Many of you are by now bathing in twinkling neon ravelights and swooning into the metal arms of Cyberpunk 2077‘s humourless unhunks, who stalk the streets of Night City like animatronic pizza restaurant mascots gone feral. That is fine. There are worse places to find oneself in the labyrinthine hell of video games. Places such as these. Here are 9 neighbourhoods you wouldn’t want to bring up your children in.

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Last year brought RPG gems like Disco Elysium. Was there an RPG as good released in 2020? We’ve updated our list of the best RPGs of all time to reflect the best of the past year – and there’s still dozens of older classics, too.

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Yes, Skyblivion is still going folks. A team of volunteers are still plugging away at remaking The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion in Skyrim as a mod. Will it ever come to a close? Well, in a new developer diary, we got an insight into how it’s looking and where it’s headed. In among all the details surrounding UI and clothes and objects, I found one thing really stood out to me. They’ve nearly completed the ‘first pass’ of the overworld, and they’re injecting some extra flavour into many of the original’s dull, empty spaces.

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Update: Microsoft say they’ll “keep the commitment” to bring Bethesda’s Deathloop and Ghostwire: Tokyo to PS5 as timed exclusives. More below.>

Microsoft just announced they’ve bought ZeniMax Media, the parent company of Bethesda. The developers of games such as Skyrim, Fallout, Dishonored, Prey, Doom, Quake and all those classics are now technically Xbox Game Studios. Xbox boss Phil Spencer made a post welcoming the developers, in what he calls a “landmark step” for both Microsoft and Bethesda.

What a year.

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Regicide is once again a topic at dinner, thanks to the release of Crusader Kings III. Your aunt passes you the gravy, and asks about council matters. Your mother comments on the rise in guillotine stocks. Your father, the king, chews his mutton with a rueful and distant glare, probably thinking about war. A cloaked advisor enters and hands you a note on parchment. “The ten worft kingf and queenf in gamef,” it reads. You cough politely, put it in your pocket for later, and continue pushing poisoned food around as if you are eating it.

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What’s your favourite Fall Guys minigame? See Saw? Door Dash? That weird thing with the eggs? I, for one, prefer the one where your merry band of tic-tacs slay the elder dragon Alduin. Now I understand that’s not a very “official” route to claiming a crown or two – but thanks to modder m150, you can now traipse around The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim Special Edition with a rabble of ravenous Fall Guys at your side.

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Nowadays, I’m a Skyrim watcher and not a Skyrim doer. I used to be a doer, but that involved more than just installing the game. I’d start modding, and I wouldn’t stop. Couldn’t stop. I’d spend more time looking for lore appropriate coin distribution than shouting at dragons. Eventually, something would break, and I’d uninstall it, promising that I wouldn’t fall into that hole again.

It’s been a long struggle, but when I stumbled upon YouTube compilations of heavily-modded Elder Scrolls, I finally broke the curse. Some brave souls do the hard work for me, turning the nine-year-old RPG (or four-year-old remaster, or two-year-old VR remake) into PC melting 4K thirst traps. I don’t have time for that. Nor the PC. (more…)

Crikey, it’s been a hot minute since we last heard anything about Skywind, hasn’t it? Nevertheless, the colossal task of bringing all of Morrowind into Skyrim is still well underway, with the modders behind the project releasing our first look at the ambitious mod in over a year, by way of a spruced-up return to The Battle at Nchurdamz. Hope your arachnophobia doesn’t extend to mechanical spiders, readers.

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It’s the banner that did it.

Drag… god. Jesus christ. Dwagonbown Goes UwU (or, more correctly, dwagonbown goes uwu) is an overhaul mod that turns you into the worst person in Skyrim. It does nothing, really, except it changes most of your dialogue options to be, well, uwu.

If you’re not familiar with the concept, please for the love of god stop now. Save yourself. There is no value in this knowledge. (more…)

Ages ago I learned how to lockpick in real life, and ever since I’ve been so impressed at how video games emulate the feeling of managing to crack a lock open. I think maybe it’s the noise, that signature *clunk* that makes it so satisfying. It’s a staple of RPGs like Skyrim, where lockpicking is literally a skill you can level up. But loads of games have introduced their own unique minigames to let you unlock things, and now you can see most of them in one place thanks to the museum of lockpicking mechanics.

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