Long before always-online games and mass multiplayer became the norm, MMOs were seedbeds of sociologically fascinating interactions among players. The base game was always a digital sandbox; empty cities, towns, and fields built from the ground up around the assumption that the players would fill them with requisite life. In the process, elegant spider webs of informal community became the norm, a glittering metagame linking the digital assets of the formal game itself.

But until Nina Freeman s soon-to-be released Cibele (pronounced SIB-ul), we haven t really had a ludic love letter to this shared reality of many MMO gamers. The game tells a semi-autobiographical story of its creator, Nina, about a months-long romance she carried on when she was 19 through an online game, fictionalised here as Valtameri, which seems like a WoW/FFXIII hybrid.

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I quit. For the next three or so months, I have better things to do than write about video games: I shall be playing the one and only game, the game of games, the game’s game, The Binding of Issac: Rebirth [official site]. The roguelikelike shooter’s expansion ‘Afterbirth’ has just come out on Steam, adding a new character, hundreds of new items, enemies, bosses, areas, room layouts, and so on. Oh, plus a whole new mode, and something no day of my life will be complete without: daily runs.

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I imagine this is both part of Steam’s gradual drive to become an all-things-digital storefront and reflective of the fact that it’s happy to take 30% of any game anyone wants to sell via it, thus encouraging more people to make games is in its interest, but it’s definitely an odd one.

The latest addition to its digital racks are software tutorial videos; you can pay for instruction in the likes of Blender, zBrush or 3D Studio Max. Conceptually not a terrible idea, but fairly expensive given guides can be found for free and your YouTubes and what not.

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Bulb Boy [official site], like Dropsy, is a word-free point and click adventure that mixes the heart-warming with the grotesque. While Dropsy never ventures into straight-up horror territory, however, Bulb Boy is packed with monsters and menace. Playing as the titular child, you wake in the middle of the night to find your house infested with monsters and must use the light within your bulbous bonce to clear the place of critters. I played a demo of the game last year when it was raising funds from the crowd and thought it was rather splendid. The full game has now arrived.

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There is much still unknown about Star Citizen [official site], the space game that’s been crowd-funded to the tune of almost $100 million (I summarised the strange situation to date here), but one of the things that is known is how its essential dogfighting works. The Arena Combat module has been around for a little while now, and while some backers are delighted at the chance to take their purchased spaceships out for a ride in it, there has been some grumbling about the flight model. Even devs Cloud Imperium Games seem to agree that it wasn’t quite hitting the high notes, as they’ve just announced detailed plans for a major overhaul.

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Have You Played? is an endless stream of game recommendations. One a day, every day of the year, perhaps for all time.>

Fallout 4 is just around the corner, but the series’ popularity is so huge that it almost servers to obscure the things which made Fallout 3 [official site] fun in the first place. It’s an easier game to pick holes in than it is to be enthusiastic about.

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Hard West [official site] looks interesting, taking XCOM-ish turn-based tacticalising into the supernatural Weird West. I dig XCOM and I dig the Weird West so yes, thank you. It had been lined up to begin rootin’ and tootin’ next Wednesday, but developers CreativeForge Games have decided to push it back a fortnight. They could’ve launched next week, they say, but think a little extra polish will do their cowboys and demons a world of good. To help pass the extra time, a new eight-minute gameplay trailer is out:

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There’s been so much talk about Batman: Arkham Knight [official site] but one question has been left unanswered, at least round these parts. Is it any good? While the game was unavailable, there seemed little point in telling you Wot I Think but I did in fact play this latest Batventure in its entirety when it first released. I was mid-way through my introductory review paragraph when Warner pulled the game from digital shelves. It’d be dishonest to pretend that my thinking about the game hasn’t changed in the months since I enjoyed it much more in the moment than my memory allows me to believe but on one point I still stand against the critical tide.

I love Rocksteady’s Batmobile.>

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Sir Francis Drake was halfway through one when the Spanish Armada arrived. Charles Lindbergh completed eight during his momentous transatlantic flight. Legendary Stalingrad sniper Vasily Zaytsev claimed they sharpened observational skills, improved manual dexterity, and helped alleviate tension in hospital waiting rooms… jigsaw puzzles have enjoyed a long and intimate relationship with warfare and transport. This week in The Flare Path I celebrate that age-old link by throwing open the doors of a jigsaw club specially designed for people who’d rather piece together aeroplanes and angry houses than kittens and kitsch cottages. … [visit site to read more]

The special seasonal event modes Valve create for Dota 2 [official site] are slightly less novel now that all and sundry can make their own modes, but Valve’s are always jolly fancy. If you fancy a good Spooky Week spooking, venture into their the Haunted Colosseum. Diretide begone! Haunted Colosseum is a 5v5 point capture mode in a new map with deadly traps and nasty pumpkinmonsters, and it’s out now.

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