Total War: Arena will be closing down its doors on February 22nd
- By Ash
- in News
Total War: Arena is a multiplayer, free-to-play spin-off of the classic Total War series where players control only a couple of elite units each, and then through teamwork and strategy attempt to overpower the opposing team. An interesting concept to be sure, but for me it just never really scratched that Total War itch like some of the mainline games did.
Unfortunately for Total War: Arena, it would appear that this sentiment was quite common given that the developers have now announced that the Open Beta simply didn't meet their expectations, and as such they will be closing down its doors for good. Total War: Arena will be available until February 22nd, however, so if you ever wanted to give it a try or just play it to until you can see its loading screens in your sleep, you still have plenty of time.
After nearly 5 years in development, DayZ has now finally entered Beta
- By Ash
- in News
[Update]: DayZ 1.0 will be officially released this December 13th!
Back when dinosaurs roamed the land and zombie games were as numerous as the undead hordes themselves, the highly ambitious and immensely popular mod DayZ launched in Early Access as a standalone game. It was buggy, bare-bones and the zombies had a tendency to run straight through walls, but it was also the long-awaited followup to the original mod, so many players were more than eager to forgive its problems.
Five years have passed since then, and though many of the same problems still remain, DayZ has now at long last transitioned from alpha to beta alongside a major update! The engine and network performance have been improved, base building has been introduced along with better AI for zombies and animals, the map has been reworked in order to be more interesting to explore, and the list goes on.
Vermintide 2's biggest update yet has improved nearly all aspects of gameplay
- By Ash
- in News
After around a month of rigorous testing, Vermintide 2's "Big Balance Beta" update has now made its way to the live servers as Patch 1.3. As the title would suggest, Patch 1.3 has tweaked and improved pretty much all aspects of Vermintide 2's gameplay - everything from weapon balance to enemy behavior.
More specifically: enemies will no longer slide around while attacking or attempt to do instant 180° turns, all temporary health talents have been reworked in order to reward more aggressive playstyles, all bottom-tier weapons have received numerous improvements and are now actually fun to use, the power difference between melee and ranged weapons has finally been equalized, and the list goes on for quite a while.
Valve appears to have now discontinued the Steam Link hardware
- By Ash
- in News
Valve's Steam Link hardware recently went on a gigantic sale, and as expected, pretty much all units were sold out within a couple of hours. If you've managed to miss the gold rush and are looking to pick one up once they finally restock, I'm afraid I have some bad news - Valve appears to have discontinued the production of Steam Link hardware in favor of the Steam Link App.
"The supply of physical Steam Link hardware devices is sold out," reads the brief update. "Moving forward, Valve intends to continue supporting the existing Steam Link hardware as well as distribution of the software versions of Steam Link, available for many leading smart phones, tablets and televisions."
Overwatch is entirely free to play on both PC and consoles until November 26th
- By Ash
- in News
As previously announced, Overwatch's extended free trial period has now begun. So if you're up for some team-based shooty action, head on over to the official website and you'll be able to experience everything Overwatch has to offer on both PC and consoles until November 26th.
You'll have access to the full roster of 29 heroes (including the newly released and rather fun Ashe), all 19 maps spanning the various game modes, all currently available cosmetics, and naturally, the numerous official and unofficial custom games that reside in the Arcade. The only thing you won't be able to access is the competitive mode, though that's not exactly something you'd want to jump into with only a couple of hours of playtime anyway.
Total War: Warhammer 2 has now finally made its way to both Linux and Mac
- By Ash
- in News
After what feels like an eternity from its original launch, the absolutely gigantic strategy game Total War: Warhammer 2 has now made its way to Mac and Linux as well. Much like its predecessor, the port was not handled by Creative Assembly themselves, but rather by Feral Interactive. You might know them from their work on the Mac and Linux versions of XCOM 2, Mad Max, Tomb Raider, Dawn of War 3, and quite a few other games.
For those of you curious about what exactly Total War: Warhammer 2 is all about, allow me to share with you one of the original trailers discussing just that. Have a gander, it's well worth the two minutes:
Steam's Autumn Sale and the Steam Awards nominations have now arrived
- By Ash
- in News
If you currently have some free time and a bit of extra money, and you feel like it's a good idea to get rid of both, you might be interested to hear that the Steam Autumn Sale has now arrived! Much like the past few sales there's no special gimmick that requires you to come back every few hours, so if you see a game you're particularly interested in, you can just grab it without worrying about it going on a deeper discount within the next few days.
Since Steam is a pretty big platform and choosing games can be a rather daunting process, allow me to share some of my favorites from the past year or two. Here they are, in no particular order: