A mild eruption of excitable comments on Twitter drew my attention to the Kaptain Brawe 2 Kickstarter. Having just launched, it’s a long way from its $150,000 goal but there are 34 days to go and there seems to be a fair amount of good feeling for the original game. Unfortunately, that’s not the case here at RPS Towers where news of the crowdfunded sequel to the comedic sci-fi point and clicker was met with confusion and fear. I think I’m the only one who clicked on the link but all of our responses are below.

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Bit of a mish mash this week starting with a quick update on Intel’s new 9 Series chipset and the motherboards that go with it. The boards are now on sale, but new CPUs of note are missing, so what gives? Meanwhile AMD has officially cut the price of ye olde Radeon R9 280 to $249 which seems like a good cue to look at the state of graphics at that 200 sweet spot here in Blighty (apologies for the mixed currency messaging). While we’re talking AMD, there’s confirmation that new high performance FX CPUs are on the way. Hurrah. But probably not until 2016. Haroo. Oh, and try this bombshell for size. Oculus Rift will be testing out its headsets on snotty youths at none other than the swashbuckling culinary trend setter and conspicuous Michelin star non-awardee that is Chuck E. Cheese’s. And some other stuff that I haven’t quite decided on as I write these very words. Click through and you never know what you might find. It might even be worth reading. … [visit site to read more]

Update: Relax, everyone! A bit, at least. Steam’s offering each Redux for half-price if you own the original game.

Huh! Metro 2033 and Metro: Last Light are being “remastered” for re-release, which is a funny thing. The pair of solid shooters are still quite recent, after all, not to mention pretty enough. It all seems quite odd until you remember new consoles now exist–shiny new consoles hungry for pixels and games, which people are quite keen to feed. So thank you, Xbox One and PlayStation 4. Thanks to you, 4A Games are giving 2033 a grand makeover and Last Light a fetching new outfit.

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Sprung from its imprisonment on Xbox, vaudevillian penitentiary platformer BattleBlock Theater has finally come to Steam. Its release is most definitely to be celebrated: BattleBlock matches shrewd puzzle construction with the furious pace and precise try-and-die challenge of Super Meat Boy, and yet fits all this in a difficulty curve so gentle you barely feel out of breath when you plant your flag at the top. The premise of each level – collect gems and reach the exit – may not be a stretch for the genre, but BattleBlock s execution has few peers, plus it boasts co-op, both online and off, loads of competitive modes, mini-games, and a level editor with Steam Workshop support. And, because this is still a game from the makers of Castle Crashers, there s a button which lets you fart yourself to death. Parp!

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Excellent and terrifying human behaviour sim SpyParty is still in development. I know this because party host Chris Hecker sent an invite to the RPS inbox, asking if we wanted to see the new art for the game. It would be an exclusive soiree just for us. I dressed for the occasion, meaning I put on clothes, and prepared my notebook with all the questions I didn’t get to ask him when he interviewed himself.

In this talk: sniping royalty, hair as a game mechanic, the influence of League of Legends and Dota, and the future of Spy Party.

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Youngsters enjoy staying up way past their bedtime, as if the world might become somehow more magical when the lights go out. That’s why the adults want to keep it to themselves. They’re right of course – after 9pm life is a series of bawdy music hall routines, bourbon and romantic riverboat liasons. Occasionally bedtime is a safe time though. Toddler terror simulator Among The Sleep has been hibernating beneath the blankets for quite some time but a new trailer has just arrived with a release date attached. And, as the headline suggests, that release date isn’t far away at all. The game will be available on May 29th, across the three major platforms – Windows, Mac and Linux.

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Picking a name for your development studio’s tricky business. You probably want something cool, interesting, and distinctive. Combinations of adjectives and animals are played-out by now, but how about throwing verbs into the mix? Nicoll Hunt cunningly went for a studio name which also doubles as a description of what one does in his first game as an indie: I Fight Bears.

His bear-bashing arcade beat ‘em up Fist of Awesome launched on PC last night, having done the rounds on the Ouya microconsole and pocket telephones last year.

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I was actively discouraged from enjoying my favourite moment of The Last Tinker. An unseen enemy bombarded me as I tried to absorb some excellent set-dressing. Though the game s pitched as a childish platforming adventure, revelling in a bright storybook aesthetic, this particular bit of the world is not for me to enjoy. I m being shooed away. You ve got more art to see. Into the next room please, sir, you re holding up the tour.

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Games Workshop are spaffing Warhammer 40,000 licenses all over the place lately, with predictably mixed-but-a-bit-bleh results. However, one did land at Streum On Studio to make first-person shooter Space Hulk: Deathwing. Yes, the folks who made E.Y.E: Divine Cybermancy. Their FPS-RPG debut was awfully wonky yet jolly ambitious, and quite endearing because of that. It’s nice to know that one of the oodles of 40K games should be, at the very least, interesting.

The first ‘screenshots’ arrived in our inbox this morning, and while they’re clearly staged they do have plenty of pretty Space Marine Terminator armour to ogle.

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With all this talk of Unreal Tournament 2014, it may be that you’re recalling fond memories of the myriad mods available for previous UT games. One of those was Deathball, a sports game in which you fired a ball not bullets and attempted to pass and shoot and score your way to team-based victory.

Well, Deathball begat Supreball, a standalone game made by the same team. It has an alpha which is freely downloadable, it’s looking for votes on Steam Greenlight, and there’s a trailer below.

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