A sequel to Hawken was certainly not on my 2023 bingo card. Five years after the multiplayer mech FPS shut down on PC, now requiring a fan-made fix even just to play offline against bots, I didn't expect to ever again dash around its cool sci-fi cityscapes as a charmingly scrappy little stomper. So I was excited when publishers 505 Games announced singleplayer follow-up Hawken Reborn on Monday then launched it into early access two days later. Having now played it, oh dear. You know, it's okay for the dead to stay dead.

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It’s time for another Humble Games Showcase, and this year the company is celebrating its three-year anniversary as well as spotlighting its newly refreshed publishing roster. This year, we got to see a special behind-the-scenes interview montage of the cast from David Gaider’s musical game Stray Gods as well as six new indie games for us to look forward to. We’ve listed everything that was announced at the show, so feel free to have a leisurely scroll through. Here’s everything you missed from the Humble Games Showcase 2023.

Wizard Of Legend is getting a follow up

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It's difficult not to start out by namedropping Dwarf Fortress. Songs Of Syx will compare to probably every colony sim you've played, in fact, but it feels like a fundamentally different game conceptually.

The usual parts are there. Chop some trees, chip some stones, and chep some crops to get your pioneers' basic needs met, then get to expanding. But Syx isn't interested in testing you or manufacturing drama. It's not about surviving, not about building a happy little colony. It's about how growth changes not just the scale, but the nature of a settlement. Despite similarities with its influences, it defines itself with a different dynamic, a whole different ethos to its peers. And it's one that even playing it my own awkward way hasn't broken.

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The Electronic Wireless Show is not bound by your mortal rules, which is why even though this is a PC gaming podcast we're going to talk about Zelda, dammit all, because everyone else gets to talk about Tears Of The Kingdom and we're just as cool as them. We (attempt to) talk about our favourite Zelda games of the past, our favourite Zelda-likes on PC, and I explain how Tears Of The Kingdom works to Nate and James. Honestly though, we don't make it very far, because it turns out the lads haven't ever played a Zelda game before. At least, Nate might have. We're not entirely sure.

We do also talk about what we've been playing this week as well - which include some old favourites, some new secrets, and Gaben's tiny hands - and give some great new recommendations. Nate also delivers a very involved mini-game involving beans and aliens, and James doesn't talk about the Asus ROG Ally.

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Last time, you decided that petting the dog is better than entering cyberspace. I'm not angry, I'm just disappointed. And you probably don't even notice me sulking here in cyberspace because you're so busy tickling some lousy stinkbag with the mind of a toddler. Fine, fine, whatever. This week, it's all about self-imposed challenges. What's better: fighting your double, or optional challenges giving rewards upfront?

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Whoooo we’re officially in the double-digits gang! We’ve somehow managed to make it to episode 10 of Indiescovery without going completely feral and wrecking the joint. I say that, but this week’s episode is a little, shall we say, unhinged? Rebecca, Liam, and Rachel hadn’t really had a proper chat all week so there’s a lot of Friday energy and catching up, and the energy levels only increase when we start to talk about our main topic of this episode: Eurovision! And indie games, of course.

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EVGA's Kingpin motherboards are some of the most bonkers out there, proper slabs that are designed for extreme overclocking with hugely impressive power delivery, multiple BIOSes and some unique features. They're also hugely expensive, normally costing close to $1000, but a deep discount on their Z690 model over at Newegg brings it to $400. That's still pricey, but a reasonable pickup given the feature list for anyone designing a top-end gaming rig around Intel's 12th-gen or 13th-gen Core processors.

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It's been a little while since we covered a prebuilt gaming PC here at RPS, but there's a good deal today on a RTX 4070 system over at CCL.

Update (18/5): CCL has upgraded the motherboard from an Asus A320 to a newer MSI A520 model. Original article continues:

A configuration that includes a Ryzen 5 5700G, 16GB of DDR4 and 500GB NVMe SSD is available for £960 when you use code GAMER20 - and you even get a free copy of Diablo 4, which debuts on 6/6 and looks quite promising!

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I've been meaning to write about Veiled Experts for over a month now, since playing it religiously during the Final Beta Test. I've been putting it off mostly because I've been busy, but also because I'm trying to find a way of saying "actually it's really good" without people laughing and throwing garbage at me. It's very hard to describe Veiled Experts to someone in a way that doesn't prompt an instant dismissal. That was my reaction too. I saw it on Twitch, my mind said "third person Counter-Strike", and sent an automatic signal down to my lips to proclaim the words: "sounds awful".

Thank goodness for boredom. Later that day I was at a loose end and saw that Veiled Experts was free, so I downloaded it and tried it out. And here we are, a month and a bit later. The game is about to release into Early Access, and I'm desperately trying to get everyone I know to play it with me, because it's bloody phenomenal.

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After playing a bunch of the demos at LudoNarraCon earlier this month, the best one I played, with zero hesitation, was Cryptmaster. Its smart text-based puzzle design fused with stylish dungeon crawling had me completely spellbound, to the point where it's now become one of my most anticipated indie games for 2024. It’s honestly unlike anything I’ve played.

Developed by Paul Hart and Lee Williams, Cryptmaster is a dark fantasy dungeon crawler where you need to type (or speak) commands to help get your undead amnesiac party members out of a strange underground kingdom. Your band of forgetful adventurers aren't completely at the mercy of the dungeon, as a devilish-looking necromancer is there to give a helping hand. An ominous figure who acts as both guide and a quest giver, the horned necromancer helps you navigate the strange rules of this underground world where words and letters are a resource for survival.

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