"The following is a work of fiction," opens Don't Get Your Hopes Up. "Amsterdam does not exist". This was news to me, having a distinct memory of my mum on holiday, grinningly sending me a photo of her first time encountering a SMEG fridge in the wild. I'll put aside my own opinions re: places that are real for now, though, since I wouldn't necessarily put it past the planet to swallow up entire capital cities for the lols right now. Just leave De Poezenboot alone, yeah?

Read more

To invert or not to invert? The question of whether to flip the Y-axis in games is often answered with recollections of childhood habits and/or varyingly smug declarations of which joystick setting is 'better'. Now, though, a cognitive research study posits that our control preferences are less about whether or not we played GoldenEye after school and more about the innate quirks of our brains.

Read more

Gearbox have released another Borderlands 4 update for technical problems on PC, with a particular focus on game stability and crashes, though they've also fixed a progression blocker or two in the process. Unlike that other Borderlands 4 patch from earlier this week, this one has an actual changelog. Gosh, wait till Mark hears of this! Oh nuts, he's already gone on holiday, presumably in sheer consternation over the shortage of bullet points. Look what you did, Randy Pitchford. Look what you did.

Read more

As the ravening shitbeetles of the Edwinphage overran the coral fortifications of the neighbouring Aspect kingdom, filling the air with the moist crunch of mandible on polyp, it occurred to me that I don't feel as much like a horrible doomsday cockroach as I should. We'll circle back to that feeling. Endless Legend 2 launches into early access on 22nd September, and I've now spent around 20 hours with it. I've previously praised its new/reborn factions and retreating ocean mechanic, and I plan to carry on praising, but there are definitely some more comprehensive issues I'd love Amplitude to address as this splendid scarab of a turn-based strategy game rumbles toward 1.0.

Read more