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quite lovely even in early access, and its success has apparently enabled developers Stray Fawn Studio to become a publisher.Their first project is publishing Earth Of Oryn, a fellow citybuilder with a medieval setting which is taking inspiration from both Banished, Age Of Empires and RimWorld.
Steam Deck has spent its entire life thus far without even a temporary price drop. That ends today, as the Steam Spring Sale has launched with the first official Steam Deck savings – a 10% cut across the range – alongside the more expected dealsplosion of discounted games.What’s more, this sale could also be the last time that the Steam Deck joins in a Steam sale, at least for a very long time. Lawrence Yang, a Valve designer who recently spoke to us about the Deck’s first year in the wild, has also told me that the company are “looking at this as a one-time deal in celebration of Steam Deck’s anniversary.” You’ll therefore have until March 23rd, when the Spring Sale ends, to seize a saving on the handheld PC before it returns to base pricing – maybe for good.
All three Steam Deck versions are part of the sale, shedding exactly 10% apiece. The 64GB model is down from £349 / $399 to £314.10 / $359.10, the 256GB model drops from £459 / $529 to £413.10 / $476.10, and the top 512GB model falls from £569 / $649 to £512.10 / $584.10. Unlike the sad old days of 2022, there’s no lengthy waiting period once you put your order in, though I wouldn’t be surprised if it takes the full two weeks of Valve’s one-to-two week delivery estimate, what with the likely surge in demand.
podcast. What are some of the bad launches we remember? What part do we play in this ecosystem? Are we just doomed to get bad PC ports for the next few years, or is this going to happen forever now.Plus, a terrifying Tower Of Jocularity that challenges us to know when games came out (we do quite well, I think), the games we’ve been playing right now, and a trio of movie recommendations.
lawsuits and other messy goings-on at Disco Elysium studio ZA/UM recently, things are starting to look a little sunnier for this troubled RPG maker. Three of its lawsuits with former employees have been resolved this week, and today marks the arrival of a new mode in the game called Collage Mode, a daft and very entertaining screenshotting and diorama tool that lets you arrange Revachol’s many, many inhabitants in all sorts of weird scenes, poses and sizes. And yes, that is a giant Kim and Kuno up top there tormenting your tiny detective protagonist. What of it?
Cities: Skylines 2, but the first game isn’t done just yet. Paradox have announced a roadmap for Cities: Skylines which will receive its last few content drops over the next few months. After taking us to Korea, Cities: Skylines will continue its world tour with three new Content Creator Packs on March 22nd – next Wednesday – and a Colossal Order-developed mini-expansion in May.
The Sims 4 recently spawned infants into its life sim sandbox via a free update, and the substantial Growing Together expansion. At launch, Sims would go from nascent babies to walking, talking kids, skipping the infant years that teach them, for example, how to talk in Simlish, although that does sound like baby talk too. The new expansion adds a lot to Sim’s life stages, but the real show stealer here is a pesky bug that elongates babies. Yes, you read that correctly.
The latest Steam Deck client update has added Valve’s local network game transfers feature – previously only available in beta form – to the Stable branch, marking a full launch for one of the most useful Steam Deck feature upgrades in months.
If you missed the local transfers beta release last month, know that the name is quite literal: it lets you transfer Steam game installs between your PC and your Steam Deck over a local network, rather than having to re-download them onto every device you own. It also works when transferring between a Steam Deck and another Steam Deck, or between two PCs. Valve have a little explainer here, but it’s simple enough that – for example – hitting the Install button for a game on your Steam Deck will automatically detect if your PC is on the same network, and start transferring as much as it can from the desktop instead of downloading the whole thing from scratch.
You can even opt into sending/receiving game data from PCs and Steam Decks owned by other people, so long as they’re also connected to the same local network. The biggest benefit seemingly comes to those with monthly data caps (morning, Yanks), as these transfers won’t usually involve any extra downloads. Even so, it’s a helpful addition for anyone on all-you-can-eat data as well, since local transfers are much faster than old fashioned installs.
Ghostwire: Tokyo is getting its next major update, a full year after its launch. On April 12th, the Spider’s Thread update will add a whole new roguelike mode, extended cutscenes, additional areas, and much more. The update will hit PC and PlayStation, along with an Xbox Game Pass release on the same day.
Paranormasight: The Seven Mysteries of Honjo is best played if you go in knowing nothing about it. Zilch, zero, nada. Its twists and turns from the get-go have my brain doing mental gymnastics, not just in the game but in trying to figure out how to write around them for this review. I’m not going to spoil everything, but keeping your expectations completley wide open lets Paranormasight snake right on in and surprise you when you least expect it to.Here’s a quick elevator pitch: Paranormasight is a Squeenix-developed horror mystery visual novel about deadly rituals, ghost stories, curses, and the occult. Its subversive approach to classic visual novel staples make its puzzles feel smart and its horror scares hit hard. If you’re a fan of the thrills found in the Danganronpa and Zero Escape games, Paranormasight is like a bite-sized version of those two behemoths. It’s short, smart, and will keep you on your toes until the end.
So yeah, if that sounds like your thing, then have at it. From here on in, I’m going to be gabbing abut it in-depth.
free game in your web browser. “It was an interesting challenge,” says Cogs & Marvel’s creative director, Jon Hozier-Byrne. “How can you tell a complex story in the simplest narrative form?” The answer is Banshees: The Game, a short, hilarious, 8-bit game that you can play right here.
