lays in your hands.

The Knife of Dunwall releases on Tuesday, April 16th on PlayStation Store for $9.99.

With Dishonored, the team at Arkane Studios let you decide what type of assassin you wanted to be – you could focus on stealth and remain in shadow, or simply leave a trail of blood across the game’s missions. However you played, by the game’s end, you had become Dunwall’s greatest assassin.

But how do you stack up about against the rest of the world?

In Dishonored’s new DLC, Dunwall City Trials, all your skills will be tested across 10 challenge maps. Providing a challenge to all levels of players, these maps will require you to creatively combine your supernatural abilities, weapons and gadgets with well-timed stealth and agility tactics.

Read below for a quick overview of the Challenge Maps:

As you complete challenges, you’ll receive a completion rating and score and be able to see how you stack up against the competition via leaderboards. Additionally, Dunwall City Trials unlocks 10 new trophies, including:

Purchase Dunwall City Trials today on the PlayStation Store for $4.99.

Early in your adventure, you will receive “The Outsider’s Mark” — a mysterious tattoo on your left hand that grants you supernatural abilities. As you progress through the game, this mark will allow you to unlock new abilities, each of which can be upgraded to a second level for improved functionality.

Below is a look at two of the development team’s favorite abilities:

Devouring Swarm

Devouring Swarm summons a vicious swarm of rats that will consume corpses or attack the nearest living thing. Level two summons a larger, more vicious swarm of rats.

Wind Blast

Wind Blast releases a powerful blast of wind, knocking your enemies off their feet. This power will also douse fires, shatter wooden doors, and reflect projectiles back at the enemy who fired them. Level two increases the power of the blast.

Have questions about the game? Let us know in the comments below. And if you’re looking to play the game tomorrow, don’t forget it’s available as a PSN Day 1 title!

Outside of PlayStation’s own announcements, the indisputable big-buzz game of Gamescom 2012 was Dishonored, the upcoming PS3 first-person stealth adventure from Bethesda. With relatively low-key showings in Cologne from many of the other major third party publishers, Dishonored really got its chance to shine last week and it duly dazzled all comers.

For the uninitiated, the game puts you in the shoes of wronged assassin Corvo Atano who is framed for the murder of an Empress – his former lover. You’ll be sneaking around a dark, atmospheric steampunk world, combining supernatural powers and a range of weaponry to avenge her death and unmask those who’ve conspired against you.

To be clear, when we say stealth we don’t mean the signposted sneaking of, say, recent Splinter Cell titles. The AI here is unforgivingly old school – more redolent of the likes of Thief. And that should come as no surprise – co-creator Harvey Smith worked on that series, as well as the original Deus Ex and BioShock precursor System Shock. We caught up with him back stage at Gamescom to learn more about his latest project.

PlayStation.Blog: What are Dishonored’s core gameplay building blocks?
Harvey Smith, Co-Creative Director, Dishonored: It’s a matter of falling back on values. We generally like the first person perspective – to give you that ‘you are there’ thing. We like RPG upgrade systems. We like analog AI, so enemies are not necessarily aware of you or unaware of you – they’re uncertain. They may have heard you, but they’re not sure, so they go and investigate. Surfing the edge of awareness, basically. We love highly mobile games; we don’t like games where you’re heavy and stuck on the ground and you have big weapons and you can’t get on top of buildings as they’re just props. We really want you to be able to flit up there like a flea.

PSB: The stealth mechanics seem really challenging compared to more recent examples of the genre…
HS: We decided to go with ‘view cone’ based stealth. Enemies have a view cone. Their peripheral vision is weaker and they don’t see as well up high – it’s squashed so you can hide in the rafters. The deal is that if you’re in front of their view cone they see you, no matter what the lighting levels. Even if I turned out the lights right now, I’d still be able to see you, right? So we decided to go with something realistic.

The truth is that we tried all of the models you can think of. We tried the ‘pool of shadow’ model, but modern players would say the AI looks bad if I’m in a shadow and an enemy walks right by me. That looks dumb. They want a more reactive system. And that makes it a little more hardcore. To sneak, you really have to stay behind cover, lean out behind walls. It requires you to really know where an enemy is looking and avoid that range.

PSB: You claim that it’s possible to finish the game without killing a single person. How challenging is that going to be compared to going in guns drawn?
HS: It’s pretty easy to avoid killing a standard guard. You just throw a bottle and when he goes to investigate you sneak by. But it gets much harder for the key targets. For example, there’s a mission where you get sent to kill two brothers who are corrupt members of parliaments. You can go straight ahead and kill them – they’re in a bathhouse – or you can do a side quest for a crime lord. If you do the right things for him he will have them captured, their tongues cut out, their heads shaved and then put to work in their own mines where nobody will know it’s them. It’s poetic justice. It’s dark, but not as dark as killing them. The two approaches are hard in different ways. The game gets very reactive if you just go in guns blazing – it fights back. But, on the other hand, stealth demands patience.

PSB: Many older gamers will be really excited to hear about a return to these sorts of values, but do you think younger gamers, who’ve never played Thief or the original Deus Ex, will get it?
HS: I have a great deal of faith in those people. When we release a game like this kids sometimes come to us and say ‘this game blew my mind; I didn’t know games could do this; I only played very linear games before’. That’s what we like to hear. I actually have more faith in the 13-year-olds as they’re playing things like Day Z or Dwarf Fortress or Eve Online. They’re hungry for highly interactive, non-dogmatic experiences, I think.

Dishonored creeps onto PS3 October 9th in North America. Look out for more coverage here on the Blog in the coming weeks!

Some games have problems with bugs, but this game has trouble with rats. Big, evil ones that prowl in packs and can rend a man’s flesh from his screaming bones. But killer rats are the least of your worries in the dark world of Dishonored, an imaginative action-adventure from Arkane Studios and Bethesda coming to PS3 later this year. The game nimbly blends inspirations from a pantheon of modern classics: The oppressive atmosphere and paranoid politicking of BioShock, the graceful bloodletting of Assassin’s Creed, the murky morality of Deus Ex, the stealth and shadow of Thief. This is a game about skulking in dark places, eavesdropping on secret conversations, setting up the perfect ambush and beating a hasty retreat.

You play as Corvo, an elite royal bodyguard wrongly accused of assassinating the Empress of Dunwall. Locked in a prison and left to rot, you’re sprung by a shadowy benefactor and set loose to claim your revenge in whatever manner you see fit. Though Corvo is a convincing protagonist the real star here is the city of Dunwall, a crumbling seaport perched over a vast and malignant ocean. Dunwall’s decaying decor is the handiwork of the man behind Half-Life 2’s iconic City 17, and the attention to detail is palpable: Steampunk carriages slide down cobblestone streets as stormtroopers patrol atop giant biomechanical stilts. It’s old and new, weird and familiar, beautiful and grotesque all at the same time. If you liked BioShock’s Rapture, you’re gonna love this.

Touched by an amoral deity called the Outsider, Corvo now wields an array of supernatural abilities, everything from teleportation and time dilation to summoning hordes of voracious rats and pushing projectiles back at enemies. One supernatural talent enables you to enter the body of a fish or rat, handy for infiltrating a building via a drain pipe or access panel. In combat, Corvo has little to fear, being a master swordsman and pistol marksman. Exotic ammunition types (explosive bullets, tranquilizer darts) and gadgets such as grenades and proximity mines further expand the possibilities. As in Deus Ex you can strike openly, spilling beaucoup buckets of blood in the process, or pull your punches by quietly choking out enemies and tucking their snoozing bodies safely away.

Whether you coldly kill adversaries or show mercy will have consequences on the game’s story — the Outsider himself is curious to see which path you follow. It will also factor in the moment-to-moment gameplay: snuff out a guard and his buddy might alter his patrol route to cover the gap, potentially disrupting your carefully laid plans. But whichever way you play will be the “right” way to play — Arkane’s goal is to put players in full control of the game’s pacing.

As you unravel the conspiracy behind the Empress’ assassination and an apparent military coup, you’ll meet a host of sketchy characters, from members of a secretive resistance movement to spoiled aristocrats and plague-stricken townspeople. Some will become targets of your wrath and will need to be dealt with accordingly, while others will provide valuable information or services.

If Dishonored sounds like your cup of tea, check back early tomorrow for the next episode of Official PlayStation Blogcast and an interview with co-directors Harvey Smith and Raf Colantonio. Have questions about the game right now? Sound off in the comments and I’ll pass along what I know!

I’m afraid it’s going to feel like DLC. Are there enough changes to make New Vegas feel unique from Fallout 3? (thanks @acsguitar)

We certainly think so! While the gameplay is similar, the world itself is very, very different. And our main storyline plays out in a very different manner, with several very different paths to completion.

Can we expect the same wasteland experience as in Fallout 3? I’m kinda scared about playing in a city untouched by atomic bombs! (thanks @The_iCroco)

Yes and no. There are some areas that were hit directly, but for the most part, the destruction you’ll see in the Mojave Wasteland is due to neglect, not bombardment. Don’t expect sprawling, fully functioning cities, though. The New Vegas strip is self-contained and tightly managed directly by Mr. House, so everything in the city works perfectly. As you get farther away from the strip, you’ll see more and more ruins and abandoned buildings.

Would love to know how they will create that WOW factor that Fallout 3 had: the wasteland, the bomb at Megaton and so on. Tricky!? (thanks @bekblayton)

We think there are some similarly cool WOW moments in our game, and you should find one in each act of the main storyline.

How difficult will it be to take care of physical needs like hydration, sleep, and so on? Is it going to be overbearing?

Those features are only in Hardcore Mode, so they’re optional. If you find they’re getting to be too much of a hassle, you can always turn it off (although you won’t get the Hardcore trophy if you do).

What can you tell us about the new Hardcore Mode?

Hardcore Mode can be turned on or off at any time, although if you want the Hardcore trophy, you have to turn it on when initially prompted and leave it that way all the way to the end of the game. When it’s on, players will have to eat, sleep, and drink water every day. In addition, ammo has weight, companions can die, Stimpaks heal over time, and damaged limbs can only be healed with a Doctor’s Bag.

While you can fast travel in Hardcore Mode, you can’t if the time it would take to get you there would result in the player dying from dehydration/exhaustion/starvation.

Will the shooting feel better than it did in Fallout 3? (thanks @DYLANmmc)

Obsidian has tweaked the real-time combat quite a bit from Fallout 3 to make it feel more natural for people who don’t want to use VATS all the time.

What’s the story with the Aim Down the Sight mechanic? And is Fallout: New Vegas still support first-person and third-person viewing modes?

First- and third-person modes are in, and we’ve tweaked the third-person camera to be a bit more useful. In first-person mode, iron sights can be used with most weapons. The only exceptions are ones like the Grenade Machine Gun that are enormous and fire from the hip, and guns that have an actual sight on them (like sniper rifles and weapons modded with a physical sight). You just hold down the button and the camera zooms to show the weapon’s iron sight instead of a crosshair. It’s very useful for combat outside of VATS mode.

How big is Fallout: New Vegas compared to Fallout 3? (thanks @maialideth)

It’s about the same size. If you thought Fallout 3 was big, you’ll find Fallout: New Vegas to be equally big.

How much install data will be needed for Fallout: New Vegas?

Fallout: New Vegas is a 5 GB install on PS3 that runs when you first launch the game.

One of my favorite things to do in Fallout 3 was scavenging homes and office buildings. Will we see many rural and urban areas for that? (thanks @JaylLaf)

Just like Fallout 3, our wasteland is littered with abandoned (and not-so-abandoned) locations for you to explore.

Will there be any Vaults to explore in New Vegas? (thanks @LewJ1196)

Yes there are! We have five different Vaults in the game. They serve as unique dungeons, and depending on what path you follow through the main storyline, you may have to venture into one of them to retrieve something.

I’m interested to know more about the music score that will be piped through our Pip Boys for New Vegas. Will there be more variety? (thanks @Peligrie)

We have three separate radio stations in Fallout: New Vegas. There’s New Vegas Radio, which has the kind of songs you’ve come to expect from a Fallout game – hosted by Mr. New Vegas (voiced by Wayne Newton). Then there’s Black Mountain Radio, which is more classic country-focused. And finally there’s Mojave Music Radio, which is similar to NVR, only without the news stories from Mr. New Vegas.

Of course that’s just the radio. If you never turn on the radio at all, you’ll be treated to a new score by Inon Zur, featuring a string quartet, samples from past Fallout games, and some very cool location-specific themes.

Will New Vegas have a Good/Evil/Neutral decision path like Fallout 3? (thanks @Reumaut)

Karma still exists, and affects some things, but for the most part our decisions are determined more by the new reputation system, which tracks how the various factions in the game feel about you.

Will the Brotherhood of Steel be present in Fallout: New Vegas? I know in Fallout 3, the “original” BoS was based near California. (thanks @SCZ_PS3)

The Brotherhood of Steel is in Fallout: New Vegas, but not nearly as much as they were in Fallout 3. The west coast BoS was really hit hard following the events of Fallout 1 & 2, so they’re not nearly as important as the NCR is in the region.

Will there be any Fallout 2 characters make an appearance in Fallout: New Vegas? (thanks @Vi9)

Yes! We’ve already confirmed Marcus from Fallout 2 is coming back, and will again be voiced by Michael Dorn. As for anyone else, you’ll just have to wait for the game to see for yourself.

Can I still force materials inside the pants of enemies? If so, what explosive additions have you made? (thanks @Foxification)

Yep, you can still pickpocket grenades into people’s pockets. Even better is that now you can pickpocket plastic explosives into people’s pants! For some fun, drop some C4 into a few random people, equip the detonator, stand back and pull the trigger. It never gets old.

Will there any kind of transportation?

Aside from fast-travel, we do have a monorail that will take you directly to the strip from Camp McCarran (assuming you’re friendly with the NCR).

Can we continue playing after the main quest line ends?

No. Instead, Fallout: New Vegas has a real ending, that shows the results of your actions throughout the game and how they affected the different factions, locations and people you encountered.

Are you still able to make a female character?

Absolutely!

Do you plan on including many DLC add-ons for Fallout: New Vegas, as Fallout 3 did? (thanks @VGNtertainment)

We’re not really going into specifics on DLC, but we have a plan, and we think it’s a good one. You should hear more about it soon.

What’s the initial level cap.. and will DLC be exclusive to one console or another for any amount of time? (thanks @keeponrunning)

The level cap for Fallout: New Vegas is 30. As mentioned previously, we’re not discussing the details of downloadable content right now. Stay tuned!

Will there be a demo to try Fallout: New Vegas? (thanks @RichLando)

There’s no demo planned for the game.. We wanted the focus to be completing the full game and making it the best game it could be.

Thanks again for all the great questions. We hope you enjoy your stay in the Mojave Wasteland!

Fallout: New Vegas’ senior producer, Jason Bergman, has put together a list of bios for the companions you’ll meet throughout the Wasteland. Learn more about them below. [Warning: some spoilers below]

Humanoid Companions

Arcade

• Full Name: Arcade Israel Gannon
• Sex: Male
• Race: Human
• Ethnicity: Caucasian
• Age: 35
• Profession: Doctor, Followers of the Apocalypse New Vegas Chapter
• Perk: Better Healing – While Arcade is a companion, the player regains more health from all sources.
• Description: Arcade is highly ethical and moral, but he understands the post apocalyptic world is one in which sometimes, people just have to be shot in the head. Most of Arcade’s concerns about the world around him have to do with large-scale issues rather than the needs of individuals. While he appreciates what individual people go through, he firmly believes that it’s more important to affect large-scale societal change than fix problems little by little.

Boone

• Full Name: Craig Boone
• Sex: Male
• Race: Human
• Ethnicity: Caucasian
• Age: 26
• Profession: Town guard, Novac
• Perk: Spotter – While Boone is a companion, hostile targets are highlighted whenever the player is actively aiming.
• Description: Boone is a town guard and former NCR sharpshooter, bitterly whittling away the hours until he can find out who’s responsible for his wife’s death — and kill them. Hardened and psychologically troubled from his time in the NCR military, Boone vacillates between being a stone-cold killer and a decent human being. Venturing out from the relative safety of Novac brings Boone into close contact with his old life until he is forced to deal with the tragic events that caused him to leave the military.

Cass

• Full Name: Rose of Sharon Cassidy
• Sex: Female
• Race: Human
• Ethnicity: Caucasian
• Age: 37
• Profession: Water merchant, owner of Cassidy Caravans
• Perk: Whiskey Rose – While Cass is a companion, she and the player gain Damage Threshold when they drink Whiskey. Additionally, the player does not suffer intelligence loss from consuming alcohol and ignores the negative effects of alcohol addiction.
• Description: Worn down by years of hard luck and a recent rash of terrible misfortunes, Cass is a despondent merchant who’s about to get out of the caravan business. She’s smart, tough, and steady with a gun, but she hasn’t been savvy enough to survive the ruthless caravan wars that have flared up in Nevada since NCR’s expansion. Though she’s quick to join up with the player for some easy money, she’s still interested in finding out if she’s been suffering from bad luck or something more sinister.

Lily

• Full Name: Lillian Marie Bowen
• Sex: Super Mutant
• Race: Nightkin Super Mutant
• Age: 203
• Ethnicity: African
• Profession: Farmer, Jacobstown
• Perk: Stealth Girl – While Lily is a companion, the duration of Stealth Boys is increased by 200% and all Sneak Attack Critical Hits do an additional 10% damage.
• Description: Though she now lives a peaceful life tending to Bighorners in the community of Jacobstown, Lily was once a Nightkin in The Master’s army. Before that, she was an elderly grandmother enjoying a simple life in Vault 17. Heavily medicated, Lily struggles with her dangerous schizophrenia and distant memories of her old life.

Raul

• Full Name: Raul Alfonso Tejada
• Sex: Male
• Race: Ghoul
• Ethnicity: Meztiso
• Age: 230
• Profession: Repairman (Black Mountain), Vaquero (pre-war)
• Perk: Regular Maintenance – While Raul is a companion, the Condition of weapons and armor decays 50% slower.
• Description: Raul is an old Mexican ghoul who has had a long and storied history. After living the life of a wild gunslinger, Raul took up the trade of a simple repairman in Nevada. While traveling to New Vegas, he was swiped by Nightkin from Black Mountain and imprisoned by their leader, Tabitha. After being freed from captivity, he will join the player out of gratitude. A new taste of adventure reminds Raul of his tumultuous past, prompting him to consider if he should embrace his old gunslinging ways.

Veronica

• Full Name: Veronica Renata Santangelo
• Sex: Female
• Age: 27
• Ethnicity: Caucasian
• Profession: Journeyman Scribe, Procurement Specialist, Brotherhood of Steel, Hidden Valley Bunker
• Perk: Scribe Assistant – while Veronica is a companion, the player can craft Workbench items through Veronica’s dialogue.
• Description: Veronica is a Brotherhood of Steel journeyman scribe who has been indefinitely assigned to the role of “procurement specialist”, responsible for venturing out of the Brotherhood bunker to find and acquire resources that the Brotherhood cannot create on its own. Irritated by what she sees as the Brotherhood’s unrealistic and uninformed views of themselves and the world, Veronica is a perpetual outsider caught between her loyalty to the Brotherhood and troubling doubts about the validity of their current course.

Non-Humanoid

ED-E

• Full Name: Eyebot (Duraframe) – Subject E
• Sex: N/A
• Age: 6
• Ethnicity: N/A
• Profession: Shop Security, Primm
• Perk: Enhanced Sensors – while ED-E is a companion, the player can detect enemies at an increased range. Additionally, enemies will appear on the player’s compass and can be targeted in V.A.T.S. even when cloaked.
• Description: Unlike standard eyebots, ED-E is a highly customized “duraframe” model with hardened armor and specialized weapons. It was an eyebot on an incredible journey, carrying an enormous amount of valuable data when it was badly damaged and taken in by a Primm shop owner. Though ED-E still retains all of its data and an understanding of its mission, its internal positioning hardware is badly damaged. The only reason it has not been seized by interested parties is because ED-E has not communicated its special mission to anyone.

Rex

• Full Name: Cyber-Hound Mk. III, LEO Support Model, Serial Number B955883
• Sex: N/A
• Age: 209
• Ethnicity: N/A
• Profession: Sidekick to The King
• Perk: Search and Mark – While Rex is a companion, unequipped chems, firearms, and ammunition within a short distance are highlighted when you zoom the camera.
• Description: Rex is a cybernetic dog that has been around since pre-war times. He was used by the Denver Police Department and Caesar’s Legion before being mostly blown up during the Battle of Hoover Dam. Since then, he’s been the loyal pet of The King of The Kings in Freeside. Capable of sniffing out loot and taking a large amount of punishment, he only has one (big) problem: his brain is starting to deteriorate.

In the two years since the release of Bethesda Softworks’ critically acclaimed Fallout 3, the team has been hard at work creating their latest post-nuke romp, Fallout: New Vegas. If big guns, mutants, warring factions and gambling are your thing, check out Veronica’s visit with Senior Producer, Jason Bergman, for an in-depth preview of what’s next in the Fallout franchise. Also, don’t miss a Fallout-inspired slot machine mini-game that reveals some very cool wallpapers.

Developer Blue Castle Games, has taken mowing down zombies to a whole new level in Capcom’s, Dead Rising 2. This thriller is packed with enough parasite infested ghouls and innovative ways to take ‘em out to satisfy even the most discriminating survival horror fan. One of the sequel’s cool new features allows players to slip into a maintenance room and duct tape up their own crazy tools of destruction.

In Qore’s look at Enslaved: Odyssey to the West, Veronica Belmont chats with Ninja Theory’s, “Chief Creative Ninja” for an under-the-hood look at the developer’s approach to story-telling and production design. Best known for their PS3 launch title, Heavenly Sword, Ninja Theory has created a lush vibrant universe for Enslaved along with a storyline centered on the symbiotic relationship between the game’s two main characters, Trip and Monkey. The concept art gallery included with the feature story is gorgeous.

In this month’s “On the Road with Qore”, the team’s off to Las Vegas where Veronica shows us how to do Sin City – ‘geek-style.’ From The Pinball Hall of Fame which boasts the world’s largest exhibit of playable pinball machines to The Gun Store to actually shoot the real weapons found in many an FPS, you won’t want to miss Veronica’s experience with full recoil from – THE SAW.

And finally, this month in the Download Center – Warhawk. In celebration of the PlayStation 15th anniversary, Qore annual subscribers can flash back to 1995 and pick up this first generation PS one hit. Also included in this month’s episode for everyone, by popular demand, Veronica Belmont now has her own PS3 theme. And, our friends at Subway have made it possible for you to be the first kid on the block to cruise around PlayStation Home with a virtual Subway Fiery Footlong sandwich.

Episode 28 is now live.