Rock Paper Shotgun

Yet again, some good food. Following the news earlier this week that 241 Bethesda Games Studios staffers had formed what was at the time the biggest wall-to-wall under Microsoft, The Verge reports that over 500 World Of Warcraft developers have voted to form their own union, alongside the Communication Workers of America (CWA).

The immersive sim has seen a revival in recent years. Not only from larger studios like Arkane, keeping the faith alive with their time loops and space stations, but also from a bunch of smaller developers bravely exploring a typically ambitious genre. RPS has always had an affinity for these systemically luxuriant simulations, historically lauding the likes of the original Deus Ex as the best game ever made. But given everything that has come since, is that still the case? Only one way to find out: make a big list. Читать дальше...

Animal caretaking sim Zoochosis is about being an ordinary zookeeper working in an ordinary zoo. What's that? There are no ordinary zoos? My mistake. Let me start again. Animal caretaking horror game Zoochosis is about being a stressed-out zookeeper in a hideous zoo where the giraffes have tendrils coming out of their chests and the kangaroos have rows of chattering teeth in their marsupial pouch. There, got it right in the end. We've known about the development of this terror-heavy tourist attraction since its announcement early this year. Читать дальше...

In a certifiably not-great week for gaming CPUs, AMD have announced that the new Ryzen 9000 series is being delayed for a few days. That’s thanks to initial production units not being up to standards, an AMD executive admitted, and comes shortly after rivals Intel copped to a potentially chip-killing fault in their latest Core processors. Ah well, there’s always – oh, wait. No. Those are the only two.

I've never been a poetry guy, not because I don't like it, I've just never gone out of my way to read them over books or whatnot. The poems I've engaged with the most are those read out during wedding ceremonies, those that pop-up before the start of a horror game, or The Tiger by 6-year old Nael that occasionally pops up as I'm doomscrolling. But thanks to the multiplayer web game "fridge poetry", where you drag words to create poems, I might become a day-to-day poem guy. Going off my first effort... Читать дальше...

Apex Legends developers Respawn Entertainment have announced that poorly-received plans to overhaul the battle royale's Premium Battle Pass will be partially walked back. Most crucially, the new passes – set to launch alongside the upcoming Season 22 in August – will no longer be sold exclusively for real-world cash; as with previous BPs, players will still be able to buy them with accumulated in-game currency.

Grit And Valor 1949 certainly evokes the tactics of Into The Breach, with its stompy machinery and floating tile battlegrounds. But, despite all appearances, this one isn’t actually turn-based at all. A tiley, tiny real time strategy then? Aye, and one that’s actually pretty frantic as it happens. Missions are snappy, intense skirmishes. You’ll fight off waves while trying to protect your useless, freeloading command vehicle. This threat, combined with on-the-fly tactical consider-me-do's like... Читать дальше...

Fallout: London, the massive fan-made Fallout 4 mod set in Poundland Prime (No Elephants, Some Castles, Canary Wharfare) has finally got a release date. Happy days, it’s actually today, Thursday 25th July. The news comes from Inverse, who’ve sent their dear alsatian companions sniffing around the mod’s Discord. Yesterday, Team FOLON lead Dean Carter shared the song I Just Can't Wait (For Tomorrow) then, when sniffed at harder, confirmed that the 'Tomorrow' part meant tomorrow (as in, today), "Unless... Читать дальше...

Capcom's turned back the clock with Kunitsu-Gami: Path Of The Goddess, bringing to us an action RPG tower defence hybrid that's very 2000s and very welcome in this age of open world, live service-ness. And for some, it'll deliver what's needed: a fairly good time. A time marked by a loop that does hack 'n slash, management, and a dash of base repairs to an average degree. For me, though, and possibly many others, I simply don't think this mix ever truly captures what makes even the simplest of tower defence games so captivating. Читать дальше...

All 36 employees of Humble Games publishing have reportedly been laid off. According to business developer Nicola Kwan, staff were informed at 9am this morning, and told that “the company is shutting down.” Humble dispute this in a statement made to Game Developer, claiming that the publishing label is "undergoing restructuring," as opposed to a full shutdown.