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These new images of The Long Dark showcase the harsh Canadian wilderness of the upcoming survival game.

Smite's unique camera angle alone sets it apart from other MOBAs and Hi-Rez didn't stop there.

The first official (and totally not real) bit of premium DLC for open-world shooter Arma 3 is kart racing. Arma 3 Karts includes (well, it would, if it existed) time-trial races and open-world kart battles, with seven versions of vehicles to choose from.

"Since we're already in the zombie business with DayZ, we felt the next logical expansion would be to take on karting," (real) Creative Director Jay Crowe writes on the Bohemia Interactive blog. "Our sandbox could not be called complete without karts, and thus we set ourselves the goal to recreate this pure form of racing. Welcome to Arma 3's World of Karts: drive / overtake / win."

Arma 3 Karts is due out in the second quarter of 2014 (no, it isn't). [Image: Bohemia Interactive]

Hello youse.

Sometimes a wee game comes along that just feels nice. It drops a board game reviewer in a difficult spot, because saying a game feels nice doesn’t actually tell anyone anything. Through the words below I will try to explain why Splendor works so well.

But it does feel nice. Honestly.

… [visit site to read more]

Ultra Rapid Fire mode removes mana, energy costs, and "anti-fun mechanics."

"There are no dangerous thoughts," said Hannah Arendt, the philosopher who died writing The Life of the Mind, "Thinking itself is dangerous." Her words ring loudly while playing Ether One. The protagonist of White Paper Games' surreal adventure, called The Restorer, literally has to go into broken minds and try to put them back together. The concept alone is unsettling. Naturally, Joystiq Streams wants in on that juicy, psychologically harrowing action! That's why we're digging into the game's guts alongside its designer, Pete Bottomley.

At 4PM EST on the Joystiq Twtich channel, Joystiq's Sam Prell will be playing through Ether One with Bottomley in tow to discuss the game and the inspiration behind its spooky brain spelunking. Anthony John Agnello will be on hand to feed your questions directly to the man.

Joystiq Streams broadcasts every Tuesday and Thursday at 4PM EST. [Images: White Paper Games]

One IGN contributor has been working hard on a new game.

Betrayer is a pre-industrial, mostly monochrome first-person action game from Blackpowder Games, among whom number several ex-Monolith developers. It’s out now.

The bloody red cross of an English flag flickers against the bleached horizon like arterial spray on snow. Brittle, near-dead pines rise from the grey-white ground, silent, skeletal giants forever threatening some terrible fate to those who dare approach. A bell tolls, endlessly, through the dark and fog of The Night, an funereal peal that sounds forever and brings madness, not comfort. A flash of scarlet amid the monochrome grass signals danger. A flash of scarlet amidst the colourless, low buildings of a long-abandoned colonial fort signals… well, not safety, but at least a link to something human. The colour red. The sound of that damned bell. A switch from white to black, and back again. So much from so little.

To think all these years, we’ve been crying out for more colour in first-person games (those tireless ambassadors of grey and brown), only for the most visually striking one in some time to neatly remove almost all colour. … [visit site to read more]

There's an element of cruelty to some of the most memorable April Fool's jokes, and Sega's prank this year is among the cruelest. Responding to years of Phantasy Star Online 2 localization requests from diehard fans, Sega has released Rappy Bird, an online clone of the mobile hit Flappy Bird starring Phantasy Star's iconic Rag Rappy character.

Surely you remember Rappies -- they're those little bird guys that you slayed by the thousands in Phantasy Star Online. Rappy Bird itself is unremarkable, since it was obviously put together quickly and is too difficult to enjoy, but at least there's a 3D mode.

Fans still hoping for a localized release of Phantasy Star Online 2 may want to keep an eye out for an upcoming English-language version hitting southeast Asian territories this year. The fact that Sega of America is acknowledging Phantasy Star after letting the series lie fallow for several years could be seen as a promising development, however.

[Image: Sega]

If you’re as old as I am, you may well remember shareware compilation discs. On the other hand, if you’re as old as I feel after a weekend navigating a showfloor packed with 12 year old streamers, you probably remember a time when most games were crafted out of human bones. But forget the bones, let’s talk about the discs for a moment. They were wonderful things, containing folders full of mysterious games that had no other home. The Internet can provide a home to almost any game that seeks one so it’s tempting to think that there are no mysteries left, which is precisely why The Pirate Bay Bundle is such a splendid thing. 101 games and I’d wager that at least 100 of them are new to almost everyone.

… [visit site to read more]

The original One Late Night mixed the mundane with the macabre in a way that I very much enjoyed. Using the setting of an after-hours office, with quietly humming computer paraphernalia and lonely trips to the coffee machine, it brought back memories of my previous life as Dilbert, the wacky wageslave. I found it to be a tidy and terrifying experience, unlike most free Slender horror games, but all the people in the comments who disagreed may be pleased to see me eat my hat, which is perched upon an appetiser of humble pie. The sequel, One Late Night: Deadline, doesn’t look very appealing. See for yourself.

… [visit site to read more]

We like to imagine that there's some fantastical conveyance - a giant slide or a catapult, perhaps - that connects the Bellevue, Washington offices of Valve and Oculus VR. It might help explain the number of Valve employees that keep making the jump (launch?) to Oculus' camp.

The latest Valver to slide on over to Oculus is Aaron Nicholls who, according to his Linkedin profile (login required), researched virtual reality for two years with Valve. Specifically, said research included "a wide range of perceptual and physical considerations necessary for delivering presence in VR."

Nicholls will be working as a scientist alongside other former Valvers, including Michael Abrash, now Oculus VR's Chief Scientist, and Chief Architect, Atman Binstock. [Image: Oculus VR]

You may have heard about last weekend’s extraordinarily disastrous attempt to film and broadcast a Pepsi-sponsored game jam, called GAME_JAM. At enormous expense (rumours fly of around $400,000), a group of in-indies – the likes of Zoe Quinn, Davey Wreden, and Robin Arnott – and YouTubers were supposed to be taking part in a reality-show-cum-game-jam for four days, to be professionally filmed, edited and broadcast on YouTube. The event didn’t make it through the first day before a number of the developers walked off set and refused to return, and everyone involved was upset and pissed off. It didn’t make it to day two. For a comprehensive account of what happened, you ought to read Jared Rosen’s article on Indie Statik, but the short version is: one of the people in charge was a sexist arsehole, the sponsorship was so ludicrous they weren’t allowed to drink anything other than Mountain Dew (not even water), and the atmosphere was miserable beyond anything conducive to making games. It was a massive, hugely expensive, disaster.

In response, we and asked Size Five Games‘ Dan Marshall to use his experience working in television production to write a guide for developers when it comes to TV. What to look out for, the tricks of the trade, and why it’s probably best avoided altogether. We should stress, this is a general guide, and not directly related to those peculiar events in LA.

… [visit site to read more]

The problem with turning this into a regular column is that I have to write it regularly. I have clearly failed this week, but that shouldn’t stop you enjoying day-late development blogs and GIFs from around the web.

Includes: dinosaurs, Nikola Tesla, flight sandboxes, conference tables, ‘game jams’.

… [visit site to read more]

Goats are so last season and frogs are the new hotness: Kero Blaster, the long-delayed platformer from the maker of Cave Story, is coming to Windows PC and iOS on May 11. The game stars Kaeru, a bipdeal frog who looks a bit like Kermit, but unlike The Muppets star he's armed to the teeth* with some powerful-looking weaponry. More like Kermit, he's in interspecial love with his feline girlfriend, who he's running and gunning to rescue.

Studio Pixel AKA Daisuke Amaya originally intended to bring the game to iPhone last May, back when it was known as Gero Blaster. He delayed it to add some improvements, and in the interim it seems Japan-friendly distributor of indie games Playism got involved, and now there's a PC version on the way too. If you're interested in an early look at Kero Blaster, Playism says it's showcasing the game at next week's PAX East conference in Boston. [Image: Playism] *Turns out frogs do have teeth

The Red Solstice is currently heading to the mid-point of a fairly solid Kickstarter campaign but I predict great things for the future. It’s an eight player coop squad shooter based on a Warcraft mod called Night Of The Dead and one may be the only game in existence to jettison zombies rather than cramming in as many as possible like the deranged operator of a bilious battery farm. It’s the Warcraft origins that caught my attention though – by 2021, will people be travelling around the world to play The Red Solstice in enormous tournaments, larger and more cash-corrupted than the FIFA Pepsi Gazprom World Cup? Stranger things draw a crowd.

… [visit site to read more]

It is the year 2014, and somehow on our wobbly stacks of gamerly plates we have more space games than we know what to do with. I refuse to look this (largely crowdfunded) gift horse-shaped starship in the terribly located exhaust port that resembles a mouth. That said, many of said spacefarers – Star Citizen, Elite Dangerous, Limit Theory, etc – are shooting for the stars with massive Do Everything Be Everything universes, and there’s something to be said for focus. That’s what the brilliant-looking Enemy Starfighter offers in spades. Each level sees you pre-plan your leap into a system from a top-down strategic map and then execute it from the cockpit with squad in tow. It’s a magnificently svelte concept, and there’s a new trailer of it in action below.

… [visit site to read more]

It’s easy to forget that Red Thread Games is working on anything other than Dreamfall Chapters because, well, Dreamfall Chapters. But last year, the viking-est man in game development, Ragnar Tornquist, and his band of merry yarn-spinners announced first-person survival horror adventure Draugen, which does not sound much like Dreamfall at all. Tornquist has instead opted to plant its ragged bones between Gone Home and Amnesia, a description that has me quite intrigued indeed. Debut trailer below.

… [visit site to read more]

Artsy adventure game follows the life of a lynx.

The next Dota 2 International Championship takes place this July in Seattle.

Blizzard’s infrastructure not being targeted but some players are being disrupted.

Meet the game with PvP, monster battles, mech combat, and more.

Good news: Day 1 of ZeniMax Online's new MMORPG went off relatively smooth.

Indie Megabooth has announced its lineup of featured games for PAX East 2014, revealing that Hotline Miami 2, Hyper Light Drifter, La-Mulana 2, and other indie standouts will be on display at next month's event in Boston.

Megabooth offerings include upcoming games like Die Gute Fabrik's Sportsfriends, Tiger Style's Spider: Rite of the Shrouded Moon, and Ronimo's Swords & Soldiers 2. Event organizers will also host the Indie Minibooth, a smaller venue that will feature a rotating lineup of games on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.

PAX East will be held in Boston on April 11-14. A full list of all featured games is after the break below.

[Image: Indie Megabooth]

Indie studio Red Thread Games announced a release window for Draugen, a first-person survival horror game that will feature support for VR technology like the Oculus Rift.

Red Thread is also working on Dreamfall Chapters, a Kickstarter-funded revival of the classic PC adventure game series The Longest Journey. Red Thread is primarily composed of former staff from The Longest Journey developer Funcom, and was founded by series creator Ragnar Tørnquist.

Speaking to Eurogamer, Tørnquist described the project as "HP Lovecraft meets Dostoyevsky," and "Gone Home meets Amnesia." Kicked off by a grant from the Norwegian Film Institute, Draugen will seek a final round of funding via Kickstarter before it ships for Windows, Mac, Linux, and an undisclosed console platform in 2015.

[Video: Red Thread Games]

Each Monday, Chris Livingston visits an early access game and reports back with stories about whatever he finds inside. This week, wild west management in 1849.

How-do, pardner! I know you’re accustomed to a ton of shootin’, lootin’, rootin’ and/or tootin’ in your wild west games, but rarely do they address the real complexities of frontier life. For instance, where did the fabric needed to sew all those enormous calico dresses come from? Who provided the lumber and fashioned the boards to build the O.K. Corral? How did gunslingers acquire olive oil to daintily dip their sourdough bread into? Finally, those head-scratchin’, long-lingerin’ questions have been answered in the early access wild-west management game 1849 from Somasim. Reach for it, cowboy! Not your gun, your sales ledger!

… [visit site to read more]

I thought Shelter was a frustrating experience about shepherding an idiot brood of badgers through bad pathfinding and poorly signposted objectives. It’s wholly possible that you’re a far better person than I, and you saw in it the same touching story of parenthood as Cara and John. If so, prepare to get broody: developers Might And Delight have announced Shelter 2.

Even I have to admit it looks very pretty. Extremely teasery trailer below.

… [visit site to read more]

I thought Shelter was a frustrating experience about shepherding an idiot brood of badgers through bad pathfinding and poorly signposted objectives. It’s wholly possible that you’re a far better person than I, and you saw in it the same touching story of parenthood as Cara and John. If so, prepare to get broody: developers Might And Delight have announced Shelter 2.

Even I have to admit it looks very pretty. Extremely teasery trailer below.

… [visit site to read more]

If these 81 patents are any indication, Microsoft is interested in bringing wearable computing to more than Xbox One.

Funcom haven’t had a smooth ride of late. The Secret World performed under expectations (although these were expectations based on their delusionally thinking they could charge a box price and subscription for a new IP MMO), and in January they were briefly suspended from trading as their offices were raided. That cannot have been fun. However, things appear to be back on track now, and last week they were showing off their next MMO, LEGO Minifigures Online. It could well be a much needed cash cow for the milking. I sat down and had a play of the family-friendly brick-me-do.

… [visit site to read more]