has been cleared for takeoff. The giant simulated world of planes will launch on August 18th. Microsoft have released a new trailer and some information about what’s included in the three differently-priced versions of the game.
I’ve only ever played bits and pieces of the Half-Life games, but it’s been a delight learning the ins and outs of their creation from Half-Life: Alyx – Final Hours. It’s a multimedia documentary on all things Valve – their (many) cancelled games, a close look at life during Alyx’s development, and the ups and downs the developers went through in making sure Half-Life returned in the best way possible. I’ve pulled out some of my favourite snippets of info from the doc, so read on to hear all about Alyx’s invisible headcrab, and why I now believe that G-Man’s actor might actually be G-Man in real life.
If you’re looking to build a team to stop people hacking your game, why not reach out to the people who are trying to hack your game? That’s an idea Riot Games had with Valorant and League Of Legends, hiding a little recruitment message inside part of their anti-cheat system. If you’re poking around in their gameguts, they might be interested in your skills.
Asus have shaved over £140 off some of their [cms-block]s in the UK at the moment, making it a good time to pick up one of their RGB-laden gaming screens. Indeed, there are four such gaming monitors on sale at various retailers at the moment, with two ultrawide mega screens and two of their 165Hz, 2560×1440 displays discounted to some of their lowest prices ever. The cheapest one can be had for as little as £319, too, which is really quite the bargain after months of stock shortages and inflated prices.
There’s just four weeks to go now until Horizon Zero Dawn does a massive electric roar and charges towards us through our PC screens, and as RPS’ resident HZD obsessive, I’m excited. And to my own surprise, possibly the thing I’m most excited about is the chance to just drink in the look of the game again. In fact, no. I don’t want to drink it in at all. I want to chug it down as if it were a protein shake, and my eyes were a pair of totally shredded bros.
Possibly because I’ve spent most of my life with PCs some way behind the curve in terms of hardware, I’ve never been that bothered about how games look. But Horizon Zero Dawn is an exception. It looked a couple of years ahead of its time even in 2017 on PS4, and if Katharine’s experimentation with Death Stranding (which uses the same engine) are anything to go by, HZD’s PC port is going to absolutely batter us> aesthetically. With this in mind, then, I thought I’d take you on a little sightseeing trip through some of the things I’m most excited to behold with new, muscly eyes.
Blizzard have released an Overwatch album, so now you can bop along to your favourite in-game tunes even when you’re not playing. Overwatch: Cities And Countries is a collection of soundtracks from the game, all based on the global locations of its maps. You know when you first load into a match, and it plays that short riff of music symbolic of the setting? These are basically just the full versions of those, and they’re actually really good.
Where Assassin’s Creed Odyssey made players choose between playing as Kassandra or Alexios at the start and Syndicate missions often picked a Frye twin for you, Assassin’s Creed Valhalla will let players switch between the female and male versions of our lone hero Eivor whenever we please. That mostly sounds useful for double-checking which voice actor you prefer and not having to start over if you change your mind. Though Ubisoft do say this switcheroo hints at some in-universe explanation involving their magic computers and that.
If you’re looking to take advantage of AMD’s free Assassin’s Creed Valhalla bundle with select Ryzen processors at the moment, then there are some great [cms-block] happening over at Newegg right now as part of their Fantastech sale (yes, I just did a big shudder as well). The best deal of the bunch is definitely the Ryzen 7 3700X, which can now be had for a new low of just $260, which is the cheapest price I’ve seen for this octa-core CPU ever since it launched last year.
People in Fallout 76 are decent enough, in my experience. I forget whether I’ve related my first encounter with another player, where I accidentally blundered into their camp, then backed away in the panicky assumption that they’d attack me, only for them to instead drop a gift bag with a level-appropriate hunting rifle and some ammunition in it. I still have that rifle.
Most people I’ve met were similarly friendly, or at least indifferent. But then there was Overprotective Thumbs Up Statue Power Armour Hermit. They were no fun at all.
Assassin’s Creed Valhalla finally has a release date and Ubisoft even showed off some actual gameplay! You can now see just how grim the dark ages were in 9th centry England, from viking sieges of Saxon castles to fighting witches in dingy swamps.
