Last month we reported that a highly rated 1200W PSU was going cheap on Newegg, where you could pick up the Super Flower Leadex 1200W 80+ Platinum for just $160. After selling out rapidly, Newegg has restocked and is offering the same deal again, giving you a second chance to get a PSU that could well outlast every other component in your system!
To get the quoted $160 price rather than the standard $220, you'll need to use code YPCDP6233 at the checkout!
Need to store a lot of non-critical data? Live in the US? Want to maximise value over speed? Have we got the storage device for you: a refurbished 12TB Seagate enterprise HDD. These drives typically go for around $130 new, but you can pick them up for just $82 in "refurbished - excellent" condition on Ebay US. Their specialist HDD seller promises fully tested drives with zero bad sectors and a three-year warranty, which sounds great at $6.83 per TB!
Helldivers 2 launched earlier today and has been sat at the top of the Steam sales charts, with a healthy 60,000+ currently in-game. Alas, the co-op shooter also has a "Mixed" user review rating on the platform, thanks in part to optimisation and matchmaking issues.
Developers Arrowhead say they're working on a hotfix to address the issues as fast as possible.
A financial report from Subnautica 2 publisher Krafton said the underwater survival sequel would adopt a "game-as-a-service model". Cue much gnashing of teeth and rending of shirts, so much so that developers Unknown Worlds have clarified what that means. "No season passes. No battle passes. No subscription."
In a financial report released today, Ubisoft said they intend to release Star Wars Outlaws in 2024. That was already expected. More interesting is that Assassin's Creed Codename Red, the stab 'em up set in feudal Japan, is also due to launch in the "fiscal year 2025". That's also known as "before March 2025", for all you non-CEOs.
Calling dusty post-apocalyptic city builders a trend is probably a stretch, but not by much. I suppose it's a natural extension of the post-2000s explosion of the survival sim from "literally about 3 ever made" to "does your tetris remake really need the hunger meter". Games like Against The Storm porting over the roguelike element as well certainly suggest it. In my head, that's probably why New Cycle hangs out more with Endzone Dash A World Apart, and Surviving The Aftermath. It's more a traditional building game than a punishing test to be retaken, or the intense "survive the ordeal" narrative of Frostpunk, despite the superficial similarity that your town expects to be ravaged by scorching solar flares.
But it might also be because after playing it more than I really wanted to, New Cycle matches those two peers by leaving me with a vague feeling of disappointment. I'm just not sure what it really has to say.
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The success of Baldur's Gate 3 is a double-edged sword for other CRPGs launching in its wake. On the one hand, there's arguably a hungry new audience for such games; on the other, you're going up against one of the best RPGs ever made. Expectations are high, but Tiny Trinket Games' co-founder Stefan Nitescu remains unfazed as his three-strong team prepare to release Zoria: Age Of Shattering on March 7th. Zoria is carving an altogether different path through the RPG landscape, fusing isometric exploration with XCOM-like combat and 50 playable characters who are more like unit classes than personalities. The latter is a decision that comes with its own "repercussions", says Nitescu, but he's confident that it will help Zoria stand apart, with character abilities being unusually central to exploration.
In survival games, I leave the building to everyone else, or I build the absolute bare minimum unless I really> enjoy the world I'm in. I think that's a thing inherent in me, as I've never taken great pleasure in snapping together pieces of Lego, and would much rather earn killstreaks than decorate a back garden. For me, building in most games is laborious and predictable and does not sate my impatient brain.
But I like Neal Agarwal's Infinite Craft, a browser game where you slide words on top of each other and see if they generate something new. For instance, "water" and "fire" combine to make "steam", with what's practically infinitesimal possibilities. It is immediate, simple, and unpredictable. More games should facilitate haphazard engineering and silliness.
I've long been enamoured with the landscape of the Pacific Northwest, from the Douglas firs and waterfalls of Twin Peaks to the redwoods I once swam beneath on a road trip. Thanks to Pacific Drive's Steam Next Fest demo, I have now also barrelled through the woods and backroads of a spooky alt-history PNW in a banged-up car which is itself a S.T.A.L.K.E.R.-esque artifact. I've had my eye on Pacific Drive for a few years and after playing the demo, I am delighted by parts of it but not entirely sold on its roguelikelike survival scavenge-o-rama structure. Hmm! Give it a go and tell me what you think.
This week The Electronic Wireless Show podcast is a bit shorter because I accidentally stopped recording in the middle of it, and then had to sort of restart. Though movie magic you will never know the difference, except I just told you. Oh no! Anyway, with the Steam Next Fest ongoing, I noticed an uptick in games and demos for games that are just about making a nice diorama, and have no goals or real restrictions. Interesting! I ask my co-hosts why they think this is, if that even makes a game a game, is making your own play less fun if you're not breaking someone else's rules, and so on. Plus: we reveal why James was in LA before!