Innholdsfortegnelse for October 2020 i PC Gamer

There are a lot of now familiar trappings to the RPG genre, but the core of the experience isn’t really loot, or spells, or even XP. Great role-playing games are about choice – the freedom to inhabit a character and do what you want to do in their world. Few developers understand that like Divinity Original Sin creator Larian Studios, a developer so much in ascendance that they’re almost in orbit. Its worlds are defined not by their lore, but by the grand scope of their interactivity. So how could we not be excited for its most ambitious project yet, Baldur’s Gate III? So much so that we’ve been to hell and back to bring you our cover feature… ROBIN VALENTINE Specialist in Dungeons, but not dragons Twitter @robinlvalentine This…

HIGHS The Witcher: Blood Origins Netflix is making a Witcher prequel series set 1,200 years before Geralt was born. Rocket League Car football is going free-to-play via the Epic Games Store. Minecraft Players have unearthed the seed for the world from the title screen: 2151901553968352745 LOWS Twitch The US Army started streaming on Twitch and violated the rules with a fake giveaway. Half-Life 3 Before Valve settled on Alyx, it scrapped five Half-Life projects, including a Half-Life 3. Assassin’s Creed Ubisoft sidelined Assassin’s Creed’s female characters because former creative boss Serge Hascoët didn’t think women would sell.…

At one point while making Halo 3, every day map designer Steve Cotton came into work, multiplayer map lead Chris Carney would start playing Yub Nub, the Ewok song from the end of Star Wars: Return of the Jedi. Cotton was pitching a map built from floating platforms in a giant forest, which eventually became Guardian. “It was every time, without fail,” Cotton remembers with a laugh. For awhile, one of Halo 3’s best maps would be nicknamed Jub-Jub. With Halo 3’s recent launch on PC as part of The Master Chief Collection, PC gamers can finally play the best incarnation of Halo’s multiplayer. Even 13 years later, many of its maps hold up as some of the best play spaces in FPS history. It was also the first time…

71% ULTIMA VII An RPG as dense as it was sprawling, in which every object could be manipulated – as could some of the NPCs. 20% ULTIMA UNDERWORLD The proto-immersive sim was a tactile physics sandbox that informed Larian’s approach to world design. 5% CELTIC LEGENDS An ancient Amiga game in which wizards could instantly transport their troops, leading to Original Sin’s teleportation. 4% CASINO GAMES When a German publisher went bust, Larian resorted to work-for-hire to survive and learned how to keep loot distribution compulsive.…

THIS IS AN IMPOSSIBLY GORGEOUS PRODUCTION FOR SUCH A SMALL TEAM Redwall is a wonderful series of children’s books, fusing woodland creatures with medieval fantasy. But author Brian Jacques was against videogames, which meant playing in that universe was strictly confined to wheeling around the garden between chapters. By now, though, all the kids who grew up on those novels are old enough to make their own. I’d wager that MonteBearo, the two-man outfit behind Banners of Ruin, spent their childhood visiting the same library shelves I did. And I’d be willing to put down cold hard cash that they’ve spent more recent years in the same corners of the Steam library I frequent now. The result is a roguelike deckbuilding tactics game – think Slay the Spire with a…

PC ports of Decima Engine games are a bit like buses. Except, of course, they’re absolutely not. Sure, you might have waited impatiently for Horizon Zero Dawn and Death Stranding to show up on a rig near you, but now that both are here, these big-budget open world games are obviously nothing like sweaty forms of public transport. Despite sharing the same genre, these PS4 hits also offer polar opposite experiences. A dystopian videogame that says something original about armageddon Longtime PlayStation collaborator Guerrilla Games developed the engine behind both sandbox smashes, yet that’s where the comparisons end. Death Stranding is a technical triumph, but it’s also an example of a Hideo Kojima game at its most indulgent. Undeniably interesting, hugely silly, and often as boring as it is weirdly…

Part puzzle game, part god game, all extremely weird, Paper Beastis unlike anything I’ve played before. A dedicated virtual reality experience, it puts you at the centre of a unique wildlife simulation where the animals are not flesh and fur, but paper origami creatures roaming a harsh desert world. It’s a fascinating and surprisingly emotional experience, albeit one that only scratches the surface of its potential. Paper Beast is broken up into two distinct halves, starting with its story mode. The precise nature of that story is open to interpretation, but your fundamental role in the game is that of a fickle god, acting varyingly as a helping hand and an agent of chaos to the animals roaming its world. The game’s eight chapters are divided into several individual scenes,…

You may be dodging spikes, whacking enemies, or clearing gaps in a platform game, but it matters howyou do it, how the character feels as you fling them around the world. I’m happy to report that the violinist in Symphoniais generally a joy to control, leaping about the place with grace, and with a couple of moves that feel fresh, even in such a well-trammelled genre. It’s a music-themed platformer set in a sumptuous concert hall, stuffed with platforms and spikes that will kill you in one hit. There are no enemies to fight, but the later jumping challenges are difficult, requiring masterful use of your high jump and wall-hanging powers. While we’ve seen these in countless platformers before, they work differently here, in ways that will test your coordination…

Combining teenage awkwardness with the ability to control time should be a disaster. Most of us would never reach 20, endlessly retrying every mangled interaction with people we secretly like. The years would roll by, but we’d be trapped in bodies that replaced aching joints with warbling voices. Life is Strange, then, feels like a reminder that while our flesh turns to dust we can at least find solace in the fact we’re no longer at school. At times it feels like teen angst written by middle-aged men The first experience of academia in Life is Strange is like a prison for the achingly hip. There’s the scheming preppie it-girl, a bullied Christian, and a suspiciously-handsome teacher whom one of the developers likely modelled on himself. At times it feels…

There’s a feeling you get in games that feature dialogue choices when you pick your response and you can already hear the rote, functional words in your head before they waft out of your speakers. Oxenfree isn’t like that. I’m always surprised by the inventive, well-acted ways characters express themselves, but I still get the sense I’m in control. It’s also rather nice to play something slow after The Binding of RSI-saac – and Oxenfree is very slow. It does mean I take the time to soak up all the arresting island vistas. But I’d be lying if I said I didn’t tentatively tease the keyboard hoping to discover a run button, which feels like adding squeezy cheese sauce to a filet mignon steak.…

You may have missed it, but for the third time in its existence phone company Apple is moving its desktop computers to a new CPU architecture. This time, from the Intel X86-64 chips it moved to in 2006/7 and with which we’re familiar with from our PCs, to its own designs based on the ARM chips we’re familiar with from our smartphones and tablets. The move has been mooted for a while, dating back to 2009 when Apple bought processor company PA Semi to develop chips for its iPods and iPhones, starting with the 800MHz, single-core, A4 chip in the 2010 iPhone 4 and first-generation iPad. Since then, the power of the chips has grown hugely, with the 2011 iPhone 4S (Apple A5, dual-core, 1GHz) showing a 68 percent gain…

ROBIN VALENTINE THIS MONTH Remembered how much I love graph paper. ALSO PLAYED Alder’s Blood, Tabletop Simulator For years, I just assumed Legend of Grimrock wasn’t for me. That unnatural, grid-based movement! Weird real-time combat, where you have to awkwardly dance around enemies! That’s too old school even for my sensibilities. It took James’ impassioned arguments for the series in last month’s Top 100 deliberations to make me finally reconsider and give it a try. Lo and behold, it might be my favourite game I’ve played this year – not despite those eccentricities, but largely because of them. The entire game takes place in one sprawling dungeon, full of monsters, traps, and puzzles. It’s an incredible space, intricately designed and a joy to explore. Countless secrets to discover turn a…

I don’t feel nostalgia for many things, but when I fire up HeroQuest and the music suddenly flips into Golden Brown (imagine being a composer, told you only have 30 kilobytes for your entire musical score and thinking, “Cool, that means I can fit this harpsichord solo by The Stranglers in”), I feel a full-blown Proustian rush. The ad for the board game version of HeroQuest has the same effect. Like a whole generation of baby dorks I saw those kids saying “I’ll use my broadsword” and “Fire of Wrath!” and immediately asked my parents to buy it for me when Christmas rolled around. Then I played it with my parents, my friends and my babysitter until everyone was thoroughly bored. Even my babysitter didn’t want to play it any…

WARHAMMER: VERMINTIDE 2  vermintide.com I will never stop banging on about this underrated co-op gem. Not only the best modern successor to Left 4 Dead, but it also nails the grim silliness of the Warhammer Fantasy setting like no other game. Rich melee combat and pleasing character variety keep me coming back again and again. LEGENDS OF RUNETERRA  playruneterra.com Stop making yourself miserable in Hearthstoneand come play a properly fun CCG where you can build the decks you want to build without emptying your wallet. Matches are clever and exciting, full of brain-teasing back-and-forths. And the business model, doing away with random packs, is a breath of fresh air. MONSTER TRAIN  themonstertrain.com Without a doubt Slay the Spire is still the king of card-based roguelikes. But if, like me, you’ve…

WITH A FEW MONTHS TO GO, VALHALLA CLEARLY NEEDS SOME MORE POLISH I almost dropped my controller in a panic when a nun pulled a sword on me. Maybe I should’ve seen it coming – she was praying in a field of corpses. But I wasn’t ready for her to charge me, shouting about chastising sinners. Two hours into my demo, Assassin’s Creed Valhalla finally surprised me. That fight was the first ‘world event’ I ran into in Valhalla, shorter and simpler than a sidequest, but also more fun, because I had no idea it was coming. Completing world events is a new way Valhalla rewards you skill points to level up Viking assassin Eivor. As Ubisoft continues to turn Assassin’s Creed into an RPG series, more focused on story…

INSTANT GRATIFICATION IS THE ORDER OF THE DAY COMPARED TO THE PREVIOUS GAMES In Project CARS’ past, extreme detail was championed. You could press a button for ‘engine on’, pirouette like an ice dancer on the first corner due to too-cold tyres, and even start a gruelling career in karting, with the dream of one day making it into the equivalent series of F1. Well, forget all that; Project CARS 3 is a game. The presentation is uncharacteristically flashy, oddly reminiscent of the likes of Asphalt 9 on iOS, with lots of XP bars and circles filling up and expanding colour bars that transition nicely into menu screens, giving everything a very modern and slick sheen. Instant gratification is the order of the day compared to the previous games’ long-haul…

YOU’VE ARRIVED IN A NEW TOWN WITH NOTHING BUT THE CLOTHES ON YOUR BACK This creature collection adventure was first announced back in 2016 and many quickly fell in love with its echoes of Pokémon, Animal Crossing, and Stardew Valley. Now it’s finally out, as an Epic Games Store exclusive and currently in the platform’s version of Early Access – and it’s been worth the wait. After spending time with the characters and critters of Ooblets – crafting, gardening, dance battling, and so on – I’ve fallen deeply into the gentle rhythms and daily happenings in the world of Oob. It starts out like many life-sims do: you’ve arrived in a new town with nothing but the clothes on your back, hoping for a fresh start. Life in the sleepy…

The 1994 adventure game Beneath A Steel Sky was considered quite good (like 91 percent good), and to call it fondly remembered would be an understatement. A collaboration between Revolution Software and comic-book artist Dave Gibbons, it addressed social divides, consumerism, and totalitarian control through pointing, clicking, and solving puzzles. And now, in 2020 of all years, it gets a sequel. Like something from monstrous episode of Black Mirror The last time protagonist Robert Foster was in Union City it was under the benevolent authority of his pal Joey. Ten years later, he’s dragged back to find it’s now under the control of The Council, and that everyone is really happy. They’ve got to be, because their lives hang on their Qdos scores. It’s nudge theory run rampant, as things…

Taking away some of the complexities seen in other JRPGS, Fae Tactics is a stripped down and faster experience than classics like Final Fantasy Tactics. From the outset, the game lays out building blocks that most strategy players are familiar with: elemental rock-paper-scissors, creature collecting, and combo attacks. Fae Tactics lets you get comfortable in a routine for a few battles, then upsets that routine with novel threats. This less-is-more approach does fit well with the flow of combat Some of these challenges were painful the first time I encountered them as heroine Peony, resulting in difficult battles if I didn’t adapt my party composition or tactics. Other times, I found ways to turn enemies’ traps against them. Once I encountered a gremlin operating a cannon covering the bridge over…

There’s no overwrought origin story to Carrion’s horror. There’s a monster. The monster eats those people. The monster does not like getting shot by the people so it should probably eat people before they shoot it. You’re the monster, and this is Carrion’s tutorial sequence, which introduces smooth controls that propel the creature through a dank underground laboratory. As I direct it, it attaches its tentacles to surfaces with no interference or complication, evoking a feeling of flight. It’s with that same streamlined gusto that Carrionpursues all its mechanics. The game is a metroidvania in concept, but the espresso shot version of one, without offering much of the way in actual exploration. You move the monster throughout the base, seeking simply to get outside, growing larger by absorbing biomass (eating…

After getting a veggie patch of my own in real life I’ve finally figured out why every farming game begins with mastering turnips – it’s because they really are quick and easy to grow. And while you’ll never be able to make a living off of them like you can in Story Of Seasons: Friends Of Mineral Town, at least the real ones have some flavour. Things kick off with a letter from a distant mayor and before you know it you’ve taken over your dead grandfather’s dilapidated farm and are desperately trying to scrounge for berries in the wild to afford your all important turnip seeds. There’s a town filled with people to woo, events to attend, and even a mine to explore. Sound familiar? This is the inspiration…

I’ve never played a game set in the city where I live until Necrobarista, which takes place in Melbourne, Australia. It’s not Australian in obvious ways, but it turns dead outlaw Ned Kelly into a supernatural enforcer in shorts and a Collingwood scarf who menaces a cafe, and expects you to realise that’s funny. If a New York show wants me to know bodegas and Tompkins Square Park, a Melbourne game can get away with referencing Collingwood. Necrobaristais a visual novel about the Terminal cafe, whose customers include ghosts and the living. It’s a space between the afterlife and Carlton, where the dead have bodies and a 24-hour-limit before moving on. People overstay that limit, but doing so runs up a debt the Terminal is supposed to pay off. Its…

Dark Souls but sci-fi. Dark Souls but 2D. Dark Souls but rubbish. I do enjoy a good Dark Souls clone, and here’s another in Tyrant’s Realm, which is Dark Souls, but made for the PS1. Not literally, obviously, but this retro-styled action game is surprisingly convincing, boasting the jagged polygonal look, the slightly awkward combat system, and even the level design of a 32-bit game. The only thing letting it down is the framerate, which is disappointingly rock-solid, as smooth as velvet. Real PS1 games ran at 14fps, and we loved every chunky second. Similar to Souls, you’ll biff baddies in third-person as you explore a medieval prison, stopping occasionally to chug a potion. Combat’s impactful, if perhaps a bit too simple and let down by a dodgy camera –…

Just as I tried to tiptoe through Life is Strange without offending anyone, I’m trying a pacifist run of Undertale. I regret nothing. Who’d think twice about heckling a comedy chicken until it gives up and goes away? Or flirting with a skeleton so hard that we end up going on the sort of date that makes you wince at strangers when you remember it years later? It makes me wish more games offered me the chance to have awkward conversations with monsters. Refusing to attack anyone in Undertale is like trying to use Twitter without getting into any arguments, in that it involves constant avoidance and the overwhelming urge to use physical violence. Unlike Twitter, however, it feels rich, productive, rewarding. A pacifist run is also a wonderful way…

Some games are for Friday nights: sweaty handed, sugar-enhanced acts of defiance against the encroaching Saturday morning. But Ni No Kuni is made for crisp Sunday meandering – the genteel, adventurous background to a day spent doing as little as possible. The systems are old fashioned, the story is familiar, the puzzles practically non-existent. But it’s so bright and beautiful and uplifting it barely matters.…

1 GO NUTS ARM’s first chips went into the Acorn and BBC computers of the 1980s and let you play Granny’s Garden. 2 NICE AS PI Single-board computers love ARM chips, such as this Raspberry Pi 2 B with its 32bit ARMv7 Broadcom BCM2836. 3 AGENT OF SHIELD This is the Tegra K1 from the Nvidia Shield Tablet. It’s got a 32bit Cortex-A15 clocked up to 2.3GHz. 4 FORBIDDEN FRUIT Here’s an artist’s impression of the A12Z Bionic from Twitter user@EveryApplePro.…

RACHEL WATTS THIS MONTH Went through about 50 rolls of film. ALSO PLAYED Ooblets, Hades When it comes to playing games, I’m a screenshot hoarder. I can’t resist stopping to snap a beautiful landscape or pausing to nab a well-timed dynamic moment. I’ll play any game that indulges my screenshot obsession, and when it comes to taking pics, Umurangi Generationis as indulgent as a chocolate bubble bath. This stylish first-person photography game lets you run around a futuristic city, snapping and editing pictures as you go. You’re given a set of photo objectives to complete, but you also have the freedom to take a few – or a lot – of your own shots. You can take pictures from multiple angles, switch through different camera lenses, and experiment with image…

TUNNEL VISION 1 If you’re tempted to save the main missions until you’ve completed all available side deliveries, don’t. Sticking with the central story until at least chapter three will give you important gear that’ll make the side stuff much easier to complete. REST STOP 2 From keeping you upright as you stroll to protect your precious cargo to giving the energy to escape BTs or Mules, stamina is extremely important. You can top it up by resting in a private room or drinking from your canteen. WELL SPOTTED 3 Make good use of your binoculars, especially when you’re about to traverse a troublesome area so you can plan the safest route. Use the rangefinder to measure cliffs and slopes, so you know where to stick a handy ladder or…

The Xbox Games Showcase was as much a PC event as it was a showcase of what’s coming to the Xbox Series X. Plenty of games were shown off that we’ll soon get our hands on, and while Microsoft didn’t make a great case for getting the new console, it definitely made a great one for Xbox Game Pass and its PC counterpart. MANY OF THE MOST EXCITING REVEALS CAME WITH ZERO DETAILS Microsoft gave us a look at five games from Xbox Games Studios and nine Xbox exclusives, and all of them will launch on Xbox Game Pass on day one. The subscription service will soon encompass three platforms and straddle two generations, and while we shouldn’t expect complete parity between all platforms, it’s likely we’ll keep getting big…

THE STUDIO HAS FOUND CRITICAL ACCLAIM AND COMMERCIAL SUCCESS WITHOUT COMPROMISE The 1980s were a halcyon age for playground liars, yet to be thwarted by the instantaneous fact-checking power of the internet. Some claimed they had an uncle at Nintendo; Swen Vincke’s friend made up a computer game where you could do anything. He spun a tale about a D&D-style adventure on which he had met an AI character who could not only speak, but respond to questions. “He was having me on,” Vincke remembers, “but I believed him.” Even once the deception was revealed, Vincke couldn’t let go of the game that had been planted in his head, like one of Baldur’s Gate III’s brain tadpoles. He clung to the dream for years, until he discovered Ultima VII. “There…

When I first played Star Renegades towards the end of last year, I was charmed by its looks and mind-bending combat. But what I didn’t get a sense of was quite how ambitious it was going to be. After a couple of hours with a far more complete build, I’m struck by how many different things it now squeezes into its roughly roguelike structure. The things that impressed me before are better than ever now. The pixelart graphics, with their slick lighting effects and flashy animations, are a joy in motion. And the combat – which uses a timeline of events where attacks happen at different points, allowing you to interrupt and counter enemy actions before they happen – is tactical and satisfying. I expected they’d slot into a fairly…

Go to hell,” says Gale. The usually cocksure wizard and optional player character of Baldur’s Gate III stares down the flames of the party’s campfire. This is a man whose leather-bound chest conceals a Netherese Destruction Orb which, given time to count down, will produce a nuclear-level explosion, ripping him apart – yet he still gets up every morning to turn a phrase and find his next spell. Tonight, though, he’s brooding. The events of the last three days have given even him cause for concern. “Go to hell,” he repeats. “It’s an everyday expression. So trivial it’s almost meaningless. But we’ve seen hell. It’s real, and it isn’t trivial.” Like the rest of the party, Gale has endured a kidnapping. He has survived the crash of a flying slave…

It’s best when Death Stranding shuts up. Being a game by Hideo Kojima, it’s naturally filled with bizarre characters, lengthy screeds of exposition, and indulgent cutscenes. But it’s in the long, quiet stretches between all this, when it’s just you hiking alone across a stark, haunting post-apocalyptic wilderness, where it really shines. In these moments, Death Stranding is quite unlike anything I’ve ever experienced in a game – or any other medium for that matter. That’s not to say there’s no value in the plot. When you’re not being bombarded with backstory, it’s pretty interesting – and deeply weird. You are Sam Porter Bridges, a courier delivering cargo across what’s left of the United States. A supernatural cataclysm called the Death Stranding has driven the last of humanity underground, leaving…

Being an F1 driver must mean a lot of weight to carry on your shoulders. When thousands of hours have been poured into crafting your race car, imagine having to face your boss after shoving it in the wall on lap one. Well… what if you are the boss? F1 2020lets you be driver and manager of your own team, so you can ignore your own inadequacy and instead punish disgruntled aerodynamic staff by closing their R&D department. There are moments of genuine edge-of-your-bucket-seat excitement The F1series has offered comparable depth in its career mode for a few years now, but creating and managing your own team really does make a difference to the emotional attachment you’ll feel. From press interview answers and sponsor choice to how you fill the…

I wish it wasn’t so hard to find a mellow multiplayer shooter. All of my current favourites are these competitive tactical skirmishes that tense up my entire body. I want more of the opposite – a laid-back shooter that goes down so smooth that eight matches can fly by before I know it. That’s not what I thought I was getting into with Rocket Arena, a shooter that presents itself like yet another contender in an increasingly crowded pile of hero-based service games. Rocket Arena gets its name from the classic Quake mod of the same name that pit players 1v1 with nothing but rocket launchers. Rocket Arena takes that concept and blows it up into a hero shooter built on the foundation of rockets. Final Strike has essentially deconstructed…

You will fight, you will fail, you will rise again.” This is Othercide’s motto, and it deserves credit for sticking to the bit. It doesn’t just sayit’s about a hopeless war against encroaching darkness, it commits to the theme. Othercide mixes turn-based tactical combat with the repetition and incremental progress of roguelikes. It takes the threat of losing your best soldier from XCOMand makes that threat a certainty. You will lose, and then you will try again. And again. Each time I felt like quitting, I learned a new trick that gave me an edge You are The Mother, some sort of eldritch being fighting against Suffering, with a capital ‘S’, to protect The Child, using resurrected soldiers called The Daughters. Other extremely capitalised nouns also feature heavily. It’s not…

AC/DC: Australian rock band formed by two Scots Bin chicken: Urban ibis birds, named for their love of garbage Bin juice: The liquid at the bottom of the garbage Fully: Extremely very Goon: Cheap bag-in-a-box wine Lamington: Sponge cake with chocolate and coconut Oi: Hey, but in a dickhead way Shithouse: Extremely very awful Tradie: Worker with a trade, ie not a barista Bloody: Very Cuppa: Cup of tea Dog’s dinner: A mess Durry: Cigarette…

The Binding of Isaac is like reaching inside your food recycling bin on a warm day and finding a toy trumpet nestling inside. Yes, it’s a fun surprise. But it’s also crammed with rotten flesh and maggots. Yet despite being repellent, I can’t help but toot on my offal cornet and delight as festering meat flies everywhere. Isaac is so vile that the story begins to lose all meaning. And more than this, the ‘try, die, try again’ loop is so perfectly numbing that all I can think about is the next room and the promise of a power up. Yes, I sold a child’s soul to Satan. But look at my powerful tears! Doot doot!…

ANDY KELLY THIS MONTH Couldn’t go on a real plane, so flew an imaginary one. ALSO PLAYED Yakuza Kiwami 2 Man, I really miss travelling. I miss the excitement of boarding a plane and stepping off into another country. I miss the change of scenery and drinking weird beers while heavily jet lagged. I even miss airports, although I’m not sure why. Being stuck in the UK has been the hardest part of the lockdown for me. So, really, the new Microsoft Flight Simulator couldn’t have come along at a better time. The latest version of the long-running flight sim is a remarkable technical achievement, letting you fly anywhere in the world. And that’s not an exaggeration – the entirety of the planet Earth is in the game, and can…

Even if you’ve not personally played Larian Studios’ giant RPG adventure Divinity: Original Sin II, you’ve probably seen evidence of the hectic, turn-based combat. Do screenshots of battlefields consumed by fire ring any bells? For me, the impromptu frying pan to fire situation would result in a party wipe, a reload, and an attempt to tackle the battle from a new angle with new skills, or painstakingly placed barrels of oil. Which then begets another ‘floor is lava’ situation. Whoops. Nothing evidences how much I enjoy tinkering with Original Sin II’s combat more than the fact that Steam reports my play time with the game is double what’s actually logged into my single save file. While I look longingly at Larian’s next RPG epic, Baldur’s Gate III, debating whether to…