Category: Rock, Paper, Shotgun

A paper aeroplane falls at my feet, with a note written inside: “Even through everything that has happened… I never stopped loving you.” Kind Words 2 is full of touching and drifting remarks like this, written by other players and tossed into the winds for you to find. If you’re allergic to vulnerability, or find cuteness or the “wholesome” games trend hard to digest, you’ve probably already turned your face away. But if your heart is open, even a smidge, if you carry a deep craving to peer through the cracks in the internet to discover a small realm of common humanity, then Kind Words 2 can show you a glimpse of that warm and welcoming world.

Read more

Paradox Interactive delayed jail management simulator Prison Architect 2 indefinitely this August, commenting at the time that the game had notable performance issues, and that its system-led design was proving tricky to tinker with. This came a couple of months after the Crusader Kings publisher washed their hands of the sequel’s original developers, Double Eleven.

Speaking to me at Paradox’s Media Day last week, deputy chief executive officer Mattias Lilja offered a shade more insight on the decision, suggesting that hard-up players have “higher expectations” at present and are less trusting that developers will fix problems. Chief creative officer Henrik Fåhraeus also offered thoughts on what Paradox have learned from the disastrous launch of Cities: Skylines 2 in late 2023. Specifically, he said they need to give actual players access to the game early on, not just testers.

Read more

An Italian-language only quirk with Bloober Team’s Silent Hill 2 Remake almost spoiled the entire plot for fans playing in that language, but was fortunately caught in time for the day one patch to make changes. As spotted by PC Gamer, some garbled lines the player hears upon first picking up the game’s radio weren’t quite garbled enough in the Italian subtitles, accidentally dropping a massive plot spoiler in the first half hour. Stop reading now if you’re still playing, obviously. Here’s a video of a cat that sounds like he’s saying “bongiorno” you can watch instead.

Read more

It’s always vaguely reassuring to see your own card mentioned by name in the recommended specs for a new release – even if that new release is just a slightly pomaded-up version of 14-year-old open world console game Red Dead Redemption. I could write a laborious metaphor about someone coming looking for me in a saloon using whatever that literary technique that Irvine Welsh does is called where you spell out the accents, but I won’t bother. I simply do not have another tarnation in me. Perhaps a root. Don’t even talk to me about a toot. Here’s the specs, as per the Steam page.

Read more

We’ve all used a Steam Deck, so we all know how poor the battery life can be when playing a more graphically extensive game like God of War: Ragnarok, or Cyberpunk 2077. Here’s the trick, you need a good power bank to accompany your portable PC adventures.

Read more

I’m told that if I do one more Prime Big Deal Days post, they’ll take off the metal clamps holding my eyelids open, and won’t put them back on until Black Friday next month. Result! So here’s a little after-dinner mint of a PC gaming hardware bargain: JSAUX’s Steam Deck thumbstick covers, which come packaged with some stick-on decals for £8 / $8. Both 20% off, they be, leaving a price so low I have real hope you’ll forgive me using the phrase “stocking stuffer” in October.

Read more

I always like to balance the inherent cynicism and general corporate awfulness of covering events like Prime Big Deal Days by focusing recommendations on hardware I genuinely like, and ideally, what I actually own. Partly hence the G515 Lightspeed TKL keyboard post from yesterday. And here’s another: the sleek-lookin’, sharp-recordin’ Logitech StreamCam, which is down from £139 to £70 in the UK and down from $170 to $100 in the US.

Read more

Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2 won’t be an “open sim” like the 2004 original game, according to Paradox Interactive. Now in development at The Chinese Room, it’ll be an action-RPG with a relatively linear story set in the World Of Darkness universe. This obviously plays to The Chinese Room’s strengths – they’re better known for melancholy or horrifying strolls through broken spaces than the Dishonorable massaging of intricate systems. But it also reflects Paradox’s view that the original Bloodlines has been “mythologised” a bit: people love the memory of it more than the reality, and there are aspects of the 2004 game, according to Paradox’s deputy chief executive officer Mattias Lilja, that simply “wouldn’t fly today”.

Read more

A new PlayStation blog (thanks cheery fanzine PCGamer for the spot) has provided some illuminating info on the upcoming Like A Dragon: Pirate Yakuza In Hawaii, and in many ways, the LAD series as a whole. The biggest takeaway: the fact pirate Yakuza was, at one point, going to be a fishing game called Like A Dragon: Tuna.

Read more

For the record, I still think it’s easier and safer to go with a microSD for your Steam Deck storage needs, and with good Prime Big Deal Days savings on two of the best – the Samsung Pro Plus and the SanDisk Ultra – that opinion remains unbudged. Still, you know what they say: when you’re holding a tiny screwdriver, everything starts to look like a tiny screw. So I understand if the call to replace the Deck’s internal SSD, or indeed that of your Asus ROG Ally, proves too strong.

In which case, have a look at the Crucial P310, which I added to our best SSDs list just last week, and is currently joining in the Prime sale frivolities. Specifically, the 1TB model has been slashed from £128 to £70 on Amazon UK, while it’s the 2TB version that gets a US discount, dropping from $265 to $168.

Read more