Last week, Epic introduced a new payment system to Fortnite which bypassed the mandatory systems of Apple and Google’s app stores to avoid paying them a 30% cut, and gave players better prices on microtransaction cash. In response, both Apple and Google kicked Fortnite out of their stores. Epic seemed prepared for this possibility (app store rules are hardly secret), immediately launching lawsuits against the two and a live-in game event with a cringeworthy propaganda video parodying a classic Apple advert....

“It’s actually based on our internal design tools. We’ve had to take those tools, which were very much meant for game developers and get them fit for consumption by our players,” explained creative director Mike Brown in an interview with Eurogamer. “It’s a rule-based system where you put in: when this happens, this is the outcome, when this happens with these conditions, then this is the action. In the video that we saw yesterday, there’s quite a lot of rules in play....

The announcement also mentioned that a new game is currently in development which will star Conan and “many of the characters in the Robert E. Howard universe.” That new game is unannounced and there are no other details. The Cabinet Group and its various IP are being incorporated as Heroic Signatures, which previously existed as a joint venture between Funcom and Cabinet focused solely on the latter’s videogame licensing. Fredrik Malmberg, co-founder and CEO of Cabinet Group, will serve as President of Heroic Signatures, and continue to manage the licensing of Conan out for monthly comics from Marvel and a Netflix series that’s “currently in the works....

During today’s reveal, RGG were asked if they consdidered making Lost Judgement a turn-based RPG the way they did with the newest Yakuza game. “We did discuss the possibility of developing that battle system further for our next title,” said executive director Toshihiro Nagoshi, “and while we may pursue the turn-based system even outside the Yakuza series, the conclusion we ended up at was that because this is a different series, the best approach would be to keep them separate and refine what makes each series great....

I’ll admit I was expecting something a bit cheesy but I actually think the online Indie Arena is pretty swell. You can pull up the little MMO-style experience in your browser to create an account and an avatar to walk around with. Interacting with screens playing trailers will scroll ya down the page a bit and play the trailer automatically. Clicking on arcade cabinets can direct you to demo downloads....

Remember, you can still get a month’s worth of Game Pass for PC for just £1 / $1 if you’re a new user, so make sure you take advantage of that offer as well if you can. As mentioned above, the price cut is only available in the US right now, but I’ve included the link for UK Game Pass peeps just in case that shows up as well. If we get the same 33% off deal, then we should be able to pick it up for £16 instead of the usual £24....

Get the WD Black SN770 2TB SSD for £170 (was £190) The WD SN770 2TB debuted earlier this year, with the RPS SN770 review coming out in February. Technoking James reckoned that the drive was ‘just short of SSD greatness’, citing the drive’s high price compared to models that had been on the market longer - such as the budget WD SN550 and the super-fast WD SN850. However, those judgements were rendered based on a 1TB price of £144 - so now you’re getting double the capacity for £36 more, and I reckon that changes the calculus somewhat!...

Unlike other Humble Bundles that usually save their best games for the most expensive tier, you could say that Humble’s Super Simulation bundle has most of its top titles in the middle ‘pay more than the average’ tier. Here, you’ll find the aforementioned Elite Dangerous and theHunter: Call Of The Wild, as well as We. The Revolution and Radio Commander, giving you plenty of moral decisions to chew over in addition to the zen-like experiences found in the chill wilds of space and the outdoors in Elite and theHunter....

Get the Elgato Stream Deck for £90 (was £140) This particular Stream Deck is the ‘Stream Deck Classic’, aka the original model that launched back in 2017. There is a newer ‘MK.2’ model, launched this year, but the two are surprisingly similar - they run the same software and use the same keys, the only difference is that the new model has interchangable face plates, a fixed 45-degree angle stand instead of the adjustable original and a USB-C plug instead of Micro USB....

They do too!

Calling Goodbye Volcano high a “cinematic narrative adventure”, Ko_op’s blurb explains: If Fang sounds familiar, that might be because they’re voiced by Lachlan Watson, who plays Theo on Chilling Adventures Of Sabrina. (Rambling late-night aside: I live in hope that Sabrina and Riverdale will cross over more in future. Who’s to say Betty’s serial killer genes (an actual plot point in Riverdale, this show is ridiculous and I adore it) can’t be demon genes?...

Get the WD_Black D10 Game Drive 12TB for £180 w/ code EXTRA10 (was £387) This is an awesome amount of storage for the money, and WD’s refurbished drives come with a one year warranty which is nice to have. As usual with used drives, we recommend checking out its stats using an app like CrystalDiskInfo to see whether how fresh the drive is - if it’s brand new or barely used, then this is an outstanding deal - and if you get a drive that has had a lot of data written to it or is spitting errors, it’s straightforward to return it for a refund....

Griftlands does have proper story campaigns underpinning each run but you might get different quests, stumble into new encounters, build different relationships, and end up with quite different decks. Our boy Brendy liked Griftlands when it first entered early access in July 2019, though it was a bit light on content at the time. Klei have added a lot since then. Brendy was quite taken with how random encounters can build into little story arcs, with relationships developing and degenerating as characters pop back up: “I like this sense of consequence, and the mingling with degenerates....

The last Heists Challenge reward was a free go kart, which was quite cool. If you’re up for the challenge then you just have to hop into any Heist finale before November 30th, and it’ll count towards the community total. It might be worth targeting the Pacific Standard Job during the week, though, because that pays out double the usual in-game cash and reputation experience points up until the end of the month....

The first game didn’t exactly show Hades’ parenting skills in the best of lights, but the very fact that there’s a Hades 2 with a different protagonist who’s also one of his kids brings all sorts of new dimensions to the issue. Zagreus’s story already confirmed that Hades is pretty hands-off as a father. I mean, Zag merrily alternated between fighting his own step-siblings to the death and snogging them, and if papa won’t step in to stop that, what will trigger a parental intervention?...

Our Hades Keepsakes guide will walk you through how Keepsakes can be earnt, used, and upgraded, along with a tier list of the very best Keepsakes in the game and the full effects of each one (including two secret Keepsakes!). On this page: Hades Keepsakes - how do they work? Best Keepsakes in Hades (tier list) Full Keepsakes list & effects Hades Keepsakes - how do they work? Almost every persistent NPC in Hades can be compelled to offer you a Keepsake for you to take on your escape attempts through the Underworld....

“For more than two years now we’ve been working on Halo Infinite doing something that – they’re very prescriptive about what we can say,” Sams said. “But we’re doing something unannounced, and we’re doing lead development on that unannounced thing, from conception and design. It’s something big and new for the franchise. But I can’t say any more about it.” Sams added that whatever Halo-related shenanigans they’re working on is the largest of the three projects they’ve currently got on the boil, with around 100 developers contributing to it....

I mean, come on. How can any development team deliver on such a promise? Let alone a development team of only five people? I started playing Dyson Sphere Program, tensed and ready for the catch to reveal itself. Had everything been simplified to the extreme? Was it riddled with bugs? Was the balancing or pacing of the game way off-kilter? Nope. I slowly realised that it was really quite a stunning game, and that I was having heaps of fun designing and redesigning my little factories that gathered up iron, copper, stone, and coal for me and automatically crafted them into more useful components and materials....

So, why is there a contingent of people, who I assume are devoid of the ability to experience happiness for even five minutes, ready to pipe up with something like, “Well, actually, Gears Of War is mindless bullshit,” whenever the series is brought up. Granted, as a story, it’s probably not on the same level as whatever 18th century author you just had to Google so you can look well intelligent....

The first Ni No Kuni game arguably pulled off the biggest art coup in the history of games: getting the renowned Japanese animation giant Studio Ghibli to magic up a living, breathing game world that looked (and sounded) just like their beloved films. Its sequel, Ni No Kuni II: Revenant Kingdom, never benefited from the same Ghibli wizardry as its predecessor, but put the two side by side and you’d be hard pushed to tell the difference....