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One of the most satisfying trends in the past few years on the indie scene is the return of desktop View the full article

Earlier this year, on April 23, Kumitantei: Old-School Slaughter released its first episode to a warm reception on Steam, sitting View the full article

The new Mortal Shell 2 adaptive difficulty setting takes cues from games like Resident Evil 4 to adjust the level of challenge as you play. Read the full story on PCGamesN: A new Mortal Shell 2 update breaks soulslike tradition with an experimental adaptive difficulty View the full article

I first met Dlala Studios CEO and Game Director, Aj Grand-Scrutton, at Summer Game Fest when I previewed Disney Illusion Island a few years back. He was genuinely delightful—and likes to pretend he is a cranky old guy—and left an impression I won’t ever forget. When he reached out to me personally about Dlala Studio’s own original IP, Murals, I couldn’t say no. That he remembered me from years ago and sought me out on his own meant something and speaks to the kind of person he is. I don’t know him outside of these two encounters, but he gives off an energy that just makes you feel good. It sounds like an odd story to tell, but it is very relevant to what I am about to say about Murals, and no, it does not affect what I think of the game itself. Something that was very apparent in Disney Illusion Island was that Dlala Studios—and Aj—want people to feel good about what they are playing. That goes for any kind of player, new or veteran, old or young, pro or novice. I thought ... Read moreView the full article

Pokémon'sannual Pokémon Worlds 2026 was one for the record books, with several exciting announcements coming out of San Francisco over the course of the three-day event. This year was especially notable thanks to the debut of PokémonXP alongside the World Championships, turning the weekend into a much broader celebration of the franchise's 30th anniversary. View the full article

Like a lot of survival games, Stalker 2 had a long journey from janky larva to playable, easily recommended butterfly. It's tempting to say that these games ought to just stay under wraps until they're done and relatively bug-free—but at Gamescom 2026, GSC Game World CEO and head of game direction Ievgen Grygorovych told PC Gamer's Joshua Wolens that deciding when to release is a more complex consideration than you might think... Read more.View the full article

If you've seen any slasher flick, you know the drill: every youth is horny, and the horny must die. Despite Halloween not being quite as trope-riddled as some of its stabbiest contemporaries, its recent asymmetrical PvP adaptation did include a minigame where two players could slip into a closet and bang each other for buffs—but after only a few days in a deluxe edition-exclusive early access, the feature has reportedly been removed... Read more.View the full article

Two of gaming's most prolific vampires come together as the Baldur's Gate 3 and Blood of Dawnwalker actors discuss their biggest influences. Read the full story on PCGamesN: Baldur's Gate 3's Astarion teams up with The Blood of Dawnwalker's Coen to ponder "the ennui of immortality" View the full article

A public records request last week revealed that Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava put forward the idea of a "GTA VI × MDC" marketing collaboration to Rockstar Games in June. Read Entire Article View the full article

The system pairs the 96-core Ryzen Threadripper PRO 9995WX processor with up to four Instinct MI350P accelerators. AMD demonstrated a two-card version at IFA, while a fully configured model with four accelerators would provide 576 GB of HBM3E memory – enough, the company said, to hold a trillion-parameter model on... Read Entire Article View the full article

A new leak for the Resident Evil 4 remake has revealed that developer Capcom initially planned to connect its lore to Resident Evil Village, though it later decided to scrap the idea. The eighth installment actually features a reference to Resident Evil 4, so this detail would have served as a reciprocation that connects the two installments even further. View the full article

A brand-new game on Steam called Mariachi Legends has drawn comparisons to Metroidvania masterpieces like Dead Cells and Blasphemous, while putting its own ******** spin on the genre. Interestingly, although Mariachi Legends clearly takes inspiration from both games, its developer hopes to surpass them and establish it as the next big Metroidvania on Steam. View the full article

The most popular mod for The Blood of Dawnwalker is one that lets you take complete control of the game’s central and divisive time mechanic. View the full article

"This is Agnes." I'm gawking at the most beautifully horrifying hand-painted statue I've ever seen in my life as James Macleod, Ritual Tides creative director and CEO of developer studio Vertpaint, beams with pride. Agnes looks like a cross between a humanoid centipede, a fleshy slug with a burst rear end, and the giant baby monster from Resident Evil Village. In short, she's gorgeous. . But even without Agnes' beady yellow eyes watching expectantly from the table, Ritual Tides has been among my most-wanted upcoming horror games for years. All I know going into this preview is what was given up in its brief 2024 teaser trailer – a title, a genre, and some cryptic ink-on-paper artwork – so I'm desperate to find out what kind of nightmare awaits. Then Macleod throws a curveball: Gamescom chaos has descended and the demo build is fundamentally broken. Luckily, he has a backup plan in the form of a level design build, so I can at least get a feel for what the ex-Rockstar developer has been cooking up since shipping GTA 5 and Red Dead Redemption 2. "So," Macleod begins. "Are you a Resident Evil or Silent Hill fan?" Strange shores (Image credit: Vertpaint) Key info: Ritual Tides Developer: Vertpaint Platform(s): PC, PS5, Xbox Series X Release date: TBC Macleod opens the level build to pan across a gritty grey coastal landscape, my first introduction to the fictional town of Hortus, and I lean closer to the screen instinctively. I spot flavors of the two survival horror franchises he mentioned in each frame, because yes, I am a huge fan of both. Ritual Tides has the heavy fog-blanketed gloom of Silent Hill, the visceral, first-person immersion of Resident Evil 7 and Village, and a "super dark" narrative that had Macleod drop everything to write it. "Getting a publisher for this is really tricky – the subject matter is so bad," he tells me. "You play this woman who wakes up on a beach, and you're uncovering her past and this mysterious island history. But the more you learn, it's a horrific history – especially if you're a woman." From Silent Hill f's powerful abstraction of a woman's coming-of-age to satirical splatter flicks like The Substance, female-centric body horror is having a well-earned moment. I recall my Agnes statue in all her bloated, man-eating, afterbirth-like glory, and sense its presence in Ritual Tides, too. Having grown up with five sisters, Macleod explains how the game helped him occupy a different perspective when considering what horror, danger, and safety feels like to different people – specifically, to women versus men. "Me and my sister were walking back from the pub, and she was saying 'I can't go down that [dark alley] route'," he recalls. "And I was like, 'What do you mean?' I just walk around like a complete ******. They were talking to me about this, and I thought, 'I've got such a lovely concept for a game here'." It's the little things (Image credit: Vertpaint) Ritual Tides might be the most painstakingly detailed horror game I've seen in years Ritual Tides sounds like a horror game from a place of kinship, exploring the harsh reality shared by billions of people who don't have the luxury of feeling safe in the shadows. But in true survival horror spirit, when it comes to combat, its amnesiac heroine keeps it old-school. Macleod hands the controller to me as he steers the character onto a beach, warning me that some extra enemies might accidentally spawn into this rougher demo build. Luckily, I have a trusty melee weapon at hand – though Macleod mentions that there is indeed a durability system in this game, so my weapon won't last forever. "Running away is the call, really," Macleod says between laughs as I beat a giant hideous bug – imagine if a facehugger and a scorpion hooked up – to death with my bat. "She's not a military expert. If she's picking up a really heavy nine-pound gun, just like I would, she's not doing it with one hand." I get to experiment a little with the game's weighty weapons system in a nearby cave, and can attest to the palpable recoil of each and every shot – though I spend so much time chatting with Macleod that my session ends soon after. (Image credit: Vertpaint) Getting into that cave was most interesting to me, though. Ritual Tides features a super precise climbing mechanic involving holding down the left or right triggers to grab or let go of a handhold, adding to the oppressive, visceral gloom that punctuates each moment and makes it feel like a battle. The sparse HUD deepens that sense of immersion as Ritual Tides finds innovative ways out of some of survival horror's biggest clichés; a chalky residue left by sea salt, presumably, leaves white tips on stones and boulders as the game's answer to yellow paint. These markings indicate rocky surfaces that can be mantled up or across, but still belong to the world itself. Paired with the stunning photorealistic environmental textures, Ritual Tides might be the most painstakingly detailed horror game I've seen in years. I might not have experienced as much hands-on time with Ritual Tides as other lucky Gamescom attendees, but vibes are all I needed. Macleod's vision shines, even in a rough build that was never intended for the media's eyes. I'm eagerly awaiting the day Vertpaint see fit to unleash its final form – though as level design builds go, this one was pretty spectacular. Silent Hill Townfall's atmosphere is spot-on, but slow-burn terrors leave a tepid first impression [/url]View the full article

Dune: Awakening's new single-player mode could be a great way to experience the MMO-survival mashup's story by yourself, but don't jump in expecting a The Last of Us replacement. Developer Funcom has been hard at work translating its beloved online game into a single-player context, with a new mode coming out alongside Dune: Awakening's console release later this month. We asked chief creative officer Joel Bylos about what fans should expect from the new mode in an interview from Gamescom - and if would-be lone wolves will get what they're looking for in Arrakis. "I think if people play the game [this month] and what they're looking for is a really great survival game experience that they can play single-player, that'll be no issue," Bylos tells us. "If they expect it to be like The Last of Us, they're probably barking at the wrong tree, right? So, I think, if their expectations are correct for what kind of genre it is and what type of game it is, they'll be perfectly satisfied." The ability to journey through Funcom's adaptation of Frank Herbert's beloved novels has apparently been a long-requested feature from fans, but it's also a feature that's been quite hard to make. "Transforming a persistent, server-authoritative, open-world survival game with multiple maps into a smooth local experience is no small feat, and today, we want to talk about the technical work our team has done to enable solo survival on Arrakis," the studio wrote earlier this summer. A blog post from the studio explained a little more about everything that has to change to accommodate for solo journeys. Translating multiplayer-centric features, balancing combat or resource harvest rates, and making your machines handle the "heavy lifting" are just a few of the changes Funcom had to make for solo sand lovers. Dune: Awakening's new single-player mode fits perfectly in the MMO because of its strong story, lead says: "I think we have the best story in a survival game that exists" [/url]View the full article

Transformersfeels like the type of franchise that would be endlessly showered in video games of all shapes and sizes. It should be getting everything from easy, cash-grab mobile live-service titles to full-blown AAA experiences on PC and console. However, while the former has been somewhat true for a while now, Transformers has somehow eschewed the AAA market in favor of less-than-stellar AA and even indie-sized projects that consistently fail to deliver the high expectations fans have for the series. View the full article

Here are all the new Roblox The Veil codes that you can redeem for free race rerolls and cosmetics. Read the full story on PCGamesN: The Veil codes (September 2026) View the full article

Atlus took everything it learned from Persona 3 Reload and went all out for Persona 4 Revival, according to series producer Kazuhisa Wada. In a move that was a little controversial at the time, Persona 3 Reload actually remade the original Persona 3 rather than the expanded Persona 3 Reload release. Some content introduced in the re-release eventually made its way into Persona 3 Reload thanks to the Episode Aegis expansion (and a few unofficial mods), but things are different this time around. Persona 4 Revival is a remake of Persona 4 Golden, not base game Persona 4. So, why the change? We asked Atlus' Kazuhisa Wada about the different approach in a chat from Gamescom. He explains "there was a lot that we wanted to do" with Persona 3 Reload, but since it was the team's first go at such a substantial remake, "we weren't really sure how much we could handle." Eventually, Atlus decided to simply focus on "making the base experience just the best it can possibly be." The Episode Aegis arc was a section the team thought could come "later as something when we have the time to do it, we can give it the treatment it deserves." Things were different by the time Persona 4 Revival rolled around, Wada says. "Marie's story was so inherent to the main story of [P4 Golden] that we couldn't release it later" like the studio did with Episode Aegis. For context, the Episode Aegis expansion serves as a sort of epilogue to the base game, making it quite simple to add after launch. But Persona 4 Golden's addition of Marie is laced throughout the entire game. "So what we decided is, 'Let's take all the lessons we learned from P3R. Let's incorporate that in. All right, it's time to roll up our sleeves and it's time to go and put all the effort into making a full remake.'" Persona 4 Revival will integrate Marie more naturally than she was in Persona 4 Golden: "She needs to be here from the beginning" [/url]View the full article

Any time you look at or talk about Exodus, the upcoming space opera RPG from Archetype Entertainment, the Mass Effect comparisons start flying at light speed. I mean, Exodus narrative director Drew Karpyshyn played a major role as a writer and lead at BioWare to shape the stories of its biggest hits. In our conversation following my hands-on preview of Exodus, he told me that Mass Effect is a perfectly fine way for people to wrap their head around what this new game is. The parallels don't end with the Paladin/Immortal morality system or the romance and relationship dynamics that are going to drive the story, either. He hinted at how the decisions you make can impact Exodus' ending. Of course, that's not exclusive to BioWare games by any stretch, but when the Mass Effect 2's suicide mission is regarded as a series pinnacle, no one would blame to draw a quick comparison. When I asked about the relationship systems in Exodus, Karpyshyn emphasized wanting to make them feel real and said it's about, "[M]aking their relationship with you grow, allowing it to evolve from the choices you've made, and realizing that the choices you make are going to bring some companions closer to you, but maybe push some companions farther away." He took it one step further, and told me, "Without spoiling too much, we definitely want to have it impact how their storylines go." Then he took it another step further and concluded, "Depending on choices you make, by the end of the game, you might not have every companion with you that you started with. That's about all I can say!" Those are aspects of an RPG in this style that I would've bet on being included, but it's nice to get confirmation that Exodus is following suit. However, from our conversation it may not seem like it's entirely due to characters facing life-or-death situations. He talked at length about companions butting heads with you and being conflicted about what you say and the actions you take in key moments. He expanded on how other in-game events can factor into how the story unfolds, saying, "Even within that optional content, there are choices that will lock or unlock certain things, change the way things play out, change relationships, change characters, change… future… missions…" Hmm, smells like loyalty missions to me! Perhaps companions can reach a breaking point and leave the party entirely. And maybe their affinity toward you or the situations they face throughout the story will impact their survival in the end. We'll know for sure when Exodus launches on April 7, 2027 for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC. For more on the upcoming sci-fi RPG, be sure to check out my hands-on preview for Exodus and read my full interview with Drew Karpyshyn. Michael Higham is an editor at IGN who regularly contributes with reviews, previews, features, and news in written and video form. He's usually entrusted with covering long RPGs and tech products, but he's got range when it comes to games. You'll also catch him at events and hosting video content, including IGN's weekly podcast Unlocked. View the full article

With a six-year gap between the original Death Stranding and its 2025 sequel, it's not often the fans of the Kojima Productions franchise have something new to look forward to. That's about to change, after a brand-new Death Strandingrelease was confirmed for 2027. View the full article

We have just shipped an updated Steam Client to the Preview/Beta channel. General Fixed a case where the steamwebhelper process could experience high CPU usage when certain events were shown in the library tab. View the full article

Even after an hour spent exploring its bustling streets, I'm still not sure what Ananta is. Billed as an "open-world RPG", that descriptor does little to explain the vast hodge-podge of ideas and systems that have been crammed into this game, which in turn do little to explain how it can possibly be free-to-play given its bizarrely massive scope. A combination of anime excess and mechanics borrowed from games far more innovative than itself, Ananta stepped triumphantly out of Gamescom as the third most-wishlisted game of the show behind Warlock and The Witcher 3. But that still doesn't help explain just how many ideas it stapled together in barely 60 minutes of playtime. My demo begins with a fight between my impossibly-handsome anime protagonist, who's concealing what looks suspiciously like the Venom symbiote from Marvel's Spider-Man 2 beneath his sharp suit. A fight with a collection of goons lets me fling manhole covers at advancing enemies, stepping up to beat them silly before flipping over them with a well-timed finishing move. I'd never played Ananta before last week, but I had no problems with the controls, because they feel very similar to those from a game I first played in the last few years. Of course, Insomniac isn't the only studio with the rights to make their combat feel that way. But later I'm given the opportunity to explore the city… by swinging through it by shooting out my arms to slingshot off buildings. Once again, it's pretty easy to get to grips with. Ananta's web connects us all (Image credit: NetEase Games) Key info Developer: Naked Rain Publisher: NetEase Games Platform(s): PC, PS5, Mobile Release date: January 15, 2027 The good news is that this isn't a reskin of a Peter Parker adventure. That's because between the fight and the exploration, I get into a massive car chase. For some of that time, I'm leaning out of a window, pumping lead into the windows and tires of an unending stream of bad-guy jeeps until each one in turn careens off the motorway or into traffic. For the rest of it, I'm behind the wheel, following an increasingly small and an increasingly unlikely route of side alleys and construction sites. Both the driving and the gunplay are solid, which is a pleasant surprise given how often something has to slip in 'jack-of-all-trades' games like this. The car chase is only possible with the arrival of a second playable character, who pulls off a devilish maneuver to save my original hero that's only hindered by its even-more devilish use of jiggle physics as she wrestles with the gear stick. Once the chase is over, I'm able to swap to this second character at any point while I explore the city, zooming out before zeroing in on their location in a manner this time lifted from both Spider-Man and GTA 5. My new character is a cop, and while my first can swing through the city using the tentacles extending from his arms, my second has her own power: the ability to question and detain random passers-by. The unfortunate salaryman I stumble across flees in fear when I try to arrest him after his breathalyzer test comes back clean, and the dev watching my play-session isn't much less alarmed. (Image credit: NetEase Games) The city I'm exploring in this section of Ananta is inspired by China's massive conurbations, and it gives me a sense of what the feeling of exploring the full game might be. As well as more random goon encounters, there are gyms, cinemas, and shops to explore, hinting at a vastly immersive version of just this one map. It's the most intriguing aspect of Ananta, but I get no time to explore it in detail, because the demo then sweeps me onto an entirely different part of the game. This new section introduces new characters in a new map, with an entirely new gameplay approach. Instead of battles or exploration, it's a stealth section focused on two young sisters, and instead of taking place in a major city, I'm sneaking out of a rural temple. Not even the goons are the same – in the city I was fighting off rust-punk bad guys in leathers and Mad Max-style vehicles. Here, I'm trying to evade organized kidnappers in sharp suits and animal masks. And once I'm free, I'm dropped into an entirely new part of Ananta's open-world, this one inspired by a quiet town in the Japanese countryside, where the gyms and cinemas are replaced by fairground games and market stalls. It's very pretty, but a complete non-sequitur to the rest of the game, with no connective tissue between the two halves of the demo. (Image credit: NetEase Games) But, I feel like that's indicative of what Ananta is. An 'everything game', where so many different ideas are thrown together so quickly and eclectically that the average player simply doesn't have time to get bored of one before they move onto another. So what if the exploration and traversal systems are lifted wholesale from games you've already seen? So what if the only thing disguising that is anime art that does nothing to reinvent those systems, and simply obscures their origins instead? There's so much going on, so much of it taken all-but wholesale from other places, that Ananta barely holds together anything resembling its own identity. It's a series of ideas delivered better elsewhere, just good enough that it doesn't fall apart at the seams, but not good enough that those seams are holding together anything of any real worth. As a free-to-play spin on a world that speaks to some of the ideas contained within GTA 6, I'm sure Ananta will do very well, and its anime stylings will do enough to attract and distract an impressive audience. But, after an initial bust of interest, I'm not sure that audience will find all that much to keep them around. An-after more like this? Our games like GTA recommendations might help, and our best open world games ranking offers more huge adventures! [/url]View the full article

Back in 2006, Rare found itself at a crossroads. The developer had spent the 1990s working with Nintendo, creating some of the SNES, Game Boy, and N64's most beloved titles. In 2002, though, it was acquired by Microsoft, becoming a first-party developer for its new game console. In the transition, some of Rare's magic seemed to have been lost. None of the four games it developed in the intervening years were hits, critically or commercially, on anything like the scale of its Nintendo golden years. As such, 2006's Viva Piñata was positioned as a comeback for the studio. The game was aimed at a younger audience and was intended to be the beginning of a fully fledged franchise, complete with its own animated TV show. On these terms, the game was not the success it deserved to be – but it proved that the embers of that old Rare magic still burned bright. (Image credit: Rare) In Viva Piñata, the player is handed the deeds to a rough patch of land and tasked with turning it into a bustling garden by filling it with plants, decorations, and – the game's undisputed stars – animals. Piñatas, to be precise, of which there are 60 varieties, from Arocknid to Zumbug, to attract into your garden with the hope that they'll make it their home. This is achieved by meeting a tick list of needs for each species: the right kind of tree for them to nest in, enough water for aquatic creatures to splash around in, and the component parts of their diet. It's a gentle start to the game, but the process of winning over a piñata is truly satisfying. Spotting a new species for the first time is a treat. All 60 are charmingly designed, with names that pun on a type of sweet, like Profitamole or Buzzlegum. Visiting piñatas start out monochrome, but convince them to become residents and they'll bloom into full colour, revealing their vibrant blues, yellows and purples – the perfect visual reward for your efforts. It's not hard to see why Microsoft saw the opportunity for a kid's TV series in Viva Piñata. Cuteness can be an easy thing to dismiss, but Rare pulls it off here with the kind of deft hand usually reserved for Disney cartoons and litters of puppies. Every bit of incidental animation is charming, bringing the piñatas and their world to adorable life. Don't you dare smash one (Image credit: Rare) Back in the Nintendo days, Rare had created Banjo-Kazooie, a series of kid-friendly games which were among the biggest sellers on the N64. In the Donkey Kong Country games, it filled out DK's supporting cast with the likes of Diddy and Cranky Kong. After the failure of Kameo: Elements of Power, an Xbox 360 launch title with a similar Saturday-morning cartoon aesthetic and a Pokémon-like cast of creatures, Viva Piñata provided much-needed proof that the design talent behind those older games was still alive and well. Viva Piñata is more than just a pretty face, though. As the game progresses, it drip-feeds the player a steady stream of new challenges. First, the introduction of ‘piñatavores', which won't settle in your garden until they've eaten one of its existing residents. There's a certain old-lady-who-swallowed-a-fly logic to attracting some piñatas at the top of the food chain: you lure in a Mousemallow to feed to a Syrupent, then feed the Syrupent to a Macaracoon and so on. This is further complicated by the ability to breed animals, which involves checking off another set of requirements to help get them in the mood. Smaller piñatas, it seems, serve as the perfect aphrodisiac. This can test your loyalties – say you want to breed the foxy Pretztails, but have grown attached to the two Bunnycombs who have settled in the garden. Naturally you get the latter to do what rabbits do best, and make another Bunnycomb – so you can feed that cute little baby straight to a Pretztail. (Image credit: Rare) As you nudge forward through the game, waiting for the right animal to wander into your garden, tending to plants, and building homes for your favourites, the initially gentle pace begins to snowball. Viva Piñata introduces ‘sour' piñatas, who drop sweets that can poison a resident; weeds that can spring up and choke your existing plants; masked Ruffians who vandalise and start fights. It's around this point that you begin to glimpse the game's hidden dark side. Rotten candy (Image credit: Rare) Family-friendly games weren't the only thing Rare was known for. Titles such as Killer Instinct, GoldenEye 007 and Perfect Dark brought a vital edge to Nintendo's catalogue. Conker, one of the cutesy animal characters created for Diddy Kong Racing, was revamped into a sweary, hard-drinking squirrel armed with Uzis and a chainsaw. By 2006, though, games had to work considerably harder to shock. Six months after the launch of Conker's Bad Fur Day, Rockstar changed the gaming landscape with the release of Grand Theft Auto III. Xbox consoles had made their name with the likes of Halo, Splinter Cell and – launched just days before Viva Piñata – Gears of War. An attempt to return to Rare's more bloody roots with Perfect Dark Zero proved disappointing. While it may not have been obvious on the surface, though, some of this spirit lived on in Viva Piñata. The violence is kept strictly PG – when a piñata is killed, they pop open and spill their sweets on the ground, accompanied by the sound of children cheering – but it's effective because the game has encouraged you to invest in these creatures. The early game incentivises naming your piñatas with mechanical reward, sneakily building attachment. After all, which are you going to care more about, ‘Horstachio 1' or the one named after your childhood ****? As anyone who's watched Bambi or The Lion King will tell you, the death of loved animals isn't exactly out of the realms of *********** entertainment, but Rare finds new opportunities to twist the knife. Those spilt sweets will get eaten by passing piñatas, meaning it's not unusual to catch a treasured Fudgehog snaffling up the innards of its former lover. The circle of life, lovingly rendered in all its gory glory. (Image credit: Rare) And then Dastardos floats into your garden. The game's equivalent of the Grim Reaper, Dastardos is genuinely sinister. He glides just off the ground, a rigid expression on his Picasso mask, towards any piñatas who have fallen sick. "Dastardos has invented a cheerful song to help him through the day and make piñatas calm while he ‘fixes' them," reads the in-game description. By fixing, of course, it means bashing them open with a big stick. Suffice to say, Dastardos is not a welcome presence in your garden. But as the pace picks up, he's an increasingly common sight. Viva Piñata increases the tension through something that's either a trick smartly borrowed from survival-horror games or a brilliant accident: the tools it gives you are just a little imprecise. The game plays out in real time, and its controls often make it feel like you're trying to complete a very delicate task with a very long pole. (Image credit: Rare) This is an offshoot of the god-game genre, but one which casts you as a hapless god. Your shovel can be brought down like a lightning bolt from Zeus, but you lack that all-important omniscience – meaning you can only react to things once they've already started happening. Turn your back for one second too long, and a wild piñata can sneak into your garden on the hunt. The game pings you with a notification when this happens, but if you don't act quickly, it'll all be over before you can intervene. When things start to go wrong, you can suddenly find yourself drowning in notifications, trying to pick through all the ones about plants drying out to get to the real trouble. Two of your favourite piñatas are fighting, so you reach for the shovel and… Too late. One of them falls to the ground, sickly green. You notice a gate open in the pen separating predators from prey… Too late. A Cocoadile is gulping down your beloved Donald, the Quackberry you spent time and money dressing up. You spot a sour piñata, and look for the seeds it inevitably left behind… Too late. Red, ugly plants climb up, spitting fire and poisonous gas, choking and trapping whole piñata populations, meaning you miss the poisoned candies the sour also dropped on the other side of the garden. Self-flagulation (Image credit: Rare) When these disasters start to happen, you notice the game doesn't offer any quick save or load options. It's not exactly Ironman mode, but Viva Piñata is pushing you to stick with the consequences. The only way to sidestep the game's permanence is by shutting it down mid-session, praying for a convenient autosave. That this option is so tempting is testament to Viva Piñata's success, building just slowly enough that you get invested in this cutesy world, before baring its teeth. The game works because it blends the brightness of Banjo-Kazooie with the harder edge Rare that showed in early games such as Killer Instinct and Battletoads. Unfortunately, when it came to finding an audience, this meant that Viva Piñata fell between two stools. The game did well enough to launch a handful of sequels and spin-off games, but sold a small fraction of what Rare's biggest hits had managed. After a couple more games, the studio was folded more closely into Microsoft, working on avatars for Xbox Live and a string of Kinect games. It's only now, with Sea of Thieves, that Rare is stepping back into the spotlight – and so in 2018, the developer once again finds itself at a crossroads, with a bold new game positioned as its big comeback. Until we ever get a new Viva Pinata, why not try these games like Palworld? [/url]View the full article

Final Fantasy 7 Revelation might be wrapping up a trilogy of remakes next year, but publisher Square Enix doesn't seem to be done with Cloud and his ragtag group of eco-warriors just yet. In a PAX West panel called 'From Reunion to Resolve,' the trilogy's game director Naoki Hamaguchi spoke about his goals for the project and beyond. The Final Fantasy 7 Remake trilogy wasn't simply an opportunity to remake an all-time classic game - despite its name - but "an effort to pass Final Fantasy 7 onto the next generation," Hamaguchi says via a translator. [Hidden Content] "We want to make this a work that creates new fans 20 or even 30 years from now," he adds. That's more or less the same impact 1997's OG game had three decades ago, though we'll need to wait a really, really long time to see if the FF7 Remake project ages as gracefully. Whether or not the Final Fantasy 7 Remake trilogy holds up in 2050, Square Enix seems to have more plans for its universe. The original game was followed up (and was arguably milked) with some great spin-off games, some horrid ones, some that have been totally forgotten, and even a lush animated sequel movie. In what sounds like a similar approach, an on-screen slide says one of the Remake trilogy's goals is to "expand FF7's future" and "move beyond being a classic of the past and shape it into an IP with an ever-evolving future." That certainly implies more projects - games or otherwise - set in Final Fantasy 7's world. Nothing has been announced past Final Fantasy 7 Revelation and its two DLC packs, however. [/url]View the full article

The Steam Client Beta has been updated with the following changes: General Fixed a case where the steamwebhelper process could experience high CPU usage when certain events were shown in the library tab. View the full article