We don’t write much about board and paper games around these parts, not since Cardboard Children was sent to the dissolving pits. I still feel that roleplay and strategy gaming has a home here on RPS even when it’s not digital though, and doubly so when it’s the work of our former comrades.
Enter Gold Teeth, a tabletop RPG “of piracy & occult horror” which just cleared its Kickstarter funding goal, and which is designed by Marsh Davies and Jim Rossignol (RPS in peace).
Woot! (which is owned by Amazon) is offering the best deal on Xbox Game Pass Ultimate. Right now you can get a 3 month code for only $36.49. Earlier this year, Microsoft raised the price of Xbox Game Pass Ultimate to $19.99 per month, so now you’re saving 40% off a 3 month membership. Note that you can purchase multiple codes and apply them to your account, up to a maximum of 36 months. If you’re an Xbox gamer, this is a great way to save a lot of money in the long run since you won’t have to buy new release games individually to play them.
Note: There is a new coupon “ULTIMATE” that takes $3 off one order, dropping the 3 month code price down to $33.49. If you purchase multiple codes, this coupon will only work on one code. The rest of the 3 month codes will be $36.49 each.
Use code: ULTIMATE
Xbox Game Pass Ultimate gives you access to a library of hundreds of Xbox games, including day one releases. You can play them for the entirety of your membership without any restrictions. You do lose access to them once your membership is over, but if you ever decide to renew, all your past achievements and progress will be saved. You’ll also have access to Xbox Game Pass for PC. Although there aren’t nearly as many games as there are on Xbox, there are still plenty of AAA titles to keep you sated. Other perks include exclusive membership discounts, the ability to play your games across multiple devices with cloud gaming, free access to EA Play membership, as well as bonus in-game content and rewards. It is an exceptionally good – almost essential – membership for Xbox gamers. New release games are not cheap, and being able to play them without buying them will save you a lot of money and easily recoup the cost of the membership.
Looking for more deals? Check out all of the best Xbox deals today.
Complete with music from David Wise.
Publisher Knights Peak and developer VEA Games have announced that their upcoming platformer Nikoderiko: The Magical World will be launching on the Switch eShop on 15th October 2024.
Looking like a bit of a cross between Donkey Kong Country and Crash Bandicoot, Nikoderiko sees you follow the story of Niko and Luna as they face off against the villainous Grimbald of the Cobring Gems Company (y’what?). There are all the hallmarks of a classic DKC game here, including side-scrolling platform levels, flying barrels, and ridable creatures.
Read the full article on nintendolife.com
Almost a decade ago, Fallout Shelter transformed the Wasteland we knew into a mobile management game, turning players into Overseers for their very own vault. It was a worldwide smash, taking what we loved about Fallout and transmuting it into something brand new – and now Bethesda Game Studios is taking that idea further, with a whole new franchise, in The Elder Scrolls: Castles.
Available now for iOS and Android, Castles builds on what Fallout Shelter began, allowing you to control rulers and their subjects as you build a thriving castle in the world of Tamriel. As Bethesda Game Studios’ Director of Mobile Games, Craig Lafferty puts it:
“Castles is the spiritual successor to Fallout Shelter. In Castles, you’ll take on the role of the right hand of the king or queen and manage your kingdom from the ground up. You’ll build the castle of your dreams, rule over your subjects, and make critical decisions about your kingdom’s future as you build your dynasty.
“Every day in our world is a year in the game. Time passes, subjects live and die, and rulers change as you build your dynasty. Eventually you will need to find new resources and items to keep your castle growing. Craft and equip outfits and weapons to your subjects and send them on epic quests to battle classic Elder Scrolls creatures and enjoy the rewards.”
Key to the team’s work has been taking what players loved about Fallout Shelter and (often quite literally) building on it, while capturing the vibe of a whole new world. “Our goal has been to build on everything players loved about Fallout Shelter, but with a ton more content, features and things to do in-game. We know that players loved building their vault in Shelter but wanted more ways to customize and make it their own. Because of that, in Castles, you can fully customize a built castle at any time, and these changes impact not only how your castle looks like ‘visually’, but it can also affect gameplay to some extent.”
That means your castle isn’t just a growing series of rooms, but dynamically reacts to what you do – build a new wing and zoom out and you’ll notice that your changes have resulted in new turrets and offshoots of the wider building. Add to that the ability to decorate your castle (with added benefits for each decoration you choose), and you have a place that feels distinctly yours. “We’ve aimed to provide players with as much castle-building flexibility as possible” adds Lafferty. “We look forward to seeing all the fun TES castles that fans will create!”
Customization goes deeper than you might imagine – every new subject you attract to your castle or birth as a baby has a distinct personality that can affect their roles. Some characters may be better suited to crafting tasks like working at a mill, or in the forge, while others may be perfect for heading out on combat-heavy quests to earn rare materials. Some of these traits can be very odd – a personal favorite was my Haunted subject, who’d periodically be chased by a ghost… who could also do their work for them.
And atop them all is your ruler – you can choose your king or queen, and their heir, which can affect things wildly. “The ruler’s traits affect everyone in the Castle,” says Lafferty, “whether it’s through their rulings or general influence over the subjects. For example, a ruler’s personality trait could make subjects more productive, but less happy at the same time. So, paying attention to your ruler’s traits/personalities can affect the overall happiness and productivity of your subjects roaming within Castles’ walls.”
Your ruler has more to do than simply sit on a throne, however. Castles introduces a rulings system – you’ll periodically be presented with choices that can affect everyone from individual subjects to the fate of the kingdom around you.
“We’ve spent a lot of time on the rulings system, making sure it was fun and easy to make rulings, at the same time, ensuring that decisions have a noticeable impact on the subjects in your Castle,” explains Lafferty. “Sometimes you’ll see an immediate impact on a subject’s happiness, or a material benefit from a ruling. But others take more time to become more obvious. And rulings can lead to immediate assassination of your ruler or a subject if you’re not careful with your decisions. So, how you rule over your dynasty has a real impact on your subjects and how long your ruler stays in power.”
There’s a lot more to this than you might expect from a mobile game – and it’s been designed to evolve over time, always offering something new for you to rule over. With each in-game year taking a real-life day to pass, Castles is designed to offer something new for you constantly. “This is where the growing a dynasty and building a lasting legacy really comes into play,” says Lafferty. “The passage of time means the player needs to always have a proper succession plan in place for the heir to the throne.
“We did a lot of work in the game design to ensure that subject relationships and how long a ruler reigns are elements that players can work towards improving. Players also need to continue to improve their gear type and level to progress through the quests. It’s an important mechanic within the game. We have a Dynasty Level system, with rewards that continues on endlessly. Our goal is to update the game regularly with new dynasty levels, quests, events, and challenges.”
On top of this, Castles is designed to be a treasure trove for Elder Scrolls fans, and the more you play, the more you’ll see how the game ties into the wider world. “We’ve worked particularly hard to make sure that Castles feels as authentic as possible to the Elder Scrolls Universe,” explains Lafferty. “And die-hard fans will be able to pick up on this when playing the game.”
From the game’s score, to the sheer number of classic Elder Scrolls races included as subjects (who form their own distinct factions within your castle) to even the smallest pieces of dialogue (“dialogue bubbles often have direct and indirect references to The Elder Scrolls universe, lore and locations – including some references only the hardcore fan will recognize”), there’s a lot to discover here.
You can even pick up unique subjects who’ve appeared in other Elder Scrolls games. “For example, [Skyrim‘s] Ulfric is a legendary subject, and so is the Adoring Fan,” teases Lafferty. “These legendary subjects have various unique traits that player can take advantage of to elevate their Castles experience… From assigning them to stations for more effective output, to making babies and carrying those traits further.”
Both the game itself and its connections to The Elder Scrolls will only get deeper over time. Castles may only just have arrived, but the team has a lot of plans in place for how it can grow. “We have tons of ideas for more content – we really had to force ourselves to stop adding new features and focus on releasing the game! All to say that we have so many great ideas that will be coming into the game. From simple elements, like new decorations, to whole new ways to play the game and interact with friends.”
Right now, the game’s seeing a Redguard-themed event (including the ability to transform the look of your castle entirely), but we’ll see Castles take on multiple Elder Scrolls locations over time. The team is also planning on expanding the game’s quests, and has some still-secret plans for how to celebrate real-life holidays in your virtual kingdom.
It may have begun as a successor to Fallout Shelter but, Castles is already evolving into something truly new – pick your rulers wisely, and see how far this goes.
The post How The Elder Scrolls: Castles Builds on Fallout Shelter to Create a Fascinatingly Authentic Elder Scrolls Spin-Off appeared first on Xbox Wire.
God of War Ragnarök is available tomorrow on PC. *
All of us at Santa Monica Studio, alongside our development partners at Jetpack Interactive, are thrilled to be able to bring the sequel to God of War (2018) and the final chapter of the Norse saga to all our fans on PC. Alongside a new trailer, we’re also happy to share a short overview of the additional features and support we’ve included for launch.
Debuting in the PC version of the game and soon to be added to the console version are two new settings to help you customize the way you play.
A new option in the Gameplay Settings tab, enabling this will reduce the frequency with which you hear puzzle hints from your companions.
Enabling the Audio Description setting under the Audio Accessibility menu will play audio descriptions of visual events during cinematics. These descriptions will provide additional contextual information alongside the spoken dialogue to create a more detailed experience for players with low vision.
As a thank you to all of our fans who take the time to stream the game to their friends and communities, we created custom alerts for you to use.
Want Kratos to give your new subscriber a nod or Thor to rejoice at a channel follower? Get the full set or download individually on the Santa Monica Studio website!
We’ve got a new fan kit ready for our launch on PC! Head to the Santa Monica Studio website here to get access to social media banners and wallpapers, including ultrawide options for those of you with supported monitors!
Whether you’re experiencing the final chapter of the Norse saga for the first time or picking it up again on a new platform, we hope your journey back into the Nine Realms and Valhalla is a ton of fun.
On behalf of everyone here at Santa Monica Studio and Jetpack Interactive, thank you so much for your continued support.
For the latest updates on God of War for PC, make sure you follow Santa Monica Studio on X, Instagram, and Facebook.
If you would like to purchase God of War for PC, it is available tomorrow on both the Steam and Epic Game Store .
*PlayStation Network Account Required
Yesterday I watched a Youtube video about Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2, in which sundry, gesticulating milords of the internet opine that they had “forgot what it’s like to be the target audience” for games, hailing the new (and for our money, fairly good) Warhammer 40K shooter as a throwback affair that “oozes masculinity”, with no excess feelings or real-life social relevancy. I then combed through several thousand comments below said video, many of which expressed similar longing for the hypothetical Good Old Days, before those wily feminists invaded the medium, transformed every game into a LGBT+ weeping simulator, and threw all the Real Men into a big hole. I did this because I was searching for one particular comment written by somebody claiming to be Matthew Karch, CEO of Space Marine 2 developers Saber Interactive.
Corinne Busche wasn’t looking for a job when she sat down for lunch with BioWare’s leadership team in 2019. She had been a fan of BioWare’s games since the days of Dragon Age: Origins, and she wanted to, in her words, “meet my heroes.”
“So I went to lunch with a couple of folks in the leadership team at BioWare, and we started riffing about progression systems and skill trees and economies, and we just really resonated with one another,” Busche remembers. “And much to my surprise, they expressed an interest in me joining, and it was kind of the question you don’t have to ask me twice. That was such a dream opportunity, and to be able to step in this space, visit the studio, see my favorite characters on display throughout the walls, I was immediately sold. Immediately.”
Busche was coming off a stint at Maxis, where she helped design the systems on various The Sims projects. In taking the helm of Dragon Age: The Veilguard, she became part of a wider talent pipeline flowing from Maxis to other parts of the games industry. It’s a pipeline that includes the likes of Eric Holmberg-Weidler, who was credited with fine-tuning many of the systems that comprised The Sims 4 before spearheading the Professions revamp in World of Warcraft’s Dragonflight expansion. Justin Camden, who also worked on The Sims, is one of Dragon Age: The Veilguard’s technical designers.
At first blush, it might not seem like The Sims has much in common with an RPG like Dragon Age outside the fact that they both feature romance in some way. Going back to its release in 2000, The Sims has garnered a reputation as a casual, frequently silly lifestyle simulator; the game where you remove a ladder from a swimming pool and watch your poor little Sims drown. Under the hood, though, The Sims is a complex web of systems, progression and relationships. Sims have jobs. They gain skills. They fall in love.
“Maxis is a great place for designers to hone their skills,” Busche says. “There are many projects across differing platforms and service models happening simultaneously which give a rare opportunity for a breadth of experience. What people may not realize about the Sims, given its playful outward nature, is the underlying systems and mechanics are deceptively deep – especially as a dev. One of the more interesting parts of coming up through Maxis as a designer is the experience you get with simulation, emergent gameplay, and emotionally relatable player experiences. It’s just a really unique opportunity being a part of these teams, and those are skillsets that can benefit a number of different games and genres.”
Busche’s systems design background is evident throughout The Veilguard. It includes extensive skill trees, with sub-classes that are geared around different weapon types and styles of play, and the choices you make also resonate deeply throughout the story. It’s also possible to level up your relationship with individual factions and shopkeepers, which in turn opens up new possibilities for acquiring unique gear, and characters bear long-lasting scars depending on the choices you make. Systems are layered throughout Dragon Age, deepening the player’s intertwined connection with the world and the characters that inhabit it.
“What’s so wonderful about [The Sims] is there’s so much autonomy in that game, and we find that RPG players are hungry for that same sense of autonomy, making decisions, influencing characters. And what you might not realize in the Sims is behind the scenes, there are some really robust progression systems, game economies, character behaviors for their own AI and autonomy… a lot of really fascinating parallels,” Busche says. “So in that regard, I’m very grateful to my time there, being able to take some of those learnings, whether it’s about how to convey romantic progression to the player, or design skill progression, game pacing, a lot of really interesting transferable ideas that you might not think about on the surface.”
In The Sims, characters go through their daily lives in an idealized world filled with strange but charming characters like Bonehilda (Dragon Age, it should be mentioned, has its own living skeleton in Manfred). While Dragon Age’s characters are still bound by the demands of the story, BioWare goes out of its way to make them seem more alive. As we talk about in our hands-on preview that went up last week, Dragon Age is filled with little messages noting how, for instance, you “traded verbal jabs” with Solas. As we’ll go into in a future article, both platonic and romantic relationships are a big part of how characters grow in Dragon Age.
And of course, as anyone who has played a BioWare or Sims game knows, both games have their share of woohooing.
Ultimately, though, it’s the character creator where the resemblance between the two is the most apparent. Dragon Age’s character creator is extensive, allowing players to adjust physical characteristics including chest size, the crookedness of a character’s nose, and whether or not their eyes are bloodshot, among other features. While custom characters are a time-honored BioWare tradition going back to the days of Baldur’s Gate, The Veilguard draws from the lessons of The Sims in everything from body customization to the flow of the user interface.
Cross-pollination like this is common within EA, and Dragon Age: The Veilguard borrows from plenty of other sources as well. That incredible hair technology, for example, got its start within EA’s sports games, meaning your Rook can have a luscious mane like Lionel Messi. But the character creator is perhaps the greatest inflection point between Dragon Age and The Sims.
“Character creators are extremely complex, and in many ways even more personal. It’s so important that players feel they can be represented and feel pride in that representation as they go through the creation process,” Busche says. “In particular, I remember we were struggling with some of our iconography, and we turned to each other and said ‘how did The Sims 4 handle this?’ While the technology and UI is quite a bit different, the underlying goals and lessons were quite similar.”
She adds that Maxis has a “tremendous wealth of knowledge when it comes to representing gender, identity, and the surprising number of localization issues that come along with that when you’re releasing in different regions and languages.”
“It’s always nice when you can draw from that prior experience. See what worked, what didn’t, and how expectations have evolved. The fun part is now we get to pay that forward and have been sharing our knowledge with other teams,” Busche says.
On a moment-to-moment basis, of course, The Sims and Dragon Age are two very different games with very different goals. One is a single-player action RPG, the other a lifestyle sim. As studios, too, BioWare and Maxis are in very different places right now. The Sims has been a powerhouse franchise for more than two decades, and EA is seeking to expand its reach with a new movie. BioWare, meanwhile, is seeking to rebuild after stumbling badly with Anthem and Mass Effect Andromeda.
But when creator Will Wright first decided to focus on the people inhabiting his games, the world he crafted wasn’t too dissimilar from the one found in Dragon Age. Both use unique systems to create reactive, imaginative worlds full of interesting choices, filled with characters with their own inner lives. It’s a philosophy that’s always been part of BioWare’s legacy; now, in The Veilguard, it finally gets to be on full display once again.
Dragon Age: The Veilguard will be on PC, PlayStation, and Xbox on October 31. Make sure to keep an eye on IGN all this month as our IGN First coverage continues.
Kat Bailey is IGN’s News Director as well as co-host of Nintendo Voice Chat. Have a tip? Send her a DM at @the_katbot.
Final Fantasy 16 released on PC yesterday and there’s already a nice little discount available. At Green Man Gaming, you can get 15% off Final Fantasy 16 by using the code ‘SEP15’ at checkout (see the game here at GMG). This drops its price from $49.99 to $42.49. Additionally, if you’ve bought from GMG before and achieved a certain XP status, you can skip the code, because the price is even lower, at $40.99. That’s a nice little deal for a game that just came out on PC, so take advantage of it while it’s still available!
By purchasing this game right now at Green Man Gaming, you’ll get a few bonuses as well:
For those curious about the XP program, this is Green Man Gaming’s loyalty program. As you gain more XP from purchases, you’ll move up to different tiers that offer a variety of exclusive benefits. To learn more about the XP program, visit Green Man Gaming’s XP page here.
In our review of Final Fantasy 16, writer Mitchell Saltzman stated that, “Final Fantasy 16 will very likely be looked back upon as a turning point for mainline Final Fantasy games, taking its combat fully in the direction of an action game, but I hope that conversation doesn’t overshadow its dark and captivating tale, memorable characters, and the innovative ways in which it helps you keep track of it all.”
If you’re looking for even more gaming discounts, we’ve got plenty of roundups for you to check out, including the best PlayStation deals, the best Xbox deals, and the best Nintendo Switch deals. We also have a roundup of the overall best video game deals that covers everything from those platforms to what other deals are happening in the world of PC gaming. Another great place to look for gaming discounts is our Daily Deals roundup, which showcases the best deals of the day.
Hannah Hoolihan is a freelance writer who works with the Guides and Commerce teams here at IGN.
As I’m sure as is the curse of anyone who’s watched the entirety of Peep Show multiple times, I cannot read the name ‘Marko’ without hearing it in a nasally Australian accent, inquiring about cocaine. This is probably a disservice to the hero of colourful metroidvania Marko: Beyond Brave, who a quick goog tells me may be based on Krali Marko – a popular character in the folklore of Studio Mechka’s native Bulgaria. Folk hero or not, Marko certainly has some heroic facial hair: his moustache floweth so bountifully that it can’t be contained in his character portrait. Extremely powerful of him.
Come get some jetsam.
Anyone who’s played PowerWash Simulator for too long while in a feverish state from having eaten too many fish fingers knows the feeling. You cease being a sanitary entrepreneur and find yourself submerged in the water, wearing a spacesuit, shooting the dirt off with a laser in a Zen-like trance while you nurture sea creatures. And now, finally, someone’s made a game about it.
Well, it’s sort of about that. In Loddlenaut, Moon Lagoon has produced a peaceful ocean purification quest in which you zip around with an underwater jetpack tidying up rubbish and un-gooping gooped-up scenery. On the way, you meet and care for little fish-like critters called loddles, then do a bit of crafting to top things off.
Read the full article on nintendolife.com
