This week's highs and lows in PC gaming

THE LOWS 

Tom Senior: Horsing around

I am excited about Red Dead Redemption 2, and I reckon we’ll see it on PC at some point. The trailers so far haven’t inspired me, however. Out of context cutscene snippets don’t tell me much about the game, only that there will be lots of talking in it and some extended fire metaphors. 

I want to see what it’s like to ride across that open world. Show me some nice desert and a gorgeous horse, Rockstar. Show me a gunfight; a co-op team of players riding out in multiplayer; something that lets me know it’s an interactive open world game and not a CGI cowboy film.

Chris Livingston: Mount & Wait

I can usually pretend to be a logical and reasonable guy, haughtily putting forth statements like 'Game development takes as long as it takes' and 'Delays don't bother me, I don't mind waiting for a game to be finished'. But then sometimes I read a nice article like this chat with Armağan Yavuz of Taleworlds about the making of Mount & Blade and then I'm suddenly ranting like 'Where the hell is Bannerlord already?' and 'Why aren't I playing Bannerlord right now?'

Deep down I do know that game development shouldn't be rushed, but that feeling of impatience, like a spoiled kid griping that it's not Christmas yet, gets the best of me sometimes. In the meantime I should probably just shut up and play Mount & Blade: Warband a few more times.

Samuel Roberts: Bored on the fourth

It's Star Wars Day today, and all the best Star Wars games are still old ones. I don't feel much desire to reinstall (new) Battlefront 2, in all honesty, but considering almost exactly five years have passed since EA acquired the licence to Star Wars, to have just two games of mixed reception is a little disappointing. 

When EA snapped up Star Wars in 2013, I assumed it meant a new singleplayer BioWare RPG was on the way, and something Dead Space-y from now-shuttered studio Visceral. Maybe we'll have better luck with Respawn's Star Wars game, even if it's a little while away.

Tyler Wilde: I am playing Hearthstone again

What is a high is also a low. I’m not going to say how much I spent on cards as I attempted to glide back into the Hearthstone meta. (I’ll let James shame himself in that regard.) It’s a bit, though. I really didn’t intend to spend anything going in, but I needed Baku the Mooneater. Needed! Because what’s the point if I can’t compete? As much as I’ve been enjoying Hearthstone this past week (in part because my internet is down and I don’t have many single-player games already installed), I’m already remembering why I burned out. 

I’ve got a decent Odd Rogue deck, and I know what kind of decks I’ll face in ranked, so now what? I play game after game in ranked, using the same strat against the same strats. A number ticks up when I do well. There just isn’t enough variation, game to game, now that I have one deck that doesn’t really need tinkering with (and I can’t make any others because I dusted all my good cards to make this one). I’m going to enjoy a few Arena runs, as well as the single-player stuff I’ve missed over the past three years, but after that, I wonder if I’ll really care enough to keep playing.

James Davenport: Destiny who?

Destiny 2's Warmind expansion releases next week and I… I don't care. I'll play it, sure, but I can't say I feel excited. There's some kind of horde mode, some new story missions that I'll play once and forget, new strikes that I won't feel motivated to repeat, and Ice Hive? Really? Hive, but with ice? At this point, I'd rather Destiny 2 just be a raid subscription service. The expansions so far have been messy attempts to add more of everything when all I really want is to kill space demigods with five friends. 

Joe Donnelly: Celebrity stitch up

I'm not against celebrity endorsements per se, but do you really think professional footballer and World Cup winner Gianluigi Buffon plays World of Tanks in his spare time? I mean, he might. He might also own a Mastercard, or wash his hair with Head and Shoulders, or fight scantily-clad, laser beam-shooting women on behalf of sports brand Puma. But I reckon he's simply in it for the money. 

Cristiano Ronaldo has probably never owned a Suzuki Swift. And I can't be convinced big Gigi has ever handled a tank with a mouse and keyboard.