Carzy Zarx’s PC Gaming Emporium - Catch Up on All the Latest PC Gaming Related News

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And here’s the totally unexpected third part of the gaming news:

Viking RTS Northgard is now Northgard: Definitive Edition, thanks to an update that folds in its major DLC and adds a bunch of new stuff free to existing players
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/strategy/viking-rts-northgard-is-now-northgard-definitive-edition-thanks-to-an-update-that-folds-in-its-major-dlc-and-adds-a-bunch-of-new-stuff-free-to-existing-players/
The recent history of real-time strategy has been more dark age than golden era, but there have been a few bright spots over the last decade. One of those is Northgard, a Viking-themed RTS that was released in 2018. Built on traditional strategy foundations, Northgard added novel ideas like game-altering weather systems and a region-based expansion system.
The result is one of the best strategy games of the last decade. "While the inspiration is clear, it would be a disservice to imply that it's mainly trading in nostalgia," Fraser Brown wrote in his Northgard review, awarding it a score of 84%. "This Viking saga builds on the history-themed RTS romps of the '90s, but it's not beholden to them."
Northgard went on to sell over 5 million copies and receive a bunch of expansions and DLC. Now, developer Shiro Games has bundled several of these additional adventures with the base game to form Northgard: Definitive Edition, which throws in a few new features for good measure.

World War 1 survival horror Conscript gets a 'huge' update that adds a hardcore mode, redesigned levels, new items and gear, and much more
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/horror/world-war-1-survival-horror-conscript-gets-a-huge-update-that-adds-a-hardcore-mode-redesigned-levels-new-items-and-gear-and-much-more/
World War 1 survival horror Conscript was one of the bigger surprises of last year, with its unvarnished depiction of a French soldier's journey through the battle of Verdun thoroughly impressing reviewer Alexander Chatziioannou. "Every aspect of the game feels meticulously crafted to convey the absurdity and depravity of war," he wrote in his Conscript review. "For sheer, despair-inducing darkness, no game in recent memory captures the torment humanity can inflict upon itself quite like Conscript."
Alexander awarded Conscript a highly respectable score of 83, but it seems developer Jordan Mochi wasn't satisfied with the version that launched last July. Since then, Mochi has been working on a massive update to Conscript, one that extensively reworks many aspects of the experience—including the name, as it's now called Conscript: Director's Cut.

Descenders Next gets a big multiplayer update as its developer apologises for taking so long with it: 'We're slowly working on getting the feel and flow of Descenders back into Descenders Next'
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/racing/descenders-next-gets-a-big-multiplayer-update-as-its-developer-apologises-for-taking-so-long-with-it-were-slowly-working-on-getting-the-feel-and-flow-of-descenders-back-into-descenders-next/
Extreme sports sim Descenders Next looked primed to be an impressive follow-up to Ragesquid's 2019 hit, taking the fundamentals which made Descenders' downhill biking such a thrill and applying them to snowboarding and mountain-boarding. PC Gamer's Shaun Prescott took it for a spin last year and came away delighted, stating the sequel" adopts all of the best qualities of its predecessor while adding something that was arguably missing before: atmosphere".
Yet it seems supporting the sequel has, ironically, represented an uphill struggle for Ragesquid, with scant updates to Next since its early access release in July. That changed this week, however, as Ragesquid implemented a substantial multiplayer-focussed patch, while also explaining what's been going on behind the scenes.

Wreckreation developer puts its entire staff on notice as publisher THQ Nordic abandons it: 'We simply cannot sustain the studio in its current form'
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/racing/wreckreation-developer-puts-its-entire-staff-on-notice-as-publisher-thq-nordic-abandons-it-we-simply-cannot-sustain-the-studio-in-its-current-form/
Three Fields Entertainment, developers of Dangerous Golf, Danger Zone, and most recently the Burnout-meets-Trackmania mashup Wreckreation, has announced that it has put its entire staff on notice of redundancy, as the studio explained it "will not see revenue from game sales for the foreseeable future."
In a statement posted to X, Three Fields' CEO Fiona Sperry explained that the studio has "had to self-fund most of this year and all of the post launch content" after Wreckreation's publisher, the Embracer Group-owned THQ Nordic, apparently lost interest in the title. "Without the enthusiasm or financial support from our publisher to continue development, we simply cannot sustain the studio in its current form."

The creator of popular animated short The Backwater Gospel is making an FPS inspired by 'Half-Life and the golden age of narrative first person shooters'
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/fps/the-creator-of-popular-animated-short-the-backwater-gospel-is-making-an-fps-inspired-by-half-life-and-the-golden-age-of-narrative-first-person-shooters/
Animator Bo Mathorne, creator of the 2011 animated short, Backwater Gospel, has revealed a new game project alongside developer Thomas Mygind: Skarven, a crunchy, lo-fi (but not too lo-fi) FPS inspired by narrative-heavy late '90s/early aughts shooters like Half-Life.

Gaming collectible purveyor iam8bit is suing publisher Skybound over alleged fraud related to cat sim Stray
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/adventure/gaming-collectible-purveyor-iam8bit-is-suing-publisher-skybound-over-alleged-fraud-related-to-cat-sim-stray/
As reported by Engadget, videogame merch and physical edition company iam8bit is suing Skybound Game Studios over alleged fraud and breach of contract in their multi-year partnership, particularly relating to their joint work on distributing Stray, the 2022 3D platformer where you play as a cat exploring a cyberpunk city.

Statistics prove everyone is T-posing for dominance in Elden Ring Nightreign, the feared Bell Bearing Hunter is only the fourth-deadliest field boss, and nobody plays Guardian
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/roguelike/statistics-prove-everyone-is-t-posing-for-dominance-in-elden-ring-nightreign-the-feared-bell-bearing-hunter-is-only-the-fourth-deadliest-field-boss-and-nobody-plays-guardian/
On December 1, Bandai Namco released an assortment of Elden Ring Nightreign player statistics to celebrate the release of The Forsaken Hollows DLC. There are some interesting omissions, like the popularity of each nightfarer (but we can extrapolate from the data we do have), as well as some surprising reveals.

Tekken boss announces retirement after 30 years in the most Harada way imaginable: a lengthy social media post and hour-long mixtape
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/fighting/tekken-boss-announces-retirement-after-30-years-in-the-most-harada-way-imaginable-a-lengthy-social-media-post-and-hour-long-mixtape/
Katsuhrio Harada—one of the driving forces behind Tekken and the series head honcho for the last 20 years—is hanging up his fighting gloves at the end of this year.
He announced his retirement in a lengthy X post, saying that 2025 would be his final year at Bandai Namco and as the project leader on Tekken. "With the Tekken series reaching its 30th anniversary—an important milestone for a project I've devoted much of my life to—I felt this was the most fitting moment to bring one chapter to a close," he wrote.