Autonauts, the colony management game with programmable robots, is all set to exploit new worlds next month. It's a crafting affair where even making a pie, judging by the release trailer above, takes a lot of steps, but that's why you've got robotic helpers. 

Using a simple visual programming language, colony bosses can teach their robots to do everything, as long as the bot has enough memory to store the command.  Despite the robots, you'll start off pretty low-tech, simply growing crops and chipping away at rocks, but eventually you'll be able to build and programme more elaborate production lines and create fully-automated industries. 

If you want to skip the build-up and get straight to the more advanced projects, there are modes that unlock all the structures right away or give you unlimited resources to play around with. The campaign, meanwhile, will teach you how to play and get you set to tackle endgame objectives. 

Autonauts is due out on October 17. If you're at TwitchCon this week, however, you'll be able to take it for a spin early. 

Autonauts is all about delegating the challenging work of building a colony on a new world. When you land on your charming little globe, you'll need to do the busywork yourself, chopping down trees and crafting items, but eventually you'll be able to build and program a legion of little clockwork bots to do your bidding. 

Using a visual programming language that's apparently easy to learn, you'll be able to teach your bots to cook, farm, mine and build, transforming your humble colony into planet-wide, automated factory. That doesn't mean you can put your feet up, though, as you'll need to teach them what to do, program all the steps and upgrade them so they can perform more complicated tasks. 

Developer Denki Studios was founded by DMA Design developers, creators of Lemmings and Grand Theft Auto, and it looks like there's a bit of the classic puzzle romp in Autonauts. You didn't need to do any coding in Lemmings, but you still had to give the suicidal little critters tasks, building an automated system that allowed as many lemmings as possible to get to the exit.

Autonauts has been in development since 2017 and an alpha build has been available on Itch.io for a while, so you can check it out right now. Judging by the trailer, however, the release version looks like it will be a significant upgrade. It's due out this Autumn. 

Northgard's adding a new clan to the roster today. The Clan of the Kraken worship a big ol' sea monster and don't like being too far from the coast. Check out the squid-worshipping beach bums in the release trailer above. 

The Clan of the Kraken might talk tough, but they become considerably weaker if they move inland. Colonisation and building costs are increased, and their warriors lose their nerve a wee bit, reducing the damage they do in a fight. 

The clan gets some new buildings, including a fishery that can be plonked down by lakes and the sea. Female members of the clan, meanwhile, can be trained as Norns, who spread happiness and also generate the mystical Wyrd resource. You can use Wyrd to activate special abilities, like getting your god to lend a tentacle. 

Here's the clan's feature list:

• Colonisation and building costs on non coastal zone are 50% more expensive.
• All units' Attack is reduced by 30% on non coastal zone.
• You can't build Longship Docks. Trade Victory is not available to you.
• The Fisherman House is replaced by the Fishery. The Clan of the Kraken can use the Fisherman House to fish in both lakes and sea.
• The Brewery is replaced by the Horgr to train females Clan Member into Norns. The Norn produces Happiness and Wyrd
• Wyrd can be used to activate special abilities.

The Clan of the Kraken DLC is out today on Steam for $5/£4.

Northgard's adding a new clan to the roster today. The Clan of the Kraken worship a big ol' sea monster and don't like being too far from the coast. Check out the squid-worshipping beach bums in the release trailer above. 

The Clan of the Kraken might talk tough, but they become considerably weaker if they move inland. Colonisation and building costs are increased, and their warriors lose their nerve a wee bit, reducing the damage they do in a fight. 

The clan gets some new buildings, including a fishery that can be plonked down by lakes and the sea. Female members of the clan, meanwhile, can be trained as Norns, who spread happiness and also generate the mystical Wyrd resource. You can use Wyrd to activate special abilities, like getting your god to lend a tentacle. 

Here's the clan's feature list:

• Colonisation and building costs on non coastal zone are 50% more expensive.
• All units' Attack is reduced by 30% on non coastal zone.
• You can't build Longship Docks. Trade Victory is not available to you.
• The Fisherman House is replaced by the Fishery. The Clan of the Kraken can use the Fisherman House to fish in both lakes and sea.
• The Brewery is replaced by the Horgr to train females Clan Member into Norns. The Norn produces Happiness and Wyrd
• Wyrd can be used to activate special abilities.

The Clan of the Kraken DLC is out today on Steam for $5/£4.

Viking RTS Northgard received a meaty update today, introducing powerful artefacts that can buff your clan. They're accompanied by an expanded crafting system, along with changes to tool mechanics and the forge, which is where your smiths will be working away to make your fancy relics. It's live now. 

Just by luck, the vikings have remembered how to craft these relics, and each clan can pick between five common and one clan-specific relic, activating one at a time. With these handy artefacts, you'll be able to summon giants and undead monstrosities to do your bidding, just like the old vikings. 

Inside the updated forge, you'll be able to put three smiths to work, letting you craft items quickly. They can upgrade civilian and military tools, and it's now possible to queue up multiple items. The smiths can be upgraded, too, giving them a boost in forge speed.

It sounds like a good excuse to return. It's one of my favourite Age of Empires-style RTS romps, and some of these relics sound like proper game changers. 50 percent defensive bonuses, colonising tiles with lore, summoning the wrath of gods—they're not messing around.

Take a look at the patch notes and relic list here. 

Northgard, the excellent Viking RTS which launched earlier this year, has released a new and free expansion. Titled Ragnarok, the expansion adds an impressive number of features, all of which are themed around the Norse end of the world myth.

The primary addition is the Ragnarok map, a vast expanse of desolate hellscape which you have the unenviable task of colonising in either skirmish or multiplayer modes. Northgard’s strategy involves colonising map “tiles”, which require a certain amount of gold to purchase, and can only sustain a set number of Viking colonists. Moreover, each tile often includes a unique combination of resources, hazards and enemies.

The Ragnarok map introduces several new tiles and tile features. Foremost amongst these is the “Volcano” tile, which occupies the centre of Ragnarok’s map. The volcano cannot be colonised and periodically erupts, hurling molten rocks across the map. These can be mined for resources, but if left too long, will turn into Rock Golems that will wreak havoc in the area.

Meanwhile, new random events have been added to the game. The Blood Moon increases the attack of all units outside of their territory, making for a more aggressive experience all around. In addition, you’ll have to watch the coastlines for Fallen Sailors, ghostly spirits that will harass shoreline settlements with their spectral blades.

Ragnarok’s updates don’t end there. It introduces a new Dark Elf faction called the Myrkalfar, who are hostile toward all players and will attack factions at random, stealing supplies and generally being a proper nuisance. Lastly, the Ancient Graveyard tile offer a new research opportunity for your faction’s Loremasters, rewarding players who study it with two spectral warriors. Neat!

Supporting these major additions is a scaffold of smaller gameplay adjustments, including a new “Military” research path that grants access to three trees of unlockable skills, re-balances to clans and AI kobolds, and the introduction of a new multiplayer season to commence with the Ragnarok map.

All told, it’s a hefty update, and it’s all free, assuming you own Northgard already. If you don’t, you can pick it up on Steam right now for $15/£11.89. PC Gamer contributor Fraser Brown found Northgard to be a fantastic RTS, and I very much enjoyed what I played of it too. Ragnarok is out now, so should come packaged with the game.

If you like RTSs then Northgard should be on your radar. As Fraser said in his review, its campaign isn't the best but its Skirmish mode shows just how elegant its systems are, creating unpredictable matches that pull you all over its Viking maps. In its latest patch, Shiro Games has fixed a long list of bugs that users have reported since the game came out last month, improved certain features, and teased what to expect in future updates.

Namely, the next update will add a multiplayer ranking system that should give you more reason to play against friends or online randoms. An improved map generator—which Fraser already thought was solid—will provide further incentive to jump in, and should throw up more balanced games. "Shortly after" that's done, Shiro Games will release another clan of fighters (think factions or races in other RTS games). At the moment, the campaign serves as an introduction to the game by giving you control of all the different clans in turn, so I wonder if the new clan also means a new story chapter. We'll have to wait and see.

In the latest patch, the team improved signposting in the campaign to give players a better idea of what to do at certain points. It also fixed a bug that meant, when entering an area, players couldn't kill a neutral unit before first defeating any enemy units, which was being "abusively used by some players". Lastly, it nerfed the Clan of the Raven by increasing the resources players needs to spend to colonise a territory.

The bug fixes are many, and issues with health bars, the camera and population numbers have been ironed out. You can read the full list in the patch notes.

Viking RTS Northgard has just swept out of Early Access, adding a singleplayer campaign in the process. Think of the game as a bit like Age of Empires, only with more snow and four-winged dragons. It sold more than 600,000 copies in its year-long Early Access, and T.J. enjoyed his time with it last year when it was still just a Skirmish mode vs the AI, so it might be worth a look.

You start off foraging for food, eventually gathering enough resources to build a settlement and have your villagers specialise in a particular job, like a warrior or a woodcutter. Where it differs from the classic Age of Empires formula is that the map is split into sections, and gaining control of each area (either by spending resources or defeating an enemy force in that area) will let you construct more buildings—each area has limited building space.

The update that brings it out of Early Access is a big one, and that campaign mode is the main addition. You play Rig, son of the Viking High King. Your father is murdered and his Regal Horn is stolen, and it's your job to quest through the wilds for vengeance. During its 11 chapters you'll get a chance to master each of the game's six clans, which should make it an ideal intro for beginners and give you some of the skills you'll need in skirmish and multiplayer.

Speaking of, you'll now be able to create solo or online multiplayer games across seven different environments. The latest update also adds combat penalties that ramp up as you travel further from friendly territory and rebalances the clans, which you can read all about in the patch notes. 

It's been on my list for a while, and I'm definitely keen to check it out. If you are too, then it's $22.50/£17.84 on Steam, which includes a 25% discount that lasts until next week.

"If Odin played Early Access strategy games, I imagine he’d be pleased," said T.J. Hafer of Northgard in February last year. 

"Claiming Thor's Wrath will please the hammer-wielding god of thunder, granting you an attack boost," said Sam Horti of the game's October update.

"Northgard has a release date", says me, right now. 

Having spent the past year living in Early Access, Shiro Games' Viking RTS colony sim Northgard will launch in full on March 7, 2018. Comprised of pretty artwork and snippets of in-game footage, here's a campaign trailer:

At launch, Northgard introduces a new 11-chapter-spanning single-player campaign that follows the saga of Rig. He's out to avenge his father's murder—who was once the High King of the Vikings—while investigating the theft of a Regal Horn. 

Alongside best chum Brand, Rig's journey sees him travelling to the eponymous continent of Northgard, where he'll make new mates and will battle hostile natives and monsters in his quest to do his dad proud. 

Northgard's multiplayer component featured in its Early Access state. Let's read T.J.'s impressions from last year: 

Just as the Vikings did much more than the pillaging they’re infamous for, Northgard offers several paths to victory. Some of them don’t even require you to bury axes in your enemies’ skulls. You can win a Trade victory by making a certain amount of money selling resources you have a surplus of to the other chieftains on the map. 

You can win a Prestige victory by performing great deeds to gain the title of King and building an associated wonder. A Lore victory requires you to seek out ruins and ancient standing stones to complete the modest tech tree and earn the blessings of the Norse gods. Or, you know, you can just kill everybody. I tried each path at least once. They all feel fleshed out and interesting, with their own unique concerns, which bodes well for replayability. 

If any of that floats yer longboat, know that Northgard is due March 7 on Steam. It'll cost £23.79/$29.99 when it docks.

When T.J. tried it out Early Access RTS Northgard in February he enjoyed the Viking theme and the Age of Empires-style combat—and the game has come a long way since then. Developer Shiro Games has pushed out regular updates, the latest of which adds a new faction to the game called the Kobolds, as well as fresh resource tiles and a mystical hawk that will scout the map for you.

The Kobold will set up camp at various points in the map near precious resources. They're neutral but they'll protect that loot with their life. So, you can set up trade routes with them or, if you're feeling brave, confront them head on and try to wipe them out. But they're tough to beat, and if you do overcome them you won't be able to trade with them in future, naturally. At first glance, it's a neat dynamic.

The update also adds new tiles for the map, namely geysers, lakes and Thor’s Wrath. Lakes are choc full of fish to keep your clan nourished while geysers grant happiness (because you can relax around them), as well as heat that will reduce resource consumption in the winter. Claiming Thor's Wrath will please the hammer-wielding god of thunder, granting you an attack boost.

The last major addition is Vedrfolnir, a hawk that you'll find hidden somewhere on the map. It's hurt, but if you nurse it to full health it will scout the map for you, revealing new areas.

Shiro Games has made smaller changes too: you'll now receive a notification whenever your units enter a fight, for example. The full list of tweaks is in the patch notes.