The owners of Torchlight developers Runic Games, the Chinese free-to-play-focused publisher Perfect World Entertainment, confirmed today that it has shut down Runic’s Seattle studio. Seeing as that’s Runic’s only studio, er, that’s them basically gone – though their games will live on. This comes barely one month after Runic released Hob.

Perfect World have also laid off most the team at Motiga, the studio behind Gigantic – which only launched in July. Perfect World say these are unconnected but sheesh, not a good week to be owned by Perfect World. (more…)

Oh no, you’ve tripped the alarm. Now the terrifying RPS podcast, the Electronic Wireless Show, knows you’re here. It’s going to hunt you down and force you to listen to it. Quick! Think of a way out of this, before you hear all about Adam becoming an accidental mass murderer in Dishonored, or John obsessively re-loading his way out of a bad situation. If you don’t escape, I’ll have to tell you about the time I threw a gun at someone’s head in Heat Signature, to absolutely no effect. This week, you see, we’re talking about Things Going Wrong. (more…)

Hob [official site] is immediately striking in its lovely decorative design. Torchlight was pretty in its own way, but here Runic have struck upon a gorgeous aesthetic, something that looks like it could be a Zelda spin-off (as in, not like any of the previous Zelda games, but could easily be the next one, complete with chopping grass). Your character, a hooded creature with glowing blue eyes, is accompanied at the very start by a large protective, gibberish-intoning robot, who very quickly sacrifices one of his enormous arms after yours is lost to a creepy purple infection. Equipped with a bloody great robo-arm, you’re then far better ready to charge about its ever-expanding lands. (more…)

Colourful, calm third-person action-adventures aren’t my usual destination of choice but the double whammy of Rime and Yonder has led to me spending a fair bit of time running and jumping and relaxing> in recent months. September might add another game to the playlist when Hob [official site] arrives on the 26th, although talk of PUNCHING and MECHANICAL GLOVE-ARMS suggests it might not be as peaceful as I’d first thought.

I know I’ve seen this game before but I hadn’t realised it’s the next game from Runic, the studio that made the Torchlight games. Torchlight is the jolliest action role-playing game in the world, with cute pets and so many bright colours it’s enough to make a goth faint, and Hob looks jolly too, but that’s about as far as the similarities go.

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Runic Games (yes, the people that brought you Torchlight) is hard at work on a quaint little curiosity called Hob. A brand new trailer made its debut during PAX West 2016, and it shows off some platforming/adventure game-lite moves that should tickle your fancy.

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