Dota 2 is ditching battle passes for more regular, year-round updates

Dota 2 is moving away from releasing new content via a pattle pass in favour of more varied and regular updates. Valve explained the change on the Dota 2 blog, saying that the heavy focus on the Compendium – the Battle Pass released alongside Dota 2’s yearly esports event, The International – was leaving “the rest of the year feeling barren by comparison.”

Read more

June’s next batch of Game Pass additions have stylish racing, idyllic farming and more

Another day, another batch of Game Pass additions, with this selection being spread out across the end of June and beginning of July. The Xbox Wire blog shared this half of the month’s Game Pass additions earlier today, and there seems to be a little something for everyone. First up is Need for Speed Unbound via EA Play, the most recent and incredibly stylish entry in the racing game series, which you’ll be able to play on PC from June 22 – you’ll be able to stream it through the cloud too.

Read more

The best Steam Deck accessories 2023

I’ve been meaning to round up the best Steam Deck accessories for a while now – ambushing Liam with homemade Etsy gadgets is one thing but now that there are literally millions of Decks in owners’ hands, quite literally, it’s time to put a serious face on and consider which accessories genuinely are the best buys.

This guide is keeping separate from the best Steam Deck microSD card list, mainly because a good microSD card is less of an accessory and more of a core essential (especially if you’ve gone for the 64GB Steam Deck model). Still, this guide will cover an array of addons, from alternative cases to thumbstick covers and USB-C docking stations.

Read more

The joy of slow living in Story of Seasons: A Wonderful Life

My Dad likes to tell this story from when I was a teenager. I had grumpily asked if he could pick me and a friend up from a local park one afternoon, and he remembers us bundling into the back of his car all smelly and sweaty and terrible as teenagers so often are. But as he pulled away, he caught a snippet of our conversation that was so unusual it’s the reason this seemingly normal car ride has cemented itself as a core memory. We were talking about the price of eggs. And tomatoes. And the order in which we were planting crops to ensure the greatest yield.

My poor father interrupted us, turning in his seat to ask what the hell we were talking about. “It’s a game we’re both playing called Harvest Moon” I scoffed in his direction. “You wouldn’t understand”.

Read more

The Callisto Protocol wraps things up with its first and only story DLC next week

The Callisto Protocol will be getting its first and only bit of story DLC next week, which Striking Distance are describing as the game’s “heart-pounding final chapter”. Entitled Final Transmission, a short teaser trailer has been released giving us a look at what protagonist Jacob Lee will be getting up to, but it doesn’t really show us all that much. There seems to be some kind of fleshy robot monster that says he’ll “never escape,” but that’s all we’ve got to go off right now.

Read more

Baldur’s Gate 3 gets surprise murder mystery prequel that puts everyone in the detective seat

Ahead of the game’s release in August, Baldur’s Gate 3 has received a prequel murder mystery game that lets you vote on how things unfold. Playable for free in your browser, it’s titled Blood in Baldur’s Gate, and is set 15 years before the events of Baldur’s Gate 3. Developer Larian Studios revealed the project yesterday. In it, you play as a detective tasked with solving a murder, and by you, I quite literally mean all of you, as this one will take a bit of collaboration.

Read more

Warhammer Age Of Sigmar: Realms Of Ruin’s story campaign will have plenty of “meat” on its bones

Next month’s open beta for Frontier Developments’ new Warhammer RTS Age Of Sigmar: Realms Of Ruin may be focused on testing its 1v1 multiplayer mode, but the Elite Dangerous studio have told me there’s still plenty to look forward to in its single-player story campaign. I got to chat with principal designer Sandro Sammarco last week, and he told me they’ve been hard at work making sure it’s “filled with loads of cool new stuff that people really haven’t seen before”. He also said that their partnership with Games Workshop has allowed them to “really go to town in terms of the visuals, the lore, [and] the story that we’re telling”, and he hopes that the way they’ve characterised the campaign’s principal faction, the Stormcast Eternals, will give players plenty to sink their teeth into when it launches in full.

Read more

Screenshot Saturday Mondays: Throw that egg

Every weekend, indie devs show off current work on Twitter’s #screenshotsaturday tag. And every Monday, I bring you a selection of these snaps and clips. This week is another shortie because Twitter is once again broken and refusing to show all the weekend’s posts, which sure feels ominous for the social media platform. The games are still good. Come on in for an immersive sim with a clever little technology trick, an adventure game set in a city on a giant octopus, the throwing of an egg, and more attractive and interesting indie games.

Read more

14 Steam Next Fest demos you should absolutely check out this June

Just in case your Steam wishlists weren’t already stocked up from this year’s Summer Geoff Fest bonanza, here we are with another edition of Valve’s Steam Next Fest, which has unleashed hundreds, if not thousands of free game demos on us, starting from today, June 19th, until Monday June 26th. You can view the entire June Next Fest line-up right here if you’d rather browse at your leisure, but we’ve also been playing some of the demos in advance to bring you some curated highlights of what we’ve enjoyed so far. We haven’t have access to every demo in this year’s Next Fest, I should note, but think of these more as some initial tasting suggestions to get you started, rather than a complete overview of what’s worth playing.

Read more

Build your next gaming PC in this discounted Phanteks Eclipse G500A case

If you’re after a clean white case with RGB lighting and great thermals without spending a fortune, then this discounted Phanteks Eclipse G500A D-RGB ATX case is a strong choice at £93.99, following a £56 discount at Currys.

For the money, you get a critically-acclaimed and good-sized mid-tower case, complete with support for modern (ie giant) components, three fans, and mesh panels used throughout to ensure a great balance between noise, dust and thermals.

Read more