Torn Banner Studios is holding a Chivalry Community Fest, which will see the addition of new maps and weapons to the bone-crunching first-person brawler Chivalry: Medieval Warfare, some exclusive in-game swag, and free access to the game over the weekend.

Chivalry: Medieval Warfare earned a very respectable review score of 81 around these parts (though you'll have to take my word for it, the review itself isn't online), and while I was less impressed by the Deadliest Warrior DLC that came out in 2013, I still had some stupid fun going full Braveheart with it. And as of 10.00am PDT today you'll be able to try it out for yourself at no charge on Steam.

Chivalry is also being updated with seven new, community-created maps and nine weapons and helms, an exclusive in-game "brand," and a swanky—you might even say foppish—"Muffin Top" hat for players who follow the game on Steam. And finally, if you like what you see, you can snag the game for keepsies for 80 percent off the regular price, which works out to $5/ 4.

The Chivalry: Medieval Warfare free weekend wraps up at 11 am PDT on May 31, while the sale price will hold until 10 am PDT on June 1. Enjoy the bludgeoning!

The Steam Workshop is a giant thing, containing over 24,000 Skyrim mods, over 413,000 Portal 2 levels and, for some reason, over 100 Goat Simulator characters and mutators. It's also a profitable thing. Team Fortress 2, Dota 2 and Counter-Strike: Global Offensive all have curated Workshops—letting players pick the community-made items that will go on sale in the game.

Valve has now announced that, since the launch of the Workshop in 2011, the total payments to individuals for the creation of in-game items has surpassed $57 million.

Previously, only Valve games had curated item Workshops—something Valve attributes to the "sheer number of challenges required in order to scale to a global audience of creators and players". Seemingly, these hurdles have been overcome, as the Workshop is now hosting curated item Workshops for Chivalry: Medieval Warfare and Dungeon Defenders: Eternity.

"Purchases of this great new content directly enables those community members to continue practicing their craft and making more awesome content," writes Valve, before going on to say that they expect more curated Workshops in "the coming weeks and months".

'Chivalry' is a word which here means 'hitting men with swords until their arms fall off and their legs fall off and maybe they don't have a head'. It's sad that modern warfare has lost this sort of gallant behaviour, but at least it's alive and well in Torn Banner's multiplayer men-hitting action game. Chivalry: Medieval Warfare has had a few free Steam weekends before now, and now it has another one. Look at it there, all temporarily free to play for the next two-ish days. As is the custom, the game is also 75% cheaper if you'd like to keep it after your sworded time is up.

Our Chivalry review doesn't appear to be online, but I'm reliably informed that we gave it 81%. That's quite a bit higher than the score Andy Chalk doled out to its Deadliest Warrior DLC, which "has neither the depth nor the polish to stay in the fight for long".

Games are great at solving ridiculous arguments. Who would win in a fight between Batman and Spider-Man? Or between pirates and Spartans? Or between motorbicyclist Valentino Rossi and former Guns 'n Roses guitarist Slash? You could spend hours in the pub imagining and solving these vital conundrums, or you could just turn to games. Sure, the answers would be no more definitive, but at least there's a time limit on bouts.

And precisely one of those examples is the subject of Chivalry: Deadliest Warrior, the alt-history battle royale expansion for Chivalry: Medieval Warfare. The DLC pack is due out on the 14th of November, and a new trailer has been released, giving you an idea of what to expect.

That trailer comes in two flavours: an original and extended cut. I'm posting the latter, because if you've not got the time to watch a two minute video, what are you even doing browsing a PC gaming website? If you really are pressed for time - or just don't want to listen to grown men screaming at each other for that long - here's the regular version.



The game will give you the chance to side with the Samurais, Spartans, Vikings, Knights, Ninjas and Pirates, in a variety of maps each themed around one side's home turf. It also features a new game mode, called "Multi-Team", pitting all six warrior types against each other at once.

Chivalry: Deadliest Warrior will cost £12/$15.