Innholdsfortegnelse for August 2020 i PC Gamer

ROBIN VALENTINE Specialist in Fake holidays Twitter @robinlvalentine This month Ran around in so many PC gaming worlds that he got a digital blister. If the past few months of self-isolation, political unrest, division and… I think at one point there were murder hornets, has left you looking for an escape, then this is the issue for you. Inside you’ll find a massive 22 page feature dedicated to the most absorbing, immersive and atmospheric worlds gaming can provide – places to lose yourself in and, for a while, forget the world. Almost our entire team has chipped in to share their favourite spaces, moments, and experiences exploring the virtual. My hope is that it’s as therapeutic to read as it was to put together.…

HIGHS Street Fighter V The Street Fighter subreddit raised $15,000 with an impromptu Black Lives Matter online tournament. Elite Dangerous Next year’s Odyssey expansion will finally let you get out of your ship and explore worlds on foot. A Total War Saga: Troy The mythological Total War spin-off will be free to keep for the first 24 hours after it launches. LOWS BlizzCon BlizzCon 2020 has been cancelled due to the coronavirus. GeForce Now Now that publishers and developers have to opt-in, Nvidia’s streaming service has shrunk once again, with 89 games leaving the service. Kerbal Space Program 2 After ditching the originalKSP2 studio, Star Theory Games, publisher Take-Two reportedly tried to poach its employees.…

I thought I was an introverted person before this,” says Kirk Williford, a senior game designer on Guild Wars 2. After a few months in self-isolation as a result of the coronavirus, working on the MMO’s latest big update during the day and playing other games for escapism in the evenings, Williford realised he’s a lot more extroverted than he once thought. Daily casual human contact is one of those things anyone can take for granted when they work at an office, but after months without it, game developers who now work from home have to find new ways to make games and make do without the water cooler. Working from home is nothing new for plenty of indie developers, but the pandemic means something very different for much bigger…

IF YOU DON’T LIKE A PARTICULAR EVENT, YOU CAN SPEND CURRENCY TO SKIP IT Project Cars has amassed a large, loyal following of virtual motorsport fans, thanks in part to its impressively realistic car physics. But the series has always been missing a few of the features expected from a modern racing sim – something its developer is remedying in this scaled-up sequel. First up, career mode. This has been rebuilt from scratch, with the intention of giving players a better sense of progression. In your career you’ll progress through ten car classes, earning XP as you go, unlocking upgrade parts and new events. But if you don’t like a particular type of event, you can spend in-game currency to skip over it. This is so players don’t feel tied…

Sometimes the real world weighs heavy on us all. This year, it’s felt like about 2,020 kilos’ worth. It can make luxuries like videogames feel pretty frivolous. But, at the same time, your PC can provide the perfect escape. Virtual worlds, despite more often than not being embroiled in their own wars and conflicts, are happier, simpler places, where everything makes sense and, as long as you keep plugging away, you’re always making progress towards resolution and success. They can show you beautiful, impossible things; provide a sandbox for your creativity and imagination; or just be a warm and pleasant space to exist in for an hour or two. When times are dark, that’s a magic worth celebrating more than ever, not dismissing. Over the following pages, that’s exactly what…

Hereby, I offer my apology to every environment artist working in games, past, present, and future. How many hours do they spend creating lavish, gorgeous, massive open worlds? Hundreds? Thousands? Huge teams spend years bringing to life spaces we could only dream of exploring – resplendent fantasy vistas and detailed historical reimaginings both. And how do I respond to this work? By running face first into a mountain. IT TURNS OUT THERE’S ESCAPISM IN PREDICTABILITY AND ORDER My strongest memories of Skyrimare of being pressed against a cliff texture. Yes, it’s a game filled with big moments – the dragon attacks, the dramatic battles, the fun sidequests discovered in unlikely locations – but those are punctuations on a game that’s often about simply travelling through an enormous world. Less than…

It’s interesting how two of the most atmospheric, detailed and well-realised worlds on PC – Yakuza’s Kamurocho and Shenmue’s Yokosuka – are among the smallest. Each game presents a painstakingly recreated, but economical, slice of Japanese life, rooting their fantastic stories of revenge and conspiracy in a lavishly mundane reality. In both games, a grimy Tokyo real estate office or a budget travel agent will have as much detail, if not more, as the story’s more glamorous locations. WALK THE STREETS OF KAMUROCHO AND YOU’LL HEAR MUSIC LEAKING FROM BARS In the Yakuzaseries we explore a semi-fictionalised version of Kabukicho, Tokyo’s infamous red light district; in Shenmue, the port city of Yokosuka. By the standards of most games, these are small spaces. But by focusing on a few streets, rather…

The most compelling open worlds are the ones that feel like they would exist even if you never visited them, and the key to that illusion is to fill the world with convincing people. I’m not talking about the main characters, the quest-givers, or the speech-makers. I’m talking about everyone else – the background extras that fill the gaps in the world, the ones you tend to barely notice unless you slow down and start paying attention to them. I TAILED HER FOR A LONG TIME AS SHE RODE OVER HILLS AND THROUGH FORESTS Early in my life as Arthur Morgan in Red Dead Redemption 2, I came across a woman being abducted. After killing her kidnapper and cutting her ropes, she thanked me and told me she was…

When you think about open world games, your mind tends to leap to Assassin’s Creed, Grand Theft Auto, and all the other big hitters of the genre. But you might be surprised to learn that one of the best, biggest, most varied, and constantly evolving open worlds doesn’t belong to a blockbuster third-person action game with a mega budget; it’s the setting for Euro Truck Simulator 2. THERE’S SOMETHING COMPELLING ABOUT THOSE LONG STRETCHES OF ROAD Longtime readers of PC Gamer will know we love SCS Software’s trucking sim. It’s one of the best driving games on PC, with weighty, nuanced handling and fun RPG elements. And since its release way back in 2012, the game’s map has been steadily growing. It now includes a huge chunk of Eastern Europe,…

I’m in a dark crypt, surrounded by skeletons and creepers. I’m blasting mobs with my firework arrows which explode into a cloud of colourful sparks, dual-wielding sickles that freeze enemies, and harvesting the souls of the fallen to power my laser cube that obliterates everything in my path. Throughout this whole spectacle, the llama I’ve summoned keeps charging head-first into mobs in a throw of spitting rage. It’s ridiculous, and I’m enjoying every second. The story is mostly just a reason for mindless brawling It’s safe to say that Minecraft Dungeonsdoesn’t take itself too seriously. It’s set in the same universe as its sandbox predecessor, but there’s no crafting or building in his world. It’s a dungeon crawler that challenges you to furiously hack-and-slash your way through hordes of enemies…

Hell is empty and all the devils are here. By here I mean on this train, teaming up with monsters to fight angels across the frozen wasteland that used to be their home, until they reach Hell’s heart and relight it with the last Pyre-flame. Surprisingly, the game beneath that wild idea is a deckbuilder so similar to Slay the Spire if I hadn’t seen the creators of both talking chummily on a livestream I’d have been a bit suspicious. Where Slay the Spire had relics that changed the nature of a run, Monster Train has artefacts that sometimes have basically the same abilities. STS had unlockable difficulty levels called ascensions, Monster Train calls them covenants. I found myself not minding the lack of originality, though. It feels like playing…

You’ve no doubt heard that Deep Rock Galactic is like Left 4 Dead, if Valve’s co-op classic swapped zombies for alien arachnids and took place exclusively in dark, confounding tunnels. That’s more or less accurate, but Deep Rock Galactic’s eponymous depth is more than just environmental. The breadth of approaches possible here makes Vermintide 2 look like Desert Bus, and frankly it’s all a bit much for the first few hours. An opening tutorial mission does a fantastic job of conveying the basics, though – this is your pick, use it to hack away at valuable minerals and carve tunnels. Right. Cool. Shoot the gun on the bad spiders – with you there. Call the M.U.L.E. to you and deposit mined resources, press 3 to equip a zipline launcher and…

After playing this post-apocalyptic train sim, I have new sympathy for British Rail, who can hardly be expected to keep the trains timely with all the monsters trying to climb aboard, all the time. To make matters worse, here you’re running a train all by yourself, by shovelling coal to keep the engine running, aiming a pistol to shoot those hangers-on, and pumping the big freaky heart you’re transporting across the wasteland – keeping it alive, as per the title. This is a one-screen game where you have to keep those multiple plates spinning, on each leg of a journey between the wasteland’s surviving stations. If the heart slows down, you’ll need to dart back to pump it up, and if the engine slows down, a zombie-style monster will attempt…

Just because this month’s theme is sport, it doesn’t mean they all have to be real. This is proof, were it needed, that I’ll find a way to put Warhammer in anything. That sandwich you just made. The jumper your mum knitted. The magazine you’re reading. They all contain Warhammer now. Blood Bowl 2 is more polished than I expected. There’s always a sense of trepidation when firing up a Warhammer tie-in for the first time: is it one of the games that got made while the Games Workshop QA team were looking in another direction? Or is it one of the good ones? Thankfully, this is more skewed towards the latter, but it’s not without its faults. Good stuff first. It’s crammed with deep, on-brand cuts for Warhammer Fantasy…

This skateboarding game’s presentation really appeals to me. Or, rather, its total lack of it. You skate in a utilitarian hellscape while cool music plays. That’s it. It’s the opposite of WWE’s creatine-gorged bulk of pointless extras around a brittle skeleton. It’s a game where you’re happy to sit and do the same level for an entire evening until you’ve nailed your high score. It has the same sense of repetition as Hotline Miami, except that in OlliOlli every shattered kneecap is your own fault. 83…

You’re trapped in something the size of a camper van with three of your buddies for the next three years. The payoff is that you get to go to Mars, but at what cost? How do you look after your mental health on such a strange journey? Crewed missions to Mars and beyond are still in the planning stage at NASA and private companies such as SpaceX. In 2015, then-administrator of NASA Charles Bolden pointed to 2030 as the date for a human landing on the red planet, and current US Vice-President Mike Pence wants boots on the surface of the Moon again in 2024. There’s rather more to it than jumping on the top of a giant missile and setting up a guidance computer running at 0.043MHz though. Long…

TYLER WILDE THIS MONTH Took pictures of pretty reflections and dead guys. ALSO PLAYED Valorant, Generation Zero After upgrading my GPU to an RTX 2070 Super, I picked Controlto be my first ‘RTX On’ experience. It’s a good game to play for any reason, but it’s also the best showcase of Nvidia’s ray tracing tech so far. It almost entirely takes place in a mid-20th century office building where glass, marble, steel, and concrete intersect in hard-edged geometric patterns, reflecting fluorescent grids, green CRT monitors, and interdimensional sun beams. I oohed and awed at the reflections for a while, but now I’m mostly taking selfies with dead guys. I swear I started out using Control’s photo mode to take tasteful shots of cool-looking stone cubes. I also snapped a few…

“I LOVE MAGICKA. IT TREATS MAGIC LIKE A VOLATILE, COMPLICATED SCIENCE” When games journalists outline the problems with a game, they’re often met with a familiar retort, “Why don’t you make one then, if you’re so clever?” And of course, most of us aren’t. But for Tom Francis, a former staff writer at PC Gamer for nine years, that’s become a foolproof method of development. “I think my process is to play a game, articulate what I wish was different, and make a game that does it that way,” he says. For Tactical Breach Wizards, the starting point was one of Francis’ favourites: XCOM 2. “I love it, and I’ve played it for hundreds of hours, and yet I could talk forever about what’s wrong with it… big, serious problems.”…

“SECOND-TO-SECOND COMBAT GETS ITS ROOTS FROM CLASSIC SHOOTERS LIKE HALO” Space is mostly bleak and empty,” says Michael Schade, CEO of Rockfish Games, the developer of Everspace 2. Without getting too Douglas Adams about it, this makes open space combat games “boring, because most of the time you shoot at tiny pixel clusters in the distance without having a concrete sense of player orientation and movement”. We’re playing the prototype build of this space shooter, the one that appeared at PAX East back in late February and which would have been shown off at this summer’s entertainment shows if they hadn’t been cancelled. It’s playable, in that it functions – you fly through space exploring, shooting and trading. It’s not exactly coherent yet, however, with little sense of purpose or…

THERE’S MINDLESS JOY IN FOLLOWING A SET OF EASY TO UNDERSTAND DIRECTIONS In this unusual sim, you play as a one-person restoration company specialising in cleaning and repairing abandoned railway stations. In the same vein as House Flipper or Viscera Cleanup Detail, there’s a big ol’ mess, and you’re the muggins that’s going to clean it all up. A whole string of stations have unfortunately fallen to a sorry state, and you’ll be working your way through each one, turning trash into treasure as you go. You start by working on a small village’s single-platform station, and work your way up to the grottiest inner-city stations, all of them in a terrible state of disrepair. You’ll need to pick up the trash, scrub the graffiti off walls, sweep the floors,…

The scene before me is unfathomably ghastly. Charred limbs and torsos the colour of charcoal are only things that suggest that these are humans littering the ground as I pick through the gore to find a man’s lost brother. I’ve witnessed the carnage that remains of this battle between the forces of Nilfgaard and Temeria before in the deceptively-quaint region of White Orchard before, some years ago – so what possessed me to return to this nightmarish world? Well, for a start, The Witcher 3 isn’t all battlefields and rotting flesh. In fact, it’s frequently staggering in its beauty, from the rugged pastoral scenes of Skellige to the bustling metropolis of Novigrad. Nevertheless, amid the bucolic rolling hills and the sparkling rivers running between them, tragedy lies. Civilians are murdered…

The reason space sim MMO EVE Online’s universe is so special – and enduring – is its relationship with its players. Thanks to an interwoven tangle of reactive systems, it’s a sandbox that plays host to dynamic politics, economics, espionage and warfare on a grand scale. Whether it’s hitmen spending ten months undercover to bring down a rival corporation, or explorer Katia Sae embarking on a nine year journey to visit all 7, 805 solar systems, or an enterprising pirate scoring loot worth $60,000 in real money from one month-long raiding spree, it’s a game that has spawned a thousand fascinating stories – with more arising every day. Check out more on its latest updates, including a full-scale alien invasion, over on p98.…

I’ve lost track of how many people I’ve eaten. My mission was to consume ten golfers, and since people don’t golf in the ocean I had to jump out of the water and shimmy my way onto the golf course to start chowing down on them. Three patrol boats filled with gun-toting shark hunters appeared, so I ate them, too. I’m probably up to about 17 humans eaten now, though I still need to eat three more golfers to finish my gory quest list. Defeating a boss fight is no big deal when you’re a goddamn shark More hunters in patrol boats and on jetskis arrive so I consume them too, along with a few divers. And then a celebrity shark hunter appears, flanked by several escort boats. It’s Candyman…

Checking all of the boxes needed to fit into the service game climate Cruciblehas: a roster of heroes with diverse abilities, cosmetics, a battle pass with dozens of progression levels, and snippets of lore that suggest a larger world. Unfortunately, it wraps these familiar elements around a competitive third-person shooter that isn’t very good. Even for a free-to-play game, I can’t find a reason to stick with its boring combat and spotty performance. So much of Cruciblefeels like a misguided effort, starting with its game modes. Heart of the Hive is a 4v4 race to farm Essence (experience points) and be the first to collect three hive hearts. Efficient farming is the best way to out-level opponents and get an edge in fights, but it’s so boring that I can’t…

It’s wild how quickly Valoranthas captured the collective consciousness of FPS fans. Riot’s competitive shooter is just barely out of beta, yet it already stands toe-to-toe with the biggest games in its genre. It helps that Valorantcomes from a gigantic studio and that its deviously smart partnership with Twitch streamers to selectively hand out beta access gave it a running start. But that enormous marketing push wouldn’t mean much if Valorantweren’t also very good. It’s true that Valorantis Riot’s best crack at Counter-Strike, but the ways it remixes Valve’s blueprint are what make it excellent. Anonymous gangs of counter-terrorists are replaced by a cast of vibrant agents with talents that match their personalities. It has the same upbeat vibe of Overwatchthat helps every loss feel a little more friendly. Valorantmanages…

Should you ever need to feel bad (or just worse) about your level of productivity, consider this fact: developer Rusty Lake has already made 15 games in its five years of operation. The team’s latest room-escape-ish adventure game is actually a remake of an older title, released a couple of years before the studio was established with Cube Escape: The Lake. Updated with new art, music, more puzzles and ties to the lore of the Rusty Lake series, Samsara Room is a must-play if you enjoy poking at tactile puzzles. Themes of life, and death, and rebirth, and having a fish for a head lie at the heart of this puzzle game, whose best feature is its surreal, Twin Peaks-y atmosphere. It may take place inside one room, but you’ll…

You remember that bit in The Shining when Jack typed the same sentence over and over? This entry could be that but with the words ‘sorry I got it wrong’. I reviewed Rocket League in 2015 and scored it an idiotic 87 percent, when it’s clearly one of the greatest multiplayer games on PC. So yes: I’m sorry. Going back to it now feels like bumping into a former paramour who ended up being fabulously successful. I’m not even angry with you, Rocket League. I’m glad that you’re important enough to have your own Back To The Future tie-in DLC. I knew you when you were new and pure and special, and honestly, I didn’t give you the love you deserved. 92…

There’s no component more crucial to a gaming PC than a graphics card. It’s the heart of any system that favours frame rate and fidelity above all else, and that’s why it’s of the utmost importance to leave aside plenty of budget and choose wisely when it comes to your next upgrade. You’ve got to ask yourself some questions when deciding on a new graphics card – such as “what resolution can my monitor run at?” and “do I really need an Nvidia GeForce RTX 2080 Ti?”. There are times when you will need an RTX 2080 Ti. If the goal for your PC is to deliver the very best 4K gaming experience that money can buy then this card’s many cores and 11GB video memory are best suited to…

JOHN STRIKE THIS MONTH Attempted potty training with disastrous results. ALSO PLAYED Twinkle Twinkle Little Star on a miniature xylophone Regrettably I wasn’t lucky enough to get my hair cut in the last week before lockdown, but I was fortunate enough to have my brother-in-law rig up an ethernet port in my home office. Much to the despair of my family, and sausage dogs, this was to signify a momentous return to gaming, the likes of which no hurried garage conversion had ever seen before. At least I’d hoped so. It’s been several months since I’ve played games with any meaningful passion, and at least a year since I’ve joined the old boys from my Battlefieldclan for a few rounds of ‘Sweary McShoot Bang’. After Battlefield 1 and 5 came…

Los Santos has a massive crime problem, and no one knows that better than anyone who plays Grand Theft Auto V… because we spend most of our time committing those horrible crimes. But when the thrill of bank heists, chases, and shootouts with the cops get a little on the repetitive side, there’s a super way to freshen things up. Superhero mods! There’s one small issue with using mods to become a superhero in GTA V, and it’s that the biggest criminal (you) vanishes, leaving the superhero you’ve transformed into without a major villain to defeat. Thankfully, some of the mods here provide a suitable superpowered enemy you can spawn and battle. But even without a supervillain to super-fight, it’s still tons of fun to use incredible powers in GTA…

BOSS COPIES More Nameless Ones spawn here, which means more fireballs to evade. This is where the fight gets hard, so ensure you have your roll and a health potion at the ready. SKELETON ARMY The Nameless One spawns shielded skeletons, so they’ll take multiple hits to take down. Keep your distance from the boss’ fireballs as you take them out. GREEN FIRE These cubic projectiles deal high damage, but they move slowly, so keep your concentration and avoid them. Initiate a speed-boosting artefact if you have one equipped, if necessary.…

APEX LEGENDS apexlegends.com It’s 11.00pm, and my phone starts to buzz. It’s Samuel – former PC Gamer editor-in-chief, current pal. “An hour of Apex?” he asks. It’s 1.30am. We’re jumping in for what we’ve promised ourselves will be the final match. It’s 1.50am. We’ve just won. The adrenaline is pumping. We won’t be getting much sleep tonight. COMMAND & CONQUER REMASTERED COLLECTION bit.ly/cncthang Looking back we can appreciate how weird C&C’s soundtrack was. It slaps, sure, but entire tracks are built around, for instance, a woman saying “just do it up” over and over again. Another, called C&C Thang, features an NWA-style west coast hiphop beat. It’s utterly wild. EASTSHADE eastshade.com During an eclipse, I use mirrors to redirect light from a statue towards a nearby plinth, activating a trapdoor…

Many developers and publishers have expressed their support for the Black Lives Matter movement this month, along with pledging donations to it, the NAACP, and other related causes. Events and announcements have also been moved back to draw attention to the protests that have been occurring in the US, as well as internationally. On May 25, George Floyd died after police officer Derek Chauvin kneeled on his neck for more than eight minutes. Floyd’s death, which was recorded, sparked protests that spread across the US and beyond, with millions marching to demand an end to unjust, racist systems. SOME GAME UPDATES HAVE ALSO BEEN DELAYED DUE TO THE CIRCUMSTANCES Within the games industry, EA was one of the first to address the protests – five days in – delaying a…

An enormous caterpillar has taken up residence in the waste disposal sector of Black Mesa. Unlike many of its peers from the planet Xen, the monstrous pit worm cannot be dislodged with machine-gun fire or experimental weapons. Instead, like the toxic materials that used to occupy this space, it must be flushed: first by turning the main pressure valve, then by hitting the emergency override button on the primary pump’s gearbox. Valve and Gearbox. It’s Gearbox Software’s Hideo Kojima moment; an early effort to establish its own authorial voice, and to list its name among the greats. For a few years after Half-Life: Opposing Force, the studio’s name would continue to follow Valve’s, on another two expansion packs, and in the credits of Counter-Strike. But even then, a distinct identity…

Two armies hold opposing ends of a battlefield. The sun’s out – it’s a nice day for a fight – and in the background sits a city, nestled behind stalwart walls. It’s the calm before A Total War Saga: Troy’s storm, but any second now a man dressed up as a bull is going to start massacring my poor troops. At least I’ve got Achilles on my side, and hopefully he’s packed some reinforced sandals. Troy’s legendary leaders are extremely gifted in combat and the echo of the fantastical stuff established in Warhammer continues here, but the heroes’ abilities are less magical, and they’re less of the big nuclear threat than their predecessors. While they aren’t quite as supernaturally gifted as their cousins in other Total Wars, they still sit…

I SCAN THE HORIZON UNTIL THE BEAM LANDS ON A LUMBERING GIANT IN THE MIST The night fog is thick as I drive towards Windland Plains in my borrowed company hatchback, its engine rattling so loud I can hardly hear the radio. A few feet in front of the windscreen, my headlights cast a sodium haze. Any further, and the weather reduces everything to shapes in the darkness. Perfect conditions for monster hunting, then. Well… I say ‘hunting’. Don’t expect the thrills of Capcom’s monster hit here. The wyverns and colossi you encounter in Titan Chaser don’t present any threat, and your interactions never get any more violent than shining a spotlight in their general direction. You play, essentially, as a supernatural park ranger, keeping an eye on these titans…

BOTCHLING Botchlings are deformed fetuses born from miscarried babies not given a proper burial. In Family Matters, you have the choice to either kill the being, or try to turn it into a kindly guardian spirit called a Lubberkin. WRAITH It’s likely you’ll hear one of these before you see them: They’re known to scream in pain and linger in places special to them in life. These spirits remain due to a sense of being wronged, driven by an eternal anger. SIREN These adept hunters are known to use their bodies to seduce sailors before killing them with razor-sharp talons. Legend has it they weren’t always hostile: it’s said that Sirens once accepted the courtship of men.…

Underwater levels in games can make you flounder. Weird water physics, breath timers, and clunky character movements have historically made submerged worlds daunting. But Giant Squid’s subaquatic adventure ABZÛtakes all that away, turning even the clumsiest of player inputs into the graceful movements of an aqua-dancer. It’s an effortless, relaxing adventure that makes you feel totally at home in its aquatic world. ABZÛis a wordless story set within the depths of the ocean. You play as a diver who’s helping restore life back to parts of the sea that are decaying. As you delve deeper, you’ll begin to unravel the mysteries of an ancient civilisation and start to understand the diver’s origins. The game has moments of quiet reflection, rushes of action, and playful interactions that use its underwater world…

VENDORS PLY THEIR TRADE, ILLUMINATED BY THE GAUDY LIGHT OF NEON SIGNS When it comes to virtual tourism, it’s hard to beat the atmospheric streets of Sleeping Dogs’ Hong Kong. It’s at once an authentic snapshot of a unique and historic city, and a kind of exaggerated martial arts flick soundstage writ impossibly large. On hazy streets, market vendors ply their trade, illuminated by the gaudy light of countless neon signs above. Cars honk their way along clogged roads, towered over by forests of skyscrapers. A world gorgeous enough to simply stroll through, transporting yourself to another place – but also dynamic enough to sprint and leap across for yet another parkour chase, scattering crowds and plates of street-dumplings like John Woo doves. Not bad for a studio based in…

Many fervent Dark Souls fans have written off Dark Souls II as an accident. But, in the words of Bob Ross who’d no doubt look over Medula with a tear in his eye, the sun setting over an endless sea, bathing the ruins of a once proud civilisation in golden light: it’s a happy accident. Dark Souls II has all the ‘serious’ series staples, of course. There are ruined castles, dead kings, piles of lore implying terrible histories of avarice and sorrow. But in contrast with those expectations, Dark Souls II folds in endless absurdity, humour, and creativity, particularly in its boss design. This is a grim fantasy world, but it’s one that never takes itself too seriously, which is why I remember more of Dark Souls II beat-by-beat than…

EVERY MISSION FELT LIKE A REAL JOURNEY, WITH ALL SORTS OF DIVERSIONS Fast travel is ubiquitous in open world games. I get why – it’s a time-saver in an industry more packed with massive games than ever. But I think it also undermines the scale of these virtual realms. More and more I find myself swearing off using it completely. Riding across the dunes of Assassin’s Creed Origins, I experienced so much more of a genuine sense of place than I would have zipping around the map. I came to learn the geography and its landmarks, and every mission felt like a real journey, with all sorts of diversions and twists along the way as I stumbled into other events and sidequests. Give it a try, next time you pick…

To Sebastian, the singing crab from The Little Mermaid: I dispute your claim that life is better, under the sea. I’ve been down there, just now, fleeing from soggy horrors in the creepy Swallow the Sea, and frankly I’m relieved to find myself back on dry land. You play as a little cell that levels up by swallowing orange, blobby things, before using your newfound power to smash through barriers, and reach new parts of the world. You’ll do this a fair few times, gathering even more blobby things, and breaking down bigger barriers, all the while increasing in presence until you resemble a human embryo encased in a bubble. Generally, life here will either flee or make a beeline for you But the sea isn’t kind to people, even…

Professional wrestling is fascinating, isn’t it? First you think it’s real, then you think it’s fake, then you realise it’s more real than you ever imagined, in ways it’s hard to comprehend. The injuries are legit. Real-life feuds spill over into storylines. The most talented people in the business are the ones that don’t hurt their opponents. And the only thing weirder than sports entertainment itself are the games that feature it. There’s always that sense that you’re not actually playing a game Like many of the titles that preceded it, WWE 2K20 aims to walk the top rope, ’Taker-style, between being a competitive fighting game and a means of simulating the spectacle of the real thing. And there are moments when it feels right – times when you pull…

When searching for a cricket tie-in, it’s tempting to go back to Ashes Cricket 2013, a game so heinous that all trace of it has been scrubbed from Steam. But Cricket 19 is good, and something of an antidote to a summer spent without the reassuring crack of leather on willow. There’s enough depth for tactical play and the systems feel intuitive. But my favourite thing is how long it takes. Even the short form version of the game, Twenty20, will eat up a significant portion of an evening, and that’s widely considered a reductive coin-toss by Test Match purists. This doesn’t feel like a finessed, big-budget release, but the love for the sport is evident in every meandering over. 80…

ROBIN VALENTINE THIS MONTH Discovered how hellish public transport can be. ALSO PLAYED Middle-earth: Shadow of War, Blood Bowl 2 There’s a strange idea in PC gaming that all games should strive for balance. A good game, conventional wisdom goes, is one in which every option feels as viable as any other, and everything is kept neatly in its place. ‘Broken’ is a dirty word. But in actuality, not only is balance ephemeral – far more about psychology than any kind of objective truth – it’s not always the path to fun. Slay the Spire is a perfect example of a game that understands that. On its face, it’s a card-based roguelike about building the most efficient deck you can. But in order to beat its toughest challenges, efficiency isn’t…

BEWITCHING BOONS 1 Every weapon and armour set has up to three slots for enchantments. You’re awarded one enchantment point with each level you gain and you can invest them in various abilities that can be upgraded twice to increase their power. SCRAP HEAP 2 When you find better gear, salvage the weapons and armour you no longer need. Not only does this restore your previously spent enchantment points on the old items, but you’ll also get emeralds to put towards something new. PAUSE FOR THOUGHT 3 Note: The action doesn’t stop if you’re tinkering with your inventory mid-level, even if you’re playing an offline game. So, either restrict your tweaking to your camp or make sure you’ve cleared the surrounding area of nefarious creepers first. ARTEFACTING 4 Artefacts are…

The A46 IN EUROTRUCK SIMULATOR Enjoy the wonderful sights and sounds of this historic motorway from the comfort of your own truck! It’s the kind of spectacle only virtual worlds can provide. Blight Town IN DARK SOULS Take a romantic stroll across the rickety scaffolding as the sun sets through a tiny, tiny sliver over a gleaming poison swamp. See if you can spot a thrumming cloud of beautiful chaos mosquitos! Rapture IN BIOSHOCK Get closer to ocean life than you ever thought possible – and a bracing swim is only ever an airlock away. Plus, you know what’s cooler than axe-throwing? Bee-throwing! Xen FROM HALF-LIFE Teeming with incredible local fauna, this exotic alien dimension makes for an unforgettable trip! Make sure to tip your floating space baby before you…