Naya’s Quest, the latest from VVVVVV and Super Hexagon creator Terry Cavanagh, is an incredibly stressful game. You know that whole relationship you have with your eyes where they by and large tell you the visual truth of a situation? That thing your entire basis of reality is more or less founded upon? Yeah, well, forget about that. You play as a girl (presumably named Naya, unless even that part is an insidious trap door of a lie) who seeks “the edge” in a world that’s falling to pieces. So you hop between squares and everything is just dandy until – if you’re anything like me – you fall right through the ground. Or so you think. But actually, the isometric viewpoint just made it look> like a square was right in front of you. In reality it was above you or on the other side of the level or in outer space. And that is when the (exceedingly nauseating, nerve-wracking) learning begins. It’s occasionally frustrating, but also frequently brilliant.

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The original La Mulana is quite well-revered around these parts, and with good reason. It’s basically Indiana Jones as a Metroidvania, only instead of Harrison Ford’s rugged charm and nigh-infinite bag of last-second tricks, you’re working with your own fickle reflexes and exceedingly >mortal tendencies. Basically, you should be prepared to be stuck/stymied a lot, which is part of the reason Adam likes to compare it to Dark Souls so very, very much. And now a sequel’s in the works, which should please him (and you, and all lovers of exploration and challenge) to no end. You will actually never stop being pleased. That proposition might strike you as existentially confusing, so I’ll allow you a few seconds to ponder it while you click past the break for scant details. (more…)

Flare Path would like to apologise for the late running of Friday’s column. The 50-hour delay was caused by signalling problems, leaves on the line, partisan sabotage, and a Lambton Worm-linked tunnel collapse. Anyone seriously inconvenienced should write to The Flare Path Customer Services Dept. c/o Captain Harry ‘Dapper’ Danvers, The Green Lion, Badger Cull Lane, Little Coddling, Wiltshire, requesting a compensation form request form request form. (more…)

Cyborg hell. I still dream of Orgonon, I wake up sidescrolling.

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Sundays are for preaching to the choir, and then stepping down from the pulpit, picking up an axe, and going outside to deal with that wolf.

• Even wondered what happens to Indie games that aren’t Minecraft, and don’t get on to Steam? Well, it can be something like this: “The other thing we feel is a factor in our sales, is that we inadvertently shoehorned ourselves into the “Endless Runner” genre, without realizing the damage this would do. We felt the concept of an arcade-style, highscore focused game deserved a pure, HD treatment, free of microtransactions and with a focus on depth – and our customers seem to agree. But there seems to be an immediate and general stigma around this genre (thanks to the mobile revolution no doubt) – that “runners” should be free, and they don’t belong on PC.”

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You might remember that DOTA 2 officially launched not too long ago. This may in part be due to the fact that it’s one of the biggest PC games ever>, making it difficult to forget about in the same way that a herd of rhinoceroses just kind of hanging out in your living room would at least spend a fair amount of time in your peripheral vision. It is, of course, already quite good, but Valve plans to continue updating it until the Earth molts away its wriggly organic shell, leaving behind naught but dust and roaches. The first step in that process? A (very) soon-to-be-launched update fittingly titled First Blood. It includes LAN play! Also lots of other things, including Portal’s own wise-cracking cracker of psyches GLaDOS as an announcer. Details below.

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Listen up kids, here’s a cautionary tale of The Man Who Drank Too Much Alcohol And Then Had A Hangover And Then Wanted The World To End An Then Had To Write Words About Video Games. Hang on, I think the title actually contained the whole story. Basically I’m doing my best, OK? Leave me alone. I’ll probably eventually feel better, and then I’ll get back to updating SavyGamer.co.uk, but I’m afraid the selection of cheap games listed here is all you’re getting out of me today. (more…)

If guttural howls from those strange, primitive hill people in console land are anything to go by, State of Decay is apparently quite excellent. We at RPS have been eagerly awaiting its arrival on PC while sipping fine scotch and inventing new> classical instruments, and now it’s finally made the leap. Kinda. The nicely freeform zombie sandbox is playable on our platform of choice right this very second, but you’ll have to contort your highly evolved digits around a controller in order to make with all the driving, surviving, and undead drop-kicking. It’s not all bad, though. Undead Labs actually wants your help> coming up with a fitting keyboard-and-mouse control setup – among other things.

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Oh what a strange state of affairs. Ours is a world that’s had war since time immemorial and planes since the Wright brothers realized that flapping their arms really hard> would only make birds laugh at them, but a combination of all those elements? A World of Warplanes, if you will? That’s apparently a much taller order. The World of Tanks stablemate has been in beta for a decent many months, but it’s still not quite ready for primetime. So instead of revving up for takeoff this month, it’ll stay in the hangar until November.

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Hello youse.

Man, I’m sitting here listening to The Stranglers, one of the UK’s greatest ever bands. It’s got me in the mood for a review of something a bit different. Something that isn’t FANTASY and FIGHTS and SWORDS and STUFF. A party game. Yeah! Hey – I’d love to play a board game with The Stranglers. I bet if you could get Hugh and JJ to sit down together for a while, you could have a pretty vicious game of Cosmic Encounter. (more…)