Ask any Baldur’s Gate 3 player about the game’s Act 2, and you’ll get one of two reactions. Some call it their favorite stretch of the game, since it’s moodier, tighter, and more focused than Act 1. Others call it the most linear and devoid of branching pathways: You clear the Shadow Curse, you walk to Rivington, done. Regardless of which camp is correct, it is true that Act 2 lacks Act 1’s room to wander, or Act 3’s sprawl to get lost in. Now, with a new mod that was nearly two years in the making, Baldur’s Gate 3’s second act is getting a lot bigger.
The latest FromSoft game multiplayer mod is here, with Dark Souls 2 seamless co-op finally out in the wild. Modder Yui, maker of similar and very popular mods for Elden Ring, Nightreign, and the original Dark Souls, has poured a year and a bit of work into their latest creation.
"Remember you matter," says AoE veteran Earnest Yuen
Image credit: World's Edge
Further details have emerged of the impact that Microsoft’s Xbox consolidation and job cuts programme is having on affected workers. World’s Edge, the studio that effectively manages strategy megaseries Age of Empires, has allegedly been hit hard, with an unnamed but verified creative director posting on industry forum ResetEra that "just under half" of all staff had been let go in the process of moving from Xbox’s direct control to Activision’s.
Arkheron is an enigmatic blend of a fast PvP action game and a dungeon crawler that's all about competing with other players to reach the top of an evolving tower. That enigma element is a key part of Arkheron's core narrative, along with its wild mix of loot-driven action-RPG combat and competitive knockout action that feel equal parts Diablo and Hades. But the developer's lengthy journey to create this quirky, high-stakes mash-up of genres is also something of an enigma, and their concept is steadily building an audience.
With the release of Control Resonant, you have the opportunity to enjoy a new chapter in Remedy's multiverse and see what happened after the events of the first game. This time, instead of following Jesse Faden, you will play her brother, Dylan. According to Willa Rowe's review for Polygon, "Dylan is ultimately a protagonist that never managed to elicit a strong emotion in me. Jesse felt like a friend; Dylan feels like that co-worker you begrudgingly tolerate."
Halo Studios now a support studio for existing Halo games
Image credit: Bungie / Microsoft
For decades, Halo developers have resisted the influence of the vastly better-selling Call of Duty shooters. Now, the makers of Call of Duty own Halo. As part of Microsoft's on-going axing-down of their Xbox gaming business, the company have placed Bungie's old FPS in the hands of Activision, while making layoffs at erstwhile series custodian Halo Studios and demoting the latter to a support studio for existing Halo games.
When I was younger, I loved Chewits. Each parcel of chewy sugar threatened to tear out a tooth, but their punch of strawberry, blackcurrent, and orange flavour was hard to resist. Left to my own devices, I would take packs of Chewits, unwrap all the sweets, and press them together in the palm of my hand until they formed a single Chewit boulder. The different colours and flavours became indistinguishable but the sheer size and density of the thing was attractive to my inner glutton. The first time I did this, I put the whole thing into my mouth and when I tried to bite down on the sweet mass my jaw became almost glued together by the sugary morass. Panicking, I tried to swallow it down and almost choked, as the formless Chewitts filled my oesophagus. Before I turned completely blue, I was able to cough it back up.
Well, there you go. Xbox have enacted a second round of layoffs and internal upheaval this year, following July's initial shooting of 1600 staff into the sun and parting ways with multiple studios.
AMD's market cap, the measure of the company's total worth according to its share price, breached $1 trillion on Monday. That's $1,000 billion, to you and me.
Image: Larian Studios
Image: Remedy Entertainment
