Five minutes of Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag gameplay, filmed at Gamescom last week, shows a chunk of the new naval warfare and the assault on an island fortress. Black Flag is shaping up to be a huge oceanic sandbox, so solid naval combat is going to be crucial to the game’s success.



The attack opens on with a mortar barrage on Punta Guarico, a small fortress in the Caribbean. The mortar is a new weapon that looks like it’s tricky to control, but it packs a real punch.

“There is a lot happening and it get can intense,” Black Flag game director Ashraf Ismail
says in the voiceover. “This is a naval sandbox, and in this case we chose to attack while there’s a Brig nearby. This could have easily happened at night or during a hurricane storm with waterspouts and thirty-foot waves. There could have been a bigger military presence.”

After destroying the enemy ships and battering the fort’s tower strongholds, assassin Edward Kenway takes a running dive off the side of the ship, swims to shore, and begins to parkour and stab his way through the defenses to get at the fort commander. The smooth transition from naval commander to free-running assassin is pretty impressive.

“The seamless concept was something we knew we needed to push because it brings the gameplay and immersion to a whole new level,” Ismail says.

Black Flag will be out on consoles on October 29 in North America and November 1 in Europe. Its PC release is slated for a few weeks afterwards.

Gun Monkeys released a few weeks ago, and it certainly looks like it could be a winner. According to players, though, there’s a problem: there just aren't enough players online. To fight the low server population, developer Size Five Games has updated the game to automatically generate free Steam keys that players can give to their friends. This is in addition to reducing the price and giving one extra copy at purchase, steps already taken by Size Five in July.

“It’s a unique solution to a frustrating situation”, said Size Five Games’ Dan Marshall in a blog post. “Despite universally positive reviews, Gun Monkeys just hasn't sold enough to keep servers perpetually-buzzing with players. It’s infuriating, but the important thing to do now is to make sure the people who have bought the game can enjoy it as intended.”

If you spend a few minutes in an empty server and no one comes to join you, Gun Monkeys will now send you a Steam key to give someone so you won’t feel quite so alone. The free keys won’t last forever and they’re limited to a few per player, but it’s certainly an interesting tactic.

“or now it’s a fun and unusual way to combat the Curse of the Indie Multiplayer Game,” Marshall said. “Let’s see how it goes.”

This week, Evan, Tyler, T.J., and Cory recap news from Gamescom: Diablo, XCOM, Elder Scrolls, and more. We compare notes on our current adventures in Saints Row IV, and T.J. vastly exceeds the legal limit for Bohemian Rhapsody lyric puns in a single podcast.

Is this the real life? Is this just fantasy? The answer is none of the above—it's PC Gamer Podcast 361 - Samurai Kangaroo Cavalry!

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Look, I enjoy brutal, senseless violence as much as the next cynically desensitised 20-something jerk. Even so, just look at this thing! Are you even allowed to put this many colours into a game without some sort of special permit? If not, we'll have to hide this Rayman Legends launch trailer from the fun police, else they will definitely confiscate it for being so damn happy.

The game is out this Friday in the UK and mainland Europe, with the American release following next week on September 3rd. In a shock-twist, the PC release is still scheduled for the same date as the console versions, although, as a Ubisoft game, it is still possible that could change. Hopefully it won't. Rayman Origins was an excellent platformer and, from the looks of things, Legends is set to be more inventively charming joy.

Somebody has given the Steam Greenlight valve a kick, turning the previous slow trickle of accepted indies into a full-on flood. Instead of the usual ten-at-a-time approval process, today Valve have cleared one hundred games to be sold on Steam, with a view to stress-testing their system. An August 28th Batch Workshop Collection has been created to let you browse through the mega-list.

"This latest milestone is both a celebration of the progress we've made behind the scenes and a stress test of our systems," explains the announcement post. "Future batches are not likely to be as large, but if everything goes smoothly we should be able to continue increasing the throughput of games from Greenlight to the Steam store."

"As with past batches, these titles will be released independently in the weeks or months ahead, as they complete development and integrate any Steamworks features they are interested in utilizing."

Browsing the giant list of soon-to-be Steamified games, a few highlights stand out. Mostly, though, its an interesting collection of the unknown and obscure. The next few months of Steam releases should be enjoyably diverse. Anything caught your eye?

Back in March, the impossible to Google turn-based tactical roguelike Enemy met its modest Kickstarter goal and secured its continued development. Since then, developer Tom Johnson has been working away on the 8-bit inspired indie X-Com-a-like, and is releasing monthly development updates detailing its progress. With the latest, the game's campaign structure is beginning to take shape, adding retro-infused strategic depth to an already promising project.



The overworld will offer a variety of 8-bit era video game themes, which the player's squad will use to plan out the equipment types they'll receive, and the difficulty they want to take on. Johnson explains that the player is free to choose their path to the End Boss, giving freedom inside an already randomly generated map. In fact, while X-Com would be the obvious touchstone, given the systemic turn-based action, Jagged Alliance seems an increasingly more fitting comparison. Except, you know, with plasma swords and witches and double-jumps.

Each land is divided up into multiple environment types. Here is what's currently planned:


Action: Alien, Base, City, Jungle, Technological
Adventure: Castle, Caves, Forest, Mountains, Plains, Town
Horror: Casle, Demonic, Forest, Graveyard, Swamp, Town
Platformer: Castle, Clouds, Forest, Plains, Sand, Snow, Town


Last month's update explained the inventory and equipping system:



While Enemy doesn't appear to have its own website yet, you can learn more about the game through the Kickstarter update page, where all posts have been made available to the public. Enemy is scheduled for a December release.

You may remember Dirty Bomb from late last year, when I told you all that, "hey, look! Dirty Bomb is the name of a game!" Well now it isn't. What is the name of a game is "Extraction". In fact, it's the name of the same game. Splash Damage have rebranded their first person shooter, announcing its new, arguably blander moniker alongside a partnership with free to play publisher Nexon.

"Fun fact: Extraction was Dirty Bomb’s original name and the reason we didn’t stick with it for the Closed Alpha was that we weren’t sure if we could secure the worldwide trademark for it," explains the Splash Damage blog. "We're confident we can achieve this with Nexon's help, so we’ve decided to go with the name we’ve always wanted for the game."

To all intents and purposes, it's exactly the same game. The only two differences are:


It will be a little harder to Google.
Doing so is less likely to flag one of the security services that are watching everything we do.


As for the Nexon deal, Splash Damage explain that Extraction will an on-going service that regularly pushes out updates and new features. "Nexon ranks among the biggest free-to-play forces in the world, having successfully operated a variety of popular online games. They've got a staggering amount of experience designing, developing, running, and supporting free-to-pay games, and they possess the vast infrastructure required for an undertaking of Extraction’s scope."

Splash Damage will have a playable build of the Extraction formerly known as Dirty Bomb at PAX, and promise further updates on the game's new teaser site.

In a dance as old as time itself (or at least, as old as the mid-2000s), Gearbox have announced the inevitable Game of the Year super-bundle for Borderlands 2. As is tradition, the package will shepherd all the current DLC bits alongside the main game into a single release. In Borderlands 2's case, that means an absolutely absurd number of things to shoot with increasingly bizarre weapons.

Hey, guys! What's in Borderlands 2's Goaty edition?


Borderlands 2 Main Game
Captain Scarlett and her Pirate’s Booty
Mr. Torgue’s Campaign of Carnage
Sir Hammerlock’s Big Game Hunt
Tiny Tina’s Assault on Dragon Keep
Creature Slaughter Dome
Gaige, the Mechromancer Character Class
Gearbox Gun Pack
Golden Key
Vault Hunter's Relic
Krieg, the Psycho Character Class
Collector’s Edition Heads and Skins
Ultimate Vault Hunter Upgrade Pack 1


A lot of stuff. Interestingly, not all of the stuff, though. Gearbox have further plans for new content, including a second Vault Hunter Upgrade pack, increasing the level-cap 72, and the further adventures of T.K. Baha. Does this mean there'll be another bundle years down the line? Borderlands 2: Game of the Decade edition may be pushing the self-congratulatory naming scheme a tad too far.

It's still a quality package, filled with some excellent DLC bits that cheerfully warp the main campaign. Borderlands 2: Game of the Year edition is due out October 11, for some as-yet unannounced amount of moneys.

Finally! For too long, Valve have tied their primary work - funny comics that are posted on the internet - to their hobby project, the computer game and dress-up toy Team Fortress 2. "Can we see the continued adventures of Saxton Hale, manpuncher?" we'd ask, only to be told that no, first we had to wait for a development team to code new maps, weapons, rule tweaks, and approximately 5,000 new hats.

Not any more, though. The multi-media wizards (and occasional game developers) have realised that not everything needs an accompanying piece of headgear, and have released the first part of a six issue TF2 comic saga, sans update.

Well, sort of. A small update has slipped out, in recognition of Team Fortress's 17th birthday. It adds "Rome-vision" sharing, allowing anyone playing an MvM server with an owner of the Hardy Laurel to opt-in to mechanical history. Chemistry sets have also been added. They sound weird, so I'm going to let the TF2 Wiki do the heavy describing.

As for the comic series, it's planned for bi-monthly release. You can read the first part here.

I know. I know. City builders aren't renowned for their CPU-straining graphics. Perhaps unfairly. While the Tropico series didn't dazzle you with its depictions of dictatorial splendour, they had a warm and vibrant beauty to their tenements, shanty towns and decadent tourist traps. And these first 'pre-alpha' screenshots of Tropico 5 show the series' first major upgrade since El Presidente's third outing.

They're another hint that this new version will be a significant update of the series. As revealed with the announcement, Tropico 5 will take you through different eras of island management, from the colonial 19th century, and into the future.

Tropico 5 is due out next year.