Much has been made of the simulation in Monster Hunter Wilds during the beta-filled run-up to its release. The ecosystem is teeming with beetles, fish and geckos. Seasons change. Carnivores go out hunting herbivores, and the herbivores wander around in a way that would make Sam Neill sit down in shock and exclaim that they really do move in herds. But those impressive details haven't had much impact on how I play this beast-whacking action game, or any effect on how my brain operates in the midst of a thoughtless crafting splurge. Pare back the vigorwasps and rockslides and sizzling steaks and what you find is a loot-the-loop straight out of an MMO, complemented with chunky combat that remains satisfying to those with the acquired taste for it and overwrought to those who crave simplicity.

For many, it's exactly what you'd expect and want of Monster Hunter. But if the buzz of bashing beasts for stat-bumps quickly wanes for you, the final hours of its 20-25 hour campaign will pass with diminishing interest. When Monster Hunter Wilds finally lets go of your hand and says "okay, go do your own thing!" I felt like handing in my notice to the guild. I've seen enough of this monster to know that it's beautiful, swole, and not for me.

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My my, it's blustery outside. Airflow is very important to my happiness, so I'm keeping the window open even though there are gale-force winds outside; I've had to push my laundry basket up against my bedroom door though, because the air pressure keeps making it clunk> in the night.

So, seeing as I'm now trapped in my room, I spose we'd better do our weekly ablutions in the community-wide hot tub of weekend gaming. Here's what we're all clicking on this weekend!

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You are playing a co-op session with Julian Gollop, Snapshot Games's CEO and the man who created XCOM. He's showing you Chip n' Clawz vs. The Brainioids, a real time strategy game where you'll gather resources, fabricate structures, and give orders to robot minions in battles against an alien menace. The twist? It's all in third person, with split-screen couch co-op, real time ranged and melee combat, and even a little platforming.

You're playing as robot cat Clawz, and Gollop is plucky spacefarer Chip. He's zipping around the map hoovering up resources on a hoverbike he's nabbed from a building that gifts you both special tech. You've got a rocket pack that lets you double jump, accessing new structure blueprints hidden in high places. It's time to take the fight to the aliens, and Gollop calmly suggests building troop spawners near your main structure - it's got mounted guns, after all.

What do you do?

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Buried in Brendan Greene and PlayerUnknown Productions' billowing, three-part, decade-long effort to build some kind of "3D internet" there is a ramshackle but thoughtful Unreal Engine game about wilderness survival and orienteering. Catchily titled Prologue: Go Wayback! and due for Early Access launch this spring, it's a game about finding a radio tower on a 64km2 map, generated based on a mix of in-house art and public access landscape data fed through the developer's in-house machine learning technology.

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This article contains moderate spoilers for the closing events of the Wedding Crashers quest in Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2.>

It’s impossible, I think, to play Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 without playing a boozer, even if you’re only boozing in cutscenes. The game’s 15th century world is greased by many splendours of hooch, from the wine used in potion-brewing through the finer vintages at banqueting tables to the viral pondwater they sell in seedier taverns. A lot of the time, the writing views alcohol as a means of teeing up some slapstick debauchery reminiscent of Paul Bettany’s character in A Knight’s Tale. It venerates the spectacle of having a large one, with custom dialogue and voice-acting for protagonist Henry when you woozily explain your antics to guards. But sometimes, perhaps despite itself, it expresses something about the culture of drinking and the unpleasantness of being militantly exhorted to drink.

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I was completely hooked the first time I played Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater. The stealth mechanics, brutal survival elements, and insane Cold War espionage plot felt like no other game at the time. I still remember crawling through the jungle with my camo set, hoping to avoid an enemy patrol only to get spotted by a guard and have the entire area on high alert.

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Presidents' Day brings a wave of discounts on gaming laptops, desktops, and more, making it a great time to upgrade or invest in a new machine. Whether you're after raw performance, high refresh rates, or a balance of power and portability, there are plenty of options available at lower-than-usual prices.

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A team of Diablo speedrunners spent months searching the 1996 RPG's 2.2 billion valid randomly generated dungeon seeds to find the layout used in a stupidly lucky speedrun they suspected to be illegitimate, says a new report from Ars Technica's Kyle Orland.

The three minute, 12 second sorcerer run by Maciej "Groobo" Maselewski was first uploaded to Speed Demos Archive in 2009. Watching it "feels like watching someone win the lottery," writes Orland, thanks to a seemingly random streak of entrance and exit stairways right next to each other, allowing for a rapid, safe descent through the dungeon. Groobo lucked out again on the ninth floor, nabbing the Naj's Puzzler item needed for later teleporting exploits.

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Sundays are for bracing for the February half-term week here in the UK, during which schools are closed and parents must occupy kids while it's still mostly cold and rainy outside. Quick, tidy the house, book in the playdates, get the shopping done, catch-up on sleep. And do some reading, obviously.

V Buckenham wrote a fun design analysis of "can you pet the dog", breaking down each word in turn.

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Greetings, pals. Nursing a nice post-Valentine's Day hangover, I hope? Had I remembered it was Valentine's Day when I selected the image, I'd possibly have picked something slightly more romantic than a group of potters going about their business.

Anyway, now for the best part of the week! No, not the playing of games. The talking about> the playing of games! Whether the playing of games actually happens is inconsequential. Here's what we're all clicking on this weekend!

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