Alright, someone has to apologise to the neighbours and round up the dogs of war, because Total War: Warhammer 3 has been delayed. Previously expected late this year, the trilogy-concluding strategy game based on Games Workshop's fantasy plastic world is now due in 2022. The developers, Creative Assembly say they want to make sure it's good, yeah?
Though a judge largely ruled against Epic Games on Friday in their App Store legal battle with Apple sparked by Fortnite in-app purchases on iOS, clearly that wouldn't be the end. It isn't. On Sunday, Epic filed a notice that yes, they're appealing the ruling. At this point they haven't said precisely what they object to and why but, y'know, they want it to go their way.
Apparently I am one of about six people in the entire world who hates working from home. I can't do it. At home I am lazy, unproductive, and I accidentally do hours of overtime despite this, because I have no place where work ends and home begins. In March 2020, we were all officially sent home for a temporary office closure, the definition of "temporary" soon being stretched as far as I allow my credulity to when I watch The Prestige. It's magical! David Bowie makes thousands of hats!
Anyway, at the tail end of last week I returned to the office, which it turns out is still almost entirely empty. It's like working from home except I have to wear trousers (also Graham is here too so I can kick his chair and throw stuff at him). I spent a few hours on the first day creeping about looking at everything that had been left here for 18 months, and concluded that if our office were a level in a post-apocalyptic game, or a scene in 28 Days later, it would be pretty embarrassing.
Among Us made a hit out of some very basic minigames and complex social interaction. Surviving against the Imposters as they stab and lie their way through a game might rely more on the players than on the game, but you can craft a more complex base game with a few mod additions - the best of which we've rounded up right here. While you can’t mod your friends, you can mod the game, building on the anxiety-ridden camaraderie crusher by adding new roles and new modes to the basic format. Below, you’ll find out how to fall in love or enact the rule of law (by killing) with our guide to the best Among Us mods.
Remember that brief period in the 00s where everyone had a mobile phone, but none of them could take decent photos, so at least one girl per friendship group also had to have a small digital camera? Laboriously uploading and tagging. These are the photos that come up on your Facebook Memories, reminding you that for a brief period during your final year of school you started wearing 50s-ish neck scarves, for some reason.
The little black-and-white puzzle adventure game Toem, in which all problems are solved with a camera, reminds me of that. Not because you are able to make disasterous or whimisical fashion choices - you very much are, mostly in the hat department - but because you just take photos of everything, for the fun of it, to remember this thing you saw. Wonky-focused snaps of a flower, or a ladybird, or a nice building (poorly framed because you can't get all of it in shot). This isn't really photography for the camera nerds interested in lenses or different exposures. This is photography as a joyful insta-record of your life. I was here, I did this thing, it was good.
William Blake once wrote: "Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand, and Eternity in an hour." Shut up, Blake. This is Deathloop. It is a full-blown action-comedy with a double jump. You get a sideways dash and a gun that splits to become two, smaller guns. If I see anyone trying to be too smart about this game, in which a time-looping assassin tries to break free of hilarious eternity by murdering many people who deserve it, I will look at them with hollow eyes and say: "In Deathloop you regularly snap necks by 270 degrees." Turn away, poets and stealth likers. This is not your daddy's Dishonored.
When Bungie announced last year that they were reviving Destiny 2's serious PvP weekend event mode, Trials, they said "It's important that this doesn't go out half-baked." Reader dear, it went out half-baked. But! Seventeen months and one revamp later, Trials Of Osiris is good now. Really good. With generous new reward systems, the option to queue solo, and a few anti-cheater measures, the return of Trials this weekend has seen a huge surge in player numbers and been, like, actually fun.
The makers of Oxenfree have started teasing the upcoming sequel via audio transmissions in the original game. Oxenfree 2: Lost Signals is set to arrive sometime next year, and it'll feature villains who're causing mysterious radio signals that mess with electronics. But it seems they're already up to no good, because an update to the original Oxenfree has introduced these spooky transmissions, which you can hear in several different areas in the supernatural thriller.
Looking to learn how to fish in Genshin Impact? Genshin Impact’s 2.1 update is finally here, and it introduces an entirely new mechanic that will gives you something else to procrastinate searching for your missing sibling with: fishing! Before you can become Teyvat’s most accomplished angler, though, you’ll need to complete a short quest and become familiar with the fishing mechanic. Here’s everything you’ll need to know about fishing in Genshin Impact.
Sundays are for staring at Mr Muscle, debating for a second whether you could take him, then coming to the conclusion that you absolutely couldn't. Before you consider things, let's read this week's best writing about games.