Embark are continuing their meteorological experiments in extraction shooter Arc Raiders with a rousing injection of wind. There’s a hurricane coming to the game on February 24th, a new map condition that limits visibility, degrades shields, impedes movement, and makes you suck even more at shooting things. Still, this stormcloud has a few silver linings. With the gale at your back, you’ll naturally move a lot faster. Also, you may find it easier to avoid detection in the open if you disable your shield.
Why is everything rolling sideways on my desk all of a sudden? What’s this mysterious force, dragging my chair towards the wall? Why are all the cars in the vicinity tumbling and rolling in the direction of *checks press release* ...North Carolina, USA? It can only be gravitational disturbance caused by the impending 1.0 release of a massive strategy project. This time it’s Heart of the Machine, a “4X-style”, “dimension-busting” sci-fi game developed by Arcen Games and published by Hooded Horse.
The single most offputting thing about a game like Arc Raiders, i.e. an extraction shooter, is that every single other person you meet in-game is Schrödinger's asshole. They could be a friend who you share a story or some loot with, or they could mercilessly gun you down at the drop of a hat. It's certainly not for everyone, but in the game's latest update, a new PvE event has arrived encouraging everyone to walk hand in hand together to defeat those big bad bots.
PUBG: Blindspot, the PUBG spin-off previously dubbed Project Arc, is set to take the early access plunge on February 5th, 2026. In case you've understadably started wondering if this is the extraction shooter which prompted my last bit of newsing about a PUBG spin-off, it isn't. That's PUBG: Black Budget, PUBG: Blindspot's all about fights in which you're staring at the tops of folks' heads.
A few years ago, it would have been pretty easy to imagine Helldivers 2 releasing as a free-to-play game. It is a live service game after all, most of those are free-to-play because studios want to reduce the barrier to entry. Instead, it launched as a paid-for, $40 game, a far cry from free, but not the $80-$100 releases we're seeing more and more of. And it's because Arrowhead made the decision to do so that Arc Raiders developer Embark did the exact same thing for their own shooter.
Right, get ready for some chatter about where the contents of our collective wallets have gone over the past year. Valve's list of the highest-grossing games on Steam in 2025 has emerged from the great mists, and in a nice revelation, features a larger number of fresh releases than last year's ranking. That's alongside all of the moderately to quite old stuff which more folks keep hopping on the train of with every passing 12 month period.
I regret to inform you, I am once again in the grips of an idle clicker. Feed The Reactor was only released last night, but I've already become one of the 0.1% of players to prestige its tech tree. In my defense, there's something a lot more active and engaging at the core of this 'idle' clicker than I'm used to.
Though, it also helps that Feed The Reactor's theming has me picturing myself as a lab boffin, carefully crafting the mix of fuel and ignition sources that will fire up the heart of a fusion reactor...
As the Bob Dylan song goes, how many lush alien planets must a Man presumptuously land on and turn into poorly optimised Toyota plants before he finally decides he’s sick of being an extractivist piece of shit? Dylan was being rhetorical, but I studied at the school of Homer Simpson, and want you to give me an actual figure. I’m going to say: four and a half. If you’ve yet to hit your personal quota, well, here’s StarRupture out now in early access.
No, I'm not busy. Ignore the very famous actor acting moody in the corner, he'll be quiet if you pay him no mind. Also, do like I am and just pretend my holo-phone doesn't have a million urgent messages about some relic sitting in its inbox. Just sit here on the sofa, in this Cyberpunk 2077 flat, and watch as the big flying thing with Dogtown's military dictator's face on it floats between my futuristic kitchen and lounge, thanks to a new mod.
Cyberpunk 2077's narrative really kicks into gear when, after a job gone wrong, metal-infused merc protagonist V realises they're now living in the shadow of a Keanu Reeves-shaped clock. Despite this, you're free to while away hours doing a million things other than confronting your urgent mortality problem. It's something even CD Projekt themselves have joked about.
If you can't resist taking cheeky potshots at your fellow players in Arc Raiders, the shooter's matchmaking can now neatly shuffle you into a session where you're more likely to get a taste of your own medicine. Developers Embark have confirmed that some "aggression-based matchmaking" has been sprinkled into the game's systems as of late, making PvP-prone players a bit more likely to be funnelled towards each other.
Most anticipated? Oh reader, you gentle, innocent child. Hark at you, ambling in here with supple joints, eyes clear as springwater, and the scent of hope in your hair. I have grown old, dear reader. I no longer feel this emotion called "anticipation", anymore than I remember the taste of strawberries in the Shire. Years of waiting for another Legacy of Kain game have broken my spirit. My heart is a sponge of sorrow. My beard coils round my ankles like a listless cat. All has become grey.
While the old saying goes 'A game in the basket is worth two in Steam Wishlist', as we teeter into a new year it's good to highlight a couple of the games shuffling our way. Especially when there are quite so many of them that include big stompy mechs. Some of them as big as cities. My engine oil-starved heart beats and thumps in anticipation.
I've tried to keep the list to games confirmed for release next year – tragically cutting The Free Shepherd, which is planned to release in 2027 – but there is one exception.
So let's begin with the outlier that's likely to wander tardily into 2027.
A recap: of the seven hopefuls I slipped into our bulk 2025 list of "Oh, that looks alright" games, only three actually released in 2025, and one of them wasn’t very good. If it’s the hope that kills you, I am therefore dead four, arguably five times over. Real Necron shit, honestly.
If I were the foreman of an game refinery, I might be dabbing my forehead in anticipation right now because there is a lot coming down the pipeline in 2026. You may be looking at the telltale bulge of Grand Theft Auto, but I'm more focused on the amount of damn fine horror we've got in the plumbing.
RPS Advent Calendar voting remains an esoteric and mercurial process, even to those of us who practice in it. If two games get the same amount of votes, which goes higher in the list? Did Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor technically release in 2025 or 2024? These are questions most of us dare not ask, and those that do often vanish mysteriously overnight. Until January 3rd or so, when they come back from holiday.
One thing’s for sure: I had a bunch of games that no-one else voted for. Don’t be sad, games. I still like you.
Vince Zampella, the co-creator of Call of Duty, founder of Respawn Entertainment, and head of EA's Battlefield franchise died in a car crash on December 22nd. He was 55 years old.
"We're heartbroken by the passing of our founder and dear friend Vince Zampella," Respawn Entertainment said in a statement on Twitter. "Our hearts are with his family, friends, and all who love him."
Slashing your way in space, Chaos Manufacturing announces SOL Shogunate at the PC Gaming Show: Most Wanted, combining the traditional samurai genre with Sci-Fi.
Set on the moon ruled by the shogunate, Chaos Manufacturing has unveiled its upcoming debut game, SOL Shogunate, currently in development for PC via Steam. Announced during the PC Gaming Show: Most Wanted, the action RPG brings the beloved samurai genre to space, as players take on the role of an outlaw ronin on a quest for revenge against a rival clan, utilizing traditional samurai skills alongside advanced technologies.
Set on the metropolitan version of Earth’s moon, the shogunate lives a lavish lifestyle with artificial gravity and simulated night as if on Earth, at the cost of many workers suffering beneath the dystopian city. Fed up with the shogunate’s grip on the moon and the death of her once-powerful family by a rival clan, Yuzuki, an outlaw ronin, embarks on a vengeful quest as she dons her armour and readies her blade, travelling through many areas set in an era in Japanese history and unravels the mysterious, long-forgotten war.
Slashing her way through the SOL Shogunate, Yuzuki wields a variety of traditional weapons enhanced with modern technology. Preparing for the various foes she may encounter, players can unlock new elemental effects that could benefit their weapons and collect gene splices to customize the skills that are suited to their playstyle, including bio-ceramic skin and enhanced vision.
Immersing players as if they were in a music video during the boss fights, SOL Shogunate will feature many artists. From what we know so far, the popular Japanese rock band AliA will be joining the game, with many more to be revealed soon.
With the SOL Shogunate announced, the CEO of Chaos Manufacturing, Guy Costantini, shared: “With our debut SOL Shogunate, we’re realizing our vision for the first samurai space opera, which brings fluid, spectacle-driven combat to a sci-fi universe that pays homage to the majesty of feudal Japanese tradition. We’re fusing combat, story, and music into an experience that we hope players will find thrilling, emotional, and unforgettable.”
For those looking to embark on a daring quest as an outlaw ronin in space, fans can wishlist SOL Shogunate on Steam.
Arc Raiders developers Embark have shed a bit of light on how their looter-shooter changed after shifting away from the free-to-play business model back in 2024. Apparently, it made Arc "drastically easier" to design, in the sense that the Swedish studio felt less pressure to turn players into whales.
Seems it’s a good day to be a Helldivers 2 player: in addition to the buff-happy Into the Unjust 5.0.0 patch that launched earlier, developers Arrowhead have shared an update on their efforts to shave down the co-op shooter’s mammoth install size. And it’s not so much a shaving as a fully fuelled chainsawing, high vis vests be damned. As the Steam post explains, there’s now a beta build, available to try, that cuts the 154GB game down to 23GB – a 131GB (!!!) reduction. That’s like surgically removing an entire Black Myth: Wukong that was growing out of its back.
