- By Ash
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In order to give everyone a fair chance and prevent a mad dash for the end-game, Blizzard has locked away most of the competitive features for the first few weeks of the Battle for Azeroth expansion. As you might expect from the title alone, those locks have now finally been broken, meaning that the Uldir raid, numerous Mythic Keystone dungeons, first PvP season and Warfronts are all now fully available.
The only features still being held back are the substantially easier Raid Finder versions of the various Uldir bosses, as well as the ultra-competitive Mythic raid difficulty. The first wing of the Raid Finder will be released alongside Mythic difficulty on September 11th, with each following week unlocking a new wing filled with bosses for Raid Finder players to tackle. A little bit too slow in my eyes, but I suppose Blizzard doesn't want 'standard' raiders feeling like they're forced to do Raid Finder content over and over again in an effort to gear up their characters.
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If you're curious about what exactly The Division has to offer, and you've somehow managed to miss the numerous free weekends so far, then consider this your lucky day. From 10am PST (7pm CEST) on September 6th until September 9th The Division will be entirely free to play on PC.
Simply head on over to the official website to learn more about the free weekend, as well as begin pre-loading so you can start the moment the gates open. The only catch, as you might expect, is that you will need to download Ubisoft's Uplay in order to explore the ruins of New York. A slight annoyance, but I wouldn't say it's much of a deal-breaker.
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As expected, Battlerite Royale will be taking Battlerite's skillshot-based gameplay away from the cramped arenas and into the wide open world filled with unique abilities to acquire, players to ambush, and naturally, loot to steal. Originally Battlerite Royale was going to be a game mode within Battlerite itself, but according to a recent update its scope has expanded so much it's now going to be its very own (and paid) game.
So if you're a fan of Battlerite and you're intrigued by the concept, you might be interested to hear that Battlerite Royale will be heading to Steam Early Access this September 26th at a €20/$20 price tag. Here's a brief teaser trailer showing off what to expect:
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After the massive success of their previous league and its endlessly replayable temples, Path of Exile developers Grinding Gear Games have now introduced a similar concept with the latest Delve League - the Azurite Mine infinite dungeon. As the name itself would imply, the infinite dungeon allows you to wonder through a variety of caves in search of loot, currency and glorious combat, as well as resources with which you can upgrade your trusty Crawler machine so you can be even more efficient in your dungeon-crawling.
If you're wondering what exactly that looks like in-game, as well as what else this Delve League has to offer, allow me to share the recently posted trailer. It's a fairly lengthy video, so if you're confused about how the Azurite Mine works, I would definitely recommend you check it out. Have a look:
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With the extremely short post-season break now well and truly over, Overwatch's 12th competitive season has now officially begun. While this new season will most likely feel quite similar to the previous one, mostly because all of the major balance changes and bug fixes are still on the PTR, there is an important change you need to be aware of - the Avoid as Teammate slots have been increased from two to three.
It's not exactly a massive improvement to the ranked experience, but it should still go a long way towards making your games just a bit more pleasant, especially if you're at the higher or lower ends of the ladder as there are less players around. That said, it sure would be nice if Blizzard also made it so avoiding a new player would remove the oldest one from your list, just to help streamline the whole process.
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Divinity: Original Sin 2 has now made its way to both PlayStation 4 and Xbox One alongside a whole bunch of improvements and bug fixes, all of which have also been added to the PC version for free! You can expect to see a much better tutorial, a new difficulty setting, a whole bunch of new dialogue and voice acting, an improved journal to help keep track of quests, changes to the Act 3 storyline, and most adorably of all, a new mini-companion in the shape of a squirrel knight riding a skeletal cat!
I would love to go into more detail, but if I tried we'd probably be stuck here for the next couple of days, so instead I will recommend you head on over to the official patch notes. There is quite literally 50 pages of text to go through, so if you're planning on reading it all, you might want to brew up some coffee beforehand. This Definitive Edition patch really is that massive!
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If you're a fan of Left 4 Dead styled games, or just heavily co-op focused games in general, you might want to try Warhammer: Vermintide 2 as it's currently having a free weekend. Simply head on over to Steam, click on that giant green button, and you'll be able to hack and slash your way through hordes of ratmen and fanatics until Monday, September 3rd.
For those of you on the fence, I would highly recommend giving Vermintide 2 a chance. It might have some annoying bugs and the very first DLC has been a bit controversial, but it's still one of the best co-op games I've ever played as there are very few things more enjoyable than standing shoulder-to-shoulder with your friends and cleaving through hundreds of filthy ratmen. So if you have even a bit of interest in the concept, do make sure to at least give it a try while it's still free.
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After the success of Battlefleet Gothic: Armada the developers were left with a rather tricky question: which of the numerous factions to include in the sequel? Well, it would appear that the answer is "all of them" as Battlefleet Gothic: Armada 2 is set to bring all 12 playable factions from the tabletop, as well as three distinct, narrative-driven campaigns!
If you're wondering what exactly these factions are, as well as what sort of ridiculous ships they like to do all of their fighting in, wonder no more as Focus Home Interactive have now posted a decently lengthy faction trailer. Have a look:
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While Reinhardt is in a pretty good place right now, the poor guy's abilities are so buggy that it's almost guaranteed you'll lose at least one fight per session because of some bizarre interaction. As such, I am delighted to announce that the latest Overwatch PTR update has corrected many of his bugs, most notably the ones related to charge and earthshatter.
The update has also corrected the most recent bug that caused Roadhog's hook to randomly break, an issue that prevented Widowmaker's grappling hook from attaching to certain ledges, and perhaps most importantly of all, the bug that resulted in Wrecking Ball doing the same area-of-effect damage to all targets regardless of distance. The patch notes are fairly small, so if you're interested, here are all of the details:
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If you're a fan of the Warhammer 40k universe, or if you just love ridiculously over-the-top action, you might want to give Warhmmer 40k: Space Marine a try as it's entirely free to grab for the next ~25 hours. Simply head on over to the Humble Bundle website, sign up for the newsletter, and you'll be able to blast Orks and Chaos fanatics at any time you want.
As for whether Space Marine is actually worth the trouble, I would say the answer is a bit of a cautious yes. It's not the most complex or lengthy game around, and the last time I played the multiplayer scene was fairly dead, but all of that pales in comparison to the sheer amount of carnage you can wreak with a chainsword and a jetpack! So if you're up for an action game where you can turn off your brain and enjoy the spectacle, Space Marine is likely to be right up your alley.