Skywind‘s latest trailer is titled ‘Slough’, but it does not, as every British reader just hoped, mark the inclusion of Berkshire’s much maligned city in the game. Instead it’s the first look at the remake of Morrowind‘s Bitter Coast inside the Skyrim engine, and it’s as pretty as every other chunk we’ve seen of the ambitious mod project so far.

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You could finish Dishonored for free this weekend. It’s free to play on Steam until 9 o’clock on Sunday evening, which certainly gives enough time to zip through and stab everyone in the neck. You would, of course, be a monster–not just for the reckless murder, but for missing some of the finest first-person sneaking of recent years. No, unless you have nowt going on, the trial will give sneaky players just enough time to crave closure. Handily, the game’s on sale cheap too, as are its ace DLC chapters.

Killfreaks can alternatively play Titanfall and Borderlands 2 free this weekend, mind.

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While QuakeCon rages away in Texas, gibsters stuck at home might feel a little left out. Chin up, little buddy: Quake’s coming to you. After missing its plan to launch during QCon 2013, Quake IV single-player mod False Dawn has launched alongside this year’s fragging festivities. It brings a new story with 90-120 minutes of non-linear Strogg-shooting and a few tweaks to good old Q4.

Its single-player side was pretty good fun, from what I remember, so sure, maybe I will revisit that so very brown and frightful planet of meaty cyborgs this weekend.

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BUT NOT SOON ENOUGH, etc. Skywind, the total rebuild of The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind in Skyrim’s engine, continues to play sweet melodies on my heart strings. They’re nostalgic tunes that lull me like the most charming of snake charmers. There’s a new trailer out, and I can practically feel the Balmoran cliff racers pecking at my back, making me invent new deities just so I can use their names as curse words (There is a god named Fuckthulhu now. You’re welcome). Ahhh, happy memories. Watch below, and revel in the good news that a public test is right around the corner.

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Update – I’ve borrowed on oldish GeForce and the game’s now running fine. Definitely primarily an AMD incompatibility, presumably at driver level.>

What time is it? It’s WHINY MOANY GRIPEY O’CLOCK, that’s what goddamn time it is. I’d hoped to have made decent inroads into Wolfenstein: The New Sequel* by now, but no PC code was available before release, and post-release the thing’s all but unplayable on my system, even on its lowest settings. I’m not alone in this, but while troubles are reported on a myriad of systems, AMD-ATI graphics card users have been hit particularly hard. I even bought a Radeon R290 yesterday for the express purposes of this and Watch Dogs, but I’m looking at 10-20 FPS most of the time. It does spike to 40 on occasion, but not often or consistently enough to enjoy the experience. Even the Bethesda and Machine Games logos at the start play like a cellphone video from 2004. At least I’m not suffering from the crashes to desktop that many others have reported.

A few possible performance aids are below, but they haven’t helped me. … [visit site to read more]

Speaking personally, I find The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion to be the weakest game of its storied lineage, but that doesn’t mean I think it was bad by any means. The prospect of exploring its world of idyllic countrysides, tastefully mudcrab-dappled waters, and screaming fire eyeball portals to hell remains an attractive one, and I’ll be especially keen to do so if Skyblivion sees the light of day. Like TESRenewal compatriot Skywind, Skyblivion is an attempt to remake Oblivion in Skyrim’s engine. Want to see how it’s coming along? Check out the trailer below.

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Oh Skywind, let me count the ways. For those not in the know, Skywind is a Skyrim mod that aims to transplant the entirety of The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind (aka, the best Elder Scrolls) into Skyrim’s more modern engine while maintaining the former’s gorgeously bizarre sense of style. Locations, NPCs, quests, the mudcrab merchant who essentially functioned as my best friend in middle school – everything’s going in. It’s an absurdly colossal undertaking, and yet unlike just about every other total conversion mod out there, it’s actually going places>. INCREDIBLY NOSTALGIA-PROVOKING video of Morrowind’s re-envisioned first areas below.

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This is the latest in the series of articles about the art technology of games, in collaboration with the particularly handsome Dead End Thrills.>

With the galaxy’s biggest sci-fi movies using ever more effects houses and artists, it can be hard to pinpoint today’s Ralph McQuarries and Ron Cobbs. They’re out there, though, often known more by work than name. At the top of the pile is Stephan Martiniere, one of those illustrators and art directors whose work is so envied by just about any sci-fi project going that’s he levelled up to ‘Visionary’. Put simply, people want the stuff in his head on their books, in their movies, at their theme parks, and, as luck would have it, in their games.

Examples? In movies, Martiniere’s applied his signature style (eye-popping ‘Golden Age’ snapshots of civilisations in overdrive) to the worlds of I, Robot, Tron: Legacy, Star Wars Episodes II and III, Star Trek, The Fifth Element, the Total Recall remake, 300: Rise Of An Empire, Guardians Of The Galaxy and The Avengers: Age Of Ultron. *and breathe…* … [visit site to read more]

It was only December that Craig last came scampering along on the back of a Silt Strider, bouncily telling us all about Skywind, a mod project to port the world, creatures and mechanics of Morrowind to Skyrim’s fancier engine. Now there’s a new trailer showing features for the next update, and a thought occurs: maybe they’re going to pull this off.>

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This is the latest in a series of articles about the art technology of games, in collaboration with the particularly handsome Dead End Thrills.>

An occupational risk of Christmas is that the great mead (Jaffa Cakes) hall of my in-laws’ living room will inspire me to reinstall Skyrim, post a few fancy screenshots, and sure enough get a few emails asking for some mythical mod guide. Then comes the abuse: “He doesn’t want anyone to have his secret sauce!” Or: “His Skyrim doesn’t look like that – *snort* – those are Photoshopped.” Only they don t capitalise Photoshop because they didn t have to sit through that> publishing meeting, lucky old them.

They’re almost right about one thing: my Skyrim doesn’t look like that. Likewise, when someone asks me what English weather is like, I don t answer: It s like that evening drive between Dorset and Wiltshire when a torrential downpour gave way to just the best> sunshine that lit up the faces of distant historic buildings and cast painterly shadows across dale and field. What I tell them is that, nine times out of ten, it s shit. (more…)