I've found the best skill in Dragon's Dogma 2 - an arrow that lets you nearly kill yourself so that you can one-shot a dragon

Yesterday was a sad day for 3DS and Wii U players as the online services went down for both of them. This is something that sadly happens with each console as they get older and age, especially with Nintendo – it just seems to always happen way too soon. With the Nintendo Switch already almost a decade old, we knew we’d watch the other consoles fall before a new one could go live, hopefully in 2025.

Buckshot Roulette is simple, and simply unsettling. Sat across the table from a mysterious opponent clad in a deeply unnerving toothy mask, you pick up a shotgun loaded with shells. Then, you decide whether to point the gun at your opponent or yourself, and pull the trigger. Some of the shells are live, and others are blanks. Guess correctly, and you get to go again.

Windows handhelds like the ROG Ally have specs that put the Steam Deck to shame, but are let down by Windows being terrible as a handheld operating system. So, what if you could have the best of both worlds?

The deck-fixing roguelikelike poker of Balatro is chuffing excellent, no doubt, but my main criticism has been that the higher difficulty modes are just a bit boring. Having beat them myself, I didn't find them a fun or interesting challenge as much as an annoying one that required too much to go right. I'm glad to hear that they're being tweaked in an upcoming patch, which you can now test in a public beta on Steam, and even the lowest difficulty setting will be tweaked. Other changes include improved (hopefully) Steam Deck performance, balance tweaks, and better Joker-related Tags.

Remember when Redbox or Blockbuster would let you rent some of the newest titles for just a few bucks a day? A new trend has emerged to fill the void left behind by the loss of rental services. Many public libraries have started to collect video games, and it doesn't cost a cent to borrow them.

Goodbye, App Store Suika Game clones. The real thing has finally arrived on iOS for players outside of Japan. Suika Game, the watermelon puzzle game that went viral on Nintendo Switch last year, is available to download for $2.99 on Apple’s App Store, making it playable on iPhone and iPad. The title for the official version is “Suika Game-Aladdin X” and it comes from XGIMI Limited.

I like horror, I like bunnies, I like cool little games. Hey, y'here that, Rental? You're alright, kid. It's a free (free!) little game originally made for 2022's 32bit jam that takes about 20 minutes to play through, wherein you play a child rabbit who has arrived at a holiday cabin with her family. You're the first to head inside and, oop, the door locks behind you. Classic twist. A further twist is that, while Rental is entirely free to download and play, you can buy a supporter zine as DLC to kick some funds to the devs. Noice.

Swedish indie developer Landfall has released the brand new game Content Warning, keeping in its long-standing tradition of April Fool's Day game releases that brought fans Totally Accurate Battlegrounds and Battle Simulator, among other things.

Helldivers 2 grunts can now call down the Quasar Cannon Stratagem, a heavy laser that's tailor-made for spreading democracy. The cannon is actually so efficient, that some helldivers are already begging developer Arrowhead Studios not to nerf it.

It’s only March and 2024 is already full of bold, big-budget games like Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown, Final Fantasy VII Rebirth, Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth, and Dragon’s Dogma 2. But one of my favorite games of 2024 isn’t available on PC, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, or even Nintendo Switch. It’s Mars After Midnight, a game from Papers, Please and Return of the Obra Dinn developer Lucas Pope. The only place you can play it? On the Playdate, Panic’s quirky little 1-bit handheld with a crank.

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Although has many mechanics that make it uniquely difficult compared to other open-world RPGs, the obscure and deadly Dragonsplague is possibly the game's most punishing mechanic. Released 12 years after the original, the sequel features an all-new map and greatly expanded systems, but with a new, wider audience, some of the game's new or returning mechanics have proven to be somewhat controversial.