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[Update]: Helldivers 2's first balance update has now landed, and it's unfortunately a very messy one. Thankfully, at least the mechs are great!
If you were eagerly waiting for the mechs to arrive ever since they were teased in that one pre-launch trailer, I'm happy to say I bring good news! According to a brief Tweet, the EXO-45 Patriot Exosuits will soon be heading to a battlefield near you!
I'd love to tell you more, but I'm afraid the details are currently nonexistent. That said, Arrowhead have previously revealed that they will be releasing a major update on the second Thursday of each month, so there's a pretty good chance the EXO-45 will be launching on March 14th. This is obviously just speculation, however, so don't get too attached to that day just yet.
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[Update]: MTG Arena's next set Outlaws of Thunder Junction is coming April 16th alongside 3 batches of bonus cards.
Once it arrives this March 5th, MTG Arena's Alchemy: Karlov Manor mini-expansion will bring with it 30 new cards to toy around with. Much like the previous sets, these will help beef up some of the currently underplayed deck concepts, add a couple of goofy cards to brew with, as well as introduce a brand new mechanic to explore - Incorporate.
"A card that incorporates adds an additional mandatory mana cost to another card, and that second card gains additional attributes/text. Incorporate perpetually adds an additional casting cost to that card, adding any new colors from that cost, and adds abilities/text to that card for the rest of the game."
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After toying around with Lara Croft and Final Fantasy VII crossovers, among others, PowerWash Simulator has now decided to give the grim darkness of the Warhammer 40k universe a good scrubbing. And so, dressed up as a lowly member of the Adeptus Mechanicus, the new DLC will task you with cleaning a variety of heavy machinery like the Land Raider, Dreadnaught or Imperial Knight.
What all of this nonsense looks like in action, as well as just how nasty the vehicles start off as, that you can check out through the trailer below. Have a gander:
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After exactly a year of updates that have fleshed out everything from the gameplay mechanics to the world and story, Sons Of The Forest has now been released from Early Access. Personally I think that may have been a bit premature as there's still parts of the game that feel underbaked, but that's a fairly minor nitpick as the basic gameplay loop of exploring, fighting and base-building is very satisfying.
As for what exactly all of this looks like in action, as well as what sort of style and atmosphere Sons of the Forest has gone for, that you can check out through the launch trailer below. Have a gander:
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[Update]: Overwatch 2's Season 10 will introduce Venture, unlock all Heroes, and make Mythic skins more accessible.
After struggling with balancing the heroes and roles for quite a while now, Blizzard has decided to undertake some drastic measures in Season 9. As such, not only has Competitive Play been made more transparent and... well, competitive, but the actual core design principles behind the various heroes have also been tweaked.
First and foremost, hero health has been increased by around 15-25% in an effort to prevent fights from devolving into who can one-shot who first. Then, in order to prevent healers from becoming too dominant with the increased health pools, Damage heroes have swapped their reload speed passive for one that reduces enemy healing by 20% for 2 seconds upon hitting an enemy.
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[Update #2]: MTG Arena's next set Outlaws of Thunder Junction is coming April 16th alongside 3 batches of bonus cards.
[Update]: All of MTG Arena's upcoming Alchemy: Karlov Manor mini-set has now been revealed.
In order to help tide everyone over until Outlaws of Thunder Junction arrives this April, MTG Arena will soon be releasing the Alchemy: Murders at Karlov Manor expansion. Once it arrives on March 5th, the 30-card mini-set will help beef up some of the currently underplayed archetypes, introduce at least one new mechanic to toy around with, and more likely than not, add a some goofy new cards for Brawl players to smash each other over the head with.
Speaking of the new mechanics, the only one confirmed thus far is called Incorporate. Long story short, it's a way to grant cards additional stats and effects, while simultaneously increasing their mana cost. Sort of like stapling on a mandatory Kicker effect. Rather than babble on, allow me to share with you an example of Incorporate in action, as well as the full description of the mechanic straight from the MTG Arena team:
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[Update]: Following numerous complaints, Total War: Warhammer 3 is changing its DLC pricing and size.
To say that Creative Assembly messed up with Total War: Warhammer 3's Shadows of Change DLC would be quite the understatement. The price tag was significantly higher than any similar DLC, the amount and quality of content on offer was rather low, and to make matters even worse, the accompanying free update was completely anemic. As such, the DLC quickly found itself a 'mostly negative' rating on Steam, and rightly so.
Usually that would be the end of the story, but thankfully Creative Assembly has decided to eat their humble pie and make amends. In order to do so, they have now unleashed Patch 4.2 which, among other things, brings with it a whole bunch of new additions to the maligned DLC - all free of charge!
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[Update]: Dota 2's Patch 7.35d has reworked hero bans and brought in yet more balance changes.
The Dota 2 team is currently working on a massive update called Crownfall, which will more likely than not include the Ringmaster hero teased back in 2023. So in order to help tide everyone over until the update finally arrives, Valve has now unleashed the rather humble Patch 7.35c.
As you would expect, Patch 7.35c is mostly focused on nerfing the overly strong heroes that have been plaguing the game for the past few months. Nature's Prophet now does less damage, Meepo isn't nearly as tanky, Lion's mana drain has finally been toned down, Faceless Void is a little bit weaker across the board, while the smurf-favorite Arc Warden is now easier to take down in the early game.
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[Update #2]: Helldivers 2 will soon be getting the EXO-45 Patriot Exosuits teased all the way back at launch.
[Update]: My 70+ hour review of Helldivers 2 is now out, and I'm delighted to say that the game is phenomenal!
Despite being a huge fan of the original, I must admit I was somewhat worried about Helldivers 2 during the lead up to its release. For the longest time the only bits of gameplay we were allowed to see were short, highly edited snippets - usually a telltale sign that a game that just can't hold your attention on its own merits.
However, I'm pleased to say that my worries were completely unfounded! Playing Helldivers 2 for the past couple of days has been a blast, even with the server issues making co-op occasionally annoying. I especially have to commend the audio-visual design as using explosive weaponry in Helldivers 2 is absurdly satisfying, and doubly so when you get some of the bigger toys to play around with. The sound effects, the fireball and dust the explosion causes, the enemies ragdolling into the sunset - it's basically perfect!
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After a seemingly messy development and plenty of delays, Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League has now finally been unleashed. And you know what? Despite the endless red flags and blaring warning signs, it's thankfully not a disaster!
It's not particularly great either, don't get me wrong, but it's got a decent bit of charm to it. I especially have to commend the combat as it feels exciting and has a good flow regardless of what character or build I tried messing around with. Things do start to get repetitive after a while, which is a bit of a problem for a looter shooter, but since the core gameplay is fun that can eventually be fixed.