Dec 19 2018
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ark: survival evolved

Raptor Claus is Comin’ to Town in ARK: Survival Evolved

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The dinosaur-filled world of ARK: Survival World is getting festive with a seasonal Winter Wonderland holiday event. The event is live now on every single and multiplayer server. Look up in the sky between midnight and 2 am in game time to find Raptor Claus flying overhead in his sleigh, dropping down high-level loot, as well as mistletoe and coal.

This year adds his partner Gacha Claus, who roams the land in a Santa-themed outfit. Gacha Claus cannot be tamed and spawns as a Parasaur with holiday colors and a Santa Hat.

You can give Gacha Claus the coal and he will exchange it for holiday-themed items. Items include holiday lights, Christmas trees, stockings, and snowman to bring some festive cheer to your homes.

You can also trade in mistletoe to Gacha Claus for weapons and armor. There’s a random chance that Gacha Claus will reward you with a special dino holiday candy, which can give a dinosaur a festive makeover.

During the event all dinosaurs have a 20% chance of spawning with holiday colors.

The event comes with a patch that includes lots of balance changes and fixes. Find the full patch notes here.

The Winter Wonderland event is available now on PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One. It ends January 7, 2019. ARK: Survival Evolved is rated T for Teen.

Dec 18 2018
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sea of thieves

The Holidays Bring Gilded Gifts to Sea of Thieves

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Microsoft’s multiplayer pirate game Sea of Thieves is celebrating the holidays with a seasonal event called Gilded Gifts. The event adds new Gilded Voyages, which can be claimed as a free gift from the Pirate Lord. The Gilded Gifts event runs through the the first week of January 2019.

Four advanced voyages are presented, each tied to a different Trading Company, but players can only choose one. Your options are: Gold Hoarders, Order of Souls, Merchant Alliance, and Athena’s Fortune. You can only select the last one if you’ve reached Pirate Legend status.

Gilded Voyages are much more challenging and must be completed in a single session, so be prepared when you decided to tackle it. Completing a Gilded Voyage gives substantial rewards to gold and reputation.

Sea of Thieves is currently in the middle of its fourth content update, Shrouded Spoils. A fog now blankets much of the ocean, providing ambush opportunities. Enemies are more ferquent and more dangerous, including more skeleton forts and ships, and rampaging sea monsters like the Kraken and Megalodon. Loot has also become more juicy, whether by defeating sea monsters or shattering Mermaid Statues, and ship customization has been expanded.

Sea of Thieves is available for Xbox One and Windows 10 PC. It’s rated T for Teen for Crude Humor, Alcohol, and Violence.

Dec 14 2018
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gog winter sale

Unlock Free Games in the GOG Winter Sale

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It’s the most wonderful time of the year – time for lots of sales on digital video games! DRM-free store GOG launched their annual Winter Sale this week, currently featuring over 1900 games on sale. The GOG Winter Sale ends January 3, 2019.

You can earn bonus free games by spending money during the sale. If you’re quick you can grab a free game right now without spending a dime, simply by stopping by the store. Full Throttle Remastered is available for free – but only for the next 24 hours. Full Throttle is a classic 90s era LucasArts adventure game, recently remastered by Double Fine Productions.

If you spend any amount of money during the sale you can earn 1996 strategy game Fantasy General for free. Spending at least $15 grants Everspace, a much more recent spaceship sim from 2016.

If you need help browsing the huge selection, GOG offers several curated lists, including by genre and publication recommendations. The Best of 2018 is a good place to start for excellent indie games, including Battletech (30% off), Dead Cells (20% off), Frostpunk (33% off) and Into the Breach (33% off).

The GOG Winter Sale also features Daily Deals. Every 24 hours new games will rotate into these deals, bringing much steeper discounts, usually 70-85% off. Chances are you won’t find a better discount any time soon.

Finally, several new games have been added to GOG Connect. GOG Connect lets you import you Steam games into your GOG library so you can play them DRM-free, completely outside of Steam. The newly added games include Oddworld: Abe’s Oddysee, Age of Wonders 3, and the Shadowrun trilogy.

The GOG Winter Sale ends January 3, 2019.

Dec 13 2018
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sky noon

Arena Shooter Sky Noon Swings Out of Early Access

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Sky Noon is a first-person shooter that eschews typical shooter violence in favor of knocking players off of the floating cloud arena in this alternate Western world. After several months in Early Access it’s moving to an official 1.0 launch on December 18.

In Sky Noon, players don’t have health bars. In order for players to eliminate each other, they need to blast them off of the arena, not unlike Super Smash Bros. The gunslingers are equipped with air-powered weaponry and gadgets , including steam-powered jet boots, lassos, and grappling hooks to help maneuver around the floating arena. It’s an interesting way to turn a first-person shooter into a more non-violent format while still using guns.

The new 1.0 update adds a new Ice Spires duel map, new unlockable weapons, and an all new free-for-all game mode. The new game mode is called Money Bags. Players are tasked with collecting and stealing coins by quickly traversing around the map and eliminating the competition.

Sky Noon is developed by New Zealand-based indie developer Lunar Rooster and is currently available via Steam Early Access. Online multiplayer supports up to 6 players. The official 1.0 launch will update on December 18.

Dec 10 2018
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epic games store

Epic Games Store Launches as Alternative to Steam

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Although many big publishers and game companies have their own digital stores, like EA’s Origin and CD Projekt’s GOG, none have managed to get anywhere close to Steam’s stranglehold on digital PC gaming. Epic Games, the makers of Fortnite, hope to change that with the newly launched Epic Games Store. The Epic Games Store is currently in soft-launch mode with a handful of PC games. It’s aiming for a larger launch, and include Android games, in 2019.

Epic Games is set to be far more attractive to developers and publishers with a more lucrative revenue sharing percentage. Epic Games will take only 12% of sales on its store, leaving 88% for the developers and publishers. For developers that use the popular Unreal Engine in their games, Epic will cover the 5% royalty fee as well.

For comparison, Valve takes 30% of game sales through Steam.

“As developers ourselves, we wanted two things: a store with fair economics, and a direct relationship with players. And we’ve heard that many of you want this too! We’ve built this store and its economic model so that Epic’s interests are aligned with your interests,” writes Tim Sweeney, founder, Epic Games, in a blog post. “Because of the high volume of Fortnite transactions, we can process store payments, serve bandwidth, and support customers very efficiently. From Epic’s 12% store fee, we’ll have a profitable business we’ll grow and reinvest in for years to come!”

epic games store

Developers will have full control over their game store pages. Consumers won’t find ads or links to other games. Purchasing a game will subscribe that player to the official news feed, where developers can provide a steady stream of news and updates.

Epic Games is also embracing Youtubers and Twitch streamers via the Epic Games Suport-A-Creator program, allowing influencers to receive a share of revenue by driving traffic to the store page. Epic will cover the first 5% of creator-based revenue for the first 24 months.

Only a few games are currently available on the Epic Games Store, including Darksiders 3, Ashen, and Supergiant Games’ newly announced Hades.

The Epic Games Store will offer free games every two weeks to help encourage newcomers. The first is underwater survival-crafting game Subnautica, which is available for free from Dec. 14-27. Starting Dec. 28 you’ll be able to snag Super Meat Boy for free through January 10, 2019.