There are a ton of King's Field-inspired first person dungeon crawlers coming out of the indie scene these days, and I try to keep my finger on the pulse of which ones have the juice. Going off its demo, Hark the Ghoul is among that number.

The vibes are very reminiscent of 2023's killer Lunacid, but with a freaky Bloodborne gothic city instead of the older game's stately underground kingdom. Hark begins with a classic Fucked Up Little Man soulslike scenario. In life, you were some kind of anthropomorphic bug person with a bug job in a bug kingdom. In death, you have been deputized to explore, sword fight, and level up your way into setting right what has gone all freaky-deaky in bugburg.

Right away, I love how Hark the Ghoul handles character creation: You don't choose a class with mechanical differences, but one of nine backgrounds that change how NPCs react to you. For example, in my second run through, I went with the "Militiaman" background, and Hark's first merchant immediately assumed I was some kind of narc.

It seems largely aesthetic, but that's part of why I love it: A ton of work put into incidental details meant to further immerse me in the world. One bit I love: This is a game where your weapon viewmodel floats instead of having your hands visible, but your kick attack shows a little leggy whipping out. The pants and foot are unique for each character background, and that's what I'm talkin' about right there.

Speaking of that quick melee kick, Hark the Choul cribbed from the best: Arkane's Dark Messiah of Might and Magic. The kick itself doesn't do damage, but it pushes enemies back and can send Hark's many physics objects flying.

You can use this to kick enemies into pits, or kick crates into enemies for direct damage. I love that the first spell you get, rather than being a magic missile of some extraction, instead summons a rock you can then kick into your foes.

The actual sword fighting didn't light my world on fire, but the kick and spells are enough for me already, and Hark the Ghoul's trailers showcase an enticing variety of weapons, like a harpoon you can throw, stick in walls, and then use for platforming.

One other note: Hark's devs made no promises about Steam Deck support, but I decided to try it out. I was nearly at a locked 60 fps in the starting dungeon, but that plummeted to 20 fps out in the city proper. This is definitely a desktop-only experience, at least for the time being.

Hark the Ghoul is scheduled to release some time this year. You can wishlist it and check out the demo for yourself on Steam.

I've had one eye on ambitious Doom 2 mod Trench Foot for a while, though it was, admittedly, my weaker eye that requires me to wear corrective lenses. I had assumed Trench Foot was a total conversion set in the First World War, but it turns out it's much weirder than that. It basically combines World War One chic with medieval religious zealotry and a gothic ostentation that wouldn't look out of place in Warhammer 40,000.

Notionally, Trench Foot has you play as a master Templar of the one true faith known as the Canonicate, on a mission to wage "apocalyptic holy war" on the heretics who cower in the sprawling trenchworks of the wartorn nation of Cretu. With 14 unique weapons to wield and 15 enemy types to blast into ludicrous gibs, Trench Foot sounds utterly preposterous in the best way.

Unfortunately, the mod has hit numerous stumbling blocks over the course of its development. Some of these were design hurdles typical to mod making, but others were external factors such as the Doom modding's sudden sourceport shift from GZDoom to UZDoom. Developer TrenchWork has addressed these issues on several occasions. But the project has finally borne some fruit, albeit not what fans were likely expecting.

Out of the blue, TrenchWork has released a three-episode mini-campaign called Butcher's Summit, which acts as a prequel to the events that will ultimately be portrayed in the mod. Playing as a knight in the Templar order, you're tasked with eliminating a heretic surface-to-air battery dug deep into the peaks of a vast mountain range. With three maps spanning an estimated two-hour run time, the prequel features multiple weapons and "over 40 new monsters", which sounds like a lot more than was initially planned for the full mod.

In an article revealing the mini-episode, Trench Foot lead L0kken explained what's gone on. "It's no secret that the development of [Trench Foot] Chapter 1 has had its ups and downs," he writes. "During one of those slower phases of development, I decided to use the free time to begin work on a new project. I wanted to make something with a smaller scope that wouldn't require the efforts of the whole team to complete."

I took a very quick Tour of Trench Foot's opening level, and my initial impressions are that it's pretty tasty. The mod throws into the action almost immediately, with you pushing through a quasi-World War One frontline as you fight through axe-wielding cultists and deadly suicide bombers with revolvers, rifles, and your own mighty fist. The levels are large and open for a Doom-based game, with moody battlefields wreathed with fog and dusted by snow.

It seems impressive even at a fleeting glance, but L0kken is nonetheless keen to stress that Butcher's Summit "does not represent" how Chapter 1 will play. "I made a few decisions to keep the project as simple and expedient as possible," L0kken points out, adding that they opted for "A single difficulty option and kept cinematic moments to a minimum, prioritising gameplay and exploration."

Regardless, I reckon Trench Foot's prequel episode is well worth trying. You can download Butcher's Summit over on ModDB. While the mod is based upon Doom 2, it's also wholly standalone, enabling you to launch it straight from the file with no additional tinkering required.

New Blood has revealed that Ultrakill's next major addition, Hell's eighth layer of Fraud, will be added to the early access FPS next week. Fraud was initially set to release at the end of 2025, but suffered a minor last minute delay.

We don't know the exact day the update will drop, but New Blood advises fans to "Skip school. Call out sick from work," because "It's finally happening. And we're not lying."

One of the coolest things about Ultrakill is that each layer of Hell pretty much has its own art style: Lust is a dreamy metropolis, Gluttony is a Jabu Jabu's Belly-style situation, Greed is a freaky golden desert filled with the monuments of humanity, it's rad as hell.

Fraud looks like a real heater, with the unifying theme seeming to be illusion, funhouse tricks, and the sort of physics-defying spaces you can only explore in a videogame.

New Blood's early access projects⁠—Gloomwood, Fallen Aces, and Ultrakill⁠—continue to simmer like a fine gumbo. The long waits will be well-worth it in the end, I think: All three have been surprising me with their scale and ambition.

Each new update unveils new layers (figuratively, in addition to Ultrakill's literal layers of hell) of depth and complexity that genuinely excite me⁠. Gloomwood's monster transformation serum system is a great example. The feeling kinda reminds me of that point we all reached in Elden Ring in 2022 where it was like "Oh, the map keeps going? What is this game?"

Ultrakill seems the closest to a full 1.0 release, with just one more layer to go after Fraud: Treachery. On the smaller side, New Blood is also set to launch a grid-based, Grimrock-style spinoff of Dusk sometime this year, Dungeons of Dusk. Ultrakill is already a great value at $25, but you should wait to buy it if you haven't already: Fraud's launch will coincide with New Blood's customary anniversary sale from February 23 through March 2.

Battlefield 6 is pretty awesome, unless you happen to be in a jeep. The LGT (light ground transport), Battlefield 6's most plentiful vehicle, is a failure on every level.

"It is so bad at its one job—safely transporting—that it's not unusual to watch your team ignore a fleet of free jeeps and choose to hoof it across the map instead," I wrote in October 2025. "With four seats, one turret gunner, and absolutely zero protection from bullets or mines, taking a ride in Battlefield 6's sole transport car is like announcing to the entire server that five free kills are vroomin' their way soon."

Over four months later, the LGT remains as useless and undesirable as the day Battlefield 6 released. Nobody bothers using one for its intended purpose, and when the exception that proves the rule decides to brave the danger, they usually get blown to bits or bail within seconds. So when I sat down to speak with two DICE developers about Season 2, I politely demanded to know when jeeps wouldn't suck.

The short answer? DICE is aware that light vehicles are death traps, and now getting around to doing something about it.

"I'm going to take the light vehicle feedback with me to the team from you today," DICE hardware producer Kit Eklöf told PC Gamer. "But I also want to promote that there's a Battlefield Labs test coming up where we're going to test some vehicle improvements around this issue, specifically because we've heard the feedback that vehicles are death traps. We are going to try a package of vehicle improvements on Labs very soon, so keep an eye out for that."

Sounds promising, but it also stings to learn another important improvement for Battlefield 6 is, at minimum, weeks and weeks away. I can live with that, and I'm glad DICE has this Labs platform to thoroughly test stuff, but I'm going to go out on a limb and claim even a half-baked payload of buffs for the LGT pushed live tomorrow would leave it in a better place than it is now.

I hope tank buffs are part of the package too, because armored vehicles across the board behave like they're made of somewhat thick cardboard. The unbelievable number of rockets that engineers lug around these days, and the popularity of the SMG-equipped class in general, has cut the expected lifespan of even a decent tank driver to anywhere between two minutes and "exploded like a July 4th firecracker as soon as you get in."

It's rough out there for vehicles, which is a strange thing to have to say about what are supposed to be vital power weapons in Battlefield 6.