When A Total War Saga: Troy finally arrives on Steam in September, it’ll bring with it a new expansion to the strategy series. The Mythos DLC will add a new campaign to the game, themed around mythical beasts. You’ll hunt down Cerberus and more, commanding actual cyclops and harpies in battle. All while the gods watch on from above..
Forza Horizon 5’s big tech trick will be the game’s massive, ever-changing map. At 1.5x the size of Forza Horizon 4’s landmass, it can afford to have some variety in its world. So while you’re racing through the Mexican landscape, developers PlayGround Games have confirmed you’ll be driving through 11 different biomes, and each will have seasonal weather events to bring more variety to the outrageous looking racer.
Picture the scene: you wake up at the side of a river and a stranger, who is reluctant to tell you their name, is like, "Can you go into the ruined city and find my mate please?" Five minutes later and you find yourself stuck in a time loop in a small Ancient Roman settlement from 2000 years ago. It's not just you who's trapped, either. There are several people stuck in this underground city that you fell into, and you're all under the threat of turning into gold statues if even one of you does something wrong. This is the situation in The Forgotten City, a time loop mystery adventure that does not, unfortunately, feature a dialogue option for constantly swearing and weeping as a reaction to the situation. 0/10 for realism.
High scores for everything else though. I didn't play the immensely popular Skyrim mod that later inspired this standalone, which probably helps one to enjoy The Forgotten City more. But it does stand alone very well. Not a pudgy toddler hanging onto the Dragonborn's ankles, this; no, it is a sturdy Roman legionary, lean and muscular.
After reading Matt Cox's (RPS in peace) early access review of Chernobylite, I was less scared about the mutant nasties I'd be facing in this horror-y survival RPG and more concerned with how janky it might be. Had the devs over at The Farm 51 smoothed things out for the game's final release? Well, I can safely say that they've polished up the game into quite the pleasant surprise. There's a compelling mystery here that you'll unravel through a mix of base-building, team management, and stealthy survival, and it all fits together to form a roguelite loop that'll actually have you itching to venture back out into radiation-town.
Whatever Gears of War 6 will be called, (6EARS is my vote, so we can call it Six Ears), it’ll certainly have graphics. Developers The Coalition (who are named after the ‘Coalition of Ordered Governments’ in the Gears of War universe) have released a couple of new tech demos showing off their work in Unreal Engine 5 for GDC 2021, which showed a familiar theme of ancient ruins, shiny tech, and beards of war.
Another season, another Apex Legends map getting an explosive facelift. Alright, so this time it doesn't involve actual human-made explosives - World's Edge's volcanic ground has simply had enough of being mined, so it's erupted leaving more lava fissures breaking through the map. We'll be able to explore the new terrain when the next season, Emergence, kicks off on August 3rd. Also, there's a new gun, the new character Seer, and (moving!!) gondolas.
Over 1000 current and former Activision Blizzard employees have signed a letter rebuking the company's response to serious allegations of harassment and abuse. Last week, it came to light that the California Department of Fair Housing and Employment (DFEH) were suing Activision Blizzard over an alleged culture of sexual harrassment and discrimination. At the time, the company issued a statement claiming the suit included information that was "distorted, and in many cases false". But now staff past and present are calling for new official statements "that recognise the seriousness of these allegations and demonstrate compassion for victims of harassment and assault".
Though Valve’s Steam Deck is emblazoned with every control you’ve ever seen (buttons, d-pads, joysticks, trackpads, back-buttons, and touchscreen) there’s one you can’t see: gyro. The John Cena of controls allows the Deck to move your viewpoint in game by physically moving the machine around. Valve showed off how it works a little, and it looks very precise.
The Sims 4's latest expansion Cottage Living has just recently launched, bringing with it a free base game update. In among all the new additions is the Pond Tool, which some folks are using to build lovely water features outside their idyllic countryside homes. Others are making monstrous, flooded disaster lots. Which is a thing that the pond tool does apparently let you do.
Free-to-play FPS Splitgate was planning to move from beta to full launch tomorrow but there's been a bit of a snag. It turns out that "Halo plus portals" was too popular a concept, raking in 2 million downloads during its open beta. So many people jumped in to take a turn with cross-platform team portal shooting that 1047 Games say they're delaying full launch of the game until next month while they work to scale up their available servers for all those players.