Category: Rock, Paper, Shotgun

“Experts urge UK households follow tips to beat heatwave, Dread Spider Tide” screech the inter-tabloids. Sparkling pig-grade hogwash, I say. I’ve recently discovered that the only things you need to defeat the sun are a cheap space heater set to fan mode and a PC overworked to boiling point, the combination of which creates some sort of mysteriously blissful temperature vacuum. Also, I refuse to open my curtains. For those also working on their attractive monitor-glow sallow tan, here are this week’s new PC game releases.

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Hello reader who is also a reader, and welcome back to Booked For The Week – our regular Sunday chat with a selection of cool industry folks about books! No cool industry person this week. Instead, a minor celebration. The RPS content management system tells me that I have used the ‘Booked For The Week’ tag….52 times! I have forgotten to post a few times and there was a brief hiatus, but in terms of volume at least, I’m declaring this the column’s official one year anniversary. Chin chin!

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A little over three years since it was announced, Dreamsettler, the spiritual sequel to Hypnospace Outlaw, has been cancelled. Yesterday, lead developer Jay Tholen shared a video simply titled “Dreamsettler is canceled”, where he explained some of his reasoning behind the decision. “This is not a joke, and I’m sorry everyone,” Tholen wrote in the description of the video.

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Ever since Gravity Rush 2 came out eight years ago (let’s not focus too hard on how much time that actually is for my mental health), I have, unfortunately, not been able to stop thinking about it. It is a game with a world full of whimsy, video game ass mechanics, and, most interestingly of all, a plot that quite directly deals with topics like class. What more can you want! And yet a sequel has never materialised. Lucky for me, just yesterday a new gravity shifting game entered the scene: Metro Gravity.

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I know this is a PC games focused outlet, but I’d like to present to you the most PS3 coded game I’ve seen in a long while: Chains of Lukomoyre. Now, to be clear I mean this in the most loving of ways possible. That era of video games obviously set the foundations for the rinse and repeat we see in a lot of triple-A games these days, but there was still the occasional oddity out there that just had the right vibe. And I think Chains of Lukomoyre fits that vibe quite well.

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Unfortunately, it’s that time of the month again. Yesterday, Splitgate 2 developer 1047 Games shared a post on LinkedIn announcing that layoffs had taken place at the company. It was described as a “small group of valued 1047 Games team members,” but as is par for the course for games industry layoffs, there was no mention of how many have been laid off – though of course the usual spiel about “redirecting resources” to make the game better. You know, classic corporation speak.

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As it stands, Remedy Entertainment’s latest entry into their Connected Universe, FBC: Firebreak, is not doing so hot. Across the board it’s not been received entirely positively (including by our own James, you can read his review here), not exactly the ideal launch for a live service game. All the same, it being a live service game might ultimately be its benefit thanks to the power of that mystical force called “updates.” In a Steam post shared by the FBC: Firebreak team, some planned improvements were outlined, which certainly sound like they’d make for a better experience.

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Indie horror game developer Ruled are onto a nice little spree with their shortform Itch.io releases – seemingly, they are skipping from phobia to phobia. First there was Automatonophobia, a game that navigated the fear of subterranean golems, then there was Chrometophobia, a game dedicated to the fear of spending money, and also to the act of finding “grimbo” gibs for a delicious pie. What’s next on the menu? Ah yes, scarecrows.

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While the prospect The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered turning out to be a real thing had folks wondering what that might mean for Oblivion remake mod Skyblivion‘s release, Bethesda were quick quell fears of a shutdown.

Both sides have been openly chummy since that point, with the studio behind The Elder Scrolls even having the team of modders pop by for a visit around the time their project was being shouted out on the official channels. We’ve now learned a bit more about how that social call went and what the two sides chatted about.

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I am getting a real kick out of Rematch. As a football game, its closest analogue isn’t FIFA or eFootball, but a certain nitro-boosting sports ’em up that has been going for ten years. I’ve already seen it jokingly described as “Rocket League without cars.” An infuriatingly accurate description that does half my job for me. My list of irritations with it is long. But there is something so compelling about the kick-by-kick play, each match a little drama, that I will gladly scrunch that list of complaints into a ball and toepoke it into a waste paper basket on the other side of the room. GOOOAAALLL!

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