Multiplayer Game BalancingAN-94: Damage slightly reduced.DSR 50: Rate of fire reduced.Ballista: Rate of fire slightly reduced.

You look at the patch notes, your whole body starting to go hot with rage. Your heart beats faster, your breath gets shorter. You HIT the Red Bull can from your desk, the murky liquid splashing your poster of Transformers-spoiling sticky-hottie Megan Fox across the arse. You stand and ram the back of your squadgy desk chair into the desk to hear it BANG, to get some relief from the rage you are feeling. You PUNCH the wall in frustration, and then hurriedly have to shake it hard because that was not the plasterboard part of the wall it was an actual stone brick. You SCREAM in anguish. “WHY?!” you yell. “WHY HAVE YOU MESSED UP MY VIRTUAL GUNS?!?!? HOW WILL I GET MEGAN TO LIKE ME NOW??!?!?!” You do a little sort of rage dance that makes you look like you belong in Populous. (more…)

I feel really bad for Matt Gilgenbach of Infinitap Games, whose game Retro/Grade, he explains “was nominated for two IGF awards in 2009 as well as won the IndieCade Audience Award in 2010″, and despite that, managed to be a spectacular failure for the talented guy – it just didn’t sell. As Nathan said back in March, Retro/Grade moonwalked onto Steam a little while back, and it’s currently on sale for next to nothing (Pick it up! It’s a super-great reverse rhythm’up in space!), but that’s not why we’re here. Matt has picked himself back up. He is going to try again. This time, it’s going to be a neverending nightmare (in that, it is called Neverending Nightmares). (more…)

It is arguable that I have slightly misunderstood what this minute’s Splinter Cell Blacklist trailer is actually about, after I read that the video title was “Ghost Panther Assault”. But that isn’t going to change anything – I’m insisting that rather than being about Ghost, Panther and Assault modes, this is about Ghost Panther, the greatest hero of our time.

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Far in the distance, a tiny speck appears on the grassy horizon. You can’t quite make it out – it could be anything, but it is moving. It is moving towards you, faster and faster now – you can make out a person’s features. It is a brunette with a bubblegum pink streak in her hair, and dark black square-rimmed glasses. She is wonderfully beautiful; just a dream. Like how you imagine Kristen Bell would be if she had brown hair and the build of an Amazon that had let herself go a bit and was about five years younger. So not that much like Kristen Bell but JUST ENOUGH. She is running, running, getting closer and closer – she is almost here, with an exhausted look on her face.

“RPS!” she says. “RPS! I bring NEWS! THERE ARE GOING TO BE SIMS 3 EXPANSION PACKS!” She coughs and splutters with the effort. “That’s right! The Sims 3 Into the Future and The Sims 3 Movie Stuff!” she says, stopping when she sees your frankly quite disappointed face. “I am not good at this news thing,” she sighs. (more…)

Magicka: Wizard Wars is a new venture for the inept, accident prone and shell-shocked mages who first appeared in Arrowhead’s unexpected hit. Designed by Paradox North, a new internal team, it’s a multiplayer team deathmatch game, with a new engine but a similar perspective. I played for a couple of hours during a hot day in London and, despite the proximity of a beer garden and a cold pint, I would have been happy to stay at the computer right through the evening. This is my kind of war.>

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Jagex send word that their third iteration of the enormously popular fantasy MMO – Runescape 3 – has materialised on this internet, right here. The game is kicking off with a ten-week event, in which the players must battle for “Lumbridge”. That might not sound very glamorous, but it gives players the chance to work together in PvP activities, with the ultimate goal of being champion of the event, and actually changing stuff in the world. Jagex explain: “You’ll be able to join one of the two factions, and to collect divine tears – fragments of condensed, Guthixian energy that can be gathered through combat and skilling, both on the battlefield and off.” Unpronounceable energies are the best kind.

Lovely trailer below. (more…)

While a sequel to this year’s Tomb Raider hasn’t officially been announced, it’s obviously inevitable despite rumours of “mediocre” sales (ie. Square’s expectations were ludicrously high). And it seems the gap between the two games will be bridged by a comickybook.

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Lovely roll-em-upper InFlux is ready to roll out, and you can help put it on Steam too. It must be lovely to be a ball. Imagine just rolling around in a paddling pool, for example. Or rolling down a grassy hill. Or bouncing gently down some steps. And in InFlux, you can do all of those things whilst solving physicsy puzzles! Just look at this trailer! Like a new Portal without the sarcastic narrator and well, less of the holes. Actually I don’t know why I brought Portal up. Perhaps I brought it up because it looks good. HERE IS THE TRAILER. (more…)

Would you like to see 14 minutes of Assassin’s Creed 4 footage? Well tough, because you have to. It’s PS4 footage, which means there’s a good chance it’ll match PC on release. Should it actually get released at the same time, of course. Oddly enough, Ubisoft hasn’t found time to get back to us regarding that.

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More hints of troubled times at Square have appeared, via the resignation of Eidos Montreal’s founder and general manager, Stephane, D’Astous. Describing “irreconcilable differences” to Develop, he let loose with a tirade about a “lack of leadership, lack of courage and the lack of communication”. And he was just getting started.

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