There’s a growing subgenre of horror games that lure you in with cutesy charm before revealing something sinister waiting beneath it. Your Doki Doki Literature Clubs. Your Among The Sleeps. Your Opening A Box Of Celebrations Only To Find Your Mum’s Knitting Kit. Absolutely bone-chilling stuff. The Bunny Graveyard fits right in with this idea, which tells a seemingly sweet tale across a series of mini-games à la WarioWare, but as expected, things take a creepy turn in the trailer below.
Starfield players have already made some incredibly useful mods, like a fix for the frustrating inventory system or the addition of DLSS support, but they’ve also added some very silly things like hairy chests, colourful juice boxes, and the lasagne loving cat Garfield.
That’s not to say the creators of these mods aren’t looking to provide a service and more options for players, of course. The Hairy Chest for Men of Starfield mod by kosmos84 comes with two options to suit different needs, for example: Normal and Furball.
Another from KaySato upgrades the bland juice boxes of Starfield: “This mod adds unique textures for the boring grey drink packs, giving more variety and immersion.”
Other players have created similar mods to spice Starfield up a bit. One from Darkslayer14, for example, replaces every collectible magazine cover with a classic Marvel Comics cover. “Some are from a specific character’s line of comics, others are for different events,” they said.
Anime lovers can get involved as well with a Cyberpunk Edgerunners poster for settlements and homes mod by feelp0, while tabletop fans can change Starfield’s board games to classic Warhammer or even tabletop versions of Skyrim and Fallout thanks to Scottyus1.
Photos of Bethesda development chief Todd Howard can also replace every painting in the game with ronaldomoon’s mod, and players can polish up Starfield’s baseballs and basketballs with the HD 4K Balls mod by Bulwarkhd.
Some mods really are just for a laugh though, but that’s perfectly valid too. Another from Bulwarkhd pulls a Thomas the Tank engine skin over Vasco the robot, while Nicolas Cage’s face can replace the flashlight glow thanks to Brandoman, and the Sansfield mod by bonobot replaces all of Starfield’s fonts with Comic Sans. Last but not least (maybe), a mod from J8oot replaces the Starfield title in the main menu background with Garfield, and turns the planet into the big ginger cat’s face.
As mentioned, some more traditionally useful mods exist for Starfield too. Players almost immediately added their own DLSS Support and a field of view slider after Bethesda released Starfield without these features.
What IGN called a “shockingly bad” inventory management system was also replaced with a mod, and though installing these unofficial improvements turns off achievements in Starfield, modders have modded that setback out too.
For more information on how to install Starfield mods (and just about anything else in the game), be sure to check out IGN’s Starfield Guide
In our 7/10 review, IGN said: “Starfield has a lot of forces working against it, but eventually the allure of its expansive roleplaying quests and respectable combat make its gravitational pull difficult to resist.”
Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelance reporter. He’ll talk about The Witcher all day.
As promised, I have returned from the Starfield fields for an extended look at its PC performance and settings. And what a journey it’s been – there was the drama-tinged DLSS mod, the crap Steam Deck showing, the streaming workaround for said crap Steam Deck showing, and even the first recorded instance (I think?) of a game utterly refusing to work on a hard drive.
Last week we discussed Starfield. This week – the week of its official launch – three other IGN UK crewmates discuss their experiences of Bethesda’s spacefaring RPG. Join Matt, Jesse, and Emma as they analyse the layers of roleplaying and space exploration, before moving on the sing even more praises of Baldur’s Gate 3 (now available on PS5!) There’s also a bit of Counter-Strike 2 chat, an enthusiastic assesment of Armored Core 6, and your feedback.
Tell us your thoughts on Starfield, Baldur’s Gate 3, and any other RPG you fancy. Or, of course, whatever food you’ve been eating this week. Get in touch at ign_ukfeedback@ign.com
Cursed ship designs were always an inevitability with Starfield, and after two full days in the wild, players have already made some wildly funky and plainly cool ships. Scrolling through social media channels, you’ll find that players have hammered away at their own unique designs while also creatively remaking other iconic vessels from Mass Effect, Star Wars, Halo and, of course, our friend Thomas The Tank Engine. There’s also been a shocking lack of, uhm, male organ-shaped spacecraft which makes putting this post together much less hard. But for now, onward! Let’s admire some cool ships.
Let Mii entertain you.
The times are a-changin’ for Nintendo, it seems. Nobody would doubt that the company has been video game-focused for the past few decades, but with theme parks, movies, and mobile apps popping up all over the place, it seems that the Big-N is moving in a slightly different direction.
This was echoed by Nintendo of America president Doug Bowser in a recent interview with the Washington Post, in which he stated that Nintendo is now “evolving into being an entertainment company with gaming as a nucleus of the overall business model.” This will come as no surprise to many of us — you can’t walk through town without seeing Mario DVDs, toys, and LEGO sets at the moment — and having put all of its hardware eggs in one basket by uniting its handheld and home console lines with Switch, diversification into arenas beyond the creation of video game systems and software makes sense.
Read the full article on nintendolife.com
To all sports and VR enthusiasts, here’s why you’ll enjoy playing Tennis On-Court – coming October 20 to PS VR2 whether you’re a complete beginner or a seasoned player.
Playing 1v1 is fun enough, but the action is multiplied tenfold when you share the great moments of a 4-player match.
Grab your racket, call your friends or other players from around the world to join you in a doubles match. It’s the perfect time to perform your best volleys, smashes and passing-shots.
Maybe you’re playing an important match and want your friends to watch, or you’d like to analyze the game of one of your next opponents.
Spectator mode is for you. At any time, you can view the list of live matches and join them with a simple click. You’re teleported into the stadium like a real spectator in the real world.
Right from the start of development, we thought about how virtual reality could help players progress in a different way than academic learning. We set up several assists that the player can activate or deactivate according to their mood or level.
By knowing your height, thanks to the headset tracking, we can, for example, calculate the ideal height for striking a service…
… or when to trigger your stroke during a point. So you can learn the right rhythm for successful strokes every time.
Rhythm is important, but so is placement on the court. We help you position yourself on the court in relation to the ball’s trajectory.
Because tennis can be a frustrating sport when two people of very different skill levels are playing together, we’ve introduced a ball trajectory correction feature that, when activated, will correct your ball trajectories to bring them into the court. In this way, both players can enjoy the game and bridge the gap between them.
A sports game is too limited without physics as close to reality as possible. That’s why our physics simulation is a key part of the game. We developed this part of the game with top tennis players to achieve a natural sensation. The team knows that it’s crucial for an enthusiast to be able to play with different effects such as the slice, the dropshot, the lift, etc.
But we don’t want to be an exclusive game. All tennis fans should be able to enjoy the game, whatever their skill level. To this end, a second arcade gameplay mode is available, in which trajectories and effects are close to reality, but corrected to stay on court. Players can focus on the fun of the game and forget about the demands of the movements.
We’re working hard to deliver a fun and enjoyable experience for all in Tennis On-Court. Feel free to wishlist the game if you want to have fun alone or with friends when Tennis On-Court serves its way to PS VR2 October 20.
Confession time: if you’ve been keeping up to date with Colossal Order’s feature highlight video series for Cities: Skylines 2 over the last couple of months, you’re probably not going to learn a huge amount from my experience of playing it at Gamescom a couple of weeks ago. I spent most of my hour-long demo session steadily working my way through its extensive tutorial, as I have not, in fact, played Cities: Skylines before now – although I can at least confirm that its tutorial is very newbie-friendly, and that I now feel more prepared to give it a go properly when it comes out in full on October 24th.
But the thing that really impressed me was just the sheer scope of its playable spaces. We’ve known since the end of July that its maps are roughly 5x bigger than those in the first game, and when I saw Colossal Order’s Maps & Themes video, I thought, ‘Yes, those sure look enormous!’ But actually seeing them in person really put things into perspective for me, especially when I tried zooming the camera out and it just kept going and going and going and…
Paradox have announced that Star Trek: Infinite is coming out on October 12th. Infinite’s previous trailers already made it look like a “Stellaris in a different version of space” affair – which is by no means an unfavourable comparison – and the latest footage shows off more grand strategy shenanigans. Planet management. Lotsa menus. Expanding factions, sometimes peacefully if you prefer a clear conscience.
The creator of viral Steam hit Only Up! has pulled the game from the storefront, citing “stress”.
Only Up! is a rock-hard physics-based platformer that went viral in May after high-profile streamers and YouTubers showcased their often futile attempts to make it to the top.
In an update on Steam spotted by PCGamesN, Only Up!’s creator described themselves as a solo developer, and said the unexpected hit was their first experience of video game development.
Only Up! is “a game I did for creativity, to test myself, and where I made a lot of mistakes” they admitted. “The game has kept me under a lot of stress all these months. Now I want to put the game behind me.”
The developer, who published Only Up! on Steam under the name SCKR Games, said they were moving on to their next game, codenamed Kilth.
“What I need now is peace of mind and healing,” they continued. “I plan to take a pause, and continue my education in game design and further with new experience and knowledge to direct my energies to my next game with the working title ‘Kith’ — it will be a new experience and a new concept with realism, a completely different genre and setting, and the emphasis is on cinematography.
“This time I hope the project will be created by a small team. This is a challenging project on which I want to significantly improve my skills in game design.”
This isn’t the first time Only Up! has been pulled from Steam. At the end of June the game was removed from Valve’s platform due to the use of copyrighted assets, but returned a day later with the infringing assets removed.
This appears to have been a recurring problem. In an update dated July 5, the developer said an “anime girl” asset “got into the game by mistake”, but had resolved the issue with the asset’s creator “on friendly terms”.
“Thanks to those who noticed the flaws in the game,” the developer said at the time. “Sometimes novice developers find themselves in such situations, and even official marketplaces for developers can sell kits containing other people’s assets.
“It’s tricky to follow and humble young developers are not safe. But thanks to those authors who are sympathetic and friendly to colleagues.”
Only Up! was also found to have quietly promoted NFTs.
The comments from the creator of Only Up! echo those of Dong Nguyen, creator of 2014 mobile phenomenon Flappy Bird, who pulled the game from the App Store and Google Play. At the time, Nguyen said he felt guilty that Flappy Bird had become “an addictive product”, and that his life had become uncomfortable. “I couldn’t sleep,” he said. “I don’t think it’s a mistake. I have thought it through.”
At the time of publication, Only Up! is unavailable to buy from Steam, although its Steam page remains online. The game’s title was changed to “not available”, and its developer renamed to “
Indiesolodev”. Only Up!’s mostly positive user review rating and near 13,000 user reviews remain online.
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.
