Happy this week, all! And what a fine week it is for feeding the Maw. I've slipped on my lead-plated exosuit, stocked my enchanted utility belt with open beta announcements, and am ready to dispense some news. Here's what's coming down the games industry oesophagus in the next few days.
On Monday 24th March, it's time for Sonokuni, a biopunk 2D action game with one hit kills and time-bending. But perhaps you'd rather give wastelands a makeover in shape-matching city builder River Towns. You like building stuff but prefer card synergies to shape-matching? Here's Kingdom Of Cards then. Galloping onward to Tuesday 25th March, we discover cosmic dungeon builder The Deadly Path, a game that I think will live or die on whether one particular irritating trailer voiceover is actually representative of the writing and VA in-game.
On Wednesday 26th March, I'm out of the office, but don't let that stop you trying mech RTS Grit And Valor 1949 (pictured above), dinky ocean clean-up sim Spilled!, or procgen chaos gremlin spelunker Mother Machine. On Thursday 27th March, it's time for post-apocalyptic Lake District escapade Atomfall, noir comic adventure-puzzler Your House, the splendidly surreal ENA: Dream BBQ, and ripped anime action game The First Berserker: Khazan. And on Friday, 28th March, the launch of fancy Simslike InZoi. People who liked The Outer Worlds might prefer Within The Cosmos.
As ever, the above games are just those I have haphazardly hooked from the news chutes in my efforts to appease the Maw. There will be other new games out there in the darkness that are equally worth mention, and only you - yes, you! - can find them. Our comments thread is down the page there, sensuously entwined with this week's live news blog. Have a good one.
I'm not sure Modulus is all that novel as factory sims go, but I do like the central conceit of actually manufacturing distinct cuboid building parts for structures, rather than generic resources. It puts me in mind of Infinifactory. Also it's quite restful to the eye.
"It feels like we’ve found the first installment in a new type of game for Rebellion," says head of design Ben Fisher of the moderately decent Atomfall, which has two unannounced DLC expansions in the works.
– Edwin Evans-Thirlwell
Out today: Rain World's The Watcher expansion. I am pleased to see this unwieldy, eldritch, inimitable exploration sim getting big updates, eight years since launch.
– Edwin Evans-Thirlwell
Killzone composer Joris de Ma has tentatively called for a trilogy remaster. “I know that there have been petitions for it,” he told Videogamer. “I think it’s ricky because, I can’t speak for Guerrilla or anything… I don’t know if it will ever happen. I hope it will because I think it is quite an iconic franchise, but also I think it kind of has to take into account kind of the sensitivities and the shift in, I guess, what people want because it is quite bleak in some ways.”
– Edwin Evans-Thirlwell
SORBET FRIDAY
Hello! Hello? Due to a mixture of press events and holiday time and illness, it is possible that me and Jeremy are the only full-time RPS writers in today. Time to divide the site in half and set ourselves up as warring tyrants.
– Edwin Evans-Thirlwell
Do I know what's going on in ENA: Dream BBQ? Absolutely not. Am I massively into its mysterious, borderline Zelda: Wand of Gamelon if it was a walking simulator vibes? 100%. Chapter One just came out today, and it's free!
Bandai Namco are remastering joyful rhythm strategy games Patapon 1 and Patapon 2 for PC. These were among the PlayStation Portable's finest games and if you disagree, you can patapatapatapiss off.
– Edwin Evans-Thirlwell
Early access RPG GreedFall 2: The Dying World has been updated with a new city, Olima, aka the City of Stars, which harbours a giant observatory.
Xbox are beefing up their free-to-play "engagement" tactics by adding various in-game "benefits" to various Game Pass titles and making them easier to find in the Xbox app.
– Edwin Evans-Thirlwell
Promisingly grotty and breathless spelunker White Knuckle launches in early access on 17th April. I played a bit of the demo for this and it's got some moves.
Nintendo are doing one of their Direct showcases later today (the 27th), with a focus on releases for the original Switch rather than its forthcoming successor, which James hates because it doesn't smell as good as the Steam Deck or something. The Direct isn't strictly speaking PC relevant, of course, but there may be new PC game announcements regardless.
– Edwin Evans-Thirlwell
Tomb Raider and latterly, Perfect Dark developers Crystal Dynamics have laid off 17 "talented team members" in order "to better align our current business needs and the studio’s future success". Honestly, I think these layoff posts would go over so much better if they'd just write something like "We're really sorry but we have to let some people go for the good of our overall business." Just write them as though you were talking to/about actual human beings.
FEED THE MAW - but not after midnight. The last time I did that we lost an entire wing of the Treehouse to oily three-eyed Pac-Men.
– Edwin Evans-Thirlwell
The Witcher 4 developers are steering clear of generative AI while making the game, according to the studio's CEO - because using it would be a legal minefield, they say.
"Gen AI, to be honest, is quite tricky when it comes to legal IP ownership and so on, and many other aspects," said joint CEO of CD Projekt Michał Nowakowski during a financial call covered by PC Gamer. "So when it comes to implementation of any gen AI in the actual games, we really have nothing happening when it comes to Witcher 4 or any projects in the near future."
– Brendan Caldwell
The laughably bad AI-generated trailer for Ark Aquatica shown earlier this month was the fault of the people marketing the game, according to studio Wildcard. When asked by Aftermath whose idea it was, the developers swiftly passed the buck.
"That [trailer] was done by our marketing department," said lead game designer Matt Kohl. "They took our assets and then ran them through an AI to animate them. That was marketing. Development team did not do that, and there has been no AI use in development of Aquatica."
– Brendan Caldwell
VANILLA VEDNESDAY
Wednesday is always the hardest one to make pun. Things seem quiet today. Too quiet. FEED THE MAW.
– Brendan Caldwell
Cruelty Squad dev ConsumerSoftproducts just launched its latest glorious assault on the eyes Psycho Patrol R into early access yesterday at a price not everyone's loving, but good on 'em I say.
– Oisin Kuhnke
Here are some free anniversary parks to accompany the latest batch of Cities: Skylines DLC (they're for the original game, to be clear).
A random discovery for people who speak and read Japanese: in
Kubitori Dolls Retriever, you visit the lairs of possessed mannequins in order to recover the heads of (their?) victims.
– Edwin Evans-Thirlwell
Hark, a developer update from the Civilization 7 team. Brace for discussion of plans for: Quick Move Functionality! Additional UI Updates & Polish! Settlement & Commander Renaming! And more!
I was introduced to the idea of knickerbocker glories as a kid. In adult life I learned that "knickerbockers" are actually trousers. Now, my memories of knickerbocker glories taste weird. FEED THE MAW.
– Edwin Evans-Thirlwell
Former Warner Bros Games Seattle studios vice president Laura Fryer has published a video about recently-closed Monolith, discussing various cancelled Batman and Lord Of The Rings projects together with the creation of Shadow Of Mordor's Nemesis system (a deliberate bid to stop people trading the game in, apparently, by making them bond with the Orcs).
Today marks the 10th birthday of Bloodborne. Please can we have a PC version Sony so that I can discourse unto the kids about the Nightmare Frontier.
– Edwin Evans-Thirlwell
Did you play the 2021 Myst remake? It's just been updated with a new mountainous Rime area, first seen in 2000's realMyst. Ta, PCG.
– Edwin Evans-Thirlwell
Hollow Knight: Silksong's Steam page has been updated, changing the Team Cherry copyright from 2019 to 2025. Rumours continue to swirl that it'll be trailered at the next Nintendo Direct in April, but I've been down this road before. They're only going to hurt us again.
– Edwin Evans-Thirlwell
Manky medieval colony sim Norlands is getting what is deservedly described as "a damn big update". Brendy wrote about this last year, recounting his adventures with a deranged and lascivious cleric. Brendy, where are you? BRENDY HELP THE CHANGELOG IS EATING ME.
– Edwin Evans-Thirlwell
Unity have a 2025 state of the industry report that somewhat ambiguously "draws on numerous polls and surveys conducted by third-party agencies and by the Unity team at major industry events such as GDC and Gamescom in 2024, alongside unique data from nearly five million Unity Engine developers." Among the highlights we find the claim that 64% of respondents are "working on networked multiplayer or couch co-op".
– Edwin Evans-Thirlwell
As reported by IGN, Minecraft vanilla executive producer Ingela Garneij has flatly shut down the suggestion that the game might ever go free-to-play. "[W]e built the game for a different purpose," she said. "So monetization doesn't work in that way for us."
– Edwin Evans-Thirlwell
MONDAY SUNDAE
The weather is getting warmer here. As such, this week's day puns are icecream-based. FEED THE MAW.
