Ian Hitman is arguably the greatest bald video game protagonist of all time. He makes his smooth skull work for him like few others. He even has a barcode on the back of his head to draw attention to it, the absolute ledge.

Because Hitman 3 is on the horizon, and we waxed lyrical about the first two Hitman 3 levels on this week’s episode of The PC Gaming Weekspot, we decided to celebrate those video game characters that choose to rock more manageable hairstyles in this week’s Mystery Steam Reviews.

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Blizzard and Activision’s game launcher, Battle.net, hasn’t won any “Sleek and Nice to Navigate” awards over the years. Blizzard have begun rolling out an update which could change this, though, as it’ll spruce the ageing client up into a tidier Battle.net 2.0.

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As if Axiom Verge weren’t already glitchy enough, with the vibe that you might be dying inside a computer, soon items won’t be where you expect to find them. Creator Tom Happ is officially adding a randomiser mode, which will shuffle the placement of orders to spice up repeat runs. Randomisers have been popular in recent years through mods for everything from Dark Souls to old Zeldas, and modders made one for Axiom Verge too. Now it’s becoming official, and you can try the beta now.

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Plague Inc: Evolved

is a game about killing off the human race with a disease. Billions of human beings are boiled down to numbers of healthy, infected, and dead, allowing players to neatly sidestep the potential well of moral turmoil that such subject matter invites (especially in these times), and instead focus on evolving their plague.

It’s a fairly challenging little strategy game that can be played out in the span of perhaps 10 minutes. And, strangely, it’s just about the only strategy game I routinely play where I haven’t the slightest desire to get any better at it.

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Riders Republic

was, in my eyes, one of the most exciting games announced near the tail end of 2020. I’ve longed for something to replace the SSX-shaped hole in my heart and Ubisoft’s snowboarding game Steep didn’t do it, but this bigly multiplayer game which features snowboarding, mountain biking, and wingsuits looks it could have the scale and silliness I want. And so, the bad news: it’s been delayed from its planned February 25th release date to simply “later this year”.

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Humble have launched their winter sale, and to kick it off you can grab strategy-management game Bomber Crew for free until January 16th. Plus there are loads of substantial discounts on other great games.

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Some inhabitants of the RPS treehouse (Alice B) have been extremely vocal in their love of giant women in games, mainly some Assassin’s Creed Odyssey DLC and then Immortals Fenyx Rising. Those are both Ubisoft games though, so now I get to crow about how influential we are: a teaser trailer for the next Resident Evil Village reveal suggests Capcom have been reading Alice’s posts.

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Assassin’s Creed Valhalla

contains within it a fictional language, one used by the Isu, the ancient and highly advanced civilization that predates humanity within the series’ lore. Now some dedicated players have worked out how to translate some of that language into English.

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Middle-earth: Shadow Of Mordor

has lost some of its online features as a result of what publishers Warner Brothers say are “changes with our network”. Among the features no longer available in the third-person orc stabber are the Nemesis Forge and Vendetta missions. Mordor is a six year-old game, but it’s always a shame when bits of things we bought break off, isn’t it?

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Prison Architect

‘s next expansion is called Going Green, and it marks the incarceration simulator’s arrival in the pantheon of games that really want to be Stardew Valley. It introduces farming as a new type of labor your inmates can undertake, the food they grow can be turned into meals or exported for profit, and it also creates the possibility sneaky prisoners might grow illicit “herbs”. Oregano, I assume?

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