Play Amnesia: The Dark Descent for free with OnLive
OnLive—the subscription service that lets you play a host of games on the cheap, regardless of your hardware—wants to scare their supporters, in the best way possible. They’re giving away free copies of Frictional Games’ indie-horror gem Amnesia: The Dark Descent, from now until 9pm PST tonight. All you have to do to snag one of the scariest games of all time is register at this link, download the free demo, then enter the promo code “THANKYOU” when it expires.
Hard Stuff: Psyko Audio Labs Carbon review
This headset is absolutely massive. I’m talking Goliath-massive. After just two hours of using it, my neck ached as if I was wearing a military-grade Kevlar helmet.
PC Gamer wants YOU for the Coconut Monkey army! [HoN, BLC]
All your life, you’ve known that you were born to be a leader. But you never yet got the chance to rise up and guide your fellow gamers, forming alliances with bonds stronger than blood. That is, until today. PC Gamer wants you to enlist in the Coconut Monkey army, becoming the leader you were destined to be. If you consider yourself a dedicated, amicable general in Heroes of Newerth or Bloodline Champions, it’s time to answer the call.
And in other PC gaming news…
Blimey, look at all that news. Creative Assembly are working on the next Total War game, we got the first in-game footage of Dead Island and some new screenshots, got an advanced peak at the Firelands raid for World of Warcraft, and about a billion other things, including more from Bioware on how your past Mass Effect choices will impact your adventure in the sequel. We even threw in a Witcher 2 competition for good measure.
What’s that, you want MORE news? Challenge accepted! Why, here’s your daily list of everything that’s been happening in PC gaming today, with a few comedy extras.
Terraria launch a huge success
Yesterday we mentioned the launch of a little-known game called Terraria. It appeared on Steam with no marketing campaign, and no real build up beyond a link on Twitter from Minecraft creator notch. Right now, it’s the sixth most played game on Steam, ahead of Portal 2 and Team Fortress 2, and is the second best selling game on Steam, lingering just behind The Witcher 2.
EU Giveaway: The Witcher 2 Collector’s Edition
The Witcher 2 is out today. To celebrate, Namco Bandai have sent us a copy of the enormous Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings Collector’s Edition to give away to one lucky European reader.
The set contains a making of DVD, a world map, an enormous art book, a set of arcane dice, playing cards and a rule book, a “cursed coin” (watch out for that), pages and pages of cut-out and build papercraft, a bonus in-game commando jacket and a bust of Geralt, modelled above by a mystery web writer. It’s massive, and a brilliant prize for even casual fans of the Witcher. To win, simple answer the question below.
Duke Nukem Forever trailers tease incoming demo
Just when you think the Duke’s gone quiet, BOOM, there he is, standing on your porch, shouting obscenities and and throwing poo at your walls. Three new Duke related videos have landed. The one above brings news of an incoming demo next month. It’s for First Access members only at the moment (that includes anyone who pre-ordered Duke Nukem Forever or bought the Game of the Year edition of Borderlands), but it’s bound to get a widespread release soon enough.
Below we have the exciting new TV trailer, and a part 2 of the behind the scenes Duke retrospective, charting Duke Nukem Forever’s long, long, long, long history. The game’s set to finally come out on June 14 in the US, and June 10 everywhere else.
Creative Assembly already working on new Total War game
Speaking to Eurogamer, Creative Assembly’s studio director, Mike Simpson has confirmed that the team are already working on another Total War game, just two month’s after the release of Total War: Shogun 2. When asked by the website whether the team were working on another Total War game, Simpson replied “We never stop, so yes.”
Dead Island trailer shows first in-game footage
The second trailer for Dead Island tries to make you feel sorry for the zombies. DON’T FEEL SORRY FOR THE ZOMBIES. It is the first and last mistake you’ll ever make. In case you’d forgotten, the first Dead Island trailer was amazing. The in-game footage was never going to be quite as spectacular, but that paradise island sure looks pretty. Check out the brand new Dead Island screens to see a gorier side to the island.
Minecraft creators planning to co-publish other indie games
Minecraft developers Mojang say that they’re planning to start co-publishing other indie games as early as November. The studio has come a long way since Notch single-handedly started work on Minecraft. Mojang now has multiple staff members, and are thinking about using their success to promote and publish other upcoming indie titles.
Civ World trailer brings Civilization to Facebook
The trailer above is our first look at Civ World, the upcoming Civilization Facebook game that’s trying to put an accessible spin on one of the most complex and detailed empire-building strategy games ever made.
Have they succeeded? Trading with friends to achieve a collaboratively could be fun, but my favourite bit is the little crown icon you get for being the most successful empire. Who doesn’t want to be king of all their friends? The game’s currently in beta, but you can find out how to join on the Civ World Facebook page.
Intel’s latest stock CPU cooler tested: is this the end for additional CPU coolers?
When Intel’s Sandy Bridge CPUs arrived in the PC Gamer labs a few months ago, one of the things that really surprised me was the size of the retail heatsink supplied with the top end Core i7 2600K. I could be wrong, but I don’t remember seeing one as small as this since the days of the Pentium 3. It’s pictured above, and as you can see, is barely higher than the RAM modules.
Aha, I thought, that must just be a cost saving trick for Intel that’s good for running the chip at stock speeds. For extra performance you’ll surely need something a bit more frosty.
When it came to testing the overclocking potential of the chip for the review, I added a watercooler that I was also testing at the time – a Corsair H60. As expected, the chip flew, racing up to 4.5GHz and beyond without any issue. How far would the chip overclock and for how long, I wondered, using just the tiny supplied cooler.
Curious about esports? Watch the StarCraft 2 TSL tournament for free
If you’ve ever been tempted to check out StarCraft 2 as a spectator sport, you should definitely watch the recent Team Liquid Starleague tournament. The whole competition is available to watch now for free on the TSL site. It’s got it all, incredibly talented players, tense match-ups, and expert narration from some of the best shoutcasters in the world.
The TSL has become another regular fixture in our StarCraft 2 calendar, alongside the GSL and Day[9]‘s regular casts. It’s fair to say many of us have become completely hooked on watching StarCraft 2 (find out how Tom got hooked here). We think you might like it, too, so we gathered together ten of the best StarCraft 2 matches to help get you started.
World of Warcraft Encounter Journal to detail boss fights, Firelands raid previewed
The new Encounter Journal has landed on the World of Warcraft test realms, providing full details of the boss fights in the upcoming Firelands raid. The Journal is set to act as a one stop, in-game wiki that will provide in depth information on every raid boss, gathering the huge amount of information normally only available on sites like WoWhead and WoWwiki into one official document.
The Journal will list detailed descriptions of each bosses’ attacks, and the exact challenges players will encounter in each boss chamber, but will the new addition ruin the surprise of WoW’s raids? And will listing every boss attack make them too easy to defeat?
Gotham City Impostors announced. Play as “The Bats” and “The Jokerz”
Warner Bros and Monolith Productions have announced Gotham City Impostors – an upcoming first-person shooter where you play as your own character in either “The Bats” or “The Jokerz” tribute gangs.
All sounds a bit “I’m not wearing hockey pads” to us.
