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Today's Deal: Save 50% on The Showdown Effect!

Look for the deals each day on the front page of Steam. Or follow us on twitter or Facebook for instant notifications wherever you are!

Save 75% on the Need For Speed Franchise during this week's Midweek Madness*!

Need for Speed Hot Pursuit launches you into a new open-world landscape behind the wheel of the world's fastest and most beautiful cars. From Criterion, the award-winning studio behind the Burnout series, Hot Pursuit will redefine racing games for a whole new generation.

*Offer ends Thursday at 4PM Pacific Time

Save 80% on the Serious Sam Franchise during this week's Midweek Madness*!

Serious Sam 3: BFE is a glorious throwback to the golden age of first-person shooters where men were men, cover was for amateurs and pulling the trigger made things go boom. Serving as a prequel to the original indie sensation, Serious Sam: The First Encounter, Serious Sam 3 takes place during the Earths final struggle against Mentals invading legions of beasts and mercenaries. Set against the collapsing temples of an ancient civilization and the crumbling cities of 22nd century Egypt, Serious Sam 3 is an exhilarating fusion of classic twitch shooters and modern gameplay features.

NO COVER. ALL MAN.

*Offer ends Thursday at 4PM Pacific Time

Aliens: Colonial Marines - Reconnaissance Pack, all new content for Aliens: Colonial Marines is Now Available on Steam.

Battle it out against other players across 4 all new maps in the 'Aliens: Colonial Marines - Reconnaissance Pack' and instill fear into enemy marines with horrifying new xeno customisation content. Users that have purchased the Aliens: Colonial Marines Season Pass receive this content automatically and do not need to purchase it separately

Awesomenauts - Pirate Leon Skin, all new content for Awesomenauts is Now Available on Steam!

Aaaarrrrr, ya scurvy old sea dogs! This here be the most feared pirate of the universe! Wanted on over 500 planets for camembert plunderin', grog stealin' and sweet talkin': you'd be wise t' to hide your beauties, for leon pirate be comin'! Leon Pirate comes with a fully customized voice set!

New Multiplayer DLC for Tomb Raider is now available on Steam!

Check out the three all-new skins and the Shipwrecked Map Pack to add to your multiplayer raiding experience!

Update 2.5a (05/07/2013) for X3: Reunion has been released.

• Added localization files for Chinese
• Updated several script files to enable compatibility with the Bonus Package DLC
• Minor text display fixes required for support of East Asian languages

X3: Reunion DLC Bonus Package is Now Available on Steam for free!

This complete package contains all existing bonus plugins for users that own X3: Reunion.

Up until now the principle source of minerals for factories has been the large mining complexes, with mobile mining left to a few dedicated souls. Now, with the introduction of the Mobile Mining / Mineral Collection Software factories and free traders alike can easily tap the resources of the smaller asteroid debris in sectors.

Of course just flying in open space can be dangerous, but with the new ability to defend a position, setting up sentries to protect your mining ships has never been easier.

Today through May 13 at 10 a.m. PT, grab the following games for up to 75 percent off their standard asking prices: Avencast: Rise of the Mage, Ankh: Heart of Osiris, Ankh: Battle of the Gods, Jack Keane, Trainz Simulator 12, The Bridge, Blue Toad Murder Files and Special Forces: Team X.

We're particularly tickled to see The Bridge, an indie puzzler with M.C. Escher twists (literally) on this list, available for 33 percent off, or $10. Special Forces: Team X is also notable this week for its permanent price drop to $10 following this sale, which puts the game at $5 - that's a 67 percent discount from its current price of $15. But don't worry about the math and take a look at the Steam sale games right here.

The Against the Qlock DLC for puzzler QUBE is out now on Steam, and is 10 percent off ($5.39) until May 13. Against the Qlock challenges players to beat ten levels in record time to top the scores of their friends.

QUBE will be coming to Wii U the form of QUBE: Director's Cut. "Quite possibly," it may also make its way to Vita. No release date for either platform has been announced.

A new Steam Client update has been released and will be automatically downloaded. The specific changes are listed below.

General:

- Added rate-limiting of Steam game downloads, via Settings -> Downloads
- Added "View" button to the downloads page for workshop items that shows you which items have been updated
- Fix client update-loops caused by inconsistent server and proxy-cache states
- Friends will now show an icon next to their Online status to indicate if they are using Big Picture Mode, Steam Mobile, or Steam Web Chat
- Fixed a rare crash loading certain corrupt jpg images
- Increased font size in chat to improve readability

Linux:

- Fix handling of http_proxy environment variable http:// prefix in some instances
- Overlay enable hotkey now handles more shifted keys correctly
- Most-recently-played tray menu will not have an extra separator if no games have been played

Big Picture:

- Workaround which fixes common D3D internal crash introduced by IE10/KB2670838 on Windows 7
- Added activate product on Steam path to Big Picture
- Fixed focus order of elements in Library Details view after Workshop
- Fixed opacity mask flash on transition in and out of main menu
- Implement native Steam Service install dialog on game launch if needed to avoid desktop dialog appearing
- Windows: Avoid more context changes in rendering for small perf improvement on low end hardware

Against the Qlock, all new content for Q.U.B.E. is Now Available on Steam and is 10% off!*

This all-new time trial package pits the player against the clock in a bid to get the highest score and beat their friends. Combining precision, logic and quick reactions the player must speed through each of the ten levels using a variety of pick-ups to their advantage.

*Offer ends May 13th at 10AM Pacific Time

Today's Deal: Save 75% on Just Cause 2!

Look for the deals each day on the front page of Steam. Or follow us on twitter or Facebook for instant notifications wherever you are!

Save up to 75% on new Week Long Deals on Steam, available now until May 6th at 10AM Pacific time!

Trainz Simulator - Aerotrain , Trainz Simulator - BR Class 14, Trainz Simulator - Coronation Scot all new content for Trainz Simulator 12 are Now Available on Steam and is 25% off!*

In addition Trainz Simulator 12 is 50% off!*

Trainz Simulator - Aerotrain
A locomotive design based on the existing SW1200 switcher was encased in a futuristic streamlined shroud. An usual Bo-1 wheel arrangement was employed and the drivetrain geared for passenger operation. The turret cabbed locomotive would be known as the LWT12. A finned tail car with a small observation gallery completed the stylised trainset exterior, and in 1955 the GM Aerotrain was born.

Trainz Simulator - BR Class 14
British Rail devised the Class 14 locomotives to replace the seemingly indispensable ex-GWR Pannier Tanks which busily performed shunting duties, yard transfers and short haul freight services on Western Region tracks.

Trainz Simulator - Coronation Scot
The Coronation Scot is a powerful steam passenger locomotive built for British railways in the 1930s. The Coronation Scot celebrates the halcyon days of LMS passenger service by recreating the sights and sounds of this historic train, and is now available as part of your Trainz collection.

*Offer ends May 13th at 10AM Pacific Time.

Special Forces: Team X, the third-person shooter from Blacklight: Retribution developer Zombie Studios, is taking its price down to $5 on Steam from May 6 at 10 a.m. PT, through May 13. After the sale, Special Forces: Team X will get a permanent price drop to $10, forever and ever, or until Zombie Studios, publishers Atari and/or Microprose decide to change that number again. Before 10 a.m. PT today, Special Forces: Team X costs $15.

Special Forces: Team X is a cel-shaded, cover-based shooter with more than 100 possible map combinations and five multiplayer modes. When it first hit Steam in February, the game had a bug that could randomly reset character XP, but that issue has been resolved via a series of patches, Microprose says in a press release. A Title Update for the XBLA version is in testing now.

"We are hoping that this price drop will bring players into the game that may have been scared away by the initial launch problems," the press release reads.

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What's New in 3DMark Windows Edition v1.1.0

This update adds the Ice Storm Extreme test and fixes issues when testing systems with multiple GPUs. 3DMark scores will increase slightly on systems with two GPUs and significantly on systems with three or four GPUs.

NEW
The Ice Storm Extreme benchmark test has been added to 3DMark Advanced Edition. Ice Storm Extreme is a Direct3D feature level 9 benchmark test for Windows tablets, ultrabooks and notebooks. Ice Storm Extreme raises the rendering resolution from 720p to 1080p and uses higher quality textures and post-processing effects in the graphics tests to create a more demanding load for the latest mobile devices. You can compare Ice Storm and Ice Storm Extreme scores from Windows and Android devices.

FIXED
- 3DMark now works correctly on systems with up to four GPUs.
- Fixed the issue caused by Windows update KB2670838, which added partial DX11.1 support to Windows 7.
- Fixed a problem with the bloom post-processing effect when using very high rendering resolutions in custom settings.

Today's Deal: Save 75% on Spec Ops: The Line!

Look for the deals each day on the front page of Steam. Or follow us on twitter or Facebook for instant notifications wherever you are!

It's May 4, which means we're only one day away from Cinco de Mayo. What other reason would there be for Steam to put a collection of Star Wars games on sale? May the fourth day of this month be remembered as the day you could buy 14 games for $50 on Steam, a 50 percent discount on a bundle that includes a list of games seen after the break.

Today's Deal: Save 66% on Of Orcs And Men!

Look for the deals each day on the front page of Steam. Or follow us on twitter or Facebook for instant notifications wherever you are!

- Made team schedule text entry boxes 32 characters rather than 16.
- Fixed crash on Alt-Tab.
- Fixed crash on map load.
- Increased the size of the team selection dropdown.
- Corrected a sorting issue in the heroes played profile popup
- Changed memory allocation strategy to address a crash when the game has been running for a long time.

The latest DLC for Painkiller Hell & Damnation is now available for purchase on Steam. The $4 Full Metal Rocket DLC bolsters the multiplayer side with five additional maps - three classic Painkiller maps in Meatless, Blink and Mines; two new locales called Town and Prison - and a pair of skins, plus a new weapon and two new enemies: the Executioner and the Beast.

Painkiller Hell & Damnation is the HD remake of the original Painkiller, which launched for the PC in 2004. Console ports for Painkiller HD are currently in the works, while ports for Mac and Linux are expected to drop this spring.

Fallen Enchantress: Legendary Heroes has been updated.

Stardock Entertainment is happy to announce the release of the 0.87 BETA for Fallen Enchantress: Legendary Heroes today on Steam. This week's update includes new epic weapons, new abilities, balance changes, bug fixes and more!

Features

Added the Calloused Hide trait (+1 defense per level)

Added Equinox (longsword granted from killing Morian, +20 hit points, enables the Autumnal Equinox ability, enables the Vernal Equinox ability)

Added the Autumnal Equinox ability (heal all allies half of the units current hit points)

Added the Vernal Equinox ability (poison damage to all enemies for half of the units current damage)

Added Sunderer (great axe granted from killing Abeix, each strike reduces the targets defense by half for 5 turns)

Added Tectonic Bulwark (tower shield granted by killing Torax, unit is immune to swarm, enables the Tectonic Shift ability)

Added the Tectonic Shift ability (teleport to any location on the battlefield, surrounding enemies take damage equal to half the units defense, and stinking mud surrounds the unit)

Added Delin's Ember (accessory granted from killing Delin, +12 fire attack, +50% fire spell damage, +100 fire resistance)

Fixes

Fixed an issue keeping some traits form being displayed in the unit ui

Fixed an issue keeping the Double Strike skill from applying its accuracy modifier

Toggleable actions like auto-explore and guard now correctly show their current state by highlighting the action button if the action is enabled

Fixed bug where auto-explore was not cancelled if you explicitly set a new destination on the main map

Fixed bug where enabling auto-explore or guard didn't disable the other action

Fixed the bug that if given a unit for completing a quest, it would not be displayed on the Quest Complete Wnd if he couldn't fit in your army (ie. your army slots were full)

Fixed bug where dead rat would show up on Quest Complete Wnd when finishing the Rats in the Ruin quest, even though you no longer have the rat upon completion of the quest

Fixed issue where treasures from some specific quests, (such as Ghost Helm), did not show up on the Quest Complete Wnd. These quests were giving their treasures in a way unlike most other quests

Fixed an issue keeping the guardian statues from showing up in props and improvements

Fixed an issue keeping pedestrians from showing up in goodie huts and resources (most notable with being unable to see horses and wargs on their resource tiles)

Fixed an issue where page back/forward buttons were not updated correctly when autoselecting the last selected spell in the spellbook.

Fixed an issue where IntroBookWnd would not use the custom backstory written when the custom sov was created

In the tactical wnd, with a spell selected and mousing over a target unit, it now correctly shows modified hit chances from the spell, and the effects of multiple damage modifiers in the spell, and the troop multiplier

Fixed bug where if an outpost adjacent to a city built upgrade modules, those modules would be absorbed into the city and allow double building of a module

Fixed a crash if you happened to press Shift+W while in a popup window like the unit design wnd

Fixed an issue messing up graphics on the research screen

Free level bonuses from some perks in the unit design wnd are now reflected in the stats in the unit design screen

Fixed an issue keeping the Adventurers Boon trait from being selectable

Fixed a bug causing the Treasury Vault to give to much gold (fix by ParrotMath)

Fixed an issue keeping Mages from being buildable

Fixed an issue causing headless slaves

Fixed an issue causing invisible goodie huts

Fixed an issue making Guard unavailable if their were enemies int he area of effect

Fixed an issue allowing non-grouping units (juggernauts and iron golems) to be grouped on the upgrade screen

Balance

Reduced Bread to 8 healing

Reduced Healing Nectar to 20 healing

Reduced Mushrooms to 8 healing

Reduced Healing Potion to 30 healing

Reduced Iru Elixir to 40 healing

Reduced Salted Pork to 12 healing

Reduced Restoration Potion to 60 healing

Reduced Tilda Herbs to 12 healing

Increased the Aid spell to 8+2 healing instead of 4+2

Reduced the accuracy penalty on Double Strike from -30 to -20

Increased the Heal spell from 8+2 to 16+2 healing

Fixed an issue with the Leech Dagger and the Butchers Axe not stealing life

Increased Thunderstrike mana cost from 28 to 38

Thunderstrike damage increased form 5+2 to 10+2

Wellspring increased healing from 12+4 to 24+4

Removed the casting time from the Wither spell

Increased the damage on the bleed ability form 1/2/3 to 3/6/9

Increase Vital Strike critical hit chance form 1/2/3 to 5/10/15

Spectral Chain Shirt made uncommon instead of rare

Ophidian Scale Shirt made rare instead of ultrarare

Mirror Shield made uncommon instead of rare

Obsidian Shield made rare instead of unltrarare

Shrill Shield made rare instead of ultrarare

Champions Cuirass doesnt randomly drop anymore

Impenetrable Plate Cuirass made rare instead of ultrarare

Obsidian Helm made rare instead of ultrarare

Impenetrable Tower Shield made rare instead of ultrarare

Obsidian Tower Shield made rare instead of ultrarare

Shield of the Sentinel made uncommon instead of rare

Defeating Sarog rewards Sarogs Axe

Defeating a War Boar grants a war boar mount

War board mounts give +3 to attack and init for the first action of combat

Ophidian from the Alchemists Offer quest starts at 3rd level

Fixed an issue raising burning hands for 8+2 per fire shard instead of 4+2

Regeneration heals all damage each season instead of fixed amount

Tweaked tactical unit battle placement

Increased the Lethal traits from +2/+3/+4 attack to +3/+4/+5

Added the Revenge trait to the Warrior tree

Removed the level prereqs from armor

Treasure chests always give uncommon items now (instead of having a chance to give uncommon or common)

Tax Office now gives +20% gildar when producing wealth instead of +25% gildar when the queue is empty

Increased the reward from the Ghost Helm quest to an Ivory Helm

Added the Calloused Hide trait to Tuatha

Generally increased the attack on champion only weapons

Generally decreased the level requirements on champion weapons

Commanders can learn Chain Mail proficiency

Shard Altars require Shard Harvesting (Shrines moved to Immortal Codex and Temples to Ereog's Journals)

Stables reduced from 1 horses per 2 seasons to 1 horse per 5 seasons (same with wargs)

Removed the Bonus Dodge and Bonus Dodge vs Ranged from Mounts

Reduced the amount of Warg and Horses resources in the world slightly

Decreased Pike to 14 attack

Decreased Boar Spear to 9 attack

Added the Incineration Staff and the Ice Staff to sovereign customization

UI

Curses are now displayed on the city details screen

The player is now notified when someone casts a curse on his cities

Started adding back some light props (you will need your amount of groundcover set above 'None' to see them)

Fixed an issue where resources could show redundant information in the info pane

Added a crest, faction name, and tint area to the conversation popup wnd for when a nation speaks to you

Today's Deal: Save 66% off the Fallout Collection!

Look for the deals each day on the front page of Steam. Or follow us on twitter or Facebook for instant notifications wherever you are!

Omerta - City of Gangsters - The Arms Industry DLC, all new content for Omerta - City of Gangsters is Now Available on Steam!

Deadeye Hastings is a notorious marksman killer and a crafty thief. He has served a decade in jail in England and the royal authorities were relieved to find out that he departed the islands to become a problem for the US government.

Most people look in the face of Johnny Hastings and think he is a monster but little do they know what kind of monster he is. Deadeye Hastings has always had problems with self-esteem and with keeping calm under pressure. He is constantly trying to compensate this with reckless demeanor dragging his comrades into unpredictable situations. Anyone who wants to have dealings with him should mind that he is far from reliable but Hastings himself cares little about what people think about him - he just wants to have fun!

Pinball FX 2 rides the Steam ramp on May 10. The XBLA and Windows 8 game arrives next week as a free download, with six packs available at launch for $9.99 each.

The sextet includes Star Wars Pinball, Marvel Pinball, Marvel Pinball: Vengeance and Virtue, Marvel Pinball: Avengers Chronicles, Pinball FX2 Core Collection, and Zen Classics.

The Steam version brings Windows 7 support to the pinball platform. As Zen Studios VP Mel Kirk tells us, the Steam version is compatible with Windows 8, Windows 7, Windows Vista, and even good old Windows XP.

Zen Studios brings its pinball platform to Steam on May 10, with a free download for Pinball FX 2 and six expansion packs priced at $9.99 each — Star Wars, Marvel, Marvel: Vengeance and Virtue, Marvel: Avengers Chronicles, the Pinball FX2 Core Collection and Zen Classics.

The co-op heist game Monaco appears to be missing whatever qualities an online video game must possess in order to turn the strangers who play it into jerks. I'm worried about telling you this, because I'm worried that I'm wrong and that Monaco is as prone to being ruined by the burrs of humanity. I'm worried that this ride isn't going to be so comfy long-term. Right now.... if you go play Monaco on PC right now, online, with strangers...you can assume you'll have a very good time. I've been having that very good time all week. Monaco is a pretty simple game, but one that benefits greatly from teamwork. Perhaps those of us who are playing it now just instinctively get that and realize that being annoying or angry will only make things worse. For now, then, it's all helping hands, banding together and piling into the getaway car while cackling. The game's a thieving paradise. What is this game going to be like when it comes to Xbox Live Arcade? That'll be the test. There are some monsters on Xbox Live. Anyway, the game: it's a one-to-four-player co-op game about stealing stuff. Think Gauntlet with yacht/disco/bank robberies. It looks old-school in still shots but actually plays with modern slickness. The game is presented as a couple of campaigns that tell the tale of a group of thieves. The campaigns are broken up into missions, each of those presented as a stack of floors that you'll ideally clean out of all its treasure. The locksmith's campaign is for beginners, though it gets tough. The pickpocket's campaign is an extreme, more dangerous re-telling of the locksmith's, meaning the level layouts are similar but with more elaborate security and maybe a bunch of things on fire. Each level is full of guards and locked doors. Those are the basic hazards. Eventually you'll be worrying about security lasers, guard dogs and pesky, ringing phones that send guards rushing off of their patrol routes to take calls. To foil this stuff, you'll be able to unlock locked doors, hide in bushes, hack computers and even pick up an array of items—from guns to smoke bombs to wrenches, all of which are permitted one use per 10 coins you collect. Most of each level's map is obscured and shows up as a gray floorplan with no indications of guards or alarms. What your character can see, however, is colored in. This changes as you move and is your key to understanding the level and pulling off the job. If you play solo, you're given four lives and increasingly long odds of sneaking and scrambling through the game's levels. You want to snatch coins, achieve a special objective and get to a getaway car. It's just not easy to do that when there's no on to distract a guard for you In each life you play as a different character, each with its own ability. The locksmith picks locked doors faster, the lookout reveals the location of all of the coins and guards on the map, the pickpocket has a monkey that can grab any nearby coins for you, the mole bashes through walls, the gentleman can always put on a disguise, the cleaner can knock unaware guards and civilians out, etc. If you play with others, you pick one character class. The other players pick different ones. As A crew, you play in the same campaign missions that you'd solo, but now you're tackling them with up to four players at once. This changes everything. One character's ability makes life easier for another. The presence of the lookout enables the cleaner to scan the map and see which guarda are in need of being knocked out. The redhead can distract the guard who is about to put a bullet in the pickpocket. The mole can make a tunnel that the rest of the crew can scurry through, bypassing some guard dogs en route to an escape ladder. If any player gets killed by a guard, another player can run over and revive them. Get the picture? Teamwork works. Teamwork makes the game more fun than playing solo. Teamwork is not what you'd expect if you jumped in with random people online. I expected that I'd need to play with friends to have a good experience and that we'd have to communicate carefully to succeed. When I first played the game online with some of my co-workers, I kept the voice-chat active because I was sure we needed to talk. We didn't. With strangers, I use the in-game text chat a little. So do they. It's not necessary, though, because the action of the game is so clear. You can just scan the screen and understand exactly what's happening. You can discern who is in trouble, who is sneaking through the back route, who is handling the safe in the upper left corner of the map. The teamwork just happens...and that feels great. Is this the secret of why people really rob banks? Do they not do it because they want all that money? It is that, as Monaco shows, well-coordinated heisting is in and of itself so much fun? Of course not. Real bank robbers want the money. But for Monaco players, the coordination that comes naturally is just wonderful fun. It happens so easily that it seems that no one thinks to be a jerk. Look, I played some games online this week in which I was the bad player (shocking!) and, when I died, people just revived me. No sweat. I guess I'd revived them a few times, too. When I played and encountered players who I was better than (shocking, too!) I quickly saw them improve and feel good about it. I felt camaraderie playing with these strangers. I felt the collective rush of zipping through a level, bypassing the guards and getting away with another big score. I felt no rancor, just some tension, some scrambling panic and, a lot of glee. Even when the random people I was playing with failed a level, we just jumped right back it. The second time was almost always the charm. OK. There was one guy who bailed because of lag. His character was jumping all over the map. And he was probably a jerk. Screw him. Otherwise... play this. Don't worry if you don't have any friends to play it with. Just go online, select a mission and wait for people to join you. Have fun. And keep up the good vibes. Be nice. There's happiness to be had among Monaco's thieves. If you want to see more, here's a half-hour of the game in action. I captured this about a week ago off of a pre-release copy of the Xbox 360 version: To contact the author of this post, write to stephentotilo@kotaku.com or find him on Twitter @stephentotilo

Q.U.B.E. is blocking out May 6 on its qalendar for new time-trial DLC titled 'Against the Qlock.' The DLC brings ten more levels to the Portal-like puzzler, with players trying to beat the timer as well as leaderboard scores. There's also a batch of new achievements.

While Q.U.B.E. is currently contained on PC and Mac, the game we deemed " a delightful on-screen Rubik's Cube" looks set to break out onto Wii U and maybe Vita.

In 2011, Fez developer Phil Fish said, "PCs are for spreadsheets." When he announced Fez would hit PC, fans and haters jumped on the "spreadsheet machine" dig. After Fez's successful XBLA and PC launches, this fan art by Steam user McKack is a good stopping point for the joke. All the jokes, even.