After trying Subtractive Runemixer, I can’t unsee the links between RPG element systems and colour theory

Subtractive Runemixer is a work-in-progress RPG by Starbage, recently released for free on Itch.io. I know about it because artist and writer Oma Keeling shared it on Bluesky. It’s a first-person RPGMaker production in you are a gloomy automaton called Caster, who is searching a labyrinth of religious icons and technology for another automaton who wants to kill you.

Read more

The school bus is unleashed in Wreckfest 2’s latest update, which also introduces car upgrades and waypoint races

Put down your pencil case and get ready to answer when your name’s called. Or prepare to pancake a bunch of rolling wrecks. Either way, early access banger Wreckfest 2‘s latest major update’s delivered a school bus. It’s far from the lone addition either, with the sequel’s first crack and car upgrading and waypoint races arriving alongside the usual extra cars and tracks.

Read more

World of Darkness lovers take note: new “Hunter” game accidentally released as a RoboCop: Rogue City update

The people behind RoboCop: Rogue City may have accidentally released an early version of an unannounced Hunter: The Reckoning game, set in the same World Of Darkness universe as Vampire: The Masquerade. The files in question were shared as an update for Rogue City, in what could be either a coded message from Hunter-Net’s witness1, or a classic case of backend butterfingers.

Read more

Slay The Spire 2’s placeholder art should be a lesson to all the developers caught up in AI-generated nonsense

Do you remember the days when we didn’t need to talk about generative AI? Whatever side of the pro or anti fence you sit on, or even indeed if your buttocks are firmly planted on those white picket panels, you may be tired of hearing about which games do or don’t feature AI-created artworks. Even the US supreme court seems done with the whole business, as they recently refused to take a case about copyrighting AI art.

I wish, instead, developers would avoid the whole kerfuffle and do what Slay The Spire 2’s developers Mega Crit Games have done: just bodge it in Paint.

Read more

You won’t have any standing armies in Total War: Medieval 3 at first, so better get chummy with the commoners

Yesterday, Julian wrote about the possibility of changing inheritance laws in Total War: Medieval 3, and thereby revealed to me that Creative Assembly have been sneakily talking in depth about the forthcoming strategy game on their forums. The audacity of those people! In other posts, we learn about their plans for standing armies, which I think are probably what interests me most about TwarMed3, in that each campaign will be an exercise in getting to the point where standing armies are a thing.

Read more

Bungie ask Marathon critics to delay “full reviews” till the release of an endgame zone, and I am wistfully reminded of Vault of Glass

Bungie’s Marathon reboot released yesterday, but you might not get that impression from the developer’s coverage embargo guidelines, which request that critics delay their “full review and impressions” until the launch of a “pinnacle endgame zone and experience” later in March.

It’s a “request/suggestion”, not a demand, but it rubs me up the wrong way regardless. The Marathon reboot is not an early access launch that is marketed to buyers as unfinished.

Read more

US governor boosts US-Iran ‘combat footage’ that is actually from War Thunder, featuring WW2-era weapons

The entanglement of war with simulation continues with the discovery that a video of a US battleship shooting down an Iranian fighter jet is very likely a clip from videogame War Thunder, depicting ordnance from the World War 2 era. The clip in question has circulated on social media to the tune of millions of views. It has also been shared around by at least one sitting US Republican statesman, Texas governor Greg Abbott, who reposted it with the caption “Bye bye”. The tweet in question has since been deleted.

Read more

Pragmata gets a release date change once again, albeit in a good way this time

Somehow, Pragmata was announced almost six whole years ago. Where did those years go? I certainly didn’t allow them to go anywhere! Originally slated for release in 2022, it was eventually delayed into 2023, then indefinitely, before Capcom finally locked in a 2026 release date. Which it will not be making, technically, as while it was originally slated to launch on April 24th, it’ll no longer be doing so… because it’s coming out earlier. Teehee, I fooled you, what a little trickster I am!

Read more

Almost 10 years on from the first one, Ruiner is getting a sequel, and this time with co-op

Not all that long off the heels of releasing parkour boomer shooter Metal Eden, developer Reikon Games have now announced that they’ll be returning to their cyberpunk world Ruiner in the form of… well, it’s just called Ruiner 2. And it’s a sequel that sure, looks like more of the same, but the immediately noticeable difference in this one will be that you can play it with a couple of your buddies.

Read more

Prepare your decks once more, Slay the Spire 2 is now out in early access

Hear ye, hear ye! It is time to play your hand, for the day of prophecy has come: Slay the Spire 2 has, finally, launched into early access. I know, I know, there’s some game about running a marathon or something by a team of folks that run a bungee jumping business out today too. Forget that! Running is difficult, deckbuilding is… also difficult, but, I don’t like running, so there.

Read more