Earlier this year, developer Eric "ConcernedApe" Barone surprised fans with news that Stardew Valley was making the jump to the tabletop with an official board game adaptation. Unfortunately, the first batch went fast - but those that missed out on the initial run now have a second chance at acquiring the game, with orders re-opening this Wednesday.

Online orders will once again only be available for shipping within the US, but Barone says he's teamed up with a number of distributors in the UK, the EU, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand this time around, and that copies will be available directly from local stores in these regions. "It's not possible for us to keep track of which stores specifically," he adds, "so the best way is to contact your local store and ask if they are carrying copies.

For those within the US, the Stardew Valley board game will be available for purchase online from 12pm PST on Wednesday, 3rd November. Do note, however, that orders may not be delivered in time for Christmas given ongoing issues impacting shipping.

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As the calendar flips from October to November, and you pop that sexy calculator costume back in the cupboard for another year, Sony arrives with a fresh batch of PlayStation Now titles, which this month include Mafia: Definitive Edition, Celeste, and Final Fantasy 9.

Last year's Mafia: Definitive Edition is, of course, the fancied up version of Illusion Softworks' fondly remembered open-world mobster game from 2002. This new version certainly looks the part, reimagining the 1930s city of Lost Heaven for modern hardware, but Eurogamer's Chris Tapsell didn't feel the the tweaks to its ageing gameplay were quite so successful.

"It's a marvelous, period-perfect setting, with fireworks and tension and some nice views of the city," Chris wrote in his rather lukewarm review, "but it immediately evokes the thought of Hitman, or even GTA 5, games next to which Mafia suffers thanks to its lack of pageantry and more traditionally linear, rigid mission design."

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Meghna Jayanth, the award-winning writer and narrative designer of games like 80 Days, Sunless Sea, Horizon: Zero Dawn and Sable, has confirmed she'll be working on the new game by Falcon Age developer Outer Loop.

She told me this during Episode 2 of The New Eurogamer podcast, which was made available to everyone today.

"I have been working on the next Outer Loop game," she said during our talk. "I can't really say a lot about it. I can't even tell you the title, unfortunately. But I think if you caught the Annapurna showcase recently, they teased a little bit of Outer Loop's new game, so I think I can say from there, there's skating in it."

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Mr. Driller Drill Land will launch for PlayStation and Xbox this Thursday, 4th November.

This is the same remake which Bandai Namco launched for Nintendo Switch and PC back in 2020, which in turn was a souped up version of the series' 2002 Japan-only entry for GameCube.

Not only does this remake provide easy access to a game which never originally reached Western shores, it also represents a polished version of what is generally regarded as the puzzle game series' high watermark. Thankfully, this remake does not disappoint either:

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I don't know this virtual woman whose cartons I'm unpacking, not really - I never see her face or hear her voice, but I feel connected to her all the same, just through the act of unpacking her belongings. Unpacking is what it says on the tin, a short game about unpacking after a move, but developer Witch Beam somehow managed to fit a whole life inside, expressed through holiday souvenirs, shampoo brands and plush animals.

Unpacking follows a woman across 6 formative moves over a timespan of roughly twenty years, starting with her childhood bedroom. Each move starts with boxes, neatly stacked in a random room, inviting you to just pull things out and find a place for them. Where you place items is largely up to you - Unpacking has a few rules and is fairly strict about you just dumping things on the floor, but you're given plenty of freedom, and if you don't like that the magnetic whiteboard absolutely has to go on the fridge, you can even activate an accessibility setting that lets you put stuff wherever.

Witch Beam warns that this removes the puzzle element, but Unpacking is really just a puzzle in the way life's limited spaces are, the way you tetris all of your pans into the cupboard just so and the sock drawer in real life likely has to hold more socks than it was designed to. You can open drawers, hang clothes hangers and stack some items, and it only ever gets fiddly if you've already stacked things close together and try to separate them again. On the Switch in handheld mode, the view is automatically zoomed in a bit, as things get too small for you to have the whole room on display and still effectively work, but that's the only niggle with that particular version of Unpacking.

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Even when she was writing Harry Potter fanfiction as a child - something I'm sure she won't thank me for sharing - she was doing something she still does now: questioning the world around her and challenging the parts of she doesn't like. It's a mindset that would propel her to fame when collaborating on Inkle's celebrated narrative adventure 80 Days, as she unpicked the famous Jules Verne novel and the backwards colonial attitudes in it.

Since then, she's only gone from strength to strength, working on renowned projects such as Sunless Sea, Horizon: Zero Dawn, Boyfriend Dungeon and, more recently, open-world adventure Sable (when we talked, it had only been out a day). She is Meghna Jayanth, a leading voice in video game writing and narrative design, and this, in roughly an hour, is her life.

This is Episode 2 of The New Eurogamer Podcast, which you can find in all the places you get a podcast from. If you can't, please let me know in the comments below.

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Stars of Blood, a long-lost space pirate game once in the works at Valve, has been glimpsed in newly-surfaced concept art.

The game's existance was acknowledged by Valve boss Gabe Newell during an interview in 2012, although the project had already been canned by that point.

"We're not doing it any more," Newell said at the time. "We had an internal project called Stars of Blood, which was a space pirate game, and that never saw the light of day."

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Microsoft has announced the games coming to Xbox Game Pass and it's an exciting month ahead.

At the top of the billing is Forza Horizon 5, available day one from 9th November across PC, console and cloud. The latest in the series is set in Mexico and is looking stunning.

Also available day one on 9th November is Football Manager 2022 on PC. Its unrivalled simulation is also arriving in an Xbox Edition that's specially tailored for the console (and cloud).

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Epic Games' Chinese version of Fortnite will shut down on 15th November after almost three years.

This standalone version of Fortnite's battle royale mode was operated in the country by Tencent, and featured numerous differences in order to comply with China's strict video game guidelines.

The game never featured in-app purchases, for example, and certain cosmetics were changed not to feature blood or skulls.

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Bloodborne is making its way to PC. At least, a PSX fan-made demake of the game is.

It's been in development for some time, but a new trailer for the demake has announced a release date of 31st January 2022.

It certainly looks faithful to the PS4 original, but wrapped in a style that's authentic to the PS1.

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