- By Ash
- in News
In an announcement that came seemingly out of nowhere, the resurrected Argonaut Games studio have revealed that they are working on a remastered version of an ancient PlayStation platformer - Croc: Legend of the Gobbos! As you might expect, the new version will come with improved visuals, smoother controls, a variety of bonus features like concept art, and perhaps most importantly of all, a better camera.
What these improved visuals look like in action, however, that you can check out through the freshly posted trailer. Have a gander:
- By Ash
- in News
While the patch did get slightly overshadowed by Blizzard dropping a $90 mount onto the in-game store, World of Warcraft is currently celebrating its 20th anniversary. The definite highlight of the update is the refreshed version of Blackrock Depths. What once was the biggest and most elaborate dungeon in World of Warcraft has now been transformed into a nostalgic yet surprisingly challenging raid... as long as the scaling doesn't bug out anyway! The loot also isn't all that amazing so it's probably not something I'd recommend running all the time, but definitely give it a visit for nostalgia's sake as the city really is a sight to behold.
Speaking of nostalgia, the free update has also revamped the highly iconic Tier 2 sets. And if you're playing one of the classes that didn't exist back then, worry not as Blizzard hasn't forgotten about you. Instead of an updated version of an old set, you'll get a completely new set based on the same sort of design principles. And I have to say they do look pretty sweet, especially the monk one!
- By Ash
- in News
It would appear that Capcom is extremely confident about the upcoming Monster Hunter Wilds because they have just announced a free Open Beta that's going to be available on all platforms! PlayStation Plus subscribers will be getting a slight head start on October 29th, while PC, Xbox and other PlayStation players will be able to dive in on November 1st at 3am GMT. The whole playtest will last until November 4th, so everyone should have plenty of time to mull over whether Monster Hunter Wilds is their kind of game or not.
Speaking of which, the Open Beta will contain three 'parts'. The first is the complete character customization tool, with the important bit here being that you can bring over your finely tuned monstrosity creation to the full version of the game.
- By Ash
- in News
In what is quite possibly the biggest 'microtransaction' I've ever seen, Blizzard has just launched the brand new "Trader’s Gilded Brutosaur" mount onto the World of Warcraft store at a very humble $90 price tag! And what do you get for that much money? A giant dinosaur that offers you easy access to both the auction house and mailbox.
Funnily enough, this isn't the first time they've done this. Back in Battle for Azeroth Blizzard released a limited time 5,000,000 gold mount that only gave access to the auction house. There was no direct way to pay for it with cash either, though if you wanted to buy WoW Tokens and then convert them to gold, the mount would've taken you around $500.
- By Ash
- in News
Now that they've sorted out most of the major issues, it looks like the Helldivers 2 team is finally able to once again focus on releasing new content. And so, the next premium Warbond will be launching on October 31st with three new weapons, two unique armors, a new booster, as well as the usual assortment of cosmetics.
The first weapon in line is the SG-20 Halt: a pump-action shotgun that can switch between stun rounds and armor-piercing flechettes. It's longer-ranged counterpart is the heavy SMG 32 Reprimand which, as you might imagine, packs quite a punch though shoots a bit slower than the previous SMGs. The final weapon is the PLAS-15 sidearm. This plasma pistol can either be shot semi-auto style, or charged for a period of time in order to deliver a more powerful punch. By the looks of things this charged attack can stagger even heavy devastators, so it should be quite a nice backup if you like running lighter primaries.
- By Ash
- in News
[Update #2]: MTG Arena will be getting the entirety of competitive Pioneer on December 10th, 2024!
[Update]: All of Magic: The Gathering's future cross-over sets will be legal in every format.
If you've been playing Standard for the past couple of weeks you're probably well aware of just how omnipresent the Leyline of Resonance 'combo' decks are. They're fragile and fold to early removal, sure, but if you stumble for even a single turn it's very easy to find yourself getting hit for over 20 damage.
Much like Tibalt's Trickery from a few years back, Leyline of Resonance creates some very boring games where the player using it either wins or loses within a couple of turns - almost like deciding the match with a coinflip. Unsurprisingly, this very quickly put it on Wizards of the Coast's ban radar, though since the set had only just released at the time of the last announcement, they figured they'd give it a little bit more time to see if the meta can self-correct.
- By Ash
- in News
As you might guess from the name alone, the Steam Next Fest is week-long event celebrating upcoming games, with the focus generally being on unique and interesting indie games. Most importantly of all, many of the participating games have free demos available for the duration of the event, so if you're looking to get into a new genre or just try out a game you've been keeping an eye on for a while, this is the perfect time to do so.
On the other hand, if you're not sure where to even begin, allow me to share with you a couple of stand-outs from various genres that I found rather fascinating, even if some are a little bit unpolished at the moment. Here they are, in no particular order:
- By Ash
- in News
In an era where games are often either singleplayer or some sort of live service ordeal with thousands of players everywhere, Hazelight Studios stands as one of the last few bastions of true co-op focused gaming. And considering how both of the team's 'recent' games, A Way Out and It Takes Two, have ended up being nothing short of amazing, it's hard not to cheer for Hazelight.
Now that you know where I'm coming from, I hope you realize just how excited I am to announce that Hazelight will soon be revealing a brand new game! It's also not going to be a sequel to either of their previous games, but rather a brand new IP!
- By Ash
- in News
[Update #2]: All of Magic: The Gathering's future cross-over sets will be legal in every format.
[Update]: MTG Arena has banned the contentious Leyline of Resonance in best-of-one Standard!
As with all of the Alchemy mini-expansions, the freshly released Alchemy: Duskmourn has now arrived with 30 new cards to muck around with. The new cards not only slot in well with the horror, enchantment and manifest themes of the main set, but many of them also share creature types with Bloomburrow's critters which gives them a lot of flexibility.
Furthermore, I feel like this Alchemy set has been the most spot-on in terms of power level. Nothing really stands out as being particularly obnoxious to play against, and there's only one card I would consider somewhat mediocre, and that's a mythic! Everything else, from the creatures to the enchantments, I can easily see being played in some sort of deck. So whoever designed both these cards and Duskmourn itself, hats off as you did a great job!
- By Ash
- in News
[Update]: Helldivers 2's next Warbond is coming October 31st with a heavy SMG, plasma pistol and unflinching armor.
While the recent and rather chunky update fixed many of the problems that plagued Helldivers 2, there were simply far too many issues to knock out in one single patch. And so, Arrowhead have now released another big update aimed at not only improving weapons across the board, but also giving fan-favorite toys a couple of new functionalities!
As such, both the Autocannon and the Recoilless Rifle have now received programmable ammo! The Autocannon can switch to flak which gives it the ability to carpet bomb a large area and clear out any low-tier enemies, while the Recoilless Rifle can swap out its bombastic rockets for a variant with lower damage, but a far bigger area of effect. Unsurprisingly, this tweak has made the already versatile Autocannon an even safer and more consistent choice regardless of what sort of enemies you might face.