Behind bars The justice system is stupid. You can go to jail for setting a plant on fire and putting it in your mouth. Shut up, the police. Be smart for once. Maybe people would stop trying to escape from prison if you did something sensible like, I don’t know, cease being a militarised gang of dirtbag predators. Stop watching everyone through video cameras, you absolute creeps. What? Oh right, video games....
We chat to Fernanda Dias and Tiani Pixel about the inspirations behind Unsighted “We worked really hard on Unsighted, and having it resonate so much with people and seeing it get this kind of recognition and praise is amazing!” Dias tells me over email. Dias and Pixel collaborated closely on Unsighted. It was their first project together, and the two of them made everything from scratch, including its soundtrack. Dias described its development as “a learning experience”, but adds that it was still “a very positive one”....
Featuring throwable shark If you’ve been hankering for moreDead Cells, then you’re in luck. The game’s next paid expansion is out now and has you dive into some nautical newness. It’s called The Queen And The Sea and is home to shipwrecks and lighthouses infested with monsters, mainly. And a throwable shark. That’s me sold. Following previous paid expansions The Bad Seed and Fatal Falls, The Queen And The Sea adds new weapons, enemies, bosses, and two new biomes you’ll need to battle through: The Infested Shipwreck and The Lighthouse....
Never met an unphotogenic dog If you listed, ooh, the top ten trends in games over the past year or two, I think you’d probably include “photo modes” and “petting the dog” on the list. So here comesPupperazzi, nailing the zeitgeist as a game specifically about taking photos of dogs - who, of course, you can also pet. It’s now just two weeks away from release, with a January 20th release date....
Definitely still alive Fast forward to now. Suddenly I own thelatest expansion The Queen And The Sea, plus all the DLCs that came before it. I’m nonchalant, thinking that I dropped the game for a reason. Surely I can’t be won almost three years later? Well, nope. I was wrong. The DLCs have opened my eyes to the game in ways I hadn’t anticipated. The combat is crunchy, the challenge is thrilling, and Dead Cells more than holds its own next to more modern darlings of the genre likeHades....
And two new characters I’m not a huge fan of anime character art, but I could soak in the environment art ofGenshin Impactall day long. There are plenty of pretty sights to see in the trailer for version 2.4, the latest update to add a new area, new characters and new weapons to the action-adventure gacha game. Version 2.4 launched yesterday, and the game should offer the option to update when you open the launcher....
If they resurrect Silent Hill through NFTs I will scream Konami, the Japanese company best known for squandering every shred of goodwill they built through series like Castlevania andMetal Gear Solid, are getting into NFTs. Of course they are. Should’ve guessed. While publishers likeSquare Enix,EA, andTake-Twoare still contemplating NFTs, I am not remotely surprised that Konami are one of the first notable names to actually start selling useless digital junk. Next week, they will hold an auction for NFTs of videos, artwork, and music from early Castlevania games....
Space is the place First-person adventure game Outer Wilds is a beautifully intricate thing, a multifaceted mystery set across a simulated solar system which runs like clockwork within a 20-minute time loop. Chasing threads reveals a little more, then a little more, and a little more, until you have revelations which suddenly change how you understand something, leading you deeper into the mystery to chase new inquiries. Discovering and solving its secrets is a joy, and sometimes a terror....
Folks really love buying GTA5, huh The Steam Awards are always slightly odd, because they’re user-voted and they often favour games with large online playerbases. The clearest example of that this year is maybeForza Horizon 5winning “outstanding visual style.” It’s a very pretty game, for sure, but is its style outstanding? The runners up includedSubnauticaBelow Zero,Little Nightmares 2,Bright Memory: Infinite, andPsychonauts 2which honestly probably should have won. Resident Evil Village took Game Of The Year, but perhaps most interesting is that Cyberpunk 2077 won “outstanding story-rich game”....
Learn how to put together the best possible Shenhe build in Genshin Impact Best Genshin Impact Shenhe build for support Alternative:The Catch While I’ve chosen to focus on Shenhe’s support abilities in this build, rather than her possibilities as a sub-DPS, you shouldn’t entirely neglect her potential to deal some damage while on the field. As such, her ideal weapon is a little rarer than I’d usually recommend for a support character: theCalamity Queller....
New year, new toys Steam Deck If Valve do succeed at squeezing fair performance out of Steam’s extensive library, AAA games and all, it’s easy to see the Steam Deck take handheld PCs from no-name-brand curios to something at least approaching the mainstream. It’s exciting and distinct in a way that previous Valve hardware efforts weren’t, and it helps that with prices starting at £349 / $399, it could be a genuine budget PC option at a time when Nvidia and AMD have largely abandoned entry-level hardware....
A daily challenge to guess the word You might have noticed the internet being peppered by little green, white and yellow squares over the past week. They’re from Wordle, a free once-a-day word puzzle where everyone is trying to guess the same five letter word. I’ve been hooked on it since Christmas - andyou should be playing it, too. It really is simple. Wordle presents you with a blank grid of squares, into which you type letters....
Or should that be Death Stranding Delector’s Plus? Following a PlayStation debut in September,Death Stranding Director’s Cutis now confirmed to be headed to PC this spring. The expanded version of the Kojima Productions stumbling simulator whacks in new items, missions, and oddities, ranging from a robot you can ride to a racetrack. It’ll also be one of the few games to support Intel’s new XeSS upscaling fanciness. More than rebuilding or reworking the game, the Director’s Cut mostly adds a load of new stuff....
