Month: September 2024

What’s the coolest thing you’ve ever found while cleaning out your garage or a relative’s storage unit? For former game developer Chad Jessup, it’s probably the beta version of the original Half-Life he uncovered this month, now shared to the Internet Archive by videogame preservation enthusiast Reagan for all to enjoy.

Jessup’s industry credits include Destiny 2’s expansions and the Xbox 360 Shadowrun, and he mentions having been an external tester on the original Half-Life. Thanks to the more “from the hip” crediting of the ’90s, some of Half-Life publisher Sierra’s QA workers only seem to appear in the game’s credits as a special thanks to “All our other hardworking beta testers,” but Jessup’s industry bona fides and the fact that he had the goods leave little room to doubt he was one of them.

Jessup first posted on X, “The Everything App” about emptying out his old storage shed on September 12, and less than a week later, under a host of other ’90s gaming goodies, he struck paydirt: A CD-ROM dated to October 20, 1998 labeled “Half-Life, Beta 2, Net Test 2.” In a subsequent tweet, Jessup explained that “This version is a few weeks before official releas…

Antediluvian survival horror romp Alone in the Dark is back this year, more than 30 years after the first game came to PC, back in the ol’ MS-DOS days. This new one has some big names involved, including Jodie Comer (Killing Eve) and David Harbour (Stranger Things), who will be playing dual protagonists exploring a haunted mansion. The story, meanwhile, has been crafted by SOMA and Amnesia’s Mikael Hedberg, so expect lots of disconcerting psychological horror. 

Comer and Harbour are stepping into the shoes of Emily Hartwood and Edward Carnby, and depending on which you play you’ll get a different perspective on Alone in the Dark’s story. You can check them out in their respective roles in the new trailer above. 

Alone in the Dark will be hitting PC pretty soon, on October 25, but you can take it for a spin a lot earlier. Right now, in fact. Instead of a conventional demo, Pieces Interactive has put together a prologue chapter set in the same location, Derceto Manor, but before the events of the upcoming game, adding more context to the story without spoiling anything. Alone in the Dark Prologue is available on Steam now. 

The last Alone in the Da…

Hooded Horse’s roguelike city builder Against the Storm slipped out of early access late last year—too late to be in contention for PCG’s Game of the Year Awards. Which is a shame, because—as our 91% review can attest—it’s a triumphant reimagining of the genre, and a game that absolutely deserves more attention.

Rather than building one city that grows and grows until you get bored and start a new one, here you’re just a temporary resident, battling against the hostility of the forest until you complete enough objectives to pack up and move somewhere new. The resources on each map are limited, and exploiting them raises the general sense of foreboding your citizens are toiling under—as you rise up the difficulty levels, it can often feel as if success is achieved just as your production chains are on the verge of irrevocable collapse.

It’s clever stuff, and made better thanks to the series of free updates made in the months since its release. And now developer Eremite Games is putting the finishing touches on the game’s first expansion, Keepers of the Stone, which the studio today revealed is coming out next month, on September 26.

The e…

Stellaris’ new story pack has been announced, and presents players with a whole new avenue for profoundly unethical behaviour. Focusing on pre-spaceflight civilisations, the First Contact pack includes new origins, new ways to interact with species that haven’t reached the stars yet, and (if you really want to screw with their heads) cloaking technology for your ships.

The new origins all hew to the pack’s first contact theme. There’s one where your species was quite literally abducted by aliens, but managed to cast down the subjugators; another where you only figured out spaceflight by repelling an alien invasion (somehow) and using their tech; and a final one where your civilisation is a kind of galactic Sentinel Island, with most of the population favouring staying at home and out of contact with whatever other polities might lie outside your solar system. Probably smart, considering prior Stellaris expansions have equipped those guys with the means to turn your planet to dust.

I’m most interested to see what kind of new mechanics are available for interactions with pre-FTL civilisations, since that’s always been a fairly minor part of the game. Up to now, observa…

In an effort to stifle any public opinion that isn’t fawning or shows viewpoints the Kremlin doesn’t want the average Russian to see, the Russian government is going to try to ban virtual private networks (VPNs). According to a report from Russia’s RIA (H/T to Fudzilla), The regime wants to ban VPNs from March 1. 

As the war in Ukraine shows little sign of ending any time soon, pressure mounts inside Russia. Citizens seek access to information that doesn’t come from Putin and his sycophants. RIA refers to statements made by Russian senator Artem Sheikin as saying that Russia’s telecom regulator Roskomnadzor has been directed to block VPNs that allow access to banned material. 

Facebook, Twitter and Instagram are examples of sites banned under Russia’s Extremist law, but still accessible via a VPN. 

VPN bans now appear to be the plan to combat access to these sites, but implementing a ban is easier said than done. Even China, which is famous for its Great Firewall, hasn’t been able to stamp out VPN usage. In fact our sister site Tom’s Guide even manages a page detailing the best VPNs to use in China. If China can’t get rid of …

An update for Starfield has been released today, but temper your expectations: the patch is a small one aimed at closing some exploits and fixing a few bugs. The other stuff players have been waiting for, like the missing FOV slider and brightness controls, DLSS and ultrawide monitor support, and city maps, still haven’t arrived.

“We are continuing to work on a larger update that will add features and improvements that we noted in our last update notes,” Bethesda says. “Thank you so much for your continued feedback and support of Starfield and we look forward to a future with you on this journey.”

What is fixed in today’s patch? Well, that ship services technician that tends to be missing from Neon (they often fall off the platform and into the ocean below) will hopefully now be at their post: one patch note says a bug that caused “characters to not be in their proper location” has been fixed. There’s worse news for those of you who have been enjoying the magic loot-puddle in Akila City, because that profitable exploit has been patched, along with others that let you help yourself to vendor stashes through map-gap trickery. Looks like you’ll have…

With how difficult players are finding the Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree DLC, it shouldn’t be a surprise that the final boss is a whole new level of pain. While some players are finding new ways to take it on, one player just got lucky (or unlucky, depending on how you look at it). 

Spoilers for Shadow of the Erdtree’s final boss below. 

Player Gneurshk_ uploaded a video of their showdown with the final boss to Elden Ring’s subreddit with the caption, “What the f*ck?! I was robbed of the fight!!!” They had managed to get Promised Consort Radahn down to about two-thirds of his health, and apparently, that was all they needed. After nearly killing Gneurshk_, Radahn celebrated by phasing into the wall and disappearing completely. You can still see some attacks firing, but a couple of seconds go by and then he just dies.  

When I first saw this, my initial thoughts were just how lucky this player was, imagining getting a free pass to beat one of the hardest bosses in the DLC. But then I thought about how I’d actually feel if this had happened to me. Imagine putting your all into the DLC, fighting all the infuriating minor bosses,…

In 2011, Freedbird Games released To the Moon, a dramatic narrative adventure about life, death, memories, and regret. It was a hit, spawning spinoffs and sequels including A Bird Story, Finding Paradise, and Impostor Factory, and later this year the main story of the series will conclude with a new game called To the Moon: Beach Episode.

“The ‘beach episode’ is generally a trope where the story takes a break from the main plot where the cast heads off to a vacation (on the beach or otherwise),” Freebird Games founder Kan Gao told me. “The biggest expectation with these kinds of episodes tend to be light-heartedness break, and a dubious amount of fan service with revealing swimwear, etc.

“With the To the Moon beach episode, of course, we’re hoping for it to be more than just the trope … I’d been cheeky with implying that with the name ‘Just a To the Moon series Beach Episode,’ and so far the stuff shown had mostly been fun and games, but I think the official trailer that just launched gives folks a more of a genuine vibe of the game, which is: more pain. Just kidding! And hey, there is a reunion of all the major characters through the decade (despite ma…

It took nearly a decade of work, but Daggerfall Unity—the best version of Bethesda’s biggest RPG—finally crossed the finish line into a full 1.0 release in January. With that Herculean task complete, creator Gavin Clayton is moving on to a new project: Making a Daggerfall-style game of his own.

“I’ve already started working on a new game, but it’s going to be something of mine this time,” Clayton said in an interview with DualShockers. “I do genuinely love that old style of game. The thing I’m building is in the same vein. You’re talking big world, complex systems, mod support, that’s all of the stuff I want to explore, and I want to take that experience of Daggerfall Unity and put it in the new game.”

Clayton said he’s wanted to make games since he was very young, but the opportunities were very limited back in the 1980s and ’90s, and so he went into IT instead because it was “sensible and down to Earth,” and something he could make a proper living from.

Now, though, Clayton is stepping back from his IT services business so he can work on the new project full time. He’s also moving away from Unity in favor of his own game engine, one he actually st…

Preserve your hard-won Wordle win streak with our vast range of Wordle help. Brush up on the basics with our tips, guides, and archive of past answers, find guidance with the March 11 (630) clue, or give yourself an easy victory by skipping straight to today’s answer.

I’m really not sure how I reached today’s Wordle answer with guesses to spare—I’d been doing OK up to that point, but I hadn’t found anything revelatory. I suppose sometimes you just have to make that brave leap into the dark and see where Wordle takes you. 

Wordle hint

A Wordle hint for Saturday, March 11

Today’s answer involves dishing out high praise for someone or something with great enthusiasm and sincerity, to _____ their virtues. There are two vowels today, and an uncommon consonant too.  

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Is there a double letter in today’s Wordle? 

No letters are used twice in today’s puzzle. 

Wordle help: 3 tips for beating Wordle every day 

If there’s one thing better than playing Wordle, it’s playing Wordle well, which is why I’m going to share a few quick tips to help set you on the path to succ…

Guarantee yourself a Wordle win with our help. Make today’s game a little easier for yourself with a freshly written clue for the November 7 (871) puzzle, break it completely with today’s answer, or just polish up your general skills with our tips and tricks. 

Some days the grey letters help more than the greens. My opening guess only revealed a single yellow, and I have to admit I was a bit disappointed about it—until I took a breath and remembered that if it definitely wasn’t those letters, then it must be one of these instead. With that helpful thought in mind, a win in three came quickly. 

Today’s Wordle hint

Wordle today: A hint for Tuesday, November 7

The word you need to find today is the upper edge or boundary beyond which someone or something mustn’t (or can’t) go. Speed, for example. A car will be restricted to a certain mph depending on the road it’s travelling on. 

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Is there a double letter in Wordle today? 

Yes, a vowel is used twice in today’s Wordle. 

Wordle help: 3 tips for beating Wordle every day 

Looking to extend your Wordl…

AI’s a thorny subject, to say the least. The big issue with technology is that it advances in waves. There’ll be a very long time where it feels like nothing’s changing much at all, and then suddenly we’re all saddled with something new to irreversibly change our lives.

The trouble with these sudden ramps is it takes a while for the law, social etiquette, and plain ol’ common decency to catch up. Generative AI’s been no different—it’s created ripples in art, music, writing, coding, design, and by virtue of the fact all of those are part of it in some way: game development.

The latest two cents thrown into the ongoing debate comes via an interview from our friends over at Edge Magazine, who sat down with former Assassin’s Creed lead producer Jade Raymond and Raph Koster, the former co-director of Everquest 2 co-director.

“AAA games have gone from taking teams of 50 people two years to make to now sometimes taking teams of hundreds of people more than ten years to make … [we believe] these technologies will eventually help game developers reverse that trend, and unlock more creativity from developers and players alike,” says Raymond as she goes over …

Asus’ ROG Zephyrus CES 2024 teaser hid something exciting in plain sight, the hint that its new gaming laptops are going to ditch the old plastic chassis and switch to an all-new metal unibody design. And I am most definitely here for that change.

The teaser trailer released last week suffered by being dropped at the same time as another, more rabidly devoured teaser trailer—y’know, the one with guns, bikes, and bikinis—and honestly we skipped over it because all it seemed to say was that there were going to be new ROG laptops coming at CES 2024.

A blind hermit could have probably predicted the same with as much accuracy, however, we’ve now learned there’s more to it. We’ve heard from people classically ‘close to the matter’ that there is going to be a more tangible re-design to the outside of the new Asus ROG Zephyrus laptops as well as new hardware going inside them.

That same hermit would have also predicted a new Intel insides (ding, ding-dong, ding) for the new machines, but we’ve learned that as well as switching up the old LED-laden AniMe Matrix top panel—for something apparently sleek and different, which now just looks like a single s…

Overcome every problem today’s Wordle could possibly throw your way with our help. Keep on scrolling and you’ll find great tips that’ll help make your opening guess work its hardest for you, as well as a clue written just for today’s game and, if you get really stuck, the answer to the December 9 (903) puzzle.

A single letter tripped me up, and that meant today’s Wordle shamefully took one guess more than it otherwise could have. That’s not ideal, but it’s still much better than staring at my screen for ten minutes the way I do some days, wondering why the English language has decided to get up and leave me for the duration of a Wordle session.

Today’s Wordle hint

Wordle today: A hint for Saturday, December 9

A slight change in position or direction could be described using today’s answer, as could going up or down gears in a car. Also, someone working until 4am would be working the night _____. 

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Is there a double letter in Wordle today? 

No letters are used twice in today’s puzzle. 

Wordle help: 3 tips for beating Wordle every day 

If there’s one thing better than playing Wo…