Balatro review: only fools would sleep on this moreish poker roguelike No joke Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Playstack Developer: LocalThunk Publisher: Playstack Release: February 20th 2024 On: Windows From: Steam Price: £12.79/€14/$15 Reviewed on: Intel Core i9-11900K, 16GB RAM, Nvidia RTX 3080, Windows 10 + Steam Deck There’s a particular boss encounter in Balatro that always feels like it’s cheating a bit. In this mesmerising poker roguelike, each stage is made up of three blinds - small, big and boss - with the blind essentially being a high score you have to hit by playing different kinds of poker hands - your traditional flushes, straights, pairs and so on....

Baldur’s Gate 3 devs Larian discuss making two new games at once: “in practice, we will probably be miserable” “I hope I can tell you five years from now: we cracked it,” says Swen Vincke Image credit:Larian Studios / Rock Paper Shotgun Last April, Baldur’s Gate 3 developers Larian announced that they were working on two new games , neither of which is Baldur’s Gate 4 . Now, fresh from the labour of pumping BG3 full of bees , Larian boss Swen Vincke has shared a little more about how Belgium’s finest mindflayer-wranglers are organising development of these mystery projects....

Baldur’s Gate 3 studio boss calls out “hurtful”, “personal” videogame reviewers - “sometimes I think it’d be a good idea for critics to be scored, Metacritic-style” “You shouldn’t have to grow callus on your soul just because you want to publish something.” Image credit:Larian Studios Fresh from the trenches of the Divinity generative AI debate , Larian CEO Swen Vincke has taken to the Twitterverse with some moderately spicy thoughts on video game critics and reviewers....

Behold, the Steam Brick Short for ‘Steam Brichard’ I believe Image credit:crastinator-pro Could we perhaps chart the entire course of technological innovation as a story of things not fitting in other things quite as well as some reckless genius had hoped? Something to ponder on, perhaps, as we behold the Steam Brick. As reported by PC Gamer , one Crastinator-pro has documented their journey to transform the Steam Deck into a controller-less, screen-less creature of ineffable bricktitude....

Being authorised to hunt in Monster Hunter Wilds is a kink No Alma in talking about it Image credit:Polygon / Capcom A kink is a twist in a rope, an unconventional sexual or non-sexual practice, a spasm, a bend that might interfere with smooth operation, an eccentricity, a source of pleasure and revulsion. A kink can be anything, as long as it’s not the done thing. Monster Hunter Wilds , meanwhile, is a game in which you hunt monsters in the wilds....

Best Call of Duty Black Ops 6 XM4 loadout and class setup Here’s the best loadout for this jack-of-all-trades Assault Rifle in Black Ops 6 Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Activision Looking to build the best XM4 loadout in Black Ops 6? The XM4 returns from previous Call Of Duty games to deliver some tried and true goodness into the hands of Assault Rifle fans in Call Of Duty: Black Ops 6. This gun is one of the first you can turn to if you’re just getting your feet wet with ARs, and it’s an excellent jack-of-all-trades option....

Best Perks in The Outer Worlds 2 The 10 best Perks to customise your Commander Image credit:Obsidian Wondering what the best Perks are in The Outer Worlds 2? There’s a tonne of choice available for character customisation in The Outer Worlds 2 , and chief among these are a wide variety of Perks which will dictate the growth of your Commander’s abilities. From granting extra movement buffs to making your shots more effective at taking down the mechs of the Protectorate, there’s options aplenty - but some Perks are definitely more useful than others!...

Bird-bashing soulslike Wuchang: Fallen Feathers has some PC system specs, and they are not brutal Out 24th July Image credit:505 Games Chinese action- RPG Wuchang: Fallen Feathers is out in a week, and it’s high time we heard about the system requirements, which don’t seem that high for a game in which you can lob lightning at supersized peacocks and leave a delicate furrow through new-fallen snow. An Intel Core i5-8400, an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060, 16GB of RAM and 60GB’s worth of SSD are all they’re asking for the chance to become an amnesiac pirate swordswoman during the age of the Ming dynasty, tasked with murdering a whole lot of bird people before she becomes a bird person herself....

Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 performs well on PC – shame about the launcher Running in the 90s Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Activision It’s always nice to say that a big, look-how-much-we-spent-on-pore-rendering AAA game actually runs quite well on PC, as Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 does. Unfortunately for Bl6ps, and for us, that technical success is balanced on the knife tip of some seriously overwrought infrastructure. Mainly in the form the UX nightmare that is the Call of Duty HQ launcher, as well as a meddlesome always-online requirement , itself serving a feature that doesn’t even work that well....

Can you play Rusty’s Retirement while at work and still get work done? Let’s find out Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun / Mister Morris Games I’m playing Rusty’s Retirement as I type this article. This cute farming sim runs at the bottom of your screen as you go about your working day. You can plant crops, hire watering robots, harvest blueberry bushes, raise pigs, all while validating the spreadsheets from Paula in accounts....

CD Projekt plan to release The Witcher 4, 5, & 6 within six years of one another, and oh, are those pigs flying? It’s bold, to say the least Image credit:CD Projekt To dig a touch more into that, Nowakowski specifically frame it this way: “[CD Projekt Red have] been using UE5 for The Witcher 4 for almost four years now, and we’re very happy with what we’ve achieved… and we’re happy with how the engine is evolving through the Epic team’s efforts, and how we are learning how to make it work within a huge open-world game, as TW4 is meant to be....

Creator of Dicey Dungeons, VVVVVV and Super Hexagon launches a big collection of his shorter games Terry’s Other Games <img loading=“lazy” src=“https://assetsio.gnwcdn.com/terrys-other-games-collection-terry-cavanagh-tiny-heist-1.jpg?width=690&quality=85&format=jpg&dpr=3&auto=webp" onerror=“this.onerror=null;this.src=‘https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhe7F7TRXHtjiKvHb5vS7DmnxvpHiDyoYyYvm1nHB3Qp2_w3BnM6A2eq4v7FYxCC9bfZt3a9vIMtAYEKUiaDQbHMg-ViyGmRIj39MLp0bGFfgfYw1Dc9q_H-T0wiTm3l0Uq42dETrN9eC8aGJ9_IORZsxST1AcLR7np1koOfcc7tnHa4S8Mwz_xD9d0=s16000';" alt=“The player navigates the blue walls of Tiny Heist as a small yellow thief. One of the white guardbots is shouting “Error! Intruder detected!” - 1”> Image credit:Terry Cavanagh If, like me, you failed and failed and failed to get a decent score in arcadey reaction game Super Hexagon , then take solace in this: there are a bunch of other games by the same developer you can fail at....

Cyberpunk 2077 devs CD Projekt might have invented presidential time travel just to tease something Community manager says it’s “not the DLC and it’s not the patch” Image credit:CD Projekt /Rock Paper Shotgun It’s been a little while since we got another Cyberpunk 2077 tease that makes folks wonder whether CD Projekt are about to u-turn on adding more stuff to it yet again. Here one is, though, and it invites us 2025 dwellers to help out a president who isn’t elected in-universe until 2065....

Cyberpunk 2077’s sequel will see you return to Night City, and head to a new city described as “Chicago gone wrong” So says Mike Pondsmith himself Image credit:CD Projekt RED / Rock Paper Shotgun CD Projekt Red’s sequel to Cyberpunk 2077 is mostly a bit of a mystery, and it likely will be for a while yet given that they’re currently full steam ahead on The Witcher 4 . We know Anna Megill, who worked on Control and the upcoming Fable game, is attached as lead writer , and that the team wants to deal with some big topics , but there’s been nothing like plot details shared so far....

Descent of Lunaris is a sci-fi dungeon crawler RPG for sickos, with Wizardry and Shin Megami Tensei roots Moon’s haunted Image credit:Unison Games I’m two for two on writing about games set on the moon today , but sometimes that’s just how it is! This time around it’s about a newly revealed game called Descent of Lunaris , a dungeon-crawling, turn-based RPG whose devs say it’s inspired by classics like Wizardry and Shin Megami Tensei....

Diablo 4 transmog sets: How to get new looks for your gear It’s simple to use Diablo 4’s transmog system once you know how Image credit:Blizzard / Rock Paper Shotgun How does the Diablo 4 transmog system work? Diablo 4 ’s transmog system allows players to change the appearance of their gear easily. And, while the process is simple, the game itself doesn’t make it very explicit as to how you get new looks and customize the color of your gear....

Disney Epic Mickey: Rebrushed review: a faithful remaster of a paint-splashing platformer An old master? Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/THQ Nordic Developer: Purple Lamp Publisher: THQ Nordic Release: September 24th 2024 On: Windows From: Steam , GOG Price: £50/€60/$60 Reviewed on: Intel Core i7-12700F, Nvidia RTX 3080, 16GB RAM, Windows 11 Disney Epic Mickey: Rebrushed is a remaster of Disney Epic Mickey, a cult classic 3D platformer first released a decade ago on the Wii....

Dragon’s Dogma 2: A Scholarly Pursuit quest walkthrough Here’s how to kill off a draconic jar in A Scholarly Pursuit Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Capcom Looking for a walkthrough for the main quest A Scholarly Pursuit in Dragon’s Dogma 2? As you take on the Purgener Dragons in the endgame of Dragon’s Dogma 2 , you might notice that Bakbattahl doesn’t have a true dragon threatening it. As befitting a nation that conducts somewhat shady experiments in its Forbidden Magick Research Lab, Bakbattahl is instead attacked by a draconic jar that summons monsters throughout the city....

Dragon’s Dogma 2: Best Magick Archer skills and augments Best Magick Archer skills and augments in Dragon’s Dogma 2 Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Capcom Interested in the best Magick Archer skills and augments in Dragon’s Dogma 2? For those who enjoy the bow in Dragon’s Dogma 2 but want to add a smidgeon of spellcasting to their attack style, the Magick Archer is a thrill. This vocation replaces the trick arrows that the regular Archer shoots with an elegant selection of magicks that can freeze, set enemies alight, unleash richocheting shots in a tight space, and even heal comrades....

Dragon’s Dogma 2: The Nameless Village quest walkthrough How to reach the Nameless Village and discover its secrets Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Capcom Stuck trying to reach The Nameless Village in Dragon’s Dogma 2? Or perhaps you’ve found the village, but are unsure of how to proceed and find out what you need to know? It’s a common issue - The Nameless Village is one of the most confusing main quests in the first half of This quest walkthrough will guide you through the ninth main quest in Dragon’s Dogma 2 , The Nameless Village....