Fox’s long-running animated sitcom, The Simpsons, has seen its share of amazing, truly wonderful episodes. But lurking below those high points are also some horrendous misfires, misbegotten episodes that are just downright awful and unfunny.
Whether you love it or hate it, the end of Abby’s third day in The Last of Us Part II is one of the sequel’s most memorable moments. While playing as Abby, the secret second main character of the game, the player is forced into a brutal fight with long-time protagonist Ellie in a Seattle theater. If you would like to…
As Bungie continues on its warpath against Destiny 2 cheaters, the studio has won $12 million in the lawsuit against Romanian cheat seller Mihai Claudiu-Florentin that began back in 2021.
On Wednesday, the UK Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) blocked the Microsoft and Activision Blizzard Merger due to its implications for cloud gaming. Along with fundamentally changing the future of Microsoft and Activision Blizzard, the document released alongside this decision has revealed quite a few details about the increasing financial demands behind AAA games.
In a massive report on the decision, the CMA revealed that some major publishers report their AAA franchises can cost over $1 billion to make.
According to the report, AAA games that are greenlit now with potential releases in 2024 or 2025 typically receive development budgets of $200 million or higher — Call of Duty has already surpassed $300 million in development costs alone, and the next Grand Theft Auto title will likely require a development budget of $250 million or more. When considering marketing costs, this number can jump to over $1 billion across a franchise, with one large studio reporting that a major franchise's development cost $660 million and marketing cost nearly $550 million.
These costs demonstrate a significant increase from five years ago, when most AAA games had budgets between $50 and $150 million.
The CMA's ruling, citing a report by market intelligence group IDG, also revealed details about the increasing development demands for new Call of Duty titles.
Since going free-to-play in 2019, Bungie has made many changes with what’s pro bono and what will require a real-world investment in Destiny 2. If you’re wondering exactly what is free and what’s paid, we made this nifty guide to help you navigate all that space magic.
First, let’s cover all the things you can do in Destiny 2 without paying. These are all the playlist activities, limited-time events, and stories you can partake in without ever running into Destiny’s paywall:
1. The “New Light” Questline and Guardian Rank Onboarding
As a newcomer, this content will be the first thing you’re forced to tackle before you can do anything else. This brief storyline will introduce you to the Destiny universe, teach you the basics of looting and shooting, and catch you up on the happenings so far, including a special cutscene to catch you up to speed all the way to Lightfall. After that, you’ll be given a series of goals via the “Journey” tab that will tell you what to do next, as part of Bungie’s new onboarding mechanic. Thankfully, it points you to free content long before you ever see an objective that would require you to buy something.
2. The Vanguard Strikes Playlist
Good Smile Company opened pre-orders for a figure of Vash from Trigun Stampede. Pre-orders are priced at 4,800 yen/$34.99 and are open until May 25, 2023. The figure is expected to release sometime in August 2023 in Japan and Q4 2023 in North America.
Images of the upcoming figure can be seen in the Good Smile Company Twitter account’s tweet below:
https://twitter.com/GoodSmile_US/status/1651787859139985410
The Vash figure is part of the Pop Up Parade series, which includes figures that are “easy to collect with affordable prices and speedy releases.” It stands approximately 125mm (about 5 inches) tall and features Vash in an action pose. He has one knee on the ground and is looking behind him, his gun at the ready. All the while, his coat is fluttering behind him.
Trigun Stampede is a reboot of the 1990s Trigun anime. It features many of the original series’ characters, with some having been given new designs. The “Final Phase” of Trigun Stampede has been announced, though no release date has been given. Crunchyroll has both series available to stream in full and has confirmed that it will also stream the reboot’s Final Phase when it releases.
It can be tough to stand out from the pack when creating another Dark Souls-inspired action game to toss on the pile. In theory, developer Point Blank Games had the right idea of how to do it with Stray Blade, making a more approachable soulslike with a focus heavily on traditional storytelling in a bright fantasy setting. But while that makes for a great first impression, every piece of it falls short of both its own ambitions and the high bar set by others in the genre. Poor level design, uninteresting world building, and shoddy combat mechanics keep this stray from ever finding its way home.
As the capable and curious Farren, you find yourself trapped on the magical island of Arcea with no way off besides being led on a quest to kill some big bad guys, break a magic seal, and yada yada yada – you know the drill. As much as I came to like the self-important heart of gold hero Farren and their relationship to their scrappy and altruistic spell slinging sidekick, Boji, this story has nothing you haven’t heard before, and is told in largely forgettable expository dialogue and lore pickups. When following the main path, I felt like I was stopping to hear the two characters riffing off of one another about the local environment, their backgrounds, or the mission way too often. The trope of lonely, barren, and opaque soulslike storytelling is tired these days, but Stray Blade feels like it overcorrected in its attempt to swing the opposite way.
Originally released as a PlayStation 2 game, Yakuza (known as Ryu ga Gotoku in Japan) spawns a lengthy series that follows the steps of Kiryu Kazuma, a member of one of the most important yakuza families (the Dojima family, under the Tojo Clan), in the game’s fictional city of Kamurocho, Tokyo. He and his multiple allies and friends try to avoid the conflicts and plans being schemed by other powerful mob groups.
It took years for the Yakuza franchise to start receiving the praise and popularity it currently has outside Japan. Its reputation only seems to increase thanks to the multiple localized re-releases and new games. In this article, you’ll find a chronology of the series if you’re interested in playing each entry from the very beginning.
Jump to:
Sega and Ryu Ga Gotoku studio have released 8 main Yakuza games and two remakes since the series’ debut in 2005. They were originally PlayStation-exclusive titles, but they were later ported to Xbox and PC, with every new game since Yakuza: Like a Dragon releasing simultaneously for every system with the exception of Nintendo Switch.
Hololive Alternative manga Holoearth Chronicles Side:E Yamato Phantasia's first volume will release soon in Japan. Specifically, it will come out on June 23, 2023, at a cost of 730 yen (about $5). Pre-orders are currently available on Toranoana and Melonbooks, and will open through other storefronts later. We don't know when it could appear worldwide, however English and Indonesian chapters are available online.
The volume’s cover illustration was released alongside the announcement, which you can check out in the tweet below:
https://twitter.com/hololiveALT/status/1651841226247933953
The Holoearth Chronicles Side:E Yamato Phantasia manga stars Hololive VTubers Shirakami Fubuki and Ookami Mio, and also features Nakiri Ayame. It is drawn by Kosuke Kurose, who also provides the art for the Goblin Slayer manga adaptation. The first chapter, Chapter 0, was released back in June 2021, and Chapter 1 was released in May 2022. The manga can be read in Japanese on Manga-Up and Holonometria, with the latter also offering English and Indonesian translations.
Aniplex announced that pre-orders are open for a new figure from the Evangelion franchise. The figure is based after her appearance in the latest Evangelion 3.0+1.0 movie. Titled Shin Evangelion Rei Ayanami Voyage End, the figure costs 19,800 JPY (or roughly $145 USD). Pre-orders will be open until July 31, 2023, from the Aniplex online store. The expected release date of the figure is February 2024.
The figure is 1/7th in scale, which amounts to approximately 9.5 inches or 24 cm. Rei Ayanami is depicted with her long hair, as she appeared in Evangelion 3.0+1.0, the last movie in the Rebuild of Evangelion series. The base of the figure is modeled after the shore of a beach, similar to the one where the Evangelion children are depicted in promotional material and posters.
You can take a better look at the Evangelion Rei Ayanami Voyage End figure here:
[gallery columns="6" link="file" ids="961261,961260,961259,961258,961257,961256"]
Evangelion 3.0+1.0 is the fourth and last movie in the Rebuild of Evangelion reboot series of the original anime. Evangelion 3.0+1.11 is the DVD and Blu-Ray release of the movie, which includes exclusive content and extras, like a motion comic.
Behind The Red Dais begins with an appeal to the nose. "First, the smell of rotten strawberries..." reads the opening text. "That's how you will know you are not dreaming." It's both an evocative line and a distancing, even self-defeating one: despite the fervent efforts of certain peripheral makers, video games continue to be devoid of an olfactory component. And yet, the smell lingers. There's a crimson flash, as though you'd taken damage, and the screen fades up to reveal a sleepy but cheerful-seeming woman standing by a bed. On the bed, a "red, dry stain".
Playable for free in a browser, Behind The Red Dais is a game from Domino Club, a group of anonymous gamejammers who have devised some of the most wonderful, fearful and specific pieces of digital art I've ever stumbled on. It's a short, potent work of curiosity and suspense, visually reminiscent of both Silent Hill and Animal Crossing, which dangles the unconventional promise of "zero endings".
Moving with the arrow keys, you leave the bedroom and explore a series of shadowy backrooms, each with the same dingy floral skirting boards and beige panelling. Roots wind across a scuffed wooden floor, leading you between chambers or disappearing beneath bookcases. The soundtrack is a blend of slow electronic guitar chords and dialtones that manages to feel at once sad, droll and empty. There are a handful of other people in this labyrinth, but they only make dismissive fart noises when you approach them. Instead, you'll receive eerie messages from the soil in glass test tubes, dispersed on tables throughout the complex.
Cherry is best-known for making the MX switches that kicked off the mechanical gaming keyboard craze circa 2010 and remain the most critical component of modern keyboards, but the German firm has only flirted with producing gaming keyboards of its own. That's changed following its acquisition of Swedish peripheral maker Xtrfy five months ago, whose products turn up in plenty of our keyboard and mouse recommendations, and earlier this week the combined firms finally showed off their new designs at an event in Cologne.
There are five new products in total, all of which speak towards the direction Cherry is taking after the acquisition - and more general trends in the gaming peripheral space too.
In short, Cherry has historically shied away from gaming wares despite supplying many gaming brands with their switches, but now we're seeing a firmer commitment with three esports-focused yet wireless designs from Cherry's designers: the MX-LP 2.1 Compact Wireless, the MX 3.0S Wireless and the MX 8.2 TKL Wireless.
We're having another long weekend, thanks to the May Day bank holiday on Monday, so we'll not be properly back until Tuesday. I trust, reader dear, that you will pinch and punch yourself on my behalf for the first of the month. And even if you do think "yes returns", you'll only have youself to pinch and punch in retaliation. But what are you playing this weekend? Here's what we're clicking on!
Respawn CEO Vince Zampella has revealed that he would "love to see" a third Titanfall game, albeit at "the right moment in time".
In an interview Barron's and spotted by PC Gamer, Zampella acknowledged that whilst the studio didn't have "exact dedicated plans" and was not "working on anything currently" connected to a new Titanfall game, "it's such a beloved franchise for the fans and also for [Respawn developers]".
"I hate to say yes, then people latch onto that, and then skewer you when it doesn't come," Zampella said. "But I would love to see it happen is the real answer.
UK games trade body Ukie's latest diversity campaign, Impact, aims to "showcase and celebrate the talents" of six disabled and neurodiverse UK-based games industry professions.
The "annual long-term initiative" hopes to feature people from across various areas, specialisms and levels and "have stood out in their career [as] are proud advocates of their identity".
To be eligible, nominees must be disabled and/or neurodiverse, be "vocal, visible, and open about their disability or neurodiversity", and working in any games industry role. The project is using the Equality Act 2010's definition of disability to define its criteria.
Destiny 2's annual Guardian Games event is set to return next week.
From 2nd May, players can expect a little more "friendly competition" between Hunters, Titans, and Warlocks as Guardians compete to ensure that their class reigns supreme. The Guardian Games Cup also returns, and this time, everyone can take part.
From 2nd May until 23rd, players can earn medallions for activities across the game, "including a class-based version of the popular PvP mode Supremacy" – "that’s right, get ready for even more fierce competition in the Crucible" – and participates in the Guardian Games can earn two weapons: Legendary Strand Scout Rifle Taraxippos, or the refreshed Void Submachine Gun, The Title, which returns with "the fan-favourite perk", Repulsor Brace.
Microsoft has partnered with cloud gaming platform Nware for a new 10-year deal to stream "PC games built by Xbox" on its platform.
A press release further adds that this will include Activision Blizzard games "after the acquisition closes".
Nware – self-described as "the only cloud gaming platform in the market that gives gamers the freedom to bring more than 20,000 video games from their current libraries to Nware" – enables users to access their favourite games on Steam, Epic Games, and Ubisoft clients, and playing them "in the cloud on any device", such as smart devices and TVs.
Cassette Beasts is not what it looks like on the surface. The premise of the game is simple: Pokemon, but you catch creatures using cassette tapes instead of Poke Balls, there are party members, and you can fuse with them Digimon style. That in itself sounds solid enough, but there is much more to it than just a neat creature collector RPG. Add to the mix a bit of the exploration in 2D Zelda style (particularly Link’s Awakening), a lot of Persona, a good serving of lo-fi 1980s music and personality, some cosmic horror, and you have Cassette Beasts.
The setting of Cassette Beasts is New Wirral, a strange island full of whimsical creatures. The player character awakens there one day, without knowing how they arrived. People in New Wirral record these creatures on tapes, and then use them to transform into them, to protect themselves and explore the island to survive. After pressing start, you create your avatar from a selection of hairstyles, clothes, and accessories. The game also lets you choose between masculine, feminine, and neutral pronouns, which was a very nice touch. If you wish to change anything about your character, the game lets you do so on your house after the tutorial.
[caption id="attachment_960932" align="alignnone" width="1200"]
Image via Siliconera[/caption]
Like Genshin Impact, HoYoVerse designed Honkai: Star Rail in such a way that there are Daily Training missions and Assignments that can give you bonus items and points that lead to Nameless Honor and Glory battle Pass rewards. These aren’t available right away, as you need to increase your Trailblaze Level to at least 11 to start. Once you do, you get a chance to actively and passively begin earning rewards.
[gallery columns="1" size="full" ids="961293" link="file"]
Go through Trailblaze Missions and the main campaign until you hit Trailblaze Level 11. The game will automatically perform a tutorial introducing you to the activity and encourage you along. Basically, these daily tasks function in the same way Genshin Impact ones do. You’ll see these under the Interastral Guide in the menu.
A handful will be available, each awarding a number of Activity Points that let you earn rewards. You need 500 points to claim all of them for a day. So on April 29, 2023, some of the ones available to me were:
The official Sword Art Online games Twitter account introduced Philia and Strea, two original characters created for SAO: Hollow Fragment, and SAO: Infinity Moment respectively, that will appear in the upcoming Sword Art Online: Last Recollection. Philia is a dagger wielding treasure hunter, while Strea is an AI and Yui’s younger sister.
Philia is a treasure hunter known as the Swordbreaker. Appropriately, she wields a sword breaker dagger. She made her first appearance in SAO: Hollow Fragment, released on 2014 for the PS Vita and 2015 for the PS4, where she saved by Kirito. Philia is a treasure-loving treasure hunter, and she will be joining Underworld in Sword Art Online: Last Recollection with her past memories intact.
https://twitter.com/sao_gameinfo/status/1651926059439489027
Since Strea is an AI, she has appeared in the in-universe world of SAO, as well as the worlds of ALfheim Online, and Gun Gale Online, and she is set to reappear in Underworld on SAO: Last Recollection. This is her first appearance in the SAO games since Hollow Fragment. Strea first appeared in SAO: Infinity Moment, released on the PSP in 2013.
https://twitter.com/sao_gameinfo/status/1651924880106061825
In nearly every niche online community, there are two kinds of people: those who like the porn related to their obscure interests, and those who don’t.
During the Honkai: Star Rail "Ones Fallen into the Abyss" Trailblaze Mission, you’ll eventually need to use Findie the Interastral Peace Corporation object finder to collect mine cart parts. However, the game doesn’t explain how to do so. It gives you the ability to place seven pieces of Findie at a time, highlights an area and leaves you to it while the character spouts ads repeatedly for things you don’t need. In case you missed the tutorial message or just want to know where the items are, here is how Findie works.
The key here is to place the seven pieces of Findie and look at the color and direction of the beams. The search will limit you to an area in yellow on the map. The item can only be around there. Place the first Findie somewhere. Look at the color of the beam. If it is pointing in a direction and red, it is very far away. If the color is yellow, it is further away in that direction. If it is green, it is very nearby and you should probably take a few steps in that direction and place another Findie part.
The part closest to the broken mine cart is the Mine Cart Pin. Place one FIndie piece right next to the treasure chest to get it. Findie will say they found it, and there will now be a point you can investigate to collect the object.
[gallery columns="1" size="full" ids="961300" link="file"]
US ratings board ESRB has revealed a new Tomb Raider collection is on the way to Switch.
Whilst the games included in the collection have not been named, it's likely they are spin-offs Guardian of Light and Temple of Osiris, as the Switch port for those titles was quietly delayed at the end of last year.
"This is a collection of two action-adventure games in which players help Lara Croft and her allies search for artifacts to stop ancient gods from destroying the world," the rating's description explains, again without specifically confirming what the two games are called.
Hand-painted indie narrative game, End of Lines, will be available for PC and Switch on 25th May.
The interactive graphic novel hails from Nova-box, the award-winners behind Across the Grooves and Seers Isle, and is inspired "by the looming climate crisis".
You can check out the "beautifully hand-painted, heartbreaking vision of the future where the world failed to act on our rapidly-changing climate" in the new teaser trailer below:
Capcom has warned that players who "access" Street Fighter 6 "outside of the [beta] designated period" may be banned from competitive play.
In a statement posted to the developer's social media channels, Capcom said that any such access outside of sanctioned beta periods would be deemed a "violation of the Capcom Pro Tour code of conduct".
"It has come to our attention that some users have been accessing the Street Fighter 6 Closed Beta Test (CBT) software and playing the game outside of the designated period," the statement begins.
UPDATE 2/5/23: In the wake of strong criticism of the PC launch for Star Wars Jedi: Survivor, EA has revealed that patches are incoming for all versions of the game. Console patches are due imminently, while the PC version was updated yesterday. This is the start of a no-doubt long process to get the game into shape and the good news is that there is progress here. However, the bad news is that based on performance testing, little has been done to improve the stuttering issues that impact the game so heavily on PC.
Below, we've posted a quick video comparing CPU-limited performance from the village in Koboh, which we found to have profound stuttering issues in the launch code. In our testing with RT off (Respawns states that CPU optimisations apply with RT disabled), the general performance level improves by around 13 percent overall on a mainstream Ryzen 5 3600, paired with an RX 6800 XT. However, you will also note that the peaks and troughs in frame-rate occur in the same areas. More to the point, examining the frame-time graph shows that the stutter has the same intensity.
In some scenarios, this actually accentuates the stuttering effect - because the crash in performance is much the same as it was before, taking you to similar lows to the launch code, only in this case, the crash is coming from a higher average level of performance. It's good to see improvement to the PC code so quickly, but it's going to require time to get the game fully into shape.
The Sims franchise has been an incredible success since its release in the early 2000s and to this day there haven't been any real competitors. Despite The Sims being truly one of a kind, the life simulation genre is alive and well. In The Sims, you can create your own character (known as a "Sim"), build a home for your Sim, interact with other Sims, and live out the life you want-the possibilities are endless. Players orchestrate the mundane daily activities of their Sims and their success is dependent upon the players' decisions. While nothing can truly match the full Sims experience, here are just a few games we think you'll enjoy if you like The Sims.
It's also worth noting that you can play The Sims 4 for free, so if you're just looking for the latest Sims game, that's your best bet.
Dead Island 2’s development cycle is infamous at this point. Initially revealed in 2014, its journey has been almost as treacherous as a runner trying to make it along Venice Beach in the midst of a zombie outbreak. Two studios tried to put a sequel together but were met with little more than a gory disaster. But while those projects died, hope did not. And so, the reins were handed to the team at Dambuster Studios.
Over the course of nine years and three developers, the long-awaited zombie-killing sequel has kept running (or walking) on. And now, it is finally at the finish line. This is the Inside Story of how Dead Island 2 was brought back from the dead.
The Dead Island 2 we’re playing today is unapologetically pulpy - a straightforward homage to B-movie horror that builds on the tone established in the 2011 original. It’s both a love letter to the zombie genre and a bite back against the more human-centric stories that have dominated it more recently. Since the release of its predecessor, zombie games such as The Last of Us, The Walking Dead, and Days Gone have focussed more on the complexities of humanity in post-apocalyptic worlds than the simple pleasure of taking on the undead headfirst with a hatchet.
Despite respecting the stories that those games have to tell, the team at developer Dambuster Studios is much more interested in the latter. For them, there’s little more satisfying than the simple thrill of punching a zombie in the face and seeing your fist crunching through the back of its skull.
Since Slay the Spire, we’ve seen tons of roguelike deck-building games that involve collecting cards, heading into dungeons, and hopefully getting as far as possible or even winning. Arcana of Paradise: The Tower plays with that idea, but pulls back a bit in terms of difficulty and adds puzzle and simulation elements to try and stand apart. While it does succeed, it also means it might be a little too easy and predictable to make runs feel satisfying.
Arcana of Paradise: The Tower begins with a tower, and a handful of children live atop it. Paradise could be at the base of it! Maybe! Or at least it could be better than what lies around them, as things were left in ruin and they barely possess enough bread to keep from starving. However, eventually children will blossom into warriors. At this point, they can be sent as pairs down the tower to try and advance or get resources to rebuild their home at the top and get sustenance to survive. There’s not really too much of a story to things, and an awkward localization means children will make quips that can sometimes sound a bit out of place or awkward.
[caption id="attachment_961278" align="alignnone" width="1200"]
Screenshot via Siliconera[/caption]
Welcome to the latest edition of the Giant Bomb Community Spotlight! I, @zombiepie, am happy to be your host once again as we look back at the best community-created works from the previous week.
If you have been heeding my previous Spotlights, then you should know that this weekend marks the Giant Bomb Community Endurance Run, the community-run spring charity drive. For more details, just scroll down.
Before we get into the video issues, there's a bit of good news that comes from Jeff Grubb. Giant Bomb plans to ramp up its coverage of games in the form of Quick Looks in the near future. To help in that, you can expect to see fellow co-workers and friends of the site from Fandom Gaming and GameSpot take up prominent roles in those Quick Looks. This is going to help the site bring more of the same high-quality coverage you want to see. For example, Giant Bomb didn't get a Jedi Survivor code until after the review embargo, so they brought in Tom Caswell from GameSpot to help. Please, be kind and civil and do not be a jerk.
With the video player, there have been multiple tickets filed, the lead engineer has been notified, and the entire team has been working on the issue. They thought that they had fixed the issue, but it appears that does not appear to be the case. Feel free to file a comment in here. Continue to send in emails to support@giantbomb.com and keep dropping comments in the bug reporting threads. As Dylan put it, we want as much ammo to show that this is a priority.
Vampire Survivors, aka the best game of 2022, might be getting an animated television series. Developers Poncle have announced that they've partnered with Story Kitchen, a media company headed a Sonic movie co-producer and the creator of John Wick, to make it happen.
Star Wars Jedi: Survivor could have used "a little more time in the bacta tank." That was James' conclusion when he looked at its performance on PC.
EA now say that they're "aware that Star Wars Jedi: Survivor isn't performing to our standards for a percentage of our PC players, in particular those with high-end machines or or certain specific configurations." They're working on fixes.
Turning Attack On Titan's giant enemies and grapple-hooking sword combat into a video game seemed like a tall order (pun intended), and one that a budget Koei Tecmo treatment seemed doomed to fail. And yet. As I explained in my Attack On Titan: Wings Of Freedom review back in 2016, the game absolutely nailed the series' action.
As of this week, both it and its sequel are permanently cheaper.
Dungeons and Dragons (D&D) is what is known as a Tabletop Role-playing Game, or TTRPG. A collaborative storytelling and boardgame experience where various dice rolls help to decide how the game and story progress. With the recent release of Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves and now Baldur's Gate 3, more and more people are making their way to the role-playing game that started it all.
Currently in its 5th edition (D&D 5e), D&D has never been more approachable or understandable for new players and now is a perfect time to join the fun! Also see: the latest news about D&D Expansion yet to come.
D&D can be played with a minimum of 2 people, but often having 3-5 people is an ideal table size. At minimum, you'll need a Dungeon Master (DM), or Game Master in other TTRPGs, and one or more Players. That being said, there is really no limit to how large an adventuring party can be, so feel free to invite as many friends as you can fit in your house.
The DM will lead each game session, develop adventures, adjudicate the rules, and fill the worlds you adventure in with people, places, and things to interact with! The role of DM can be a daunting task at first, but for people that find themselves interested in building the framework of heroic stories, it's an unbelievably rewarding experience.
After someone passes Trailblaze Level 14 and finishes the Jarilo-VI Trailblaze Mission “Lying in Rust,” the Honkai: Star Rail “Old Foreman’s Treasure” Companion Mission for Hook unlocks. This is a fairly straightforward side quest. Players end up being tasked with helping her father, Fersman. However, like the Arlan Companion Quest, there’s a bit of an investigation involved. This means there’s a logic puzzle to help figure out who stole the vein detector in Honkai: Star Rail.
[gallery columns="1" size="full" ids="961309" link="file"]
After you help Fersman and get him to Natasha’s clinic to get patched up, the Trailblazer and Hook will head to the vagrant camp in the minds. There are four possible candidates who might have stolen the vein detector in Honkai: Star Rail, and this is a situation in which the person who is guilty in “Old Foreman’s Treasure” will lie and the others will tell the truth.
In a way, you don’t need to bother with the logic part of it. When talking to the four candidates, the cook is the one who will behave in the most suspicious manner. However, during interrogations, the cook will blame the helper, the helper will plead innocent, the merchant will blame the cook, and the tailor will plead innocent.
I've been playing Marvel Snap for months now, and there's a particular card that has been blowing my mind a bit. Agatha Harkness takes over your hand and plays your cards for you. She essentially turns the game into an auto-battler. And since I first encountered her, I've been trying to work out how she goes about all this, and why she's in the game in the first place. [Unsurprising spoiler: my theories were deeply incorrect.]
Rather than go online and Google the answers, I spoke to Ben Brode, the co-founder and chief development officer at Second Dinner, the creator of Marvel Snap, and the former game director of Hearthstone. Everything he told me was fascinating, so this is quite a long interview. And even if you already know how Agatha works, I do think it's worth reading what Brode has to say about the design and all the other points we touched upon.
Also: super quickly, Marvel Snap is that rare game that I think makes players feel a bit like game designers themselves. As players create decks and synergies, they're really starting to reprogram how they want the rules of the game to work for them. Speaking to Brode I was struck again and again by the sheer love for the minutiae of design that came through in everything he said.
The Super Mario Bros. Movie is expected to cross $1bn at the worldwide box office later today (Sunday, 30th April).
We already knew the Super Mario Bros. Movie was doing alright for itself, and that it's now officially the highest grossing film of 2023 so far and the biggest video game adaptation of all time, but if it does hit that milestone later today, it will only be the 10th animated movie to do so.
That's according to The Hollywood Reporter, which says the North American projected weekend gross for the movie is $37.5m for a domestic tally of $487.5 million through Sunday.
A Star Wars Jedi: Survivor player is warning others of a "major game-breaking bug" that can prevent progress.
If you pass a certain point early in the game – usually within the first two to three hours, although this depends upon how quickly you're trying to get through the story, of course – and die before you save, you risk respawning into a trapped location, effectively blocking your progress.
Like the OP, it's not possible to warn you of the issue without at least spoiling a couple of non-story things, so proceed with caution if you're anxious to play without any spoilers whatsoever.
Sundays are for cheersing the air with a beverage of your choice. Before you raise a glass to yourself, let's read this week's best writing about games (and game related things).
