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  • ✇Rock Paper Shotgun Latest Articles Feed
  • Dune Awakening will burst out of the early access sands in "early 2025"Brendan Caldwell
    Lo, a ripple in the release date sands. Stand still a moment while we study this phenomenon. Yes, yes, it is the unmistakable rumble of a large survival MMO pondering its release date. Dune: Awakening is having a think and has decided "early 2025" is a good non-specific time period to come out in early access. That could mean January or February. Or March, I guess. April? Now don't be silly, that's spring. Not April, surely. This beast seems hungry. It will eat before then. I have foreseen it.
     

Dune Awakening will burst out of the early access sands in "early 2025"

Lo, a ripple in the release date sands. Stand still a moment while we study this phenomenon. Yes, yes, it is the unmistakable rumble of a large survival MMO pondering its release date. Dune: Awakening is having a think and has decided "early 2025" is a good non-specific time period to come out in early access. That could mean January or February. Or March, I guess. April? Now don't be silly, that's spring. Not April, surely. This beast seems hungry. It will eat before then. I have foreseen it. Mostly by watching the trailer that dropped at Gamescom.

Read more

Wasteland Waste Disposal is a cute clean 'em up set in a toxic world (not ours)

Our unlucky planet in Wasteland Waste Disposal has suffered not just one apocalypse but all of them. Turns out the "megapocalypse" was an unhealthy combination of "every worst-case apocalyptic scenario imaginable". Luckily, in this upcoming sandbox adventure, you have a giant metal fortress that walks above the pools of toxic sludge on huge spidery legs and chomps up all the trash you bring it. If you are not intrigued by that, perhaps the little janitor with a sci-fi vacuum cleaner (or the feel-good music reminiscent of Adventure Time songs) will convince you.

Read more

Dead Cells gets its final update after 8 years of development, bringing it to a cursed close

One of the best roguelikes on PC is getting a farewell of sorts this week. Twitchy slashfest Dead Cells received its final major update, introducing new enemies, fresh weapons, and a few mutations. Unfortunately, all this new stuff is very cursed. In other words, it all toys with the game's "curse" status effect, a hex that causes you to be killed if you take even a single hit. You'll probably die a few times as a result of this update, which in some ways is a fitting finalé for this fast-paced jar smasher of a game. You can see the new features in the trailer below.

Read more

Mellow mountain biker Lonely Mountains: Downhill is getting a wintry sequel about skiing

The mountain biking of Lonely Mountains: Downhill was sometimes a relaxing ride down gentle slopes, and at other times a hairy hurtle down declivitous cliffs. Alongside the likes of the Descenders and Riders Republic, it offered a more laid-back game, open to furious time trialling but always remembering to let you stop and appreciate the view. Both the stakes and the poly count were low. Happy news then, that it is getting a snowy sequel. In Lonely Mountains: Snow Riders you'll be swapping your bike for a pair of skis, and you'll be able to barrel down the mountainside with friends in co-op.

Read more

Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 delays its medieval RPG hustling until early next year

Put your mortar and pestle down, my herb-smooshing friend. The peasant-quelling RPG antics of Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 won't be releasing this year after all, say developers Warhorse in a video message to fans. "We aimed for the end of the year, and almost made it," said PR man Tobi Stolz-Zwilling. "Almost is not good enough though, so unfortunately we slipped to 2025." Never mind, it's easy to slip in the medieval era. There was mud everywhere.

Read more

Oops... the release date for Dragon Age: The Veilguard leaks a few hours early

The release date for Dragon Age: The Veilguard has been revealed in a last-minute leak thanks to a naughty video advertisement. Electronic Arts had planned to share the game's debut-day in about... *checks watchless wrist* ... 7 hours, as part of a special release date trailer. But the internet will ever internet, and thanks to some slip-up or other, we have the knowledge just a smidge early. Will I tell you what the actual release date is? Sure. I guess so.

Read more

  • ✇Rock Paper Shotgun Latest Articles Feed
  • The 11 best racing games on PCBrendan Caldwell
    Vroom vroom. That is the sound of 11 rivals revving their engines as they blink the sweat out of their eyes and exhale years of self-doubt from their lungs. Today is their day. We have lined up these racing games on a starting grid and are interested to see how things shake out. Will the realism-obsessed driving sims take the lead with their sublime physics engines? Might the futuristic combat racers simply destroy the opposition with explosive rockets? Or perhaps a nippy arcade crowd-pleaser w
     

The 11 best racing games on PC

Vroom vroom. That is the sound of 11 rivals revving their engines as they blink the sweat out of their eyes and exhale years of self-doubt from their lungs. Today is their day. We have lined up these racing games on a starting grid and are interested to see how things shake out. Will the realism-obsessed driving sims take the lead with their sublime physics engines? Might the futuristic combat racers simply destroy the opposition with explosive rockets? Or perhaps a nippy arcade crowd-pleaser will soar to the finish line, propelled by the sound of roaring cheers. It's all to play for here at our incredibly messed-up grand prix with a worrying lack of rules or regulation. Start your engines, everyone, these are the 11 best racing games on PC. 3! 2! 1! ...

Read more

Abiotic Factor's biggest update yet adds new sectors to explore, plus jetpacks, jeeps and laser katanas

Everyone loved Half-Life yet no one in 1998 was brave enough to say: "Okay, but what if this was an early access crafting survival game voiced by a bunch of New Zealanders?" Those 90s cowards. Abiotic Factor is the courageous game that has been correcting this historic oversight. It's fun, and the fun just got funnerer. The "Crush Depth" update, released yesterday, adds a heap of new areas to the game's messed-up scientific facility, including a dangerous Security Sector and a vast reservoir zone called the Hydroplant. On top of that there are new weapons, tools, workbenches, drivable vehicles, fishing rods, and quite a bit more. It's all shown off in the trailer below.

Read more

Shadows Of Doubt emerges from the wet alleyway of early access with 1.0 release next month

In Shadows Of Doubt you can fall from the roof of a corporate office building during a routine investigation, shatter all the bones in your frail detective body, wake up in a clinic fully healed, and then sprint out the door without paying your sky-high hospital bills while the clinic's auto-turret shoots at you for doing a medical dine and dash. The early access game is on our best immersive sims list for a reason, you know, and now it has an autumn release date for the final version, along with a new trailer.

Read more

Doom modders are annoyed at the "chum-bucket" of wrongly credited mods in the latest Doom remaster

Last week, Bethesda released a remastered edition of Doom and Doom II on Steam, with lots of extra episodes and improvements. One of these new features is a built-in browser for mods, and support for many existing mods that previously required a different version of the game. Basically, lots of good fan-made mods are now playable on the Steam version of ye olde Doom. That's neat! Ah, but there is some demon excrement on the health pack, so to speak. The mod browser lacks moderation and lets people upload the work of others with their own name pinned as the author. That's prompted one level designer to call it "a massive breach of trust and violation of norms the Doom community has done its best to hold to for those 30 years."

Read more

  • ✇Rock, Paper, Shotgun
  • Wasteland Waste Disposal is a cute clean 'em up set in a toxic world (not ours)Brendan Caldwell
    Our unlucky planet in Wasteland Waste Disposal has suffered not just one apocalypse but all of them. Turns out the "megapocalypse" was an unhealthy combination of "every worst-case apocalyptic scenario imaginable". Luckily, in this upcoming sandbox adventure, you have a giant metal fortress that walks above the pools of toxic sludge on huge spidery legs and chomps up all the trash you bring it. If you are not intrigued by that, perhaps the little janitor with a sci-fi vacuum cleaner (or the fee
     

Wasteland Waste Disposal is a cute clean 'em up set in a toxic world (not ours)

20. Srpen 2024 v 11:24

Our unlucky planet in Wasteland Waste Disposal has suffered not just one apocalypse but all of them. Turns out the "megapocalypse" was an unhealthy combination of "every worst-case apocalyptic scenario imaginable". Luckily, in this upcoming sandbox adventure, you have a giant metal fortress that walks above the pools of toxic sludge on huge spidery legs and chomps up all the trash you bring it. If you are not intrigued by that, perhaps the little janitor with a sci-fi vacuum cleaner (or the feel-good music reminiscent of Adventure Time songs) will convince you.

Read more

  • ✇Rock, Paper, Shotgun
  • Dead Cells gets its final update after 8 years of development, bringing it to a cursed closeBrendan Caldwell
    One of the best roguelikes on PC is getting a farewell of sorts this week. Twitchy slashfest Dead Cells received its final major update, introducing new enemies, fresh weapons, and a few mutations. Unfortunately, all this new stuff is very cursed. In other words, it all toys with the game's "curse" status effect, a hex that causes you to be killed if you take even a single hit. You'll probably die a few times as a result of this update, which in some ways is a fitting finalé for this fast-paced
     

Dead Cells gets its final update after 8 years of development, bringing it to a cursed close

19. Srpen 2024 v 13:05

One of the best roguelikes on PC is getting a farewell of sorts this week. Twitchy slashfest Dead Cells received its final major update, introducing new enemies, fresh weapons, and a few mutations. Unfortunately, all this new stuff is very cursed. In other words, it all toys with the game's "curse" status effect, a hex that causes you to be killed if you take even a single hit. You'll probably die a few times as a result of this update, which in some ways is a fitting finalé for this fast-paced jar smasher of a game. You can see the new features in the trailer below.

Read more

  • ✇Rock, Paper, Shotgun
  • Mellow mountain biker Lonely Mountains: Downhill is getting a wintry sequel about skiingBrendan Caldwell
    The mountain biking of Lonely Mountains: Downhill was sometimes a relaxing ride down gentle slopes, and at other times a hairy hurtle down declivitous cliffs. Alongside the likes of the Descenders and Riders Republic, it offered a more laid-back game, open to furious time trialling but always remembering to let you stop and appreciate the view. Both the stakes and the poly count were low. Happy news then, that it is getting a snowy sequel. In Lonely Mountains: Snow Riders you'll be swapping you
     

Mellow mountain biker Lonely Mountains: Downhill is getting a wintry sequel about skiing

16. Srpen 2024 v 11:52

The mountain biking of Lonely Mountains: Downhill was sometimes a relaxing ride down gentle slopes, and at other times a hairy hurtle down declivitous cliffs. Alongside the likes of the Descenders and Riders Republic, it offered a more laid-back game, open to furious time trialling but always remembering to let you stop and appreciate the view. Both the stakes and the poly count were low. Happy news then, that it is getting a snowy sequel. In Lonely Mountains: Snow Riders you'll be swapping your bike for a pair of skis, and you'll be able to barrel down the mountainside with friends in co-op.

Read more

  • ✇Rock, Paper, Shotgun
  • Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 delays its medieval RPG hustling until early next yearBrendan Caldwell
    Put your mortar and pestle down, my herb-smooshing friend. The peasant-quelling RPG antics of Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 won't be releasing this year after all, say developers Warhorse in a video message to fans. "We aimed for the end of the year, and almost made it," said PR man Tobi Stolz-Zwilling. "Almost is not good enough though, so unfortunately we slipped to 2025." Never mind, it's easy to slip in the medieval era. There was mud everywhere. Read more
     

Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 delays its medieval RPG hustling until early next year

15. Srpen 2024 v 12:37

Put your mortar and pestle down, my herb-smooshing friend. The peasant-quelling RPG antics of Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 won't be releasing this year after all, say developers Warhorse in a video message to fans. "We aimed for the end of the year, and almost made it," said PR man Tobi Stolz-Zwilling. "Almost is not good enough though, so unfortunately we slipped to 2025." Never mind, it's easy to slip in the medieval era. There was mud everywhere.

Read more

  • ✇Rock, Paper, Shotgun
  • Oops... the release date for Dragon Age: The Veilguard leaks a few hours earlyBrendan Caldwell
    The release date for Dragon Age: The Veilguard has been revealed in a last-minute leak thanks to a naughty video advertisement. Electronic Arts had planned to share the game's debut-day in about... *checks watchless wrist* ... 7 hours, as part of a special release date trailer. But the internet will ever internet, and thanks to some slip-up or other, we have the knowledge just a smidge early. Will I tell you what the actual release date is? Sure. I guess so. Read more
     

Oops... the release date for Dragon Age: The Veilguard leaks a few hours early

15. Srpen 2024 v 11:11

The release date for Dragon Age: The Veilguard has been revealed in a last-minute leak thanks to a naughty video advertisement. Electronic Arts had planned to share the game's debut-day in about... *checks watchless wrist* ... 7 hours, as part of a special release date trailer. But the internet will ever internet, and thanks to some slip-up or other, we have the knowledge just a smidge early. Will I tell you what the actual release date is? Sure. I guess so.

Read more

  • ✇Rock, Paper, Shotgun
  • The 11 best racing games on PCBrendan Caldwell
    Vroom vroom. That is the sound of 11 rivals revving their engines as they blink the sweat out of their eyes and exhale years of self-doubt from their lungs. Today is their day. We have lined up these racing games on a starting grid and are interested to see how things shake out. Will the realism-obsessed driving sims take the lead with their sublime physics engines? Might the futuristic combat racers simply destroy the opposition with explosive rockets? Or perhaps a nippy arcade crowd-pleaser w
     

The 11 best racing games on PC

14. Srpen 2024 v 18:33

Vroom vroom. That is the sound of 11 rivals revving their engines as they blink the sweat out of their eyes and exhale years of self-doubt from their lungs. Today is their day. We have lined up these racing games on a starting grid and are interested to see how things shake out. Will the realism-obsessed driving sims take the lead with their sublime physics engines? Might the futuristic combat racers simply destroy the opposition with explosive rockets? Or perhaps a nippy arcade crowd-pleaser will soar to the finish line, propelled by the sound of roaring cheers. It's all to play for here at our incredibly messed-up grand prix with a worrying lack of rules or regulation. Start your engines, everyone, these are the 11 best racing games on PC. 3! 2! 1! ...

Read more

Abiotic Factor's biggest update yet adds new sectors to explore, plus jetpacks, jeeps and laser katanas

13. Srpen 2024 v 13:04

Everyone loved Half-Life yet no one in 1998 was brave enough to say: "Okay, but what if this was an early access crafting survival game voiced by a bunch of New Zealanders?" Those 90s cowards. Abiotic Factor is the courageous game that has been correcting this historic oversight. It's fun, and the fun just got funnerer. The "Crush Depth" update, released yesterday, adds a heap of new areas to the game's messed-up scientific facility, including a dangerous Security Sector and a vast reservoir zone called the Hydroplant. On top of that there are new weapons, tools, workbenches, drivable vehicles, fishing rods, and quite a bit more. It's all shown off in the trailer below.

Read more

  • ✇Rock, Paper, Shotgun
  • Shadows Of Doubt emerges from the wet alleyway of early access with 1.0 release next monthBrendan Caldwell
    In Shadows Of Doubt you can fall from the roof of a corporate office building during a routine investigation, shatter all the bones in your frail detective body, wake up in a clinic fully healed, and then sprint out the door without paying your sky-high hospital bills while the clinic's auto-turret shoots at you for doing a medical dine and dash. The early access game is on our best immersive sims list for a reason, you know, and now it has an autumn release date for the final version, along wi
     

Shadows Of Doubt emerges from the wet alleyway of early access with 1.0 release next month

12. Srpen 2024 v 17:05

In Shadows Of Doubt you can fall from the roof of a corporate office building during a routine investigation, shatter all the bones in your frail detective body, wake up in a clinic fully healed, and then sprint out the door without paying your sky-high hospital bills while the clinic's auto-turret shoots at you for doing a medical dine and dash. The early access game is on our best immersive sims list for a reason, you know, and now it has an autumn release date for the final version, along with a new trailer.

Read more

Doom modders are annoyed at the "chum-bucket" of wrongly credited mods in the latest Doom remaster

12. Srpen 2024 v 14:06

Last week, Bethesda released a remastered edition of Doom and Doom II on Steam, with lots of extra episodes and improvements. One of these new features is a built-in browser for mods, and support for many existing mods that previously required a different version of the game. Basically, lots of good fan-made mods are now playable on the Steam version of ye olde Doom. That's neat! Ah, but there is some demon excrement on the health pack, so to speak. The mod browser lacks moderation and lets people upload the work of others with their own name pinned as the author. That's prompted one level designer to call it "a massive breach of trust and violation of norms the Doom community has done its best to hold to for those 30 years."

Read more

Splitgate 2 will add bum slides and time-altering bubbles to its portal-hopping shootsing

The first Splitgate was a cracker mash-up of Halo multiplayer gunfights and Portal's nifty spacetime windows. It was a gimmick that made flanking fun again, at least until you died to a distant rifle that was right next to you all along. Its sequel, Splitgate 2 is continuing that gimmick but is also sprucing up the free-to-play arena shooter with a few modern additions, like bum-sliding around corners and big deployable bubbles called "time domes" that slow down your enemies yet speed up your allies. All this and more comes from a gameplay trailer that went up yesterday.

Read more

  • ✇Rock, Paper, Shotgun
  • Splitgate 2 will add bum slides and time-altering bubbles to its portal-hopping shootsingBrendan Caldwell
    The first Splitgate was a cracker mash-up of Halo multiplayer gunfights and Portal's nifty spacetime windows. It was a gimmick that made flanking fun again, at least until you died to a distant rifle that was right next to you all along. Its sequel, Splitgate 2 is continuing that gimmick but is also sprucing up the free-to-play arena shooter with a few modern additions, like bum-sliding around corners and big deployable bubbles called "time domes" that slow down your enemies yet speed up your a
     

Splitgate 2 will add bum slides and time-altering bubbles to its portal-hopping shootsing

9. Srpen 2024 v 12:55

The first Splitgate was a cracker mash-up of Halo multiplayer gunfights and Portal's nifty spacetime windows. It was a gimmick that made flanking fun again, at least until you died to a distant rifle that was right next to you all along. Its sequel, Splitgate 2 is continuing that gimmick but is also sprucing up the free-to-play arena shooter with a few modern additions, like bum-sliding around corners and big deployable bubbles called "time domes" that slow down your enemies yet speed up your allies. All this and more comes from a gameplay trailer that went up yesterday.

Read more

  • ✇Rock, Paper, Shotgun
  • 7 Dos and 7 Don'ts in 7 Days To DieBrendan Caldwell
    You're a long time undead. 7 Days To Die was shuffling along in early access for 11 years, until version 1.0 finally burst through the windows. In that time, many other survival games have sprouted, blossomed, and gently faded away. I first visited the burnt-out ruins of this zombie-infested world a decade ago and I returned to it this week to find a tree-puncher that, despite bearing the pockmarks of early access, retains much of what made it enjoyable back when the survival genre was still we
     

7 Dos and 7 Don'ts in 7 Days To Die

8. Srpen 2024 v 18:36

You're a long time undead. 7 Days To Die was shuffling along in early access for 11 years, until version 1.0 finally burst through the windows. In that time, many other survival games have sprouted, blossomed, and gently faded away. I first visited the burnt-out ruins of this zombie-infested world a decade ago and I returned to it this week to find a tree-puncher that, despite bearing the pockmarks of early access, retains much of what made it enjoyable back when the survival genre was still wearing its baby onesie. Instead of a review, I figured I'd scribble together a mini starter guide for new (or returning) players. Partly because the game is a proper time sink and it was taking me so long to get through everything. But mostly because I wanted to use that numberful headline. So, here you go: 7 dos and 7 don'ts in 7 Days To (7) Die.

Read more

  • ✇Rock Paper Shotgun Latest Articles Feed
  • 7 Dos and 7 Don'ts in 7 Days To DieBrendan Caldwell
    You're a long time undead. 7 Days To Die was shuffling along in early access for 11 years, until version 1.0 finally burst through the windows. In that time, many other survival games have sprouted, blossomed, and gently faded away. I first visited the burnt-out ruins of this zombie-infested world a decade ago and I returned to it this week to find a tree-puncher that, despite bearing the pockmarks of early access, retains much of what made it enjoyable back when the survival genre was still we
     

7 Dos and 7 Don'ts in 7 Days To Die

You're a long time undead. 7 Days To Die was shuffling along in early access for 11 years, until version 1.0 finally burst through the windows. In that time, many other survival games have sprouted, blossomed, and gently faded away. I first visited the burnt-out ruins of this zombie-infested world a decade ago and I returned to it this week to find a tree-puncher that, despite bearing the pockmarks of early access, retains much of what made it enjoyable back when the survival genre was still wearing its baby onesie. Instead of a review, I figured I'd scribble together a mini starter guide for new (or returning) players. Partly because the game is a proper time sink and it was taking me so long to get through everything. But mostly because I wanted to use that numberful headline. So, here you go: 7 dos and 7 don'ts in 7 Days To (7) Die.

Read more

  • ✇Rock, Paper, Shotgun
  • New Elite Dangerous spaceship is advertised as a space trucker's dream, but it'll cost yaBrendan Caldwell
    Spaceship likers, come hither. Long-running space sim Elite Dangerous has just unloaded a new interstellar vessel into its universe, and she's a beaut. The new Type-8 Transporter is a medium freighter capable of hauling a maximum of 406 tons of cargo. It's got a default jump range of 17.55 light years and two big prongs sticking out of its face like a sci-fi forklift. Cool. The catch is that this ship can only be bought with real money for now, say the developers. This is part of Frontier's new
     

New Elite Dangerous spaceship is advertised as a space trucker's dream, but it'll cost ya

8. Srpen 2024 v 14:27

Spaceship likers, come hither. Long-running space sim Elite Dangerous has just unloaded a new interstellar vessel into its universe, and she's a beaut. The new Type-8 Transporter is a medium freighter capable of hauling a maximum of 406 tons of cargo. It's got a default jump range of 17.55 light years and two big prongs sticking out of its face like a sci-fi forklift. Cool. The catch is that this ship can only be bought with real money for now, say the developers. This is part of Frontier's new strategy of having paid-for ships in the game. I don't really play Elite Dangerous anymore, so I don't have strong feelings about that. But I do have strong feelings about the space trucker advertisement the developer has put together for the new ship. Come watch it with me.

Read more

New Elite Dangerous spaceship is advertised as a space trucker's dream, but it'll cost ya

Spaceship likers, come hither. Long-running space sim Elite Dangerous has just unloaded a new interstellar vessel into its universe, and she's a beaut. The new Type-8 Transporter is a medium freighter capable of hauling a maximum of 406 tons of cargo. It's got a default jump range of 17.55 light years and two big prongs sticking out of its face like a sci-fi forklift. Cool. The catch is that this ship can only be bought with real money for now, say the developers. This is part of Frontier's new strategy of having paid-for ships in the game. I don't really play Elite Dangerous anymore, so I don't have strong feelings about that. But I do have strong feelings about the space trucker advertisement the developer has put together for the new ship. Come watch it with me.

Read more

  • ✇Rock, Paper, Shotgun
  • Children in Norland can now learn pig farming from their elders, the little idiotsBrendan Caldwell
    One of the neat things about Norland's fantasy medievalism is that specialist knowledge is tied to characters. So if there's only one person in your village who knows how to brew tastier beer, and they die after being freakishly savaged by a passing wolf (it happens), suddenly your village will have no artisanal lager master. The results may be devastating. Luckily, you can share knowledge in a number of ways - by copying books, or having "wise conversations". The exception to this is child ch
     

Children in Norland can now learn pig farming from their elders, the little idiots

5. Srpen 2024 v 11:53

One of the neat things about Norland's fantasy medievalism is that specialist knowledge is tied to characters. So if there's only one person in your village who knows how to brew tastier beer, and they die after being freakishly savaged by a passing wolf (it happens), suddenly your village will have no artisanal lager master. The results may be devastating. Luckily, you can share knowledge in a number of ways - by copying books, or having "wise conversations". The exception to this is child characters, whose pea-sized brains can't learn specialist knowledge, only soaking up basic attributes like "manners" from the teachers you assign to them. Well, until now. The developers for the Rimworld-meets-Crusader Kings catastrophe simulator have made kids a little smarter. They'll now learn more important things from their adult teachers.

Read more

Children in Norland can now learn pig farming from their elders, the little idiots

One of the neat things about Norland's fantasy medievalism is that specialist knowledge is tied to characters. So if there's only one person in your village who knows how to brew tastier beer, and they die after being freakishly savaged by a passing wolf (it happens), suddenly your village will have no artisanal lager master. The results may be devastating. Luckily, you can share knowledge in a number of ways - by copying books, or having "wise conversations". The exception to this is child characters, whose pea-sized brains can't learn specialist knowledge, only soaking up basic attributes like "manners" from the teachers you assign to them. Well, until now. The developers for the Rimworld-meets-Crusader Kings catastrophe simulator have made kids a little smarter. They'll now learn more important things from their adult teachers.

Read more

World Of Goo 2 review: an inventive return to goo with some flies in the ointment

The first World Of Goo was a cheerful parade of goopy engineering with a sense of never-ending novelty (well, never-ending for about four hours). Every level would introduce a new goo type or a twist on the basic bridge-building puzzle that challenged you to get a gaggle of gurgling balls to the nearest pipe. World Of Goo 2 pursues that sense of novelty with just as much twitchy eagerness as its predecessor, throwing new toys and goos at the player in an effort to keep you on your sludge-coated toes. That pursuit doesn't always result in pleasing new levels, though. There is a "hit and miss" feeling to things this time around. But those hits are hits. For anyone who has spent the last 16 years yearning for more sticky structure-building: I hope you like comically unpredictable fluids.

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Activision revive Warzone's Caldera map as open source (yay!) but say it's to help train AI (booo)

Hardened battle royalists will remember Caldera, the sandy island map of bunkers and palm trees in Call Of Duty: Warzone. It got shut down last year as Activision focused their efforts elsewhere, making the map unplayable. But you can now revisit those bullet-strewn beaches. In theory, anyway. Activision have released it as a 4GB open-source project that can be explored in a 3D model-viewing tool. That's cool. But among their reasons for doing so, there lies a predictably grubby logic: they want people to use the data to train AI.

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  • ✇Rock Paper Shotgun Latest Articles Feed
  • Grassy green JRPG Visions Of Mana gets free demo a month ahead of releaseBrendan Caldwell
    As the first Something Of Mana game to come out in 15 years, Visions Of Mana is bound to be exciting some of you out there. Well, funnel all that anticipation into your mouse-clicking finger, because developers Square Enix have just put up a playable demo of the bright JRPG on Steam. I'm not sure how much the demo offers, as we're only told it includes "a section of the story, battles and exploration." But that's better than nothing, and with a full month before release, you have plenty of time
     

Grassy green JRPG Visions Of Mana gets free demo a month ahead of release

As the first Something Of Mana game to come out in 15 years, Visions Of Mana is bound to be exciting some of you out there. Well, funnel all that anticipation into your mouse-clicking finger, because developers Square Enix have just put up a playable demo of the bright JRPG on Steam. I'm not sure how much the demo offers, as we're only told it includes "a section of the story, battles and exploration." But that's better than nothing, and with a full month before release, you have plenty of time to scope it out.

Read more

Mortal Kombat 1 will get the T-1000, Conan, and the Scream guy alongside a new story expansion

The story of Mortal Kombat games in recent years has been a mish-mash of double-crosses, weird friendships, and alternate dimension wobbles. They often feel like a casualty of Marvel movie bloat. Mortal Kombat 1 was marketed as a "reboot", for example, but is really just a continuation of previous nonsense, with developers NetherRealm saying "I don't know, stick a multiverse in it." Yet from that multiverse now arrives another bad guy, bringing new story chapters for the fighting game's first big expansion, as well as extra characters like the liquid metal murderer from Terminator 2, a Conan of the barbarian persuasion, and the masked killer of the Scream movies.

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Final update to Morrowind-like RPG Dread Delusion adds a big nautilus with a town built inside its shell

In a recent interview, the director of The Elder Scrolls Online said that if you made Morrowind today, it would struggle to find an audience. "If you play that right now," he said, "there is no compass, no map, literally the quests are like 'go to the third tree on the right and walk 50 paces west'... And if you did that now, no one would play it. Very few people would play it." Well sir, have you heard of a little open world RPG called Dread Delusion? It's pretty good. And what's more, it has just added a whole new area with - let me see - a giant floating squid creature with an entire town of citizens living inside its shell.

Read more

Zombie survival game 7 Days To Die version 1.0 is out now after 11 years in early access

I don't know what the longest-running early access game in history has been (perhaps Project Zomboid?) but I know that zombie survival game 7 Days To Die is definitely up there. We first reported its appearance back in the dark ages of 2013. For context, that was the year Grand Theft Auto V came out. Whoa! Okay, calm down, sorry, I didn't mean to panic you. Yes, the arrow of time is inviolable. We are all marching steadily towards our graves, I know. But at least now 7 Days To Die has finally released its fully baked version 1.0.

Read more

Legacy Of Kain: Soul Reaver I & II remasters on horizon, if a Comic-Con plaque is to be believed

It looks like the Legacy Of Kain: Soul Reaver games could be getting the remaster treatment. An attendee at San Diego Comic-Con was looking at a set of figures based on characters from the series when they saw that the plaque accompanying the figures was labelled with the words "Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver 1 & 2 Remastered" alongside the logo for Crystal Dynamics. I suppose if you throw a coin enough times, one day it will land on the side with the head of a jawless vampire on it.

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  • The 10 best immersive sims on PCBrendan Caldwell
    The immersive sim has seen a revival in recent years. Not only from larger studios like Arkane, keeping the faith alive with their time loops and space stations, but also from a bunch of smaller developers bravely exploring a typically ambitious genre. RPS has always had an affinity for these systemically luxuriant simulations, historically lauding the likes of the original Deus Ex as the best game ever made. But given everything that has come since, is that still the case? Only one way to find
     

The 10 best immersive sims on PC

The immersive sim has seen a revival in recent years. Not only from larger studios like Arkane, keeping the faith alive with their time loops and space stations, but also from a bunch of smaller developers bravely exploring a typically ambitious genre. RPS has always had an affinity for these systemically luxuriant simulations, historically lauding the likes of the original Deus Ex as the best game ever made. But given everything that has come since, is that still the case? Only one way to find out: make a big list.

Read more

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  • World Of Goo 2 review: an inventive return to goo with some flies in the ointmentBrendan Caldwell
    The first World Of Goo was a cheerful parade of goopy engineering with a sense of never-ending novelty (well, never-ending for about four hours). Every level would introduce a new goo type or a twist on the basic bridge-building puzzle that challenged you to get a gaggle of gurgling balls to the nearest pipe. World Of Goo 2 pursues that sense of novelty with just as much twitchy eagerness as its predecessor, throwing new toys and goos at the player in an effort to keep you on your sludge-coate
     

World Of Goo 2 review: an inventive return to goo with some flies in the ointment

2. Srpen 2024 v 18:00

The first World Of Goo was a cheerful parade of goopy engineering with a sense of never-ending novelty (well, never-ending for about four hours). Every level would introduce a new goo type or a twist on the basic bridge-building puzzle that challenged you to get a gaggle of gurgling balls to the nearest pipe. World Of Goo 2 pursues that sense of novelty with just as much twitchy eagerness as its predecessor, throwing new toys and goos at the player in an effort to keep you on your sludge-coated toes. That pursuit doesn't always result in pleasing new levels, though. There is a "hit and miss" feeling to things this time around. But those hits are hits. For anyone who has spent the last 16 years yearning for more sticky structure-building: I hope you like comically unpredictable fluids.

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The twisted animals of horror zookeeping sim Zoochosis will be released from their cages in autumn

Animal caretaking sim Zoochosis is about being an ordinary zookeeper working in an ordinary zoo. What's that? There are no ordinary zoos? My mistake. Let me start again. Animal caretaking horror game Zoochosis is about being a stressed-out zookeeper in a hideous zoo where the giraffes have tendrils coming out of their chests and the kangaroos have rows of chattering teeth in their marsupial pouch. There, got it right in the end. We've known about the development of this terror-heavy tourist attraction since its announcement early this year. But now the upcoming horror sim has been given an autumn release date in a new trailer.

Read more

The Sims 4 now lets you set how jealous Sims will get when they catch their partner flirting

The latest free update to The Sims 4 will let you "define the conditions under which your Sims become jealous". That's handy. The new feature, called "Romantic Boundaries", will give you some settings to tweak that determine whether a Sim will be bothered when they see their partner flirting with the neighbour, or kissing the neighbour, or getting into bed with the neighbour, or becoming a blur of obscene pixels with the neighb- okay Cindy, stop! I'm not comfortable with this. When I said we could open up I didn't mean with Nigel.

Read more

Activision revive Warzone's Caldera map as open source (yay!) but say it's to help train AI (booo)

1. Srpen 2024 v 15:52

Hardened battle royalists will remember Caldera, the sandy island map of bunkers and palm trees in Call Of Duty: Warzone. It got shut down last year as Activision focused their efforts elsewhere, making the map unplayable. But you can now revisit those bullet-strewn beaches. In theory, anyway. Activision have released it as a 4GB open-source project that can be explored in a 3D model-viewing tool. That's cool. But among their reasons for doing so, there lies a predictably grubby logic: they want people to use the data to train AI.

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Stretcher Men is a comedy game about carrying a dying man across the hills without dropping him

A glance at comedy medieval medic sim Stretcher Men might have you believe it is a co-op game about co-ordination and teamwork. Not so! It's a singleplayer game in which you control not one but both carriers of a stretcher. You have to ferry a sick man over the hilly countryside, past muddy lake banks and over snowy mountains, all without dropping him on the ground. I can only imagine it controls a bit like Brothers: A Tale Of Two Sons, but with added ragdoll jollity. We'll know next week, when it releases on Steam.

Read more

Large catfish spotted chasing tiny little man around in Japanese folklore game, is terrifying, wonderful

One of the most memorable moments of Metro Exodus comes from a standoff with a giant catfish, who you have to avoid for a while (along with the cultists who worship it) before going "fishing" using an entire human corpse as bait. I didn't expect to see any rival catfish appearing in games after that, but now that I think about it - why not? They're a naturally freaky animal, perfect video game antagonists. And the developers of upcoming Japanese folklore 'em up Otoshi No Shima seem to understand this, having created a monstrous creature with a gaping mouth that follows the player at every turn. Come see.

Read more

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  • Heihachi rises from the dead as Tekken 8's third character DLCBrendan Caldwell
    Heihachi Mishima, the mustachioed malevolence of the Tekken series, is going to be the next DLC character for Tekken 8. He was last seen with his loving son Kazuya, who threw him into a volcano. Of course, to be fully submerged in impossibly hot liquid rock is merely a long-running family prank for the cast of this 3D fighting game, sort of like forcing your granddad to do the ice bucket challenge, but with lava. Nobody truly expected the horn-haired headbutter to be fully removed from the seri
     

Heihachi rises from the dead as Tekken 8's third character DLC

Heihachi Mishima, the mustachioed malevolence of the Tekken series, is going to be the next DLC character for Tekken 8. He was last seen with his loving son Kazuya, who threw him into a volcano. Of course, to be fully submerged in impossibly hot liquid rock is merely a long-running family prank for the cast of this 3D fighting game, sort of like forcing your granddad to do the ice bucket challenge, but with lava. Nobody truly expected the horn-haired headbutter to be fully removed from the series. But I am a little surprised to see him back so soon.

Read more

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  • Grassy green JRPG Visions Of Mana gets free demo a month ahead of releaseBrendan Caldwell
    As the first Something Of Mana game to come out in 15 years, Visions Of Mana is bound to be exciting some of you out there. Well, funnel all that anticipation into your mouse-clicking finger, because developers Square Enix have just put up a playable demo of the bright JRPG on Steam. I'm not sure how much the demo offers, as we're only told it includes "a section of the story, battles and exploration." But that's better than nothing, and with a full month before release, you have plenty of time
     

Grassy green JRPG Visions Of Mana gets free demo a month ahead of release

30. Červenec 2024 v 12:09

As the first Something Of Mana game to come out in 15 years, Visions Of Mana is bound to be exciting some of you out there. Well, funnel all that anticipation into your mouse-clicking finger, because developers Square Enix have just put up a playable demo of the bright JRPG on Steam. I'm not sure how much the demo offers, as we're only told it includes "a section of the story, battles and exploration." But that's better than nothing, and with a full month before release, you have plenty of time to scope it out.

Read more

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  • Mortal Kombat 1 will get the T-1000, Conan, and the Scream guy alongside a new story expansionBrendan Caldwell
    The story of Mortal Kombat games in recent years has been a mish-mash of double-crosses, weird friendships, and alternate dimension wobbles. They often feel like a casualty of Marvel movie bloat. Mortal Kombat 1 was marketed as a "reboot", for example, but is really just a continuation of previous nonsense, with developers NetherRealm saying "I don't know, stick a multiverse in it." Yet from that multiverse now arrives another bad guy, bringing new story chapters for the fighting game's first b
     

Mortal Kombat 1 will get the T-1000, Conan, and the Scream guy alongside a new story expansion

29. Červenec 2024 v 12:27

The story of Mortal Kombat games in recent years has been a mish-mash of double-crosses, weird friendships, and alternate dimension wobbles. They often feel like a casualty of Marvel movie bloat. Mortal Kombat 1 was marketed as a "reboot", for example, but is really just a continuation of previous nonsense, with developers NetherRealm saying "I don't know, stick a multiverse in it." Yet from that multiverse now arrives another bad guy, bringing new story chapters for the fighting game's first big expansion, as well as extra characters like the liquid metal murderer from Terminator 2, a Conan of the barbarian persuasion, and the masked killer of the Scream movies.

Read more

Final update to Morrowind-like RPG Dread Delusion adds a big nautilus with a town built inside its shell

26. Červenec 2024 v 18:00

In a recent interview, the director of The Elder Scrolls Online said that if you made Morrowind today, it would struggle to find an audience. "If you play that right now," he said, "there is no compass, no map, literally the quests are like 'go to the third tree on the right and walk 50 paces west'... And if you did that now, no one would play it. Very few people would play it." Well sir, have you heard of a little open world RPG called Dread Delusion? It's pretty good. And what's more, it has just added a whole new area with - let me see - a giant floating squid creature with an entire town of citizens living inside its shell.

Read more

  • ✇Rock, Paper, Shotgun
  • Zombie survival game 7 Days To Die version 1.0 is out now after 11 years in early accessBrendan Caldwell
    I don't know what the longest-running early access game in history has been (perhaps Project Zomboid?) but I know that zombie survival game 7 Days To Die is definitely up there. We first reported its appearance back in the dark ages of 2013. For context, that was the year Grand Theft Auto V came out. Whoa! Okay, calm down, sorry, I didn't mean to panic you. Yes, the arrow of time is inviolable. We are all marching steadily towards our graves, I know. But at least now 7 Days To Die has finally r
     

Zombie survival game 7 Days To Die version 1.0 is out now after 11 years in early access

26. Červenec 2024 v 13:09

I don't know what the longest-running early access game in history has been (perhaps Project Zomboid?) but I know that zombie survival game 7 Days To Die is definitely up there. We first reported its appearance back in the dark ages of 2013. For context, that was the year Grand Theft Auto V came out. Whoa! Okay, calm down, sorry, I didn't mean to panic you. Yes, the arrow of time is inviolable. We are all marching steadily towards our graves, I know. But at least now 7 Days To Die has finally released its fully baked version 1.0.

Read more

Legacy Of Kain: Soul Reaver I & II remasters on horizon, if a Comic-Con plaque is to be believed

26. Červenec 2024 v 11:43

It looks like the Legacy Of Kain: Soul Reaver games could be getting the remaster treatment. An attendee at San Diego Comic-Con was looking at a set of figures based on characters from the series when they saw that the plaque accompanying the figures was labelled with the words "Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver 1 & 2 Remastered" alongside the logo for Crystal Dynamics. I suppose if you throw a coin enough times, one day it will land on the side with the head of a jawless vampire on it.

Read more

  • ✇Rock, Paper, Shotgun
  • The 10 best immersive sims on PCBrendan Caldwell
    The immersive sim has seen a revival in recent years. Not only from larger studios like Arkane, keeping the faith alive with their time loops and space stations, but also from a bunch of smaller developers bravely exploring a typically ambitious genre. RPS has always had an affinity for these systemically luxuriant simulations, historically lauding the likes of the original Deus Ex as the best game ever made. But given everything that has come since, is that still the case? Only one way to find
     

The 10 best immersive sims on PC

25. Červenec 2024 v 14:26

The immersive sim has seen a revival in recent years. Not only from larger studios like Arkane, keeping the faith alive with their time loops and space stations, but also from a bunch of smaller developers bravely exploring a typically ambitious genre. RPS has always had an affinity for these systemically luxuriant simulations, historically lauding the likes of the original Deus Ex as the best game ever made. But given everything that has come since, is that still the case? Only one way to find out: make a big list.

Read more

The twisted animals of horror zookeeping sim Zoochosis will be released from their cages in autumn

25. Červenec 2024 v 13:24

Animal caretaking sim Zoochosis is about being an ordinary zookeeper working in an ordinary zoo. What's that? There are no ordinary zoos? My mistake. Let me start again. Animal caretaking horror game Zoochosis is about being a stressed-out zookeeper in a hideous zoo where the giraffes have tendrils coming out of their chests and the kangaroos have rows of chattering teeth in their marsupial pouch. There, got it right in the end. We've known about the development of this terror-heavy tourist attraction since its announcement early this year. But now the upcoming horror sim has been given an autumn release date in a new trailer.

Read more

  • ✇Rock, Paper, Shotgun
  • The Sims 4 now lets you set how jealous Sims will get when they catch their partner flirtingBrendan Caldwell
    The latest free update to The Sims 4 will let you "define the conditions under which your Sims become jealous". That's handy. The new feature, called "Romantic Boundaries", will give you some settings to tweak that determine whether a Sim will be bothered when they see their partner flirting with the neighbour, or kissing the neighbour, or getting into bed with the neighbour, or becoming a blur of obscene pixels with the neighb- okay Cindy, stop! I'm not comfortable with this. When I said we co
     

The Sims 4 now lets you set how jealous Sims will get when they catch their partner flirting

24. Červenec 2024 v 12:08

The latest free update to The Sims 4 will let you "define the conditions under which your Sims become jealous". That's handy. The new feature, called "Romantic Boundaries", will give you some settings to tweak that determine whether a Sim will be bothered when they see their partner flirting with the neighbour, or kissing the neighbour, or getting into bed with the neighbour, or becoming a blur of obscene pixels with the neighb- okay Cindy, stop! I'm not comfortable with this. When I said we could open up I didn't mean with Nigel.

Read more

Stretcher Men is a comedy game about carrying a dying man across the hills without dropping him

23. Červenec 2024 v 11:57

A glance at comedy medieval medic sim Stretcher Men might have you believe it is a co-op game about co-ordination and teamwork. Not so! It's a singleplayer game in which you control not one but both carriers of a stretcher. You have to ferry a sick man over the hilly countryside, past muddy lake banks and over snowy mountains, all without dropping him on the ground. I can only imagine it controls a bit like Brothers: A Tale Of Two Sons, but with added ragdoll jollity. We'll know next week, when it releases on Steam.

Read more

Large catfish spotted chasing tiny little man around in Japanese folklore game, is terrifying, wonderful

23. Červenec 2024 v 11:09

One of the most memorable moments of Metro Exodus comes from a standoff with a giant catfish, who you have to avoid for a while (along with the cultists who worship it) before going "fishing" using an entire human corpse as bait. I didn't expect to see any rival catfish appearing in games after that, but now that I think about it - why not? They're a naturally freaky animal, perfect video game antagonists. And the developers of upcoming Japanese folklore 'em up Otoshi No Shima seem to understand this, having created a monstrous creature with a gaping mouth that follows the player at every turn. Come see.

Read more

  • ✇Rock, Paper, Shotgun
  • Heihachi rises from the dead as Tekken 8's third character DLCBrendan Caldwell
    Heihachi Mishima, the mustachioed malevolence of the Tekken series, is going to be the next DLC character for Tekken 8. He was last seen with his loving son Kazuya, who threw him into a volcano. Of course, to be fully submerged in impossibly hot liquid rock is merely a long-running family prank for the cast of this 3D fighting game, sort of like forcing your granddad to do the ice bucket challenge, but with lava. Nobody truly expected the horn-haired headbutter to be fully removed from the seri
     

Heihachi rises from the dead as Tekken 8's third character DLC

22. Červenec 2024 v 11:59

Heihachi Mishima, the mustachioed malevolence of the Tekken series, is going to be the next DLC character for Tekken 8. He was last seen with his loving son Kazuya, who threw him into a volcano. Of course, to be fully submerged in impossibly hot liquid rock is merely a long-running family prank for the cast of this 3D fighting game, sort of like forcing your granddad to do the ice bucket challenge, but with lava. Nobody truly expected the horn-haired headbutter to be fully removed from the series. But I am a little surprised to see him back so soon.

Read more

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  • Glittering cyberpunk life sim Nivalis has been delayed until 2025Brendan Caldwell
    When the makers of Cloudpunk revealed their next game would be set in the same cyberpunk city as their sci-fi delivery sim, my ears were pricked. When they showed you'd be running a noodle bar and fishing in the slums instead of flying a hovercar around, I went into full wishlisty mode. Nivalis (named for the cyberpunk city in question) was due to come to PC some time this year. But plans have changed. If, like me, you're intrigued by the promise of a life under a neon canopy, you might have to
     

Glittering cyberpunk life sim Nivalis has been delayed until 2025

21. Červen 2024 v 12:15

When the makers of Cloudpunk revealed their next game would be set in the same cyberpunk city as their sci-fi delivery sim, my ears were pricked. When they showed you'd be running a noodle bar and fishing in the slums instead of flying a hovercar around, I went into full wishlisty mode. Nivalis (named for the cyberpunk city in question) was due to come to PC some time this year. But plans have changed. If, like me, you're intrigued by the promise of a life under a neon canopy, you might have to wait. The release date has been pushed into next year. As compensation, here, the creators have put out another trailer to remind you what's coming.

Read more

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  • The 19 best roguelike games on PC in 2024Brendan Caldwell
    Chaos and comedy. Death and rebirth. Luck and, uh, running out of luck. A good roguelike doesn't treat the player like other games do. Roguelikes won't guide you helpfully along a path, or let you cinematically snatch victory from the jaws of defeat. They're more likely to dangle you deep between the jaws of defeat and fumble the rope until you go sliding down defeat's hungry gullet. This is their beauty, and it's a part of why we keep coming back for another go. Next time everything will go ri
     

The 19 best roguelike games on PC in 2024

20. Červen 2024 v 16:20

Chaos and comedy. Death and rebirth. Luck and, uh, running out of luck. A good roguelike doesn't treat the player like other games do. Roguelikes won't guide you helpfully along a path, or let you cinematically snatch victory from the jaws of defeat. They're more likely to dangle you deep between the jaws of defeat and fumble the rope until you go sliding down defeat's hungry gullet. This is their beauty, and it's a part of why we keep coming back for another go. Next time everything will go right. Next time you'll find the right pair of poison-proof loafers, the perfect co-pilot for your spaceship, a stash of stronger, better ropes. Next time.

Here's our list of the 19 best roguelikes on PC you can play in 2024.

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  • The existential dread of horror game Soma has been manifested in a plushieBrendan Caldwell
    The sinking terror that comes of having no fixed identity and being trapped alone thousands of metres beneath the ocean has been compacted into the soft, comforting (?) form of a plushie. Frictional Games, the creators of first-person horror game Soma, launched the soft toy depiction of the game's protagonist Simon on Makeship, aka Kickstarter for plushies. Normally, we don't report on merch - why would we? - but there is something deeply and darkly funny about making a fleece-coated fuzzy hugg
     

The existential dread of horror game Soma has been manifested in a plushie

20. Červen 2024 v 12:39

The sinking terror that comes of having no fixed identity and being trapped alone thousands of metres beneath the ocean has been compacted into the soft, comforting (?) form of a plushie. Frictional Games, the creators of first-person horror game Soma, launched the soft toy depiction of the game's protagonist Simon on Makeship, aka Kickstarter for plushies. Normally, we don't report on merch - why would we? - but there is something deeply and darkly funny about making a fleece-coated fuzzy huggy wuggy about the psychologically harrowing experience of being forgotten under the sea. Then again, Frictional Games are not the first to do this sort of thing.

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  • You can turn on Scottish slang in the subtitles, reminds Still Wakes The Deep developerBrendan Caldwell
    When I wrote our Still Wakes The Deep review I mentioned the true-to-life Scottish slang used by the oil rig workers of this North Sea horror. It was wonderful, but all these slang terms were being translated in the subtitles for some reason. "Gobshite" became "bastard". The "polis" were localised as the "police". And every "yersel" sneering out of the machismo-ridden workers became "yourself". Well, turns out that's the result of the game defaulting to "International English" for its captions.
     

You can turn on Scottish slang in the subtitles, reminds Still Wakes The Deep developer

19. Červen 2024 v 12:37

When I wrote our Still Wakes The Deep review I mentioned the true-to-life Scottish slang used by the oil rig workers of this North Sea horror. It was wonderful, but all these slang terms were being translated in the subtitles for some reason. "Gobshite" became "bastard". The "polis" were localised as the "police". And every "yersel" sneering out of the machismo-ridden workers became "yourself". Well, turns out that's the result of the game defaulting to "International English" for its captions. But if you want to immerse yourself in Scottish vernacular as deeply as protagonist Caz McCleary immerses himself in hazardous chemical spills, good news. There's another option, says one of the game's developers.

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  • The Habbos return in Habbo Hotel: Origins, a relaunch of the 2000s chatroom gameBrendan Caldwell
    You forgot about Habbo Hotel, didn't you? Habbo Hotel. With those words and the above image, it is possible I have sent a shocking dose of neurochemical nostalgia through your brain and into your various internal organs. Your vision blurs. You sweat. You are 12 years old again, frightened and intrigued at the idea of graduating to teenhood, bathing in the cool glow of a cream-coloured CRT computer monitor. "Habbo Hotel is back!" is what I might shout if I did not know better, snapping you back
     

The Habbos return in Habbo Hotel: Origins, a relaunch of the 2000s chatroom game

18. Červen 2024 v 11:53

You forgot about Habbo Hotel, didn't you? Habbo Hotel. With those words and the above image, it is possible I have sent a shocking dose of neurochemical nostalgia through your brain and into your various internal organs. Your vision blurs. You sweat. You are 12 years old again, frightened and intrigued at the idea of graduating to teenhood, bathing in the cool glow of a cream-coloured CRT computer monitor. "Habbo Hotel is back!" is what I might shout if I did not know better, snapping you back to the present day in an act of psychological whiplash. The truth is the pixellated hangout zone of the early 2000s never went away. It has been alive this whole time. You forgot about the Hotel. But the Hotel did not forget about you.

Today, developers Sulake are doing something to jog your memory. They are calling it Habbo Hotel: Origins. I ask you to think carefully before you go there.

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  • Still Wakes The Deep review: soaked in sea horror and shiveringly good voice actingBrendan Caldwell
    Scottish petrochemical horror is not exactly a genre, but maybe it ought to be. From the opening moments of Still Wakes The Deep you know life on its 1970s North Sea oil rig is precarious. Leaky ceilings, busted panelling, faulty drill machinery - the omens pile up as you spend your first thirty minutes wandering through the colleague-packed canteen and over the platform into the boss' office for a severe dressing-down. It's a classic pre-disaster setup for a mostly traditional monster story,
     

Still Wakes The Deep review: soaked in sea horror and shiveringly good voice acting

17. Červen 2024 v 15:06

Scottish petrochemical horror is not exactly a genre, but maybe it ought to be. From the opening moments of Still Wakes The Deep you know life on its 1970s North Sea oil rig is precarious. Leaky ceilings, busted panelling, faulty drill machinery - the omens pile up as you spend your first thirty minutes wandering through the colleague-packed canteen and over the platform into the boss' office for a severe dressing-down. It's a classic pre-disaster setup for a mostly traditional monster story, yet the game sticks expertly to the first-person horror form, and its voice actors' performances are so spot-on, that it'd feel churlish to judge this foaming fear simulator for sticking to type. It also has some markedly unsettling use of the shipping forecast, a famously dull feature of British radio I definitely did not expect to freak me out in a video game.

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  • The Kingdom Hearts games are now out on Steam, don't ask me to explain themBrendan Caldwell
    The impenetrable wall of crossover fiction known as Kingdom Hearts has come to Steam. The games have been on Epic Games Store since 2021, so they're not new to PC folk. But this does open them up to players who shy away from Epic's storefront. I use the term "open up" loosely, because Kingdom Hearts is popularly regarded as a tangle of criss-crossing JRPG confuse-o-plots that require diagrams and multiple explainer videos to follow. I don't know if that's true, having never followed Alice down
     

The Kingdom Hearts games are now out on Steam, don't ask me to explain them

14. Červen 2024 v 12:20

The impenetrable wall of crossover fiction known as Kingdom Hearts has come to Steam. The games have been on Epic Games Store since 2021, so they're not new to PC folk. But this does open them up to players who shy away from Epic's storefront. I use the term "open up" loosely, because Kingdom Hearts is popularly regarded as a tangle of criss-crossing JRPG confuse-o-plots that require diagrams and multiple explainer videos to follow. I don't know if that's true, having never followed Alice down this Buster Sword-shaped rabbit hole, but it is the popular joke. And, looking into Goofy's cold, dead eyes, I find I am afraid to question it.

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  • After 10 years in early access, 7 Days To Die finally has a release date for version 1.0Brendan Caldwell
    Ten years ago, we were drowning in early access survival games about chopping trees and crafting camp fires. Rust pit monstrous players against one another, DayZ had us dashing around for beans and bleach, while The Forest creeped us the hell out in a dark jungle. There was even a week-long celebration here at RPS called survival week to get the genre out of our systems. A lot of those games have since graduated to a full 1.0 release, but one survivalist shambled on. 7 Days To Die is a solid sa
     

After 10 years in early access, 7 Days To Die finally has a release date for version 1.0

13. Červen 2024 v 15:46

Ten years ago, we were drowning in early access survival games about chopping trees and crafting camp fires. Rust pit monstrous players against one another, DayZ had us dashing around for beans and bleach, while The Forest creeped us the hell out in a dark jungle. There was even a week-long celebration here at RPS called survival week to get the genre out of our systems. A lot of those games have since graduated to a full 1.0 release, but one survivalist shambled on. 7 Days To Die is a solid sandbox craft 'em up with zombie hordes, and it never left the comfort of its early access log cabin surrounded by spikes and land mines. But a (tentative) release date is finally on the horizon, according to the developers. And it's quite soon.

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  • Our 9 favourite demos from the summer Steam Next FestBrendan Caldwell
    Excuse me, sorry, pardon me, can I just, thank you, ah, sorry, thanks... Phew, made it. Steam Next Fest is pretty crowded, eh? As if the unholy swarm of trailers and game announcements from Summer Game Fest was not enough, this week the fearful megalords at Valve decided to drop their regular cavalcade of coming-soons onto their megastore. The beautiful (and terrifying) thing about Next Fest, of course, is the overwhelming number of demos that come out during the event. A small herd of video g
     

Our 9 favourite demos from the summer Steam Next Fest

13. Červen 2024 v 11:49

Excuse me, sorry, pardon me, can I just, thank you, ah, sorry, thanks... Phew, made it. Steam Next Fest is pretty crowded, eh? As if the unholy swarm of trailers and game announcements from Summer Game Fest was not enough, this week the fearful megalords at Valve decided to drop their regular cavalcade of coming-soons onto their megastore. The beautiful (and terrifying) thing about Next Fest, of course, is the overwhelming number of demos that come out during the event. A small herd of video games are standing on my toes as we speak. But that's okay, we are expert curators. Here's a handy list of our nine favourite demos of the lot.

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  • Can you guess which Australian TV sci-fi of the early 2000s inspired Citizen Sleeper 2?Brendan Caldwell
    No, it's not Silversun. Sit down, Brian. Let somebody else have a go at answering. Citizen Sleeper 2: Starward Vector is a sci-fi RPG with plenty of dice and a heavy nod towards tabletop role-playing. The first Citizen Sleeper saw your bio-robotic protagonist landing on a donut-shaped space station where they learned to make a new life for themselves among interstellar farmers and ramen-serving rapscallions. In the sequel, a demo of which I've played [smug face], the hook is a little different.
     

Can you guess which Australian TV sci-fi of the early 2000s inspired Citizen Sleeper 2?

12. Červen 2024 v 15:00

No, it's not Silversun. Sit down, Brian. Let somebody else have a go at answering. Citizen Sleeper 2: Starward Vector is a sci-fi RPG with plenty of dice and a heavy nod towards tabletop role-playing. The first Citizen Sleeper saw your bio-robotic protagonist landing on a donut-shaped space station where they learned to make a new life for themselves among interstellar farmers and ramen-serving rapscallions. In the sequel, a demo of which I've played [smug face], the hook is a little different. This time you're being pursued across a bunch of backwater truck stops, colonies, depots, and derelicts. All the while your misfit crew will clash and commingle. You still haven't got it, have you? Ugh. I suppose I'll let the game's designer tell you then.

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  • Glittering cyberpunk life sim Nivalis has been delayed until 2025Brendan Caldwell
    When the makers of Cloudpunk revealed their next game would be set in the same cyberpunk city as their sci-fi delivery sim, my ears were pricked. When they showed you'd be running a noodle bar and fishing in the slums instead of flying a hovercar around, I went into full wishlisty mode. Nivalis (named for the cyberpunk city in question) was due to come to PC some time this year. But plans have changed. If, like me, you're intrigued by the promise of a life under a neon canopy, you might have to
     

Glittering cyberpunk life sim Nivalis has been delayed until 2025

When the makers of Cloudpunk revealed their next game would be set in the same cyberpunk city as their sci-fi delivery sim, my ears were pricked. When they showed you'd be running a noodle bar and fishing in the slums instead of flying a hovercar around, I went into full wishlisty mode. Nivalis (named for the cyberpunk city in question) was due to come to PC some time this year. But plans have changed. If, like me, you're intrigued by the promise of a life under a neon canopy, you might have to wait. The release date has been pushed into next year. As compensation, here, the creators have put out another trailer to remind you what's coming.

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  • The 19 best roguelike games on PC in 2024Brendan Caldwell
    Chaos and comedy. Death and rebirth. Luck and, uh, running out of luck. A good roguelike doesn't treat the player like other games do. Roguelikes won't guide you helpfully along a path, or let you cinematically snatch victory from the jaws of defeat. They're more likely to dangle you deep between the jaws of defeat and fumble the rope until you go sliding down defeat's hungry gullet. This is their beauty, and it's a part of why we keep coming back for another go. Next time everything will go ri
     

The 19 best roguelike games on PC in 2024

Chaos and comedy. Death and rebirth. Luck and, uh, running out of luck. A good roguelike doesn't treat the player like other games do. Roguelikes won't guide you helpfully along a path, or let you cinematically snatch victory from the jaws of defeat. They're more likely to dangle you deep between the jaws of defeat and fumble the rope until you go sliding down defeat's hungry gullet. This is their beauty, and it's a part of why we keep coming back for another go. Next time everything will go right. Next time you'll find the right pair of poison-proof loafers, the perfect co-pilot for your spaceship, a stash of stronger, better ropes. Next time.

Here's our list of the 19 best roguelikes on PC you can play in 2024.

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  • The existential dread of horror game Soma has been manifested in a plushieBrendan Caldwell
    The sinking terror that comes of having no fixed identity and being trapped alone thousands of metres beneath the ocean has been compacted into the soft, comforting (?) form of a plushie. Frictional Games, the creators of first-person horror game Soma, launched the soft toy depiction of the game's protagonist Simon on Makeship, aka Kickstarter for plushies. Normally, we don't report on merch - why would we? - but there is something deeply and darkly funny about making a fleece-coated fuzzy hugg
     

The existential dread of horror game Soma has been manifested in a plushie

The sinking terror that comes of having no fixed identity and being trapped alone thousands of metres beneath the ocean has been compacted into the soft, comforting (?) form of a plushie. Frictional Games, the creators of first-person horror game Soma, launched the soft toy depiction of the game's protagonist Simon on Makeship, aka Kickstarter for plushies. Normally, we don't report on merch - why would we? - but there is something deeply and darkly funny about making a fleece-coated fuzzy huggy wuggy about the psychologically harrowing experience of being forgotten under the sea. Then again, Frictional Games are not the first to do this sort of thing.

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You can turn on Scottish slang in the subtitles, reminds Still Wakes The Deep developer

When I wrote our Still Wakes The Deep review I mentioned the true-to-life Scottish slang used by the oil rig workers of this North Sea horror. It was wonderful, but all these slang terms were being translated in the subtitles for some reason. "Gobshite" became "bastard". The "polis" were localised as the "police". And every "yersel" sneering out of the machismo-ridden workers became "yourself". Well, turns out that's the result of the game defaulting to "International English" for its captions. But if you want to immerse yourself in Scottish vernacular as deeply as protagonist Caz McCleary immerses himself in hazardous chemical spills, good news. There's another option, says one of the game's developers.

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The Habbos return in Habbo Hotel: Origins, a relaunch of the 2000s chatroom game

You forgot about Habbo Hotel, didn't you? Habbo Hotel. With those words and the above image, it is possible I have sent a shocking dose of neurochemical nostalgia through your brain and into your various internal organs. Your vision blurs. You sweat. You are 12 years old again, frightened and intrigued at the idea of graduating to teenhood, bathing in the cool glow of a cream-coloured CRT computer monitor. "Habbo Hotel is back!" is what I might shout if I did not know better, snapping you back to the present day in an act of psychological whiplash. The truth is the pixellated hangout zone of the early 2000s never went away. It has been alive this whole time. You forgot about the Hotel. But the Hotel did not forget about you.

Today, developers Sulake are doing something to jog your memory. They are calling it Habbo Hotel: Origins. I ask you to think carefully before you go there.

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Still Wakes The Deep review: soaked in sea horror and shiveringly good voice acting

Scottish petrochemical horror is not exactly a genre, but maybe it ought to be. From the opening moments of Still Wakes The Deep you know life on its 1970s North Sea oil rig is precarious. Leaky ceilings, busted panelling, faulty drill machinery - the omens pile up as you spend your first thirty minutes wandering through the colleague-packed canteen and over the platform into the boss' office for a severe dressing-down. It's a classic pre-disaster setup for a mostly traditional monster story, yet the game sticks expertly to the first-person horror form, and its voice actors' performances are so spot-on, that it'd feel churlish to judge this foaming fear simulator for sticking to type. It also has some markedly unsettling use of the shipping forecast, a famously dull feature of British radio I definitely did not expect to freak me out in a video game.

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The Kingdom Hearts games are now out on Steam, don't ask me to explain them

The impenetrable wall of crossover fiction known as Kingdom Hearts has come to Steam. The games have been on Epic Games Store since 2021, so they're not new to PC folk. But this does open them up to players who shy away from Epic's storefront. I use the term "open up" loosely, because Kingdom Hearts is popularly regarded as a tangle of criss-crossing JRPG confuse-o-plots that require diagrams and multiple explainer videos to follow. I don't know if that's true, having never followed Alice down this Buster Sword-shaped rabbit hole, but it is the popular joke. And, looking into Goofy's cold, dead eyes, I find I am afraid to question it.

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After 10 years in early access, 7 Days To Die finally has a release date for version 1.0

Ten years ago, we were drowning in early access survival games about chopping trees and crafting camp fires. Rust pit monstrous players against one another, DayZ had us dashing around for beans and bleach, while The Forest creeped us the hell out in a dark jungle. There was even a week-long celebration here at RPS called survival week to get the genre out of our systems. A lot of those games have since graduated to a full 1.0 release, but one survivalist shambled on. 7 Days To Die is a solid sandbox craft 'em up with zombie hordes, and it never left the comfort of its early access log cabin surrounded by spikes and land mines. But a (tentative) release date is finally on the horizon, according to the developers. And it's quite soon.

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  • Our 9 favourite demos from the summer Steam Next FestBrendan Caldwell
    Excuse me, sorry, pardon me, can I just, thank you, ah, sorry, thanks... Phew, made it. Steam Next Fest is pretty crowded, eh? As if the unholy swarm of trailers and game announcements from Summer Game Fest was not enough, this week the fearful megalords at Valve decided to drop their regular cavalcade of coming-soons onto their megastore. The beautiful (and terrifying) thing about Next Fest, of course, is the overwhelming number of demos that come out during the event. A small herd of video g
     

Our 9 favourite demos from the summer Steam Next Fest

Excuse me, sorry, pardon me, can I just, thank you, ah, sorry, thanks... Phew, made it. Steam Next Fest is pretty crowded, eh? As if the unholy swarm of trailers and game announcements from Summer Game Fest was not enough, this week the fearful megalords at Valve decided to drop their regular cavalcade of coming-soons onto their megastore. The beautiful (and terrifying) thing about Next Fest, of course, is the overwhelming number of demos that come out during the event. A small herd of video games are standing on my toes as we speak. But that's okay, we are expert curators. Here's a handy list of our nine favourite demos of the lot.

Read more

Can you guess which Australian TV sci-fi of the early 2000s inspired Citizen Sleeper 2?

No, it's not Silversun. Sit down, Brian. Let somebody else have a go at answering. Citizen Sleeper 2: Starward Vector is a sci-fi RPG with plenty of dice and a heavy nod towards tabletop role-playing. The first Citizen Sleeper saw your bio-robotic protagonist landing on a donut-shaped space station where they learned to make a new life for themselves among interstellar farmers and ramen-serving rapscallions. In the sequel, a demo of which I've played [smug face], the hook is a little different. This time you're being pursued across a bunch of backwater truck stops, colonies, depots, and derelicts. All the while your misfit crew will clash and commingle. You still haven't got it, have you? Ugh. I suppose I'll let the game's designer tell you then.

Read more

The combat in Flintlock: The Siege of Dawn feels a bit floaty, but at least its café staff have ten hands

How do you like your coffee? For those who answer: "served by a barista with ten arms wearing a mask adorned with intense scarlet lipstick", you are in luck. The multi-limbed coffee shop owner of Flintlock: The Siege of Dawn is, indeed, a reassuring sight, since they are the ones who sell the player fashionable jackets and trousers to wear while you axe enemy heads to bloody fragments. In this soon-to-sally-forth soulslike from the makers of Ashen, the creature design is a highlight. Whether it's a good souls 'em up remains to be seen. I've only played a couple of hours in the Steam Next Fest demo. But I want to make clear that, among the reservations I've collected on my murder jaunt, nothing will diminish the espresso-pumping hand-haver of the game's first café.

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Tactical Breach Wizards gets a summer release window, then throws a man through it

We continue to rummage through the debris caused by the horrendous pile-up of summer video game announcements. Among the wreckage, a release date for Tactical Breach Wizards, the funny strategy game in which you play a ragtag crew of uniformed magic-zappers clearing enemies in confined spaces. It's not XCOM, but it is XCOM-ing soon. That's about as good a joke as I can muster on a Monday morning. Don't worry, there are funnier ones in the trailer below.

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Do a drive-by shooting from the back of a bear in Streets of Rogue 2 this summer

"Deus Ex but tiny and hilarious" is how I pitch the first Streets of Rogue to people in elevators. Then I kick the elevator control panel to pieces, climb out the hatch, and cut the cord with a buzzsaw I smuggled in earlier. "It's also total chaos!" I yell, as the elevator plummets. "Ha ha ha ha ha ha!" Streets of Rogue 2 is looking similarly chaotic. But one thing has been brought to order: its release date. It's coming to early access on August 14th, while a new trailer (below) shows horse riding, flame throwing, and speed boating. My favourite moment is when a man pumps magic gas into a room full of people doing zumba, and it turns them all into giants, and they freak out and start smashing the walls in a panic.

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Boozy management sim Ale Abbey puts you in the sandals of a beer-brewing monk

The god of video games news is vengeful, for this weekend He has sent forth a flood of game announcements to wipe out any remaining game journalists from this earth. Come at me, God! What have you got? Ah. It’s Ale Abbey, a management game about brewing beer in a monastery of medieval monks, and between making craft ales the priests get tipsy on their own supply. You can’t fool me, god of game reveals, this one has been openly in the works on GameJolt for 2 years. But, yes, I suppose now that the developer is teaming up with the Northgard creators as a publisher, the people must know.

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You can play Cult of the Lamb with a friend in a local co-op update this summer

A goat or a lamb - which makes the better sacrifice? Trick question, it's neither. The best sacrifices are old rich people. In Cult of the Lamb's next update, Unholy Alliance, you can sacrifice folks with a pal. The upcoming free update will add a co-op goat character so a friend can indoctrinate and stab alongside you. The developers have shown off the two-player update amid the summer news plague that is threatening to tear entire branches off the RPS treehouse this week. "Summoned by blood and born in corruption, this wicked new ally can join the holy Lamb in local co-op," say publishers Devolver. Ah, local co-op. Not online then. I guess this is for real-life people with real-life friends and a proper real-life sofa. Well. Good for them. I'm happy for them. Couldn't be happier. Happy happy happy.

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Leery first-person reality show The Crush House steps into the limelight in August

The news panamax has come in and all the shipping containers are spilling off the deck in an uncontrollable catastrophe of trailers. Here's another: you may remember The Crush House, the colourful 90s reality show where you film the cast by day, trying to please the audience, and creep around by night, trying to investigate the unsettling true nature of the show. No? You don't remember? Well, it has been a long year. Never mind, The Crush House now has a release date. But I'm not telling you what it is until you come watch the new trailer.

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Would you look at the size of this puzzle cube in The Talos Principle 2’s upcoming expansion

Wet chunks of summer games news continue to shower down on us like an explosive blast of whale viscera. But look, this bit of news blubber is quite good. Philosophy-obsessed puzzler The Talos Principle 2 is getting a big three-part DLC expansion, and some of the environments look lush. Not least this humongous cube sticking out from the sands of a tropical island at a jaunty angle. It is called the Hexahedron, and its interior constitutes a “large, continuous puzzle cluster” that the player will navigate. As one of those dweebs who has walked around London saying “aha, brutalism” at every insignificant piece of concrete he sees, this pleases me. Come and see it up close in the trailer.

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  • Possessor(s) is a side-scroller from the folks behind Hyper Light DrifterBrendan Caldwell
    The creators of Hyper Light Drifter are not ones to rest. In the terrifying tidal wave of trailers that continually washes over us this weekend, they send word of a new game via the Devolver Direct. Possessor(s) is a side-scrolling character action game of mysterious sci-fi horror set in a "quarantined city ripped apart and flooded by an interdimensional catastrophe". This is coming on top of the already-announced Hyper Light Breaker. Please, Heart Machine, pace yourselves. I barely have time t
     

Possessor(s) is a side-scroller from the folks behind Hyper Light Drifter

The creators of Hyper Light Drifter are not ones to rest. In the terrifying tidal wave of trailers that continually washes over us this weekend, they send word of a new game via the Devolver Direct. Possessor(s) is a side-scrolling character action game of mysterious sci-fi horror set in a "quarantined city ripped apart and flooded by an interdimensional catastrophe". This is coming on top of the already-announced Hyper Light Breaker. Please, Heart Machine, pace yourselves. I barely have time to play the daily crossword.

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  • I met a money-eating axe murderer in Sorry We're Closed and now so can youBrendan Caldwell
    In Sorry We're Closed, an axe-murdering entrepreneur called Jenny is described in newspaper clippings as both a serial embezzler and as the city's "wealthiest bachelorette". Aside from being a dry reflection of tabloid reporting on women who commit crimes (bad woman! sexy, bad woman!) this is also the kind of incidental character-building you can expect in this perky, retro-styled survival horror. It plays like Silent Hill charged with the hot pink body horror of Porpentine interactive fiction
     

I met a money-eating axe murderer in Sorry We're Closed and now so can you

In Sorry We're Closed, an axe-murdering entrepreneur called Jenny is described in newspaper clippings as both a serial embezzler and as the city's "wealthiest bachelorette". Aside from being a dry reflection of tabloid reporting on women who commit crimes (bad woman! sexy, bad woman!) this is also the kind of incidental character-building you can expect in this perky, retro-styled survival horror. It plays like Silent Hill charged with the hot pink body horror of Porpentine interactive fiction. And judging by my hour of unsettled strolling through the decrepit tube station of the game's demo, it's a powerful combo.

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Hammer of the gods comes down on the weapons of Hades 2 in the roguelike's latest patch, but in a good way

Witchy roguelike Hades 2 got a fresh update yesterday that sees a bunch of weapons getting stompier, thumpier, and, yes, whompier. It's like the hammer of Hephaestus himself was put to work on the entire armory. The Moonstone Axe's heavier attacks now channel faster, for one thing, which could make the most sluggish of the weapons a little more viable. I haven't had a go at the re-jigged bashing yet myself but I trust from these patch notes it will be subtly noticeable.

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F.E.A.R.-inspired retro shooter Selaco comes out blastin', covered in early access dust

There is a time for perfect clarity in a shooter, for clean walls and clear-cut character silhouettes. But this is not it. Retro first-person gunwaltzer Selaco is a messy machine gun dash through an office exploding with glass, concrete, splinters, and sparks. The glock-toting wreckage 'em up first hit our radar when it was announced as a modern combination of F.E.A.R. and Doom, promising both the fiendish AI enemies of the former and the satisfying blasting of the latter. Well, it's out today. Bursting forth into the corporate lobby of early access with uzis akimbo, peppering the walls with angry bullets. Good, I say.

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  • A Just Cause movie is in production, with Blue Beetle director in chargeBrendan Caldwell
    Destructive third-person action game Just Cause is getting made into a movie, produced by the men behind The Fall Guy and Nobody, according to the Hollywood Reporter. This isn't the first time the over-the-top explode 'em up has been in line to get the big screen treatment. Another version spent years in development hell until the rights lapsed. But it's been picked up again by Universal, who are no strangers to turning video games into box office burger bucks (they did The Super Mario Bros. Mo
     

A Just Cause movie is in production, with Blue Beetle director in charge

Destructive third-person action game Just Cause is getting made into a movie, produced by the men behind The Fall Guy and Nobody, according to the Hollywood Reporter. This isn't the first time the over-the-top explode 'em up has been in line to get the big screen treatment. Another version spent years in development hell until the rights lapsed. But it's been picked up again by Universal, who are no strangers to turning video games into box office burger bucks (they did The Super Mario Bros. Movie). So, it might result in an actual movie this time.

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It's hard to like the heroes of Wuthering Waves when they keep soiling you with dictionary vomit

Understanding any given sentence in Wuthering Waves is like trying to discern sensible meaning from the back of a rain-bleached Doritos packet you found while cleaning your gutters. Last week, players of the character action gacha asked for more freedom to skip story scenes and dialogue. Having sunk a bunch of hours into the game, I can see why. The combat may be swish and the traversal across its rolling landscape flowing and carefree, but the lore-obsessed babble of its characters is mind-numbing. Wuthering Waves has been this month's lightning rod for hype. But it's worth dissecting what it's actually like to play.

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Kerbal Space Program 2 producer confirms mass layoffs, contradicting CEO's remarks

A producer on Kerbal Space Program 2 has confirmed that those working on the space flight sim are being laid off en masse. We already knew that the developers at Intercept Games would be losing their jobs thanks to a closure announcement from Washington State. Until remarks from Strauss Zelnick, the CEO of Take-Two Interactive, muddied the waters. Zelnick refused to acknowledge that the studio was being closed when asked by a reporter, even going so far as to claim the opposite. "We didn't shutter those studios," he told IGN. But it seems clear from one producer's testimony that Zelnick's remarks are inaccurate.

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  • Anthology of the Killer is out now, bringing murder to your doorstepBrendan Caldwell
    A whopping 1000 corpses have been found in our ongoing investigation into Anthology of the Killer, Rock Paper Shotgun can reveal. The bodies were discovered in the aforementioned murder mystery "video game", which is out now on itch.io. Following our previous reports we can confirm that exposure to the game's crime-infested city can cause severe disorientation, confusion, uncontrolled fits of laughter, and moderate enlightenment. The streets here are so dense with crime that entire apartment bl
     

Anthology of the Killer is out now, bringing murder to your doorstep

A whopping 1000 corpses have been found in our ongoing investigation into Anthology of the Killer, Rock Paper Shotgun can reveal. The bodies were discovered in the aforementioned murder mystery "video game", which is out now on itch.io. Following our previous reports we can confirm that exposure to the game's crime-infested city can cause severe disorientation, confusion, uncontrolled fits of laughter, and moderate enlightenment. The streets here are so dense with crime that entire apartment blocks must shutter at night. When Rock Paper Shotgun reported the 1000 corpses to detectives, we were told this was "normal" and "appropriate".

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Zenless Zone Zero gets a release date of July 4th, plus a trailer with lots of kicking

In the vast Wuthering Waves-shaped shadow that has descended across gaming comes an announcement from HoYoverse, publishers of quite large gacha gubbins 'em up, Genshin Impact. The studio's follow-up Zenless Zone Zero is now set to release on July 4th. For anyone who hasn't yet heard of the bright cyberpunk character action game, I guess now's your chance to look at the slick anime visuals in the new trailer below and go "hmmm", with either a songful note of eye-widening interest or the suspicious rumble of a free-to-play skeptic. Your choice.

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'Don't worry! I'm a murderer!' - award-winning comedy Anthology of the Killer is out next week

In Anthology of the Killer you do not exit the game using a pause menu. You exit it by walking down a back alley into the quavering arms of two hungry bears. This is just one of many laughs your diaphragm will endure as you navigate "the escalating adventures of a girl trying to make zines in a town of giallo-style masked serial murderers". The horror comedy already won its creators the Nuovo Award at the Independent Games Festival this year, recognition that has been a long time coming for prolific game maker Stephen "thecatamites" Gillmurphy. If you're unfamiliar with his work, you can get acquainted next week, when Anthology of the Killer gets its full release on Itch.io on May 28th. At which point you can explore its unsettling urban hell of shady corporations and cops who think they're cool. There's a trailer below.

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  • The best Alices in PC gamesBrendan Caldwell
    At RPS we like Alices. When somebody comes along with the name "Alice" you don't just say "oh hi" like some insolent rube. You nod with solemn respect and you say, "Alice". An Alice is someone you should not take lightly, nor take for granted, nor leave unmonitored. For they will destroy worlds and build better ones while you are not looking. This is dangerous and exciting. Alices are a force to be reckoned with. To treat an Alice poorly is to invite shame, dishonour, and contempt. Here are som
     

The best Alices in PC games

At RPS we like Alices. When somebody comes along with the name "Alice" you don't just say "oh hi" like some insolent rube. You nod with solemn respect and you say, "Alice". An Alice is someone you should not take lightly, nor take for granted, nor leave unmonitored. For they will destroy worlds and build better ones while you are not looking. This is dangerous and exciting. Alices are a force to be reckoned with. To treat an Alice poorly is to invite shame, dishonour, and contempt. Here are some of the best Alices in video games!

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  • Sims contender Life By You gets delayed once again, this time indefinitelyBrendan Caldwell
    The neighbourhood citizens of Life By You are positioning themselves as bright-eyed pretenders to The Sims. But in this ultimate game of keeping-up-with-the-Jones, the life sim from Paradox has slipped on a wet kitchen tile. The game has been delayed for a third time, and the developers are reluctant to set a new date for the planned release into early access. "[We] believe it is more prudent to hold off while we plan ahead," said Mattias Lilja of Paradox Interactive, "rather than committing to
     

Sims contender Life By You gets delayed once again, this time indefinitely

The neighbourhood citizens of Life By You are positioning themselves as bright-eyed pretenders to The Sims. But in this ultimate game of keeping-up-with-the-Jones, the life sim from Paradox has slipped on a wet kitchen tile. The game has been delayed for a third time, and the developers are reluctant to set a new date for the planned release into early access. "[We] believe it is more prudent to hold off while we plan ahead," said Mattias Lilja of Paradox Interactive, "rather than committing to a new date that we cannot be certain to meet."

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Prison Architect 2 is coming up for release, but it's hard to rehabilitate from years of 2D

There are management games and there are micro-management games. Prison Architect 2 is the latter. I don't mean this as an annoying thing, like when Harold from corporate starts commenting all over your document at 4.30pm on a Friday. I mean it as a distinction between those games that let you plop down a house, and others that need you to stack the bricks, install the plumbing, fit the lights, and select the wallpaper. The first Prison Architect allowed you to finesse every detail of a secure correctional facility, down to each cell and dog kennel. Unsurprisingly for a sim about prison, it encouraged obsessive control. The 3D-ified sequel isn't finished yet, but it's taking a similar approach. Maybe a little too similar.

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Captain Price seems to die in a cut ending from Modern Warfare 3, uncovered 13 years later

You remember the ending of 2011's first-person bullethoser Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, right? Everyone does! A big man kills another big man with a gun but then - then! - a third big man kills that first big man with a rope. It's dramatic stuff. Well, a data-diving enthusiast of the CoDwars has discovered a cut ending from the original trilogy's closing chapter. It's a more downbeat and mysterious finale, featuring a shadowy figure whose identity is never revealed. Also, Captain Price, the hero of the franchise and aforementioned big man number three, drops his cigar with possibly mortal implications.

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First Hades 2 patch lets you gather seed, silver and souls simultaneously

Hell-wandering roguelike Hades 2 has received its first proper patch, and it does everything the developers said it would. You now sprint faster and, significantly, you can gather more than one type of crafting resource per run (as long you've unlocked the tool that lets you gather that resource). This means Melinoë can now go fishing, dig up seeds, mine silver, and gain the trust of errant shades, all in a single night's work. There is a catch though.

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  • Ubisoft quietly cancel The Division HeartlandBrendan Caldwell
    As Ubisoft revealed Assassin's Creed Shadows they also released their earnings report for the financial year 2023-2024. Buried among the chatter of "profitable growth trajectories" and "B2B partnerships" was a brief note about looter shooter The Division Heartland. "Ubisoft has decided to stop development on The Division Heartland," it reads, "and has redeployed resources to bigger opportunities such as XDefiant and Rainbow Six." Ah, so this is the games industry equivalent of being summarily d
     

Ubisoft quietly cancel The Division Heartland

As Ubisoft revealed Assassin's Creed Shadows they also released their earnings report for the financial year 2023-2024. Buried among the chatter of "profitable growth trajectories" and "B2B partnerships" was a brief note about looter shooter The Division Heartland. "Ubisoft has decided to stop development on The Division Heartland," it reads, "and has redeployed resources to bigger opportunities such as XDefiant and Rainbow Six." Ah, so this is the games industry equivalent of being summarily dumped by text.

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Read Only Memories: Neurodiver review - a bright cyberpunk noir overdosing on easter eggs

The characters in Read Only Memories: Neurodiver are deeply into anime. They love manga and figurines and trashy movies and horror novels. The interests of the game's creators have not so much leaked into this fictional world as they have been generously pumped in with an industrial hose. Even the visual novel's loading screens take the form of those two-second intermission panels that flash up to signal an anime's commercial break, complete with random characters announcing the game's name ("Neurodiver!"). In moments like that, the passion is endearing. But in other places, it is overwhelming. Neurodiver is obsessed with media in a way that often distracted me from the bright-eyed cyberpunk story it wants to tell.

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  • Braid Anniversary Edition is out now, rewinding time approximately 15 yearsBrendan Caldwell
    Look, you've had 15 years to play that well-regarded time-bending puzzler sitting in your Steam library, staring at you this whole time. Well, now you can have another 15 years. Braid Anniversary Edition is out on Steam now, a high definition remastering of a classic indie. It got stuck in time following a few delays but it's finally defrosted now. The sharper look will appeal to pixel perfectionists, but there are also 40 new levels for serial rewinders. And - for those interested in the thoug
     

Braid Anniversary Edition is out now, rewinding time approximately 15 years

Look, you've had 15 years to play that well-regarded time-bending puzzler sitting in your Steam library, staring at you this whole time. Well, now you can have another 15 years. Braid Anniversary Edition is out on Steam now, a high definition remastering of a classic indie. It got stuck in time following a few delays but it's finally defrosted now. The sharper look will appeal to pixel perfectionists, but there are also 40 new levels for serial rewinders. And - for those interested in the thought processes of designer Jonathan Blow - a bunch of developer commentary.

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Who needs a Morrowind remake when you can explore the beautiful nightmare of Dread Delusion?

I booted up Dread Delusion and fell 30 feet to my death. This throwback first-person RPG is hazardous, and not only due to the dreamlike islands floating in the sky. My leg-snappin' plummet may be down to early access changes, causing the ground to be updated from right under my feet. Far from being a nuisance, meta-jank like this only endears me further to Dread Delusion. It is an RPG from the other side of some attic mirror, an Elder Scrolls from a parallel 2002. It has, somehow, slipped into our reality and is seeing its full release today. There are gods you can thank for this, but we dare not speak their names.

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These racing game players are 11 days into an exhausting race to climb a deadly tower

Buckle up. A bunch of players are competing to cross the finish line of a brutally difficult tower of racetracks in racing game Trackmania, with a prize pool of $30,000 waiting for the first three drivers to reach the top. The course is a huge, winding gauntlet made of pieces suspended in midair, and even expert players have fallen from their positions over 1000 times, their cars hurtling back to the bottom of the tower to start again. The top contenders are currently trying to crack a difficult spot to reach the 12th floor, at which point the course will reveal unknown territory. They seem a little tired, which is not surprising. They are 11 days into the event.

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