Rock, Paper, Shotgun

Warner Bros. free to play licensed brawler MultiVersus is testing its ranked mode for a week starting today, devs Player First Games have announced. Hop into the game from 5pm GMT/6pm CET/9am PT today and you’ll find the ranked tab is accessible for the first time. Select that and you should be good to go with ranked play. Player First say they’ll be enabling ranked mode permanently once they’ve implemented any useful feedback from the alpha.

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It turns out a week is a long time, where the best early Black Friday deals on desktop gaming PCs are concerned. Most of the prebuilt rig offers on the US side have mysteriously (read: annoyingly) vanished, so I’ve found some newer replacements of similar value. You can find all of these below, along with the current crop of desktop deals in the UK.

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World-straddling behemoth of a guessing game Wordle has welcomed its own overlord this week in the form of an editor. The New York Times have announced that Tracy Bennett is now in charge of curating the word list for the puzzle game, which was acquired by the newspaper back in January. Wordle will be programmed and tested just like the NYT’s Spelling Bee and Crossword.

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Get your chainsaw guns, body armour and chin-fluff at the ready, because the unstoppable assault of Netflix video game adaptations has found a new target. The Coalition’s Gears Of War series of beefy blastermen fending off equally beefy aliens is coming to the red streaming service at some indefinite point in the future, it’s been revealed. Netflix say they’re working together with The Coalition on producing both the movie and animation.

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Activision have not-so-clarified that next year’s annual Call Of Duty release will be a “full premium” one. The shotgun blast of marketing speak erupted from the company’s third quarter earnings results for the year, setting off car alarms, shattering glass, and triggering journalists’ Google Alerts. You can interpret “full premium release” to mean an actual game that costs $70, or an expansion packaged and sold during the ritually observed Call Of Duty release window. I choose to sit on the fence for the next 12 months, carefully raising one eyebrow so I don’t topple over.

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How To Say Goodbye starts with someone dying. It’s not shocking or distressing; quite the opposite. The person died in a hospital bed surrounded by their closest friends and family, and after they've passed on the group begins to share stories and memories from when they were alive. Death isn’t always this calm and it isn’t always this peaceful, but on rare occasions it can be.

This is how developers Florian Veltman and Baptiste Portefaix have approached death in How To Say Goodbye, a cosy game that explores the topic with kindness and sensitivity. With its paper doll illustrations and pastel colour palette, it kinda feels like a children's pop-up book that teaches kids about grief. It’s not overly sweet or patronising, just a gentle game about a group of ghosts who discover how to mourn, how to accept their own death, and how to move on.

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If you’re a Mass Effect aficionado then you’d definitely have been aware that yesterday was the annual N7 Day celebration of the series. You probably also noticed that BioWare shared some concept art of an in-construction mass relay from the next Mass Effect game, along with a snippet of jumbled audio for people to download. Enterprising Shepard stans set to work cleaning up the noise to see if anything meaningful was held within and, lo and behold, there was a short message from everyone’s favourite asari scientist Liara T’Soni.

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Ebay's TAKEIT10 code offers a 10% discount on a wide range of PC components and peripherals, but I was tickled by this deal on an Integral 480GB SSD, which brings this sizeable drive down to just £24.

That's a solid £5 below the price of the same drive on Amazon, and well into bargain buy territory for anyone that wants to cheaply and easily add more storage to their desktop or laptop. If you have any old laptops that are still running on hard drives, for example, then this could be an awesome low-cost upgrade!

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If you're a streamer or a macro fiend, you've probably have heard of Elgato's Stream Deck. This little gadget has a simple premise: fifteen customisable keys, each with a little LCD screen behind it, that can be bound to accomplish a wide range of things from scene switching in OBS and monitoring your computer's vitals to launching programs or muting your microphone. Normally the Stream Deck costs £150, but today it's down to £90 at Amazon UK.

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Compared to many of the latest FPS offerings out there, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive is a fossil. It's such a simplistic looking game, right? A bit bland and archaic, lacking that colour and pop that the likes of Apex Legends and Valorant possess. But to pass it off as dull and basic is to do the game a disservice, as it's more refined than basically any of its competitors.

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I, like many people I know these days, will only watch a YouTube video if it's either less than 5 minutes or more than an hour long. YouTube evolved a while ago into a platform for long-form video essays, and I for one am happy about it. Even better: Jenny Nicholson just released an almost four hour video on an uncompleted attraction in Utah called Evermore. Evermore is a sort of theme park-slash-immersive-theatre that appears to have been beset both by uncontrollable world events and bad management, but I still want to go because it looks pretty fun(ny).

I did think about what games I would like to become immersive experience theme parks in this kind of vein, though, and I gotta say... I'm coming up empty.

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On this week's episode of the Ultimate Audio Bang, we give our verdict on Modern Warfare 2 and its grab bag of a campaign.

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Fantasy roguelike Dead Cells is being invaded by indies again. Weapons and outfits from six games are making their way into the game with today's free Everone Is Here 2 update: Terraria, Hotline Miami, Shovel Knight, Slay The Spire, Risk Of Rain 2, and Katana Zero. There’s also new lore rooms based on locations from these games, which is where you’ll find the weapons stored. You can watch some of the costumes and weapons in action in the trailer below.

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Ever fancied becoming the bad guy? Well, a new Stranger Things VR game that mixes psychological horror with action is coming from creative studio Tender Claws in 2023, and it casts you as telekinetic monstrosity Vecna. The game’s been commissioned by Netflix, with the series writers involved in creating it. I’m not sure exactly how involved they are, but the trailer is suitably Stranger Things enough that it’s not that big a deal if they just looked at it and went “Yes, fine.” You can watch it for yourself below.

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Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 2's multiplayer - not including Warzone 2.0 - brings out the best of COD's excellent gunplay on an array of colourful maps that largely deliver. And it tones down the pace of movement too, making for a measured experience that certainly rewards speed, but doesn't make it an athletics competition.

And while the game's multiplayer is a slick refinement of what's come before, its gun unlock process is messy and excessive, even if it offers plenty of options for all types of player. Oh, and make sure you've got the game installed on an SSD...

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Black Friday can always be relied upon to take the pain out of a new keyboard purchase. I’ve only been keeping track in a very general sense but it does feel like non-sale prices, especially on mechanical keyboards, have been creeping upwards. If you are in the market, you could thefore find, say, a list of the best early Black Friday gaming keyboard deals very useful indeed. Hey, here's one.

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I don’t know about you, but a hectic working and family schedule means my time for games is way more limited than it used to be. That’s why I’m intrigued by Chop Goblins, a “microshooter” from Dusk and Gloomwood developer David Szymanski that’s coming to Steam on January 2nd, 2023. Szymanski says Chop Goblins’ campaign can be finished within a single sitting of around 30 minutes. Appropriately enough, it’s all about time travel.

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There’s a war going on between instalments in the Battlefield series, and it looks like Battlefield 1 is coming out on top for now. The World War One FPS has been spotted nestled in Steam’s top ten best-selling games rankings (thanks, Emopulse), although it's since slipped out again. Battlefield 1’s also set a record over the weekend for its all-time highest concurrent player numbers, reaching more than 50,000 players in the past 24 hours. I say, tip top.

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Every weekend, indie devs show off current work on Twitter's #screenshotsaturday tag. And every Monday, I bring you a selection of these snaps and clips. This week, my eye has been caught by tactical mecha action, a spinny shotgun, and honestly a good number of games and things which I don't entirely understand—a mood I'm always here for. Check 'em out!

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Fresh hell could arrive in April 2023 in the form of a Diablo 4 launch, if new rumours are accurate. Windows Central and the XboxEra podcast both say they’ve heard the release window from sources. That’s not all, as details of the fantasy action RPG’s release could be announced on December 8th at The Game Awards, according to both sets of sources. These include pre-orders opening during the show, and a February 2023 open beta.

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It’s nearly the end of the year, a time when many a person's thoughts turn to the birth of Jesus Christ (along with whether or not they’re getting FIFA 23 on Christmas morning). Forget about other games for the moment though, because one developer’s bringing The Bible itself to Steam. The appropriately named Bible Games are releasing a fully voiced version of the good book on November 14th, complete with trivia quizzes to check your biblical knowledge. You can watch the surprisingly dramatic trailer below.

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Sundays are for leaving your controller on a hard surface while you pop out to do something quickly, but then it vibrates and makes a horrible, terrifying noise. Before you rush back, let's read this week's best writing about games (and game related things).

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Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective was released for Nintendo DS in 2010. It was a linear detective game written and directed by Shu Takumi, the creator of the the Phoenix Wright series, and it has you solving puzzles - and avoiding murders - by possessing objects and corpses.

It's just been rated for a PC release in Korea.

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In a sprawling interview with IGN, Final Fantasy XVI producer Naoki Yoshida addressed the lack of apparent racial diversity in the game's trailers. "This is a difficult question, but not one that was unexpected," said Yoshida, before standing immediately upon every rake in front of him.

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Warren Spector has been talking about his studio's next game, Argos: Riders On The Storm. In the broadest possible terms, at least. In a brief interview with IGN, Spector says that Argos is multiplayer and "the next step in immersive sims."

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Overwatch 2's next hero was introduced during last night's Overwatch League Grand Finals, as planned. It's Ramattra, an Omnic war machine and Tank class hero who can shift between two different styles of fighting. There's an origin trailer and more details below.

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If we're to have some sort of National Video Game Day in the UK—and I assume industry bodies will one day attempt to make it happen—we should have it on November 5th to run alongside Bonfire Night. Explosions, colours, people going "ooh" and "ahh", teenagers running amok and threatening people, some sort of message that's broadly ignored or forgotten... it's a perfect match. But which video games are you playing to go with the outside explosions? Here's what we're clicking on!

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It's been almost exactly ten years since Little Inferno released and now it's getting an expansion. Little Inferno: Ho Ho Holiday is a Christmas-themed DLC which adds a new story and 20 new items to throw in your fireplace. It will launch on November 18th, but there's a reveal trailer below.

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The Sims 4 is getting two new pieces of DLC next week on November 10th. The Pastel Pop Kit includes colourful '60s-inspired home decor, while the Everyday Clutter Kit will let you pepper your Sims house with the kind of junk that litters your real one.

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I can't remember now if it was Monster Prom or Dream Daddy that introduced me to the dating sim genre, but Monster Prom was definitely my first dating sim hybrid, a sub-genre I'm now more than a bit obsessed with. Other favourite examples of mine include last year's Boyfriend Dungeon (a dating sim and dungeon crawler), Max Gentlemen: Sexy Business (a dating and business sim), and HuniePop (a dating sim and match-3 puzzle game). Monster Prom is a dating sim and competitive multiplayer party game, where up to four players vie to romance attractive monsters and invite them to the school dance.

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Harvestella, Square Enix's swing at the farm 'em up, is out now. It bundles crop management together with monsters to biff in a fantasy world where a new season called Quietus is muscling in like an extra mean version of winter. You'll find a launch trailer below.

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Blood Bowl 3 had originally intended to touchdown sometime in 2021, then slipped into 2022. Its release date has now been announced and it's a little later, still. The turn-based death sport will return on February 23rd, 2023. There's a brief release date trailer below.

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The coming release of Dwarf Fortress But For Humans may be making many colony/management sim devs nervous, but Stardeus ought to find some room for itself anyway.

RimWorld is the more direct influence, really. Instead of a planet's surface, your little blobby torso people are stuck on a spaceship, which you need to rebuild around them using a fleet of robots as they gradually wake up from stasis. If you know the genre well, it will be reminiscent of several games, but its balance of survival, management, and creative building makes for a refreshingly forgiving experience at the current default settings.

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Horror series The Dark Pictures Anthology is drawing its first season to a close with the arrival of supernaturally bereft slasher The Devil In Me on November 18th, and a new trailer lets us meet all the cheerful faces we’ll undoubtedly see brutally murdered at some point. Handily, it’s made me realise that Paul Kaye – known for his Game Of Thrones role as resurrectionist Thoros of Myr, and for being mortally annoying as Dennis Pennis in the Nineties – is playing shock doc director Charlie. Kaye’s nonchalant accent seems like a great fit, as you’ll see in the trailer below.

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Players of 343 Industries’ futuristic open-world shooter Halo Infinite will be able to bask in the glow of ray traced graphics when the game’s season 3 arrives next year. The inclusion was announced at AMD’s recent, horrifically named AMD Presents:together we advance_gaming livestream, where the company showed off their latest Radeon RX graphics cards. Season 3 of Halo Infinite is expected to launch on March 7th, 2023.

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It's been an interesting exercise playing Triangle Strategy and Tactics Ogre: Reborn in quick succession lately. I've now played both Square Enix strategy RPGs for around six hours apiece now - starting with Tactics Ogre for my preview the other week, and following it up with a Triangle-shaped chaser. I didn't have any history with either game before now, but it's become increasingly apparent that they're effectively cut from the same tile-based cloth. And I mean, exactly the same. They're so similar, in fact, that it's kinda hilarious Square are releasing them so close together on PC, with Tactics Ogre's release on November 11th following little more than a month after Triangle Strategy.

At the same time, though, their approach to story-telling couldn't be more different, and comparing and contrasting them like this one after the other has been both fun and enlightening. Triangle Strategy, for example, is about 80% cutscene, 20% fighting for its first six hours, while Tactics Ogre is pretty much the opposite. And yet… I think I sort of prefer Triangle Strategy? Let me explain.

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When Team Ninja's Soulslike action-RPG Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty was announced not long ago, I thought: "Wow, that looks like my sort of jam". A PS5 demo came out and I only got to spend all of five minutes with it before life got in the way. I never got to truly taste the jam, which was quite sad. So, colour me very excited when I got to spend a good couple of hours battling through two short hands-on demos. I got battered by a big pig, prickled to death by a massive porcupine, and aggressively mauled by a large tiger. And I'd say I had a whale of a time. There was no killer whale in the demo, but I wouldn't count it out for the full release.

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There’s not long to wait until we find out who the next hero coming to Overwatch 2 will be, as Blizzard have revealed they’ll be announcing the character during the Overwatch League Grand Finals. They’re due to air tonight, November 4th, in the US, and in the early hours of tomorrow morning for people on the other side of the Atlantic. That leaves enough time to place your bets on who it’ll turn out to be.

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We finally have AMD’s answer to the Nvida RTX 40 series: the Radeon RX 7900 XT and Radeon RX 7900 XTX, the red team’s first graphics cards build on the RDNA 3 architecture. These are both high-end GPUs, set to cost $899 and $999 respectively when they release on December 13th, but you’ll note those prices are oodles cheaper than the £1269 / $1199 RTX 4080 and the £1679 / $1599 RTX 4090.

They’re also structurally distinct from the current Radeon RX 6000 cards to an extent that, frankly, is quite surprising to see from AMD GPUs. RDNA 3 uses a Ryzen CPU-inspired chiplet design, where the GPU is split up into different sections, and the new media engine is engineered for the 4K gaming monitors of the future as much as it is for current PC hardware.

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Devs Fatshark are making their co-op fantasy action game Warhamer: Vermintide 2 permanently free to keep if you grab it on Steam by November 7th. The freebie is part of a month-long 7 Years Of ‘Tide celebration marking the release of the original Vermintide, and finishing up with the launch of Fatshark’s Warhammer 40,000: Darktide on November 30th. There’s also a free update coming to Vermintide 2, Trail Of Treachery, on November 8th. You can watch the trailer for that below.

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