I thought the style looked familiar! The Norwood Suite [official site] is the new game from Off-Peak creator Cosmo D. Off-Peak, you might remember, is the surreal train station experience Alice and I played which I’d tend to describe as an experiential collage more than a game, if you’re into that categorisation. You should definitely play it if you’re looking for a curious project for the weekend – it’s free.

The Norwood Suite seems to have a similar style and is set in the same universe but is about a secluded, mysterious hotel filled with secrets. It now has an official launch date too so Alice and I can pencil in some time to play it simultaneously over the phone! October 2, if you are thinking of doing the same with your pals…

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Here’s a game I call Reboot, Remake, Rip Off. It works like Flip, Marry, Kill but with video games and without putting your genitals near anything, being more about which of the options you would most like to see rebooted, remade, and widely copied from, yeah? Let’s start with some neglected first-person shooters.

Reboot, remake, rip off: Red Faction, F.E.A.R., and Sin?

Answers and arguments in the comments, gang.

What are you playing this weekend? Here’s what we’re clicking on. (more…)

I had thought Blizzard were about done with big StarCraft II balance changes, or at least had decided which units should be in the game, but nope! This week they announced a load of changes for all factions in multiplayer, redesigning some units and outright removing one. Blizzard explain, “This time around our general focus is to address underused units and abilities while also trying to reduce sudden game ending moments.” The changes are now live for public testing but won’t launch properly until after the current season ends in November. They’ve got a lot to test and think about. (more…)

How many times have you played as The Hero of the Revolution? Where you get to lead the charge against an evil government, backed by a rag-tag rebel group, as a rough, gruff outsider. You re the one who drives the action, at the head of every important rebel action – it s your guts and your guns that will win glory for the revolution. You re the face of change, in that you literally show up on all the WANTED posters. The rebels cheer for you when you walk close. Everyone assures you history will remember your name.

Pyre s not that game. You re just a hero of the revolution, no capital letters, and certainly no glory. No one will remember your face, much less your name.

Extensive spoilers for Pyre follow. (more…)

In Observer [official site], AKA David Cronenberg’s Bladerunner, Rutger Hauer is having a very bad day. It begins with a phone call, some family problems, and ends in blood and regret. Hauer lends his voice to the player character, who is the titular Observer, a special kind of cop who can jack into suspects’ memories, hopes and fears as a means of interrogation. To do so, he inserts a cable into a chip lodged in their brain and connects it to his own gray matter.

Around a quarter of the way through this particular grim night, he dives into the mind of a person who has just died, an act of necro-hacking that is totally against protocol. That’s when things get really> weird.

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In a nice confluence of events I was wondering what had happened to laser puzzler Archaica: The Path Of Light [official site] which I wrote about years ago and a quick web search revealed that it’s launching in a few weeks on 8 September and has a launch trailer! (more…)

Delightfully unpleasant top-down survival horror Darkwood [official site] has finally escaped early access and launched in full. I’m a big baby where jump scares are concerned but Darkwood looks like exactly the sort of horror I crave: surreal, unsettling, often slow, and with some friendly-ish faces but so many more awful things. The bits I’ve heard from certified brave man Adam make Darkwood sound wizzo, so I’m glad it’s finally properly out.

Here, look at the launch trailer showing the terrible things that happen when you receive something as simple and pleasant as an invitation to a party: (more…)

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

Was Metal Gear Solid ever on PC? I have feverishly Googled for the answer and discovered: yes! It was ported in 2001 with slightly prettified graphics and some updated VR missions. That means I can write about it. Sweet PC port of the past, you have given me a fine gift this day. The gift of not scouring my brain for videogames that aren t already on our 700+ list of things we ve already covered for this column. (more…)

The Sims 4‘s Toddler Stuff Pack (stuff packs being the tier of paid DLC that adds cosmetics and objects and things around a particular theme) is how I found out I have opinions about ball pool physics and ball pools as represented in games. I have frequented many a ball pool – sometimes even a ball lido – and I know that The Sims 4 is eliding many a problem with ball pools.

For one it’s entirely possible to perform a ball pool bellyflop and significantly injure yourself but here it’s all fun and games. Actually, I’d say it’s harder to dive or jump into a ball pool and make it look like a fun experience than it is to do so and really hurt yourself. It’s also impossible to confine balls to the ball pool area. Oh, and there’s not a single frame of the trailer showing an adult having to clamber through a ball pool searching for and then hauling out their recalcitrant toddler. Further objections include the fact that you can’t keep adults out of a children’s ball pool and, somewhat relatedly, that I find it objectionable that EA seem to be taking a stand against a grown woman’s right to enjoy a ball pool.

They do manage to recapture an actual argument I had with my brother over who had the right to play with a plastic dinosaur, though. (My argument was: “I’m older and I want it more” and his was “but it is literally my toy dinosaur”). (more…)

The build-your-own-warcmhine battling of Robocraft [official site] is almost ready to launch in full, after three years in early access. It’ll hit version 1.0 and launch on August 24th, developers Freejam Games have announced. If you’re the cautious sort who’d rather not play even a free-to-play game until it’s done, hey, it’s almost here. (more…)