Offer ends on May 23rd.

VCMI is an attempt to recreate engine for Heroes of Might and Magic 3 with fixes, new features and support for more platforms (Windows, Linux, MacOS, iOS and Android).

What's new in 1.5.0 release?

• Online multiplayer support
• Better random maps
• AI optimizations
• Most remaining campaign issues fixed
• Basic game controllers support added
• Easier installation of game files from gog.com
• Artifact improvements
• Configurable keyboard shortcuts
• Many other features and fixes

Full changelog can be found here

Steam page with demo

Affected devs:

• Arkane Austin (closed)
• Tango Gameworks (closed)
• Alpha Dog Studios (closed)
• Roundhouse Games (absorbed into ZeniMax Online Studios)

These changes are grounded in prioritizing high-impact titles and further investing in Bethesda’s portfolio of blockbuster games and beloved worlds which you have nurtured over many decades.

The Government recognises recent concerns raised by video games users regarding the long-term operability of purchased products.

Consumers should be aware that there is no requirement in UK law compelling software companies and providers to support older versions of their operating systems, software or connected products. There may be occasions where companies make commercial decisions based on the high running costs of maintaining older servers for video games that have declining user bases. However, video games sellers must comply with existing consumer law, including the Consumer Rights Act 2015 (CRA) and the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008 (CPRs).

The CPRs require information to consumers to be clear and correct, and prohibit commercial practices which through false information or misleading omissions cause the average consumer to make a different choice, for example, to purchase goods or services they would not otherwise have purchased. The regulations prohibit commercial practices which omit or hide information which the average consumer needs to make an informed choice, and prohibits traders from providing material information in an unclear, unintelligible, ambiguous or untimely manner. If consumers are led to believe that a game will remain playable indefinitely for certain systems, despite the end of physical support, the CPRs may require that the game remains technically feasible (for example, available offline) to play under those circumstances.

The CPRs are enforced by Trading Standards and the Competition and Markets Authority. If consumers believe that there has been a breach of these regulations, they should report the matter in the first instance to the Citizens Advice consumer helpline on 0808 223 1133 (www.citizensadvice.org.uk). People living in Scotland should contact Advice Direct Scotland on 0808 164 6000 (www.consumeradvice.scot). Both helplines offer a free service advising consumers on their rights and how best to take their case forward. The helplines will refer complaints to Trading Standards services where appropriate. Consumers can also pursue private redress through the courts where a trader has provided misleading information on a product.

The CRA gives consumers important rights when they make a contract with a trader for the supply of digital content. This includes requiring digital content to be of satisfactory quality, fit for a particular purpose and as described by the seller. It can be difficult and expensive for businesses to maintain dedicated support for old software, particularly if it needs to interact with modern hardware, apps and websites, but if software is being offered for sale that is not supported by the provider, then this should be made clear.

If the digital content does not meet these quality rights, the consumer has the right to a repair or replacement of the digital content. If a repair or replacement is not possible, or does not fix the problem, then the consumer will be entitled to some money back or a price reduction which can be up to 100% of the cost of the digital content. These rights apply to intangible digital content like computer software or a PC game, as well as digital content in a tangible form like a physical copy of a video game. The CRA has a time limit of up to six years after a breach of contract during which a consumer can take legal action.

The standards outlined above apply to digital content where there is a contractual right of the trader or a third party to modify or update the digital content. In practice, this means that a trader or third party can upgrade, fix, enhance and improve the features of digital content so long as it continues to match any description given by the trader and continues to conform with any pre-contract information including main characteristics, functionality and compatibility provided by the trader, unless varied by express agreement.

Consumers should also be aware that while there is a statutory right for goods (including intangible digital content) to be of a satisfactory quality, that will only be breached if they are not of the standard which a reasonable person would consider to be satisfactory, taking into account circumstances including the price and any description given. For example, a manufacturer’s support for a mobile phone is likely to be withdrawn as they launch new models. It will remain usable but without, for example, security updates, and over time some app developers may decide to withdraw support.

Department Culture, Media & Sport

TL;DW:

Plenty of interesting info in the video, with dive into each category on what's done and what's needed to finish them. Worth a watch.

TL;DR: Mediocre and flawed game, still had fun.

Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex is a PS2 action game developed by Cavia. Those familiar with that name might already know what to expect and those who don't... let's just say this studio isn't known for their masterpieces.

Post doesn't contain spoilers.

Story

Story was written with the help of staff from Production I.G, studio responsible for Ghost in the Shell anime (and many other series), and feels like an alright secondary arc from the SAC show - not an original one mind you, but still floating around some of the themes tackled there.

Beyond the lack of originality it also suffers from how it is presented: each stage starts with an audio briefing, followed by a short cutscene and another call after loading into the stage proper. It's not a great system and it feels like a budgetary restriction rather than anything else however it still a part of the game and affects how it's received.

All in all, it's nothing mind blowing but decent enough.

Gameplay

As mentioned before, GitS: SAC is an action game - it has shooting, melee combat and platforming, with most of the play time focused on the first one.

Control scheme is weird and unintuitive for anyone used to playing modern action games with homogenized button layouts but it's not unplayable or even a huge problem once you get used to it.

Movement feels rather stiff but not painfully so. It suffers from janky and limited animations that not only look dated but also unpolished at times.

Jumping is a bit floaty which might make the platforming sections a bit more challenging than they should be. I didn't have too many issues with that (except in like two places focused on wall jumping) but I've seen people struggle with those parts so I guess it's worth a mention.

There's a dodge move but it's kind of useless - Major does cool acrobatic jumps that look good (the only good animations in the game) but also makes the camera focus on her and follow her movement which can lead to losing track of an enemy you're trying to avoid. Batou does a slow dive that neither protects him from damage nor moves you far enough to scatter away from danger.

Shooting doesn't provide a lot of "oomph" and can feel a bit bullet spongy depending on where you aim (there is a damage multiplier depending on body parts, even for mechanical units).

You have access to two weapons and up to three gadgets at once - gadgets use melee button to throw so you have to switch between them and unarmed attacks. It's easy to blow yourself up if you're not careful.

One big issue here is bad camera control - it's slow and feels sticky in a way that makes smooth aiming almost impossible. I'm not sure if it's just a screw up or an attempt at some kind of auto-aim/target-snapping but it's not great.

Melee is pretty limited, with just a few basic attacks flowing into a simple combo. It's also pretty situational as running head first into a group of enemies can be extremely deadly.

There's also a simple hacking minigame which allows you to take over an enemy for 20-30 seconds. It's not particularly useful but can help with killing few enemies if you're fast enough.

All those elements are pretty basic in a way familiar to anyone experienced with budget titles from that era. They work well enough to not be a chore or make the game unplayable. Not only that, I had a decent amount of fun throughout.

Graphics

Surprisingly decent. While some of the interior locations can feel samey at times there's also a decent amount of nice looking vistas and backgrounds

Two playable characters, Major and Batou, look good. I wasn't entirely sold on Major's design initially but ended up liking it quite a lot (especially when equipped with a "stun unit" which gives her big Shadow the Hedgehog shoes). Batou looks pretty close to his anime version.

Enemies have distinct designs that let you know what's you're going to deal with - as long as you can see them that is. The big problem with enemies is a stupidly short draw distance which can lead to situations where you end up shooting into an empty space because the reticle turned red.

As mentioned before, animations are very limited. Most of them look like placeholders rather than an intended end result. The only exception for this is Major's air ballet when dodging - these moves feel like the only set animators spent some actual time on.

Finally, there are prerendered cutscenes. They appear at the beginning of every stage and are quite good - both from graphical and composition standpoints. They're also pretty short so we don't get to watch much of them.

Sound

Music is a mixed bag. Some tracks sound a bit GitS-like (without reaching the quality of anime unfortunately), some (mainly combat ones) can be a bit repetitive and dull. None of them got on my nerves so at least there's that.

Characters are voiced by their anime VAs which is neat. Their performances are alright if a little flat - that might be because of the direction or due to the fact I'm more familiar with the JP cast of GitS, not sure about that one. They're good enough for the most part.

What's not good enough? Tachikomas. I like those muppets both in English and Japanese versions of the anime, here on the other hand they went a little too far into the annoying and silly aspects of their characterization.

There's not much to write about the sound effects - they're about what you'd expect from a mediocre shooter from that era. They neither break nor enhance the experience in any significant way.

Summary

I didn't have high expectations starting this game. I've seen plenty of opinions about it being "not great" to say the least and knowing the devs behind the project didn't do much to alleviate my worries.

Despite all the jank, mediocrity and a couple of frustrating sections (mainly focused on wall jumping) I had a surprising amount of fun. It wasn't a fantastic experience I'll remember for the rest of my life but it was enjoyable enough I managed to stick with it to the end - that's more than I can say about some of the critically acclaimed classics in my library.

Bonus trailer showing off new mechanics, moves and bosses coming with the Next Fes update.

Just like the UK variant, this is an official government petition to look into the issue. Unlike the UK variant, the only signature threshold is 50 signatures - that said, more is better in this case.

Deadline: 20 May 2024

Here’s the Stop Killing Games campaign site for those unaware or not from Australia.

All proceeds from the Palestinian Relief indie bundle will be donated to the PCRF (Palestine Children's Relief Fund).

Not sure if we're allowed to post special bundles like this so feel free to bonk me mods.

I've been trying to finish this write-up for a while now but due to the combination of limited time and constantly changing thoughts about the game it was a rather difficult process. It should be good enough to communicate my feelings about D3 but get ready for a wall of text, lots of rambling and rough edges - sorry about that.

Post doesn't contain any spoilers.

Intro

Drakengard is a difficult series to write about. None of the entries is objectively good as actual game and yet they can provide a type of experience that's still rare to this day.

I finished replaying Drakengard 3 some time ago, years after I engaged with it in any form beyond listening to the OST. It has been long enough I managed to forget A LOT (pretty much all of routes B & C as well as some other parts of the game). To some extent this playthrough felt like I was going through this story for the first time and that was probably the best case scenario I could think of before doing it.

I decided to play the game on my Steam Deck - both to see how well it would run and because it was an a great way to put in a session right before sleep. The good news is, game runs surprisingly well. Outside a few specific situations game held pretty stable 30FPS and felt better than the OG experience. Another benefit came from the small screen as it helped mask some of the less impressive visuals - hell, I was surprised how pretty the game could look in motion at times.

One caveat however was the batter life - 2-2.5 hours depending on the load. It's understandable and worked out pretty well for me (again, I was doing these sessions right before sleep) but seeing such results is never particularly fun on a portable device.

Gameplay

Let's get the easy part out of the way - mediocre gameplay. It's neither revolutionary nor complete trash and works well enough for what it is. The biggest issue I had with it stems from the amount of worthless combat encounters used as pure padding.

I'm not sure how much of said padding and reuse of assets comes down to the budget or the studio itself but I feel like game would improve a lot just by making a proper balance pass to cut down on some of the tedium. It wouldn't be a masterpiece but it would make the grind less of an issue.

I initially wrote a paragraph about a limited enemy variety but after going over them again it's not actually that bad. The problem with that however lays with the fact that despite a decent number of enemy types, good chunk of them feels pretty similar during gameplay. It's kind of impressive.

If you heard about this game before you probably know about the final boss. It's infamous for being unfair and kind of disrespectful towards the player (it's an 8 minute sequence with disorienting camera, 1HP and no checkpoints) but I ended up loving it. Mostly anyway.

I appreciate the general concept of the fight as well as the gameplay change (it's pretty simple and fun if you know how to deal with purposefully confusing elements) - at the same time, I think the parts specifically intended to make you fail (especially at the very end of the fight) are bullshit and should never make it into the final product.

It could've been a special moment to wrap up the game but ended up feeling mean spirited towards everyone who dared to stick with it until the finale.

Story

Drakengard 3 turned out to be both worse and just as good as expected. While the main story is solid, most of it is dumped right at the end of the game with rest of the playtime focused on side branches that don't really do much beyond showing "well, this timeline is screwed in a new way, oh well". This is a pretty big issue with writing as over all, not much happens in this story compared to other titles.

There are some pretty neat nods and setups to other games - not important to this game's story but I found them to be interesting additions nonetheless.

The finale and some of the major moments can hit pretty hard is you're invested however that doesn't excuse the amount of inconsequential stuff happening along the way.

Another problem lays with humor - it's juvenile and rather one note. If you like or at least can tolerate it that's fine but this will be a big turn off to a lot of people. Even ones interested in Taro's other works. It's not all bad and there are some genuinely funny moments but these were a minority for me.

Characters

Main characters, Zero and her sisters, are interesting. They all start pretty archetypal but they do have their own stuff going on beyond this initial impression. Unfortunately, some of that info is locked behind DLC and outside media (which varies in quality apparently).

Additionally, there's the issue of localization. It's not terrible but it does change some of the characters in pretty significant ways - the most glaring example being Zero, our MC. Her JP persona is more mature and calm with a sense of guilt, EN version on the other hand feels more like an angry asshole (though she does have her moments).

I also really love Maaya Uchida as Zero - she did a great job with her role and might be one of my favorite performances in Taro-verse. EN voices in general didn't fully hit the mark for me to be honest. Some of that comes down to the script and some to VA direction - not great, not terrible, just like the rest of the game.

Side characters, the disciples, are pretty one note - mostly focused on a single trait, related to horny stuff. There is some character development along the way but most of it is relegated to later parts of the game and gets partially reset with each branch.

Mikhail, our dragon, can be hit or miss for people. I get why he is how he is and liked him from the beginning but I can see why others would be annoyed with him. He's a good baby.

Music

Not much to say about this, it's good. Good enough that I keep listening to it whenever my mind gets stuck thinking about the series.

Boss themes are fast and energetic, calm and somber songs carry their atmosphere perfectly and generic combat music is memorable enough I ended up humming alongside it during stages. Some of the songs could easily fit on Nier soundtrack (either game).

There's also an amazingly haunting version of an ending theme from the original game - now even better than before!

Summary

All in all I'm a bit on the fence about Drakengard 3. It has really strong concepts as well as fun and enjoyable moments. It also has a lot of problems with writing, gameplay and technical execution. It can be janky. It can be frustrating. It can be straight up embarrassing at times.

It can be a real gem if you're able to get over its issues. It can be an frustrating mess if you can't.

This game is trash and yet, for some reason, I still love it.

Release date: 2024-07-18

Available on:

• itch.io
• Steam
• Switch
• PS4
• Xbox