When The Elder Scrolls Online [official site] first slunk into the world I was not impressed. At a preview event, I was reticent, and at release I was still unconvinced. The MMO shackles just didn t fit with the Elder Scrolls I have always known. But Zenimax have been hacking away at the RPG s extraneous limbs and replacing them with whole new ones, which has reportedly improved the beast. Morrowind is the next leg to be stitched on, the developers have announced, bringing with it the wide island of Vvardenfell, 30 hours of story quests, a new class and a new PvP mode. … [visit site to read more]

Oh, Early Access!

Sorry, just stubbed my toe. Yes, it’s certainly worked in places, but goodness me if it isn’t sometimes the most infuriating way of releasing barely functioning games for a fee. Time was it cost a developer lots of money to have their game concepts tested and QAd – now they charge 27 for the privilege. That’s how much it’ll cost you to get into Funcom’s Conan Exiles [official site] right now. The store page describes a game where you discover ancient secrets, enslave your own army, ride around on rhinos, build entire cities – it sounds stunning. Right now it’s a game where you’re more likely to die because a menu won’t load. [Nudey Warning: There are some pictures of naked characters below]> … [visit site to read more]

Knights vs. Vikings vs. Samurai stabfest For Honor [official site] will hold a four-day open beta test shortly before launch next month, Ubisoft announced today. From February 9th through 12th, all and sundry will be able to stab each other across a variety of modes. This announcement comes after a closed beta test last weekend and, er, a cheeky little leak giving the news away. … [visit site to read more]

Hello your majesties. Crown and Council is the Mojang-made freebie that popped up unannounced last year, like a gatecrashing mole. I made a light snack of it plenty of times that week a teeny weeny boardgamish strategy that felt like a single player version of Eight Minute Empire. Now I might be snacking on it again, because it has recently received an update, increasing the levels, generating new ones and tweaking some of the land-bashing mechanics to make it less frustratingly random. … [visit site to read more]

Game Swap is a new series in which one person recommends another a game they might like. This week, Alec suggests that Adam return to the vintage first-person shooting of Star Wars: Dark Forces. Is it really still the best Star Wars FPS ever made?>

Alec: Choosing a game for our friend in the North is peculiarly difficult, as the bugger s played almost everything and moreover doesn t appear to dislike any particular breed of videogame. I cycled through a few options, with really only the belief that he doesn t entirely tolerate cod-mystical flibber-jibber to go on – just one way in which our tastes tend to align. Finding the gaps is what makes this particular swap so much more intriguing than a straighter hey, you don t like things like this, play it anyway arrangement.

… [visit site to read more]

I don’t mean crap> crap. I mean “merely adequate in the age of Half-Life 2” shooters. Unreconstructed action nonsense, perhaps with some kind of gimmick, definitely with too-big weapons, a plot you never care about, lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots of men to shoot. … [visit site to read more]

The wonderful murder sandbox of Hitman [official site] is now a touch livelier and, if you want, tougher too. A free update launched today adding a new hit set in Sapienza during a concert and a new ‘Professional’ difficulty setting, along with fixes, tweaks, HDR support, and some other gubbins. That’s a good-looking update. I’ll get into that soon but first, have a peep at the trailer for new bonus mission ‘Landslide’, which sends Ian Hitman to Sapienza to whack a politician with mafia ties: … [visit site to read more]

Have You Played? is an endless stream of game retrospectives. One a day, every day of the year, perhaps for all time.>

What happens if you take one of the waddling jelly people from Gang Beasts and drop it into a physics puzzler, set in surreal environments? Human Fall Flat [official site] happens. It’s a game about pulling levers, hopping across platforms and shunting crates around, but all of those things are made trickier and more interesting thanks to a control scheme that gives you control of individual limbs that are about as stiff as a plank of porridge.

… [visit site to read more]

All Sunless Sea [official site] players get access to the formerly Kickstarter-exclusive Pirate Poet and Cladery Heir content thanks to an update to the game today. Failbetter consulted with Kickstarter backers to see if they backed the move and the consensus was apparently “the more, the merrier”, or words to that effect.

I assume the timing is very much related to Sunless Skies (the Sunless Sea sequel*) starting its own Kickstarter campaign on 1 Feb so the more people are eyeballing Failbetter’s games, the better its chances of success. … [visit site to read more]

The next chapter of the hugely impressive Resident Evil 4 HD Project [official site] will arrive on March 31st, its makers have announced, overhauling the game’s castle areas. This is possibly the best fan-made overhaul I’ve seen, and certainly goes far beyond Capcom’s work in the official HD re-release. Working with unofficial tools, the RE4HD Project’s makers have added more 3D detail to the world, relit areas, and taken such care in recreating textures that they even track down buildings Capcom photographed as source material. Check out this new comparison video showing off improvements: … [visit site to read more]