The next The Sims game could have online elements, EA say

Don’t panic. Or don’t get too excited, depending on your opinions on the long-dead The Sims Online from 2002. During a recent earnings call, EA’s CEO Andrew Wilson alludes to experimenting with social and competitive elements in a future Sims game but the word “MMO” was definitely not mentioned. Instead he says that “this notion of social interactions and competition […] will start to become a part of The Sims experience in the years to come.”

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Inkle Studios' next game is an Arthurian story

Early this month, the studio behind the archaeological language adventure Heaven’s Vault tweeted out seven words teasing their next project. At the time, the story-focused Inkle Studios had only this to share: “swords, anguish, Britain, unrequited, forests, hope, and revenge.” As of today we’ve still got no imagery to go with all the teasing but we do have some more words and they’re much less abstract this time.

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Flashpoint launcher is saving Flash games from impending extinction

We’ve known about Adobe’s plans to kill of Flash for years now. Back in 2017 Alice O shouted off a list of memorable Flash games and it’s telling that I’ve an entirely list in my head (as do all of you) of games that it will be a shame to lose. Fortunately there are enough preservationists here in the wilds of The Internet looking to keep an archive of what was, even the wonky ones. Flashpoint is a launcher preserving all the old games and animations built in Flash before Adobe trashes support this year.

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Blizzard own your Warcraft 3: Reforged custom maps, but that's no surprise

It’s come to everyone’s attention that Blizzard have revamped their User Generated Content policy just in time to launch Warcraft 3: Reforged, and claim ownership of all maps made in its editor. The new legalese, while definitely overbearing and disappointing, shouldn’t be a surprise: they started tightening legal claims years ago with StarCraft II.

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Shelter developers will beta test their new “tiny MORPG” this summer

The folks who’ve brought you all those cute animal parent games: Shelter, Shelter 2, Paws, Meadow and the lot, revealed last year that they have something new in the works (aside from the planned Shelter 3). Might and Delight’s “tiny MORPG” is called Book Of Travels and is planned as a “unique social roleplaying experience” somewhat in the vein of the studio’s multiplayer experiments in Meadow. After being successfully crowdfunded, they are looking forward to beta testing starting this summer and an early access release for the autumn.

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Crusader Kings 3 introduces us to new Lifestyles, and brings back some favourites

A new Crusader Kings 3 video developer diary explains how Lifestyles are going to work in this third instalment of the series. It’s a new and improved system that’s pretty different from Crusader Kings 2 – featuring proper skill trees so you can better shape your character to be the way you want them to be.

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Get ready for a scrap in hoverbike shooter Disintegration when the open beta starts today

Disintegration, the upcoming game from V1 Interactive about flying around and shooting people on a tricked out hoverbike called a “gravcycle”, goes into open beta today. Lead by Marcus Lehto of Halo fame, the developers are inviting as many players as they can to come and test their game. With two modes and seven gravcycle crews on offer, it’s a chance to get your hands on it for a short time before it releases later in the year.

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Disco Elysium’s Hardcore Mode is just one way games can meaningfully explore poverty

Last week, the haunting and hilarious Disco Elysium added an extra difficulty setting called ‘Hardcore True Detective Mode’. On the surface, it seems like a fairly standard set of tweaked parameters. More demanding dice roles to shaft dear old Harry Du Bois at every opportunity.

If you take time to read the update notes though, it becomes clear that these new changes are storytelling devices as much as adjusted sliders. Since there are no monsters to make tougher, it’s your wallet and psyche that take the hits. It’s had me thinking about how ZA/UM’s surrealist cop odyssey, and other games, express poverty through their systems. Games that invert the traditional power curve of farmhand to godhood, or make us try twice as hard to get half as far. Far from being a detached add-on, the update is a deft application of mechanics-as-metaphor that wouldn’t work if desperation, isolation, poverty, and addiction weren’t already stitched deep into the fabric of Disco Elysium’s fiction.

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How Legends of Runeterra's rounds work

Rounds in Legends of Runeterra are perhaps the most complicated thing to get your head around. It relies on understanding the logic behind how spells resolve, when you can play certain cards, and actions that can take place during combat phases. A lot of how Runeterra works is dependent on understanding a concept Magic players would be familiar with. Let us guide you through how turns work in Runeterra.

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Discord ditches some underused features to stay “fast and clean”

Since it first launched years ago as the Skype-killer app for Twitch streamers and gaming communities, VOIP and group chat app Discord has hulked up. New features are constantly in the works like sorting servers you’ve joined into folders, an overlay for seeing your voice chat while in-game, and plenty of other big ticket features. Like any widely-used app that reigns over a relative lack of competition (lookin’ at you, Steam) some features just don’t survive contact with users and need to be culled (lookin’ at you, Steam). Discord threw two such underutilised bits in the bin this week.

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The Final Fantasy VII Remake hype is real

Listen, we all know that Final Fantasy VIII is the best Final Fantasy, but even I, Squall Fangirl #1, has to admit that the recent Final Fantasy VIII Remastered port wasn’t everything I hoped it would be. What I’ve been itching for all these years is a proper Final Fantasy VIII Remake in the style of the upcoming Final Fantasy VII Remake – although by the time Square Enix finally finish making the latter, I’ll probably be old and grey and too decrepit to play video games anymore.

Still, while a FFVIII Remake is the thing I live in hope for, by golly does the new four-minute trailer for its wildly popular predecessor look exciting. There’s Red XIII! Cross-dressing Cloud! Hojo! Some questionable dialogue! Lots of horrible Shinra execs! Summons! More of that gorgeous battle music! And someone called Aerith? Time to get HYPED.

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Legends of Runeterra patch notes

As with many collectible card games, Legends of Runeterra is one that is going to see updates, lots of updates. So in order to keep up with all the changes that will be made to the game, I will be looking over the changes that are being made when every Runeterra patch note post is released and seeing where the biggest changes are going to be.

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Video games to play on Brexit Day

I did not expect that I would ever Google something like “will Big Ben bong?” in service to an article for RPS, and yet here we are – and it turns out it will not. The big B day has arrived, not with a bong but a whimper. It’s a sore subject for a lot of us (stuff disappearing off of Netflix; my partner is European and won’t have to queue as long at airports), a genuinely frightening one for others (unknown economic impact; forced repatriation).

As in most times of stress, I turn to video games for both a distraction from and mirror to life. I don’t even mean obviously Brexit-y things like Not Tonight or Spinnortality. There are many games notionally unrelated to today that nonetheless feel apposite to play. Here are a few that I thought of.

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