June 2022

Hello folks. Sorry it’s been so long since I’ve written one of these Letters From The Editor. Things have been… manic, to say the least. Manic in the traditional ‘busy’ sense (hello Elden Ring, PAX, V Rising and now notE3 planning), but also in the ‘man, there are so many cool things I want to talk to you about but aren’t quite ready to announce yet’ sense. I’ve been on the cusp of writing about these things every single month since, err, March, but then something falls through, the weeks go by, and we’re back to square one again. So I’m sorry about that, I really am.

What I’m writing to you about today still isn’t one of those exciting things, unfortunately, but it is nonetheless very important. When we relaunched our RPS Supporter Programme last year, we did so on June 17th, which means its one-year anniversary is just around the corner. It also means that those of you who signed up for our yearly supporter tier will be coming to the end of your subscription soon, and I wanted to explain a little bit about the renewal process as it’s… err, a bit convoluted. Sorry again about that.

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I’m okay at card games. Better at things like Pokemon Trading Card Game and Yu-Gi-Oh than Blackjack, to be sure. I suck at shuffling too. But after some hours playing Card Shark on the Switch, I felt overconfident and daring. Like maybe I could pull off the Three-card Monte! Perhaps I could ensure a certain person would get all high-value cards when dealing? Okay, probably not. But this game made me feel confident in my virtual self!

Card Shark follows an individual who falls in with a con-man called Comte de Saint-Germain. After helping him cheat at a game in an inn, things go horribly awry. Your former employer is killed, and you’re essentially framed. But the Comte takes you on as a partner, and the two of you head to the Court of Miracles. It’s a place where essentially the unwanted in France end up. While you will be conning folks out of money, you’ll also be supporting this community and gathering information about the monarchy.

There's new Monster Hunter Rise Sunbreak concept art from Capcom, and this one shows a litter of baby Lunagaron "puppies." In some images, they're being tended to by their parent. In others, they're going about their daily lives. There's even one showing a sense of scale for a juvenile version of the fanged wyvern on its hind legs.

Things begin in the top right corner with a pair of Lunagaron puppies and a parent nearby tending to the babies. The two are playing together, with one biting the other. The parent nearby offers a sense of scale to show how its young would look alongside the fanged wyvern. Below it are two images that give a better idea of how a baby would look. One features it running, while the other shows it on its hind legs.

Acclaimed point-and-click specialist Wadjet Eye Games - the studio behind the likes of Unavowed and the celebrated Blackwell series - has unveiled its latest contribution to the genre, time-travelling adventure Old Skies.

Old Skies cast players as Fia Quinn, a time agent for the ChronoZen agency tasked with keeping a close eye on seven travellers who've paid for a sightseeing jaunt to the past. "Some are simply curious," explains Wadjet Eye. "Others have unfinished business to resolve. And they’ve all put down a lot of money for the trip, so it’s vital that you keep them happy while ensuring they follow the rules. But what could go wrong? It's only time travel, after all."

Wadjet Eye is promising seven distinct time periods from history to explore - "from the speakeasies of Prohibition to the gangs of the Gilded Age to the morning of September 11th" - with puzzles set to take advantage of the game's temporal premise.

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Today, Giant Bomb announced that the website’s co-founder, Jeff Gerstmann, was leaving the popular video game website after nearly 15 years. In a blog post announcing the departure, it was explained that “Giant Bomb and Jeff Gerstmann have agreed to go our separate ways.”

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Developer and publisher Epic Games will make its official foray into crypto with Grit, a battle royale game from blockchain video game creator Gala Games.

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In honor of Pride Month, the MC Championship 2022 will be raising money for The Trevor Project during the upcoming event. In addition, you’ll get to watch your favorite Minecraft gamers battle it out in the free-to-enter tournament. If you want to see the participants in this competition, here are all the Minecraft MC Championship Pride 2022 teams.

Minecraft MC Championship Pride 2022 Teams

The Minecraft MC Championship 2022 is on June 18 at 7 p.m. GMT. You can join the fun by voting for the next game you want the players to compete in once it starts. Battles included are Survival Games, Hole in the Wall, and Sands of Time. Finally, the event will end with an epic duel of Dodgebolt to see who will be the last team standing.

Contributing to this competition will help the Trevor Project immensely by bringing in donations and awareness to the LGBTQ+ community. So, let’s dive into the groups participating in the MC Championship Pride 2022.

Today third-party developers shared new looks at upcoming Microsoft Flight Simulator airport scenery addons.

We start with SNJ SIM which shared the first screenshots in Microsoft Flight Simulator of Saga Airport (RJFS) in Japan.

The developer also mentioned that he hopes to release both Saga and the port of his Fukuoka International Airport (previously released for another simulator) by the end of the year.

Madden NFL 23 is coming in August with some new tech set to change the game entirely on both sides of the ball. Our own Brian Shea recently went hands-on with the latest version of Madden and its game-changing feature FieldSense, which encompasses a variety of changes to gameplay and animations. You can check out a deep dive into everything FieldSense offers in the video above.

FieldSense, which is exclusive to the newest generation of consoles (PS5 and Xbox Series X/S), has a few different aspects that are covered in the video by senior game design director for Madden NFL 23, Connor Dougan. First is a set of new physics-informed animation as well as animation branching technology that brings a more realistic look to the action on the field. New gameplay techniques like 360 Cuts introduce more control for receivers and running backs, while Hit Everything is a feature that affects just about everything on the defensive side of the ball. For Quarterbacks, Skill Based Passing will let players fine-tune where they're throwing the ball for more precise passes that can be kept away from pass defenders. There are demonstrations of those new concepts and more in the almost five-minute breakdown.

Back at E3 2021, we learned that Plumbers Don’t Wear Ties, one of the strangest FMV games of the ’90s, was getting remastered for modern consoles courtesy of Limited Run Games. Now we know that John, Jane, and Thresher will return later this year. 

The news comes by way of today's Limited Run Presents showcase. What the heck is Plumbers Don’t Wear Ties, you ask? The 1993 game is best described as an interactive romantic comedy firmly aimed at adults, thanks to its mild nudity and sexual innuendo. Players guide a plumber named John, who tries to win the heart of a beautiful woman named Jane in an adventure laden with ridiculous hijinks. That includes dealing with an unreliable narrator and confronting a, shall we say, creepy boss. The gameplay involves making simple decisions in a choose-your-own-adventure format and watching live-action cutscenes. 

To editorialize a bit, Plumbers Don’t Wear Ties is absurd and pretty bad. However, as footage of the game found its way on YouTube over the years, the game has found new life as a cult favorite “so bad it’s good” oddity, not unlike Night Trap (which got a similar remaster a few years ago). Since Plumbers Don’t Wear Ties had a limited release on PC and the poor-selling 3DO console, not many folks have been able to play it themselves. 

Netflix has started a week-long celebration of its upcoming shows and movies coming to the streaming service, and on today's edition of Geeked Week, a new trailer premiered for the new Resident Evil series. Beware, the footage does contain violence, gore, and adult language.

Resident Evil takes place in two time periods, 2022 and 2036, following Jade Wesker (Ella Balinska) before and after the T-Virus is unleashed on the public, causing all kinds of monsters such as zombie people, zombie dogs, and the biggest monster of them all, pharmaceutical corporations. There's also a kaiju-sized caterpillar, and that's pretty cool too! The series also stars Lance Reddick as Albert Wesker, Tetiana Gaidar, and Connor Gosatti. 

Here's a brand new poster for Resident Evil featuring the Licker, an iconic creature that first premiered in Resident Evil 2:

You can start watching Resident Evil on Netflix beginning July 14.

The Razer Huntsman Elite is one of the company's best mechanical keyboards, courtesy of advanced opto-mechanical switches, a comfy palm rest and full-size UK layout, but its RRP of £200 is enough to put off even the most craven mechanical keyboard enthusiasts. Today though, Amazon UK has discounted the board to just 80 of your British pounds, a 60% reduction that brings it below some of the best value gaming keyboards. That's an awesome price for a full-size UK layout with this kind of tech on board.

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When Mob Psycho 100 season 3 appears, Crunchyroll will offer it. The streaming service announced it will air the next season of the anime adaptation. It confirmed a release window too. It will appear in October 2022. That's also when it is due to debut in Japan.

In addition to the release window, Crunchyroll offered an idea of regions in which it will be accessible. However, it didn't note which dubs could potentially be available after season 3 of the Mob Psycho 100 anime launches.

Here’s the full list of places in which people will be able to view it.

• Africa
• Central America
• The Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS)
• Europe
• The Middle East
• North America
• Oceania
• South America

In the meantime, people can start catching up with past episodes of Mob Psycho 100. Crunchyroll already offers season 1, 2, and the Reigen The Miraculous Unknown Psychic OVA. All of them are available in English with subtitles or dubbed. English, German, Portuguese, and Spanish dubs are available.

The Mob Psycho 100 manga is also available outside Japan. Dark Horse Comics handles the English localization.

The Limited Run Games hosted its LRG3 Showcase on June 6, 2022. Over 30 games appeared, all of them getting physical releases in 2022 and beyond. Among the announcements was a River City Girls 2 release window, a Shadowrun Trilogy console reveal, and even a 3DS game. LRG will also release physical copies of DOOM 64 for the Xbox.

Here’s the full list of Limited Run Games LRG3 Showcase physical games coming in the future. In some cases, exact pre-order dates were revealed.

DICE will be revealing first gameplay of the beleaguered Battlefield 2042's long-awaited Season 1 this Tuesday, 7th June, and there's a new update promising "hundreds of changes, bug fixes and quality of life improvements" due on the same day.

DICE has, of course, been steadily working to improve Battlefield 2042 since its launch last November, when it quickly become one of Steam's worst-reviewed games of all time. While the developer has committed to bringing this latest Battlefield "up to the highest standards that we all hold for the franchise", it's only now, some eight months after its release, that players will finally get a first look at the game's long-delayed first season of post-launch content.

Those curious to see what DICE has in store for Battlefield 2042's first season, known as Zero Hour, will be able to see its gameplay premiere tomorrow, Tuesday 7th June at 4pm/8am PDT.

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During a recent interview with Gamer, a prominent Japanese gaming website, Final Fantasy XIV producer Naoki Yoshida let slip that his team was at one point mulling the possibility of adding a competitive battle royale to the online role-playing game. It sounds like it’d be a whole lot of fun, too.

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Last October, after a surprising amount of hype, Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl debuted on all major platforms. While the game was well-received, one big complaint arose from the lack of voiced characters, making the whole thing feel a bit quiet and dead, especially compared to its competition. But now, a new update out…

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Wordle can be a tricky game, requiring not just knowing the words that make up the answer, but also a certain level of deduction to unearth the right letters. The better you are at eliminating incorrect letters, the more chances you’ll have of answering correctly. In this guide, we’ll go through all of the 5-letter words starting with F and ending with D to give you a good idea of where to start and aid you on the quest to maintain your streak.

Note that the following list of words has been tested and will work in Wordle. However, if you spot any missing or incorrect words, please inform us via the comments below so we can take a look at the list and update it if necessary.

All 5 Letter Words Starting with F and Ending With D

• faced
• faded
• faked
• famed
• farad
• fared
• fated
• fauld
• faurd
• faxed
• fayed
• fazed
• felid
• feted
• fetid
• feued
• feyed
• field
• fiend
• fifed
• fiked
• filed
• fined
• fiord
• fired
• fixed
• fjeld
• fjord
• flied
• flood
• flued
• fluid
• found
• foxed
• fraud
• freed
• fremd
• fried
• frond
• fumed
• fused
• fuzed
• fyked

Now that you are caught up with this particular list of words, you should have everything you’ll need to start the game off. Pick your chosen word and input it as your answer in Wordle, and check the colors to get an idea of where you are at. Correct letters in the right position will turn green, yellow indicates a right letter in the wrong place, while grey rules out the letter entirely.

It is time for another try at Wordle, but instead of guessing blindly, why not take a more measured approach? Don’t start wasting your five guesses on random words; instead, it is better to gradually refine your answers with each guess. In this helpful guide, we will go through all 5-letter words starting with FL so you have a better idea of where to go next after your preliminary guess.

The following list of words has been tested in Wordle and works as guesses. However, if there are any missing or incorrect words, please let us know in the comments below so we can investigate and update if necessary.

By narrowing down your options one by one, you’ll have higher chances of success when it comes to a game like Wordle. Being able to determine the letters that make up the word of the day is a key step, and then you can reduce the number of wrong guesses significantly. In this guide, we go through all of the 5-letter words ending with OOD to give you a good idea of where to start, and keep that streak of yours going strong.

Note that the following list of words has been tested and will work in Wordle. However, if you spot any missing or incorrect words, please inform us via the comments below so we can take a look at the list and update it if necessary.

All 5 Letter Words Ending with OOD

• agood
• blood
• brood
• flood
• snood
• stood

With this list, you are ready to kick things off and start narrowing down your choices. To enter your chosen answer, use the in-game keyboard and check the colors for a hint at your next move. Correct letters in the right position will turn green, yellow indicates a right letter in the wrong place, while grey rules out the letter entirely.

Keep using this process and you will arrive at the right answer before it is too late. If you’d much rather save time for today, here is the answer to today’s puzzle.

The free-to-play Battle Royale behemoth, Fortnite, is literally on every console that matters in the game industry. While an immensely popular multiplayer game, there are still hoops players might feel they have to jump through to play on their system of choice.

Xbox, for example, has its tried and true Xbox Live service, which has evolved in many ways since its early days but still hangs on to the ability to let players do online multiplayer content in games like Destiny. With that in mind, many Xbox players wanting to play Fortnite might be confused, asking if you need Xbox Live to play Fortnite. Here’s the answer!

Do You Need Xbox Live Gold to Play Fortnite on Xbox Consoles?

Starting at $9.99 a month, Xbox Live Gold is the go-to service for Xbox players so they can play online multiplayer. However, in the case of Fortnite, you don’t need the Xbox Live service to play the game online. It wasn’t always a simple yes or no, though. Up until April 2021, Xbox players had to have an active Xbox Live Gold subscription service to play the battle royale title.

After loads of negative feedback about free-to-play games restricted to Xbox Live, the company eventually changed it in April.

The new release of Diablo Immortal has been bringing new and original fans to this mobile/PC game. With so much news and updates, players have many questions about Blizzard Entertainment’s latest arrival. Most importantly, is Diablo Immortal pay to win? Find out what you can expect before you start the storyline.

Diablo Immortal’s Pay to Win Mechanics

Even if Diablo Immortal is free for all users, the game has pay-to-win features. The purchase options of Crests, Battle Passes, and bundles can advance players’ armor and stats faster. You can still progress through the story without microtransactions, but it may take longer to level up and battle through certain stages.

When players finish the story’s content, the main objective is to enhance their overall abilities. With this in mind, the purchase of Legendary Gems can significantly boost your skills in Diablo Immortal. However, players have issued concerns about these items in the Closed Beta since you can’t transfer them to other users.

Blossom Tales 2: The Minotaur Prince is coming this August, and a new trailer shows off the rogues' gallery of bosses fans can expect to confront in the sequel.

The follow-up to the 2017 Zelda-inspired adventure launches on August 16. Like the first game, players steer an adventurer named Lily through a choice-driven story told by a grandfather to his kids a la The Princess Bride. You’ll hack and slash through dozens of dungeons across both a main story and sidequests. For an idea of the retro-inspired dangers in store, check out the game’s latest trailer. 

Blossom Tales 2: The Minotaur Prince will be available on Switch and PC.

Capcom will bring Resident Evil Village to the Mac in late 2022. The announcement was made at WWDC 2022. Advanced Technical Research Division Manager Masaru Ijuin revealed the title would support 1080p resolution and 4K through MetalFX Upscaling. The presentation also featured a look as to how the port will look and perform on Mac computers with Apple Silicon.

You can watch an archived version of the Apple WWDC 2022 online event below. The Resident Evil Village Mac segment begins at 1:23:31.

[embed]https://youtu.be/q5D55G7Ejs8?t=5011[/embed]

Several environments are shown throughout the presentation. These include looks at Castle Dimitrescu and the titular village on a Mac.

Capcom announced in June 2021 that Resident Evil Village DLC would eventually appear. A follow-up statement was made in January 2022, revealing that the company plans to release the add-on sometime in 2022. However, an exact date has yet to be confirmed. Capcom has also not specified what the contents of the DLC will involve. This means there are no details about potential narratives it will cover or in what characters will appear.

In December 2021, Resident Evil Village appeared on Capcom's Platinum Titles list. Worldwide sales for the title reached 6.1 million units as of May 11, 2022.

Back in February, Gary Bowser—who in most media reports has been described as a ‘hacker’—was sentenced to 40 months in prison for his role in selling cheat and modification devices for Nintendo hardware. Being a court case, most of the reporting dealt only with names on a page and cold facts, but a transcript of…

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Today Atlus released one of its daily trailers of its upcoming JRPG Soul Hackers 2, focusing on one of the demons that will appear in the game.

This time around the trailer reveals Chimera, a demon that has been part of the series for basically forever, including the recent Shin Megami Tensei V.

As usual, the trailer also includes the daily horoscope displaying Taurus at the top of the fortune ranking and Aries at the bottom.

Soul Hackers 2 releases for PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, and PC (Steam and Windows Store) on August 26, just one day after the Japanese launch on August 25.

The brilliant French artist Jean “Moebius” Giraud had one of the most recognisable art styles around. His works have inspired video games for decades—including the ones he worked on directly—but few have been able to truly look like one of his illustrations come to life.

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The vast world of Diablo Immortal can be a lot to take in when starting the game. Choosing the right class type and exploring the inventory mechanics are just some of the few things you need to learn initially. To help you with this process, we’ve put together some tips and tricks for beginners in Diablo Immortal. So, let’s dive in to start your RPG journey.

Choose the Right Class for You

The first thing you want to do is pick the best class that caters to you. Diablo Immortal features various characters to choose from, including Barbarian, Crusader, Demon Hunter, Monk, Necromancer, and Sorcerer.

The time to stop evil is upon us yet again, and should you choose the path of the Neplahem, you will once again be facing an overwhelming horde of demons that will do everything they can to stop you. As the first Diablo game to feature MMO elements and is free-to-play, there are definitely some changes and mechanics players will need to get used to in Diablo Immortal. Here are the five main things to do first in Diablo Immortal to get your adventure started efficiently.

Sony’s new console has quickly established itself as a powerhouse for JRPGs, and this year is continuing to look really strong for the genre. Here are the best PS5 JRPGs to play in 2022.

Final Fantasy VII Remake

Best PS5 JRPGs 2022

Final Fantasy VII Remake was already pretty damn impressive on the PS4, but it’s been enhanced slightly on Sony’s new console and is definitely worth checking out if you haven’t already. The PS4 version of the game still runs at a stable 30 frames per second, but the loading times have been improved, making for a more fluid gameplay experience.

Not only that, though, the release of Intergrade has also given FFVII Remake a nice performance boost, allowing players to enjoy the game at 60fps. The Episode Intermission DLC is also available now, and it features Yuffie as a playable character as she journeys to Midgar in search of new Materia. There was a lot to enjoy in FFVII Remake, and Episode Intermission just makes it even better.

Korean developer NCsoft has been teasing quite a lot of new projects lately, and today they revealed another code-named “Project M.”

The game was teased back in February, but today we get to see a lot more of it. Specifically, we take a look at rather impressive visuals and acting achieved via the extensive use of performance capture and photogrammetry.

It appears to be an “Interactive movie” and pretty much feels like the Korean version of a Quantic Dream game.

You can check out the trailer below, keeping in mind that English subtitles are provided (alongside Japanese, Traditional Chinese, and Vietnamese), but you may need to activate them manually with the “cc” button.

At the moment, platforms or release windows have not been shared, so we may have to wait some time to know more. That being said, if Quantic Dream-style movie-like adventures are your drift, this certainly looks like a game to keep an eye on.

All we know so far is that the footage we’re seeing is work-in-progress and the game is currently in development. That being said, it certainly already looks promising.

Of course, you can expect further coverage here on Twinfinite when NCsoft reveals more about Project M.

Despite the name Diablo Immortal, this free-to-play spinoff from the main ARPG series does not necessarily take that long to beat the main story. Of course, there is plenty of other content like Battle Pass activities, PvP combat, endgame grinding, and more to get into, but for players chasing after the main story, there is a definite end to things, at least at this stage. If you are wondering how long does it take to beat Diablo Immortal, read on for the answer.

How Long Does It Take To Beat Diablo Immortal

As mentioned, the main story is not exactly a done deal just yet, but if you are looking to reach the end of things as they are, it should take you about 8 to 10 hours to finish the story in Diablo Immortal.

However, for those looking to reach the max level cap of 60 in order to fully enjoy the endgame content found in the game, you are looking at upwards of about 20 to 24 hours. Then you can start diving deeper into the different dungeons, raids, rifts, and even dabble in PvP.

All of these will change depending on if you are playing solo, in a group, or actively using microtransactions to make your journey a little easier. Even at max level, there is still the Paragon system in play, so you can chase after that to sink even more hours in Diablo Immortal.

Nexon and Arc System Works released a new trailer revealing a new character that will be included in their upcoming fighting game DNF Duel.

The character is the Troubleshooter, described as “the romanticist of the Lawless District” and “the jovial menace of the battlefield.”

You can take a look at what the Troubleshooter looks like and how he fights below.

DNF Duel is coming for PS5, PS4, and PC on June 28, 2022. You can check out more videos showcasing the basics of the game.

Dungeon Fighter Online, which inspired this title, is one of the most played games in the world if you look at actual revenue, so it was pretty much a matter of time for it to expand to other genres and markets.

After the tragic and sudden passing of Berserk creator Kentaro Miura last year at the age of 54, fans had been wondering whether the series would, or even could, continue without him. After over a year of waiting, they now have their answer.

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In a first for the series, Street Fighter 6 lets you change your character's facial expression during the versus screen.

Capcom revealed the feature via a short clip posted to Twitter, below, that shows Luke and Ryu change their facial expression a couple of times with the camera up close and personal.

"Show your attitude with the Game Face Feature in #StreetFighter6 by pressing directional buttons during the versus screen," reads the tweet.

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Diablo Immortal has been here for a week now, yet many players are struggling with no sound issue. As with most video games, Diablo Immortal has a fair share of bugs and glitches which hinders the gaming experience. So if you’re also encountering no sound issue in Diablo Immortal, here’s a comprehensive troubleshooting guide to get rid of this annoying error.

Methods To Fix the Diablo Immortal No Sound Issue

There could be multiple possible reasons behind the no sound issue in the game. However, it’s worth noting that Blizzard Entertainment, the developers behind Diablo Immortal, hasn’t acknowledged any such problem with the game, meaning the issue is more likely to be arising on your end. Here are the potential troubleshooting steps that you can execute to fix the Diablo Immortal no sound issue:

Check Game’s Master Volume

The master volume setting is used to control the overall volume of Diablo Immortal, such as sound effects, music volume, SFX, and more. In general, the game’s master volume is set to 100%, which ensures the proper sound is being delivered to the audio output device. However, players sometimes accidentally disable it and encounter the no sound issue. Here are the steps to enable master volume in Diablo Immortal: