When I consider Satellite Reign [official site] as a whole, a grand canvas spattered with raindrops, neon and bulletholes, I’m in love with it. Yes, it looks and feels a little like Syndicate, but 5 Lives’ Kickstarted RTS-RPG does not slavishly follow a model from the past. Its city is open, a series of district-hubs with opportunities and mission locations scattered across them, and there are many possible routes to victory.

Satellite Reign is, from the wide-scan satellite’s view, a thing of beauty and promise. But I’ve been down in the streets for the last few days to take a closer look at the city. Here’s wot I think.>

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With Fidget, our Ferret scout car, on loan to the Peshmerga, and Pam, our photo-reconnaissance de Havilland Mosquito, grounded with dry rot, Flare Path is totally reliant on the intel-gathering equipment of cyber comrades at the moment. Today’s stories came via Subsim.com’s cod-kissed sonobuoys, Tactical Wargames’ perpetually circling Auster AOP, Real and Simulated Wars’ energetic-Dutch-schoolboy-on-a-bicycle, and Rock, Paper, Shotgun’s own infinite Tu-95.

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Ark: Survival Evolved [official site] has only been in Steam Early Access since June, but has already announced its intended release date of June 2016. I spoke to co-creative director Jesse Rapczak at Gamescom 2015 about the merits of early access development, and he mentioned that they may use a similar process for post-release DLC – and that they hope the first expansion will arrive just a few months after the release of v1.0.

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Big Pharma [official site] is part business sim, part logistics puzzle , where you’re dealing with balancing three competing resources: the limited space you have for the machinery that makes your drugs; the money you make from selling those drugs and spend to buy new machines; and your own conscience as you get reports back on the side effects of your pills. It’s out today.

Do you have enough heart to sacrifice money and space to stop the terrible nightmares your hypertension pills are giving people? Think about it while watching the trailer below.

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Headlander is the next game from Double Fine, and with news that the project lead from the wonderful Stacking is in charge I’m definitely paying attention. Borrowing the body-swapping concept from that Russian Doll-themed game, Headlander applies it more of a Metroidvania structure, with some lovely 70s sci-fi trappings and the option to graft your head onto anything from dogs to dancers. Take a look below.

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Good news: Valve Time hasn’t entirely disrupted the planned Holiday 2015 launch of the Vive, their much-anticipated VR collaboration with HTC. It’s still on course to happen before the year is out.

Bad news: But, er, only for a lucky few. The main launch has been pushed back to next year. … [visit site to read more]

Sweepstakes letters, credit offers, charitable donation requests, timeshare invitations… I’ve been diligently filling in form letters on behalf of each and every one of these companies as part of Lucas Pope’s new paperwork project, Unsolicited [official site].

The Papers, Please creator submitted the game as part of the Ludum Dare game jam. The theme was “You Are The Monster” and it’s a horrible-but-great experience in which you help send unsolicited mail.

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It’s time to catch up with the latest graphics kit and developments as fully unified shader architectures wait for no man. Nvidia has just released a new value-orientated 3D card in the GeForce GTX 950. We’re talking roughly 120 / $160 and so entry-level for serious gaming. But could you actually live with it?

Meanwhile, AMD’s flagship Radeon R9 Fury graphics has landed at Laird towers. Apart from being geek-out worthy simply as the latest and greatest from one of the two big noises in gaming graphics, the Fury’s weird, wonderful and maybe just a little wonky 4GB ‘HBM’ memory subsystem begs a potentially critical conundrum. Just how much memory do you actually need> for gaming graphics? … [visit site to read more]

It’s been nearly half a year since we devoured Pillars Of Eternity. Now Obsidian are back with another great big chunk, in the form of the first half of The White March [official site]. Does the expansion give good reason to return to the Dyrwood? Here’s wot I think.>

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Cursed for some unknown slight, Far Cry 2 and Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory designer Clint Hocking has been doomed to wander the game Earth until the second coming of Ouya. Since leaving Ubisoft Montreal after FC2, he’s joined then left LucasArts, Valve, and Amazon Game Studios. As curses often compel people to, he’s come full circle.

Hocking today announced that he has joined Ubisoft, this time their Toronto studio. What he’s working on is a mystery, but he seems keen to set down roots.

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