As World Of Warcraft Classic - an MMORPG that is, confusingly, a new version of the old version of World Of Warcraft - enters phase 3 of its Season Of Discovery, PCGamer has an interview with some of the devs where they talk about the decision to not run Player Test Realms - servers where they roll out the new content to smaller numbers of players to road test it. This means that when they launch new stuff for Seasons Of Discovery it'll probably break more often, but it means players get to discover brand new things together. Which is great! And the developers think it's good too.

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The long-serving top producer of legendary RPG series Dragon Quest has stepped down from the role, according to sources that spoke to RPS Maw tribute site Bloomberg. Yu Miyake, who has been involved with numerous DQ games since he joined Enix in 1989 as marketer on DQ books, is moving on to head up Square Enix’s mobile games.

The change comes as part of shake-ups at Squeenix under new President and blockchain enjoyer Takashi Kiryu, who Bloomberg point out has committed to reverse SE’s flagging sales of both big releases (like Final Fantasy 16) and mobile titles (like Final Fantasy 7: Ever Crisis), possibly so he can profit handsomely enough to construct himself an arm-mounted Australian Shepherd launcher (like Final Fantasy 8.)

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A big 'ol patch is coming to the System Shock remake next Thursday, headlined by "[reworking] the entire final fight with new mechanics and a unique flow" and adding a female character option for our hacker. Update 1.2 will also tweak and fix and fiddle with heaps of other things. Our System Shock review called it "a breathtakingly beautiful and astonishingly faithful remake that proves the enduring power of Looking Glass design" when it launched last year, though I would say System Shock's final battle is one of the most dated parts, so I'm curious to see the new form.

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Thrones of Decay, the upcoming expansion for strategy game Total War: Warhammer 3, will now be available to purchase as either three separate faction packs, or as a bundle at a discount. So, if you don’t fancy shelling out the full £19.10 for all three factions, you can grab new bits for either Nurgle, the Empire, or the Dwarfs for £7.49. If you do buy just one to start off with - say, to get a feel for the quality of Thrones of Decay as a package - you’ll get a 15% discount on the remaining two packs in the future.

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Goblin Stone released almost a month ago, but we haven't written about it yet, and it feels like you should know about it. It's a turn-based RPG, it's a roguelike with permadeath, it's got XCOM-style base-building, its got card-based combat; it is extremely your sort of thing, if you're the exact statistical average of Rock Paper Shotgun readers.

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Vlambeer, developers of Nuclear Throne, Luftrausers and Super Crate Box, among others, called it quits back in 2020, so that co-founders Jan Willem Nijman and Rami Ismail could work separately on other projects.

Now Vlambeer is returning. Nijman announced today that he is now the sole owner of Vlambeer, and he's going to release new games under the name while continuing to support their older releases.

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Update: Roblox Studios have responded to Eurogamer's report, in particular addressing the quote that they "hired some teenagers" to clarify that they do not hire minors. You can find Roblox Studios' full response over on Eurogamer.

Original story

Roblox allows its players to create and monetise their own creations within its ecosystem. Across the entire breadth of Roblox game makers, a lot of money is made. At the individual level, however, the vast majority of creators making work within Roblox never earn enough to cash out their earnings - and some of those creators are children. This has long led to allegations that Roblox is exploiting child labour, generating value for Roblox Studio and its shareholders in the process.

"I don't know, you can say this for a lot of things, right?" said Roblox Studio head Stefano Corazza at GDC, when the allegation was put to him by Eurogamer. "Like, you can say, 'Okay, we are exploiting, you know, child labour,' right? Or, you can say: we are offering people anywhere in the world the capability to get a job, and even like an income. So, I can be like 15 years old, in Indonesia, living in a slum, and then now, with just a laptop, I can create something, make money and then sustain my life.

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Ubisoft racing game The Crew shut down on March 31st, rendering the game unplayable for everyone who bought it since its release ten years ago.

In response, YouTuber Ross Scott has launched Stop Killing Games, "the largest campaign ever to stop publishers destroying games". The initiative exists to encourage people to petetiion their governments about the issue.

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I'm not much of a reality TV watcher. Genuinely, I've been humiliated on this count in RPS morning meetings, with certain "colleagues" whose names rhyme with "Malice Knell" making references I don't understand and laughing at my expression of hurt and confusion. My grasp of reality TV basically ends with the finale of the very first season of Big Brother, feat. Nasty Nick. But you could argue that you don't need to watch reality TV to understand and enjoy reality TV, because the basic reality TV thrill of forming weird parasocial attachments to people who are role-playing as themselves is now the golden rule of digital society generally.

"'Reality' stuff is huge now, and it's not just reality TV," says Nicole He, designer of The Crush House - an enticing, absurdist and engrossingly unpleasant new sim from Reigns and Card Shark developers Nerial. "It's any kind of celebrity or influencer or streamer or something like that - there are so many parasocial relationships in that way, and I think that really started with reality TV, and then [continued] in the era of social media. It's one of those topics that we don't talk about in an explicit way, necessarily, but it's something that you hopefully think about as you're playing the game."

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You could say that the best Steam Deck case is the one you get for free, and to be sure, I have no qualms with Valve’s bundled carrier. Especially not the one you get with the 1TB Steam Deck OLED, which adds a neat mini-case in the form of a removable liner. Still! As you’ll see here, you do have a choice of worthwhile upgrade options, ranging from conventional hard cases with extra accessory storage to clever protective sleeves that combine impact resistance with improved handheld grip. The best way to avoid Steam Deck damage is to not drop it in the first place, as Sun Tzu probably said.

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