Author: Harvey Randall
-
‘Everyone and their mum’ is playing Hades 2, which is exactly why The Rogue Prince of Persia is delayed
Hades 2 burst forth from the bloody river Styx into a ‘surprise’ early access last week, immediately throwing its weight around with over 100,000 concurrent players and—as you might’ve noticed—causing several indie developers to go on red alert. One such developer is Evil Empire, the offspring of Dead Cells creator Motion Twin, which is currently…
-
President of Xbox asked about the closure of Hi-Fi Rush developer Tango Gameworks, spends close to a minute saying almost nothing
The recent closures of Arkane Austin (Dishonoured, Prey) and Tango Gameworks (Hi-Fi Rush) have sent ripples throughout the gaming industry. Arkane has a beloved library of games, but recently flubbed on Redfall—while Tango seems unceremoniously shuttered after the comparative success of its most recent title. Microsoft’s messaging on exactly why Tango Gameworks was shut down…
-
Arrowhead CEO says Helldivers 2 was going to have helmets with bespoke HUD elements like enemy outlines—but they were cut due to ‘well, having to ship the game’
Johan Pilestedt, the CEO of Arrowhead Games, made a visit to the Helldivers 2’s Discord recently. He answered a deluge of questions before needing to “do [his] part as a husband and watch ‘The Boys’”, though one answer in particular leapt out at me—turns out, helmets were originally meant to actually do something. As you…
-
Redfall’s devs were reportedly building out its massively delayed Hero Pass content ‘very recently’—before Microsoft closed Arkane Austin for good
In case you missed the news, yesterday Microsoft’s Xbox division announced the closure of four studios—which included Arkane Austin (Prey, Dishonoured) as well as Tango Gameworks (Tokyo: Ghostwire, Hi-Fi Rush). The news came as a shock to an industry still reeling from thousands of layoffs in 2023 and 2024, seen as a cynical move that…
-
Microsoft announces 4 studio closures—including Arkane Austin and Tango Gameworks, creators of Prey and Hi-Fi Rush respectively
Microsoft’s Xbox division has announced a rash of studio closures as part of an effort to prioritise “high-impact titles” according to multiple sources, including IGN and Bloomberg. Included in the four announced studio closures are Arkane Austin, Tango Gameworks, Alpha Dog Games, and Roundhouse Games. Arkane as a whole has been responsible for several excellent…
-
Despite not having mod support, Manor Lords player adds Shrek to the delight of its developer: ‘You can’t deny the potential’
Manor Lords is doing pretty dang well, huh? It crushed it on concurrents to the tune of 100,000 medieval landowners in its first day alone, thanks to being a surprisingly stable early access city builder with a lot going for it. Except for mods, that is. See, Manor Lords doesn’t have official mod support yet—but…
-
‘Operation Clean-up’ begins for Helldivers 2 players as Sony’s PSN plans lie in rubble, with over 70,000 (and counting) positive reviews landing on Steam
Helldivers 2 players completed what I can only describe as their first real-life Major Order over the weekend. After Sony revealed that it would be going ahead with its initial plans to require the monstrously popular co-op shooter’s Steam players to link themselves to a PSN account, an uproar of furious divers retaliated with military…
-
Fallout: New Vegas director reveals that game balance is ‘mostly vibes based’, says he only used a weapons spreadsheet ‘for maybe a couple of months’
It would be nice to live in a world that makes sense, wouldn’t it? One where you could easily reduce the issue of weapons balance to points on a spreadsheet, defeating the issue of game design with the raw power of maths. Unfortunately we don’t live in that world, as backed up by Fallout: New…
-
‘This is looking so good I can’t NOT pay you’: Fighting game YouTuber commissions modding ‘god’ to overhaul Marvel vs Capcom: Infinite’s artstyle
—
by
Marvel vs Capcom: Infinite (MVCI) is getting a remaster—but not from Capcom. As announced on Twitter, popular fighting game community YouTuber and streamer Maximillian Miles Christensen (Maximilian Dood) is commissioning a modder to create a complete top-to-bottom overhaul of the 2017 fighter’s visual style, and hot damn is it an improvement. “We’re in the early…
-
Baldur’s Gate 3 dev spills the secret sauce: Players love finding a place, then ‘ending up 2 hours and 3 puzzles later in a sacrificial chamber of a cult that murders giraffes’
Baldur’s Gate 3 is a Larian Studios game, and boy howdy are those things dense—as CRPGs tend to be. A far cry from the open-world RPGs saturated with merry little tasks that succeeded them, most CRPGs put you in a large-ish area that’s utterly rammed with stuff. Dungeons, quests, dialogue, sewers—on average a CRPG’s world…