Category: Video Games

While co-op third-person shooter Helldivers 2 has gone down well with players and become Sony’s biggest ever PC game launch, it has continued to struggle with login issues and rewards not tracking, even forcing its developer to roll back a patch due to performance problems.

Helldivers 2 developer Arrowhead Game Studios released patch 01.000.005 for the game on Steam yesterday, January 12. The update was designed to tackle the main issues impacting players’ ability to log in, but it caused performance problems, which in turn caused Arrowhead to roll the patch back.

“We have rolled back the patch due to some users experiencing significant degradation in performance,” Arrowhead said in a note on the Helldivers Discord. “The mission reward fix will not be affected by this.”

In the patch notes for update 01.000.005, Arrowhead promised to compensate players for lost rewards via an increased reward event. Much of Helldivers 2’s progression is gained from mission rewards, which makes this a particularly bad problem for players trying to grow their avatars more powerful.

Meanwhile, today, February 13, Arrowhead rolled out a patch for the PS5 version that addresses server capacity, login capacity progression, and mission rewards. It’s the same as the PC patch, but Arrowhead said it does not anticipate performance problems on PS5. “We are currently investigating that issue with the PC build from yesterday,” the developer said.

Arrowhead CEO Johan Pilestedt had previously issued an apology to players and explained how the servers had struggled to cope with the onslaught of players following last week’s launch. Meanwhile, Helldivers 2 players have already established an “unspoken” co-op etiquette.

Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.

Atomic Heart’s Trapped in Limbo DLC is colourful and eye-catching, and I hated every minute of it. I certainly felt trapped; trapped in a mobile game-inspired expansion that’s repetitive, frustrating, and a chore to complete. As someone who enjoyed Atomic Heart itself a great deal last year and found several things to like about the previous DLC, I am genuinely baffled at how actively I do not want to play Trapped in Limbo ever again.

While Atomic Heart’s first dose of DLC, Annihilation Instinct, explores what happens after the shorter of the main game’s two unfulfilling endings, Trapped in Limbo picks up in the aftermath of the longer one. Respecting and expanding upon both endings is an interesting and commendable approach, even if having these add-on DLC chapters flip-flopping from one ending to the other before anything is resolved makes playing through them feel like reading a Choose Your Own Adventure book from front to back.

In this conclusion, P-3 is left in limbo – a dream world for the subconscious that P-3 was previously sent to during the main campaign while the Kollektive network controlled his body. Unfortunately, unlike the visits to limbo during the core campaign – which were creepy, quirky, and used in brief bursts – Trapped in Limbo drastically overstays its welcome and goes all in on just a couple of gameplay mechanics that are repeated ad nauseam until I was thoroughly nauseated. For clarity, it only goes for a few hours – which is entirely fair for a low-priced add-on. The levels are just not enjoyable, so they drag. Everything here really could’ve been edited into a short prologue level to illustrate P-3’s return to the real-world. The majority of what’s here is just padding.

The first – and worst – are the sliding levels, which function similarly to Counter-Strike’s “surfing” (which, if you’re not familiar with it, is a long-running mod scene for Counter-Strike that embraces a physics quirk and is based around sliding down sloped platforms). Trapped in Limbo’s sliding levels are finicky, trial-and-error affairs, and they go on and on and on. I can see no other reason for the “percentage complete” bar at the top of the screen other than to reassure us that there is, indeed, an end to this torment – if we can persevere to it.

There’s just something off about the way it feels, and I was never able to get a good gauge on how to consistently get the right amount of air off the end of each slide segment. It has nothing to do with jumping, because you can’t. It’s all about the angle – and yet getting it right is not always possible thanks to the huge spiky obstacles. It’s like playing Tony Hawk with a broken ollie button, and the half-pipe is mined. I didn’t feel a sense of satisfaction getting to the end of these sliding levels – only relief that they were done and I wouldn’t have to do them again. That’s not a sensation I associate with having a good time.

Accompanying the two sliding levels are a pair of climbing ones, which focus on first-person platforming (although they also include aggravating sliding sections of their own). These levels are a lot more in line with the moments of first-person puzzle-platforming present in the main game, and they’re certainly a little more straightforward. For instance, it’s quite forgiving when it comes to landing on tiny cubes and detecting clambering opportunities. That said, I still had times where I was cursing the sloppiness of the jumping on a timing-based trap, or reloading my last save after falling into an area it didn’t appear I was supposed to have been able to get into. Like the sliding levels, I have no desire to play these again, either.

If you’re wondering why we haven’t discussed combat yet, it’s because there really isn’t much of it beyond a few arenas. Enemies are largely edible reskins of the ones in the main game but, despite the small cache of sugar-coated candy cannons at your disposal, the combat is anything but sweet. I get P-3 is living in a dreamland here, but it just has none of the punch or metal-rending mayhem of the main campaign. It’s plain.

The fifth and final level of Trapped in Limbo is the weirdest of all, and that’s saying something in a universe where the main character’s dead wife is actually two eight-foot-tall ballerina robots. It’s… an endless runner. The level actually does have an end, but it’s long enough to feel like it doesn’t – and not in a good way. I get that this version of Limbo is a weird place where anything’s possible, but an endless runner as Atomic Heart DLC is a little like having a band you like coming out for their encore and humming a nursery rhyme.

Not quite what you’d expect – and you’d probably walk out.

Nintendo is attributing the financial success of Super Mario Bros. Wonder to its multiplayer mode, as Mario’s latest outing becomes the latest Nintendo game to offer another way for one to make memories with their friends and loved ones.

In a Q&A with investors following its recent earnings report, Nintendo president Shuntaro Furukawa explained some of the likely contributing factors to Super Mario Bros. Wonder’s success. Furukawa explained how the multiplayer feature in Wonder was vital in that it “suited the need for a game many people can enjoy with family and friends” as the game was released ahead of the holiday season and was likely a gift for many during that period.

Super Mario Bros. Wonder offers local and online multiplayer. The latter allows four players to play on one Nintendo Switch and run through the game’s levels; in contrast, the latter allows up to 12 players to gather in a private lobby before breaking off into groups of four to run through the levels. According to Furukawa, “around half” of Mario Wonder’s users played in multiplayer.

More interestingly, Furukawa noted that The Super Mario Bros. Movie, released in theatres and is available to stream on Peacock and Netflix, was also an influential factor in Super Mario Bros. Wonder’s sales.

“So even though the theatrical release is over, the number of people who have seen the movie for the first time continues to increase, and we believe this has also helped drive the good sales of Super Mario Bros. Wonder,” Furukawa explained.

Nintendo has previously been vocal about Super Mario Bros. Wonder’s success. In early November, the company revealed that it was the fastest-selling Mario game to date, selling 4,3 million units within the first two weeks of its release with the company anticipating the number would continue to grow.

In our review of Super Mario Bros. Wonder, IGN said: “Super Mario Bros. Wonder looks and plays like the true next step for 2D Mario platformers. Wonder effects change each stage in both surprising and delightful ways, the Flower Kingdom makes for a vibrant and refreshing change of pace, and Elephant Mario steals the show.”

Taylor is a Reporter at IGN. You can follow her on Twitter @TayNixster.

Like spotting the first sign of shore after years adrift, Skull and Bones has finally, actually found its way to launch. Six separate delays and several different concepts that were forced to walk the plank might’ve made you understandably apprehensive about Ubisoft’s long-brewing pirate game, but I’ve already found a yo-ho-whole lot to be excited about after spending nearly 30 hours with its surprisingly unconstrained open beta this past weekend. The 17th-century Indian Ocean works well as avast open world to be explored and plundered, the RPG mechanics are (briny) deep with opportunities for buildcrafting alongside your fellow scurvy dogs, and the naval combat you’ll spend bucca-nearly all your time on the high seas engaging with is tactical and consistently entertaining. Aside from the expected instability one usually encounters with a beta for an online game, the only red flags so far are the lackluster story and a list of endgame activities that feel like they could become repetitive in short oar-der. I won’t be able to complete my voyage until the full version sets sail later this week, but I’m already excited to sea more.

Skull and Bones is fairly unique in the grand scheme of open-world RPGs in that it gives you direct control of a ship and lets you sail the ocean as you pillage ports and send enemy ships to Davy Jones’ locker in search of loot and infamy during the Golden Age of Piracy. Alone or alongside the ships of up to two friends as a fleet, you’ll gather resources and complete action-packed heists to feed your greed and climb Jacob’s progression ladder as you power up your vessel, which is usually a blast. Though it might be tempting to compare this live-service, pirate-filled RPG to Sea of Thieves, they really couldn’t be more different – Skull and Bones focuses entirely on wonderfully intricate maritime gameplay and commodities/economy simulation, not running around on foot as you get into sword fights and eat unpeeled bananas stem-first.

While it’s a bit odd at first that you only ever get to explore the world by controlling your ship (aside from brief intermissions at the social hub), it took just a few hours for me to not feel like I was missing out on much. That’s primarily thanks to how good the ship-to-ship combat quickly becomes. After a fairly underwhelming opening meant to help you get your sea legs with the glorified hunk of driftwood as a starting ship, things really open up. Once you start to upgrade and customize your vessel to fit your playstyle, then tackle some of the more challenging areas and activities that require you to seriously up your game, Ubisoft’s strict focus on navals fights works a lot better than I thought it would.

Skull and Bones appears to have only the faintest whiff of a story, which has so far amounted to a handful of conversations with pirate legend John Scurlock (who keeps insisting I should kill the French). That’s not to say there aren’t a few likable rogues and skallywags to meet along the way – like Yanita, who introduces you to the world of black market trading with all the enthusiasm and pomp of a circus ringmaster – but NPCs are little more than vendors and quest dispensers with no substantial story connecting them. It’s especially weird that meatier pieces of the story seem to have been lopped off since I saw them in the closed beta last year, like an early part where you meet a dying pirate named Abel Rassler, who you now just find dead instead. My guess is these changes were made to keep you out on the ocean waves as long as possible rather than lingering in the social spaces, and I certainly found myself spending a lot more time doing just that – which isn’t such a bad thing. Still, I expect my pirate games to have a bit of drama, infighting, and betrayal, and it doesn’t look like Skull and Bones will deliver on that front based on this initial taste I’ve gotten. There’s still a chance more of that could get turned on when the final version is out, but I wouldn’t bet on it.

Instead, your attention is directed toward the compelling treadmill of blasting through increasingly lethal enemy ships and then using your loot to craft better instruments of piracy. Ship-to-ship PvE combat is the star of the show, and it requires strategy, cooperation with other player-controlled vessels, and good aim to pull off at higher levels. For example, when taking on powerful fleets found in later areas, you might want to reconfigure your ship to a tank build optimized for withstanding cannonfire and dealing close-range damage, while your friends focus on DPS or even support options capable of healing allies by peppering them with nonsensically medicinal cannonballs. (How would that even work?) It’s also awesome how great naval combat and sailing the open ocean look, as a lot of effort clearly went into giving elements like waves and cannonfire an extra layer of visual polish – although, on the flip side, NPCs often look animatronic, with dead eyes and robotic mouths.

Crafting new ships and trying out different builds is extremely compelling. Just when I thought I’d built my ideal vessel, I’d see a special cannon or a unique piece of ship armor I just couldn’t live without, then gleefully jump through surprisingly rewarding hoops by attacking certain factions and seeking out rare resources to buy a schematic and craft it. Taking those new toys out to lay the beatdown on any blaggards foolish enough to oppose me is especially thrilling. For example, I spent hours and tons of resources to craft my first mortar, which unlocked the ability to rain fire from the sky on my enemies like I was calling in an airstrike. Sure, doing so forced me to spend every last scrap of my ill-gotten riches, but can you really put a price on turning your foes into pulled pork?

Once you’ve established yourself on the high seas a bit, you’ll also begin to understand both trade routes and the supply and demand they influence in different parts of the world. You’ll even gain access to the black market via The Helm, a mechanic that allows you to build and manage underworld businesses by creating and delivering embargoed goods, like opium. This opens up a whole new way to line your pockets on your quest, as you can ferry legitimate and illegitimate goods to and fro, buying low in one place and selling high in another. Later on you can even conquer areas and turn them into automated revenue generators to help you obtain the most powerful equipment, and I’m excited to push the limits of this economy system in the final version.

Though I went pretty hard during this latest beta and even got a sneak peek of the endgame activities last month, I still have plenty of questions about what else Skull and Bones has in store beyond what I played this past weekend. I still don’t know if there are any dedicated PvP options or other activities beyond the single Legendary Heist public event in the beta, which sends you to take down an NPC ship, then fight over the loot with anyone else in the area. And I still have no idea how the planned microtransactions and season model fit into things, since they’ve not been present in any version of Skull and Bones I’ve seen so far. But I have really enjoyed what I’ve played, and since progress in the beta carries over to launch, I’m looking forward to setting sail right where I left off and becoming a proper pirate legend later this week.