Well, that was earlier than I expected. It was only last week that I noted that a new demo for Dream Dock's DREADMOOR was out, and (announced yesterday) we'll get a bit more than just a demo early next month. Heading to early access, we'll get the "core experience and main gameplay systems [...] already in place," with the team working on balancing, polish, and taking on feedback from players.

It is that hallowed season; the spooky and dark creep in as the days grow shorter. I love Halloween, and I love all things vampiric, gothic, witchy, etc. For all the cozy vibes I enjoy, games like Pale Incense are absolutely my flavor. Developer Ongun Ayhan has revealed that their upcoming project, Pale Incense, will be coming to the Steam Next Fest from October 19th-26th.

Monday, Apple Crumble got a release date and I was singing about killing someone stabbing grannies, the DLC for Marvel Cosmic Invasion got a November release date, and FM27 keeps getting sexier and sexier with each deep dive. Tuesday, Stupid Never Dies is proven by politics every 2-5 years, but this week's deep dive is very artsy. Wednesday, The Lady Greyhounds…

Captain’s Log: I got bored of this season and started rewatching DS9 again. Directed by For All Mankind and Shadow and Bone director, Dan Liu has been around these parts before with Picard’s one good season and three previous episodes of Strange New Worlds. Writing, this time, won’t lead me to swear so much, as Bill Wolkoff returns following “The Sehlat Who Ate Its Tail” and five other episodes.

For PC and console gamers, the Xbox controller has been a favorite for over a decade. Its form factor, ergonomics, and familiar design have led Xbox to stray only slightly from its 2013 design with the Xbox One. We were due for a shakeup, and with the rising popularity of portable, multi-platform controllers, the newest Xbox controller is a drastic new design that offers a much-needed first-party alternative in size and cost.

I don't often cover the Steam Next Fest and what's coming to it simply because I have no time to actually cover the demos during it in the first place. A weird little circle of being busy. Nonetheless, there are games announced for the upcoming Steam Next Fest that I think are worth watching, including one I've spoken about before. When we last saw…

It's always a treat to see a niche indie title get a sequel, as some video games leave more of a mark than others, but every game needs to sell well to get a second iteration. One such game would be Toem: A Photo Adventure, from developer Something We Made. There was just something about picking apart each diorama and the several "a-ha!" moments that game evoked from me that stuck in my mind for all this time.

I love life-sim games and cooking games. So, when I find out about games that mix the two genres, I’m sold. Green Rapture Games just provided a ton of new info on its new cozy life-sim set in Japan, Sushi on Wheels. Specifically, Sushi on Wheels will be released on December 7th, 2026. It is also celebrating a 10,000 wishlist milestone and will be a part of Steam Cooking Fest from October 12th-19th and the Steam Next Fest from October 19th-26th.

1999 is widely considered one of the greatest years in video game history. While many enjoyed Final Fantasy VIII, Chrono Cross, Planescape: Torment, and Silent Hill, I was obsessed with two games. Pokémon Silver, which I still stand by, and Toy Story 2 for the PlayStation, which I still stand by. The former is easier to debate with people than the latter, but clearly, enough kids who are now adults loved these games too, which led to the release of…

Mmm, how about that? Indeed, I could have used any number of Lasso-isms, but given the internet and men being upset that they can't watch men in shorts that climb up their backsides, I couldn't exactly quote Trent Crimm, Independent. Before my editor kills me, yes, Ted Lasso Season 4 is now over, and recently EA did one of those things where the yearly sports release...

Fortnitemares 2026 is about halfway through its spooky-season run. With new Five Nights at Freddy's content, another iconic horror Freddy, plus returning items and twists on past season areas, there's plenty to like. If you wait for seasonal or limited-time events to decide whether it's time to hop back on the Battle Bus, let's talk. Here's my take on whether or not…

Before Phenixx Gaming, I was an art student. Specifically, I thought for a while that I would get an art history degree, before I realized that I loved writing more than I did regurgitating dates and names. Stupid Never Dies’ 4th Dev Diary takes me back to something I love: dissecting art styles and picking at the way things look.

Short, sweet, and to the point - something I am not when talking about Football Manager. However, on Friday we got a short video overview of the upcoming training and tactical complexity that has been overhauled for Football Manager 27. Some of it can be very interesting. Which is odd for me to say, given I delegate team training and focus more on individual bits and pieces.

It is the year of Doctor Doom for Marvel, with Avengers: Doomsday on its way. As such, games like Marvel Tokon have added Doom to their ranks. However, a new Marvel title is adding Doom-centric content. Marvel Cosmic Invasion’s “The Siege of Castle Doom” DLC now has a release date! Announced on Friday, the release date comes along with a trailer reveal of two new playable characters.

I feel like I have to admit that I've been singing a twisted version of an already twisted version of "She'll Be Coming Round the Mountain When She Comes." Why yes, it was an even more twisted version of "Ye Cannae Shove Yer Granny aff a bus," but that's beside the point because Happy Broccoli Games announced the release date for the granny protection game, …

So after two very emotionally heavy weeks, let's ruin my week further with Prime/Luna in October. As usual, we focus on the games to download and such, but the Luna side of... "Luna" with this Cloud Gaming nonsense is quite interesting this month. God no, not that Sonic X Shadow Generations is on offer, nor that you can play…

Technically, the Nintendo Switch did let players play Kingdom Hearts. In the days of Nintendo's handheld-home hybrid console testing the waters of cloud gaming, it was possible to play versions of the Square Enix games via stable, strong internet. Now, with the power of the Switch 2, Nintendo fans are no longer held hostage by data throttling or slow internet speeds.

Monday, Town of Tinysville is another in the deck-based city builder boom, and Poker Night at the Inventory got a new update. Tuesday, Farm to Table got another early access update for the farming/restruant sim, and you couldn't beat my excitement for FM27 down with a hammer. Wednesday, despite being October, Humble Choice was a lot fairer this month than Epic or…

Am I a Captain or am I a muppet? Directed by series regular and established Schitt’s Creek Director, Jordan Canning. This is the fourth of Canning’s five episodes on Star Trek: Strange New Worlds. If only we could end it there, but I’m left having to talk about the episode and who wrote it. This week we have a duo, with a return from last week’s “

There are three things I need you to know about me, folks: I'm not a huge fan of Star Wars, I'm even less of a fan of racing games, and I'm just about as far from being a "car guy" as one can get. I'm telling you all that upfront both as an excuse for my lack of knowledge about the intricacies of my subject today, and as a means of emphasizing how much I enjoy…

I’ve been following Stupid Never Dies and its “Deep Bite” deep dives lately. I’m really excited to try the new game from GPTRACK50, and these deep dives are painting a picture of what will be coming in just a few weeks. Now, the third “Deep Bite” has arrived, focusing on an important pillar of any game’s development: Music. Producer Hiroyuki Kobayashi walks us through the game’s musical journey in the new deep dive, and here is a little more about it from the press release:

I've always enjoyed the various spin-off games set within the universe of Warhammer 40K. This week, Games Workshop and the developers at Auroch Digital have announced some new details regarding the upcoming roguelite entry within the universe. Hopes to capture the magic of the highly successful Vampire Survivors. Announced earlier this year, Warhammer Survivors allows you to battle through endless swarms of enemies utilizing characters from the 40k and…

I am, if nothing else, a creepy-horrorsexual. This is drastically different from the jump-scaresexuals that YouTube harbors, as creepy-horror enjoys suspense, the uncomfortable atmosphere, and not jumping out of cupboards wearing fake breasts and an Angela Merkel mask while clanging saucepans together. One of my and everyone's favorite creepy-horror games recently was DREDGE, and a similar-ish game announced late last year that had a…

Well, folks, it’s early October. You know what that means: We’re in that weird time of year between fulfilling our obligation to wake up Billie Joe Armstrong and when Mariah Carey is fully defrosted for the season to wreak havoc on shopping centers worldwide with that accursed song. In the meantime, there are positive things like Halloween, more agreeable weather, and…

It's easy to imagine we'll all have plenty of games to play in October. With major releases on Xbox, Switch 2, and PlayStation 5, it's going to be a jam-packed month. When a schedule is this full of top-tier titles, some sleeper picks can go by the wayside. Well, we're not going to let that happen. Don't let a busy month of gaming get in the way of keeping an eye on these indie games releasing in October 2026 that you shouldn't overlook.

See, this should have been the "deep dive" last week to reveal the release date for Football Manager 27. Though if we're honest, putting my production hat on, Sports Interactive could have used better mics that have a bit of dynamics to them than cheap headphone mics that make everyone sound bored. Released last night, we got a deep dive into the tactical improvements and the match engine upgrades that make the football of…

I’ll admit, I haven’t been following Farm to Table all that closely lately. My time has been occupied with a review I’m working on, as well as time playing Dressmaker. However, I peeked at a recent press release for the cozy life-sim yesterday, and some interesting stuff just came out. IndieGiant Games just released a major update for Farm to Table…

For so many years, Jackbox Party Packs have been one of the go-to party games. From New Year's Eve parties to Pax events or a random Saturday night, these games are phenomenal for all to enjoy! There have been moments in recent years where the developers will spin off some of their more successful games into standalone titles. This time around, it is…

I love a bit of poker. The advent of recent gambling games like Balatro has definitely scratched that itch for me, but one classic always hits the right spot. The remade version of Poker Night at the Inventory is a lot of fun, but after playing its initial four tables for a while, I put it down. Now, I have plenty of reasons (4 specifically) to pick it back up, as the most recent update just added a heavy batch of new content to the game!

The Steam marketplace has plenty of games to satisfy a dedicated deck-building fan. There's also no shortage of roguelikes either. Mix in games where you map out the development of a town, and these distinct genres and game types can keep you busy for hours and hours. Throw all three into a pixel-style experience, and it might become one of the great games to close out 2026 when it launches in December.

My name may not be Elim Garak, but for the town of Twillford, I am but a simple modiste. As I once said in an article stating I am more interested in Free Lives and Cozy Lives’ Dressmaker than GTA VI, I can say wholeheartedly that is still true to this moment. Originally made by Terra Nil and…

Steam offers plenty of games to satisfy a competitive gamer. As more games use leaderboards and high scores to pit players against one another, pinball is a genre with strong potential to become a hotbed of 1v1 action. Independent Canadian studio Hollow Light announced its debut game, Tilt Rivals, a fast-paced arcade pinball game built around head-to-head competition. Here's what we know so far.

Monday: Nothing happened that was worth covering over doing editorials and reviews, and Tuesday we didn't put out anything because the site was affected by a maintenance period that has now resulted in our Twitter (suck farts, Elon) account being suspended from a site infested with AI and porn for "inauthentic behavior." Wednesday, Coffee Stain teased the new Satisfactory expansion…

The definition of insanity is watching Star Trek in 2026 and expecting a different result. Returning for her third season, Dana Horgan is joined by a new writer in almost every sense of the word. Skyler Ojeda has a couple of credits, mostly as a production assistant on films and TV, like Daredevil, alongside being Akiva Goldsman’s assistant from 2019.

The Following Article contains Spoilers for Control and Control Resonant; reader discretion is advised After spending over 50 hours with my current GOTY contender, Control Resonant, I have a lot of thoughts, particularly about where Remedy could take the game and its story in expansions. If past games are any indication, Control Resonant will likely receive at least 2 expansions before they move to either…

Take a deep breath; it is time to jump into the toxic waste as the internet moans about a game that it (collectively) will buy en masse despite complaining about it and swearing off this year's release before it was announced. 10 months after the release of Football Manager 26, we have details over the last week about the upcoming "we're sorry" album: …

The Rush song "The Spirit of Radio" is an ode to the radio, the music it plays for us, and the beneficial effects said music has on us. My subject today particularly reminds me of the following two lines of its lyrics: "Off on your way, hit the open road / There is magic at your fingers." What we've got here is…

I have loved the Fire Emblem franchise since I played one of the first games released on the Game Boy Advance. Of course, it has had less success in the US than in Japan, but since Awakening, Fates, and most recently, Three Houses, the series has grown into an RPG powerhouse in its own right. Fire Emblem: Fortune’s Weave…

I say it a lot, but every time I so much as think about Satisfactory, I wish I had more time. It is one of those games where you sit down to start playing, you'll get through the first little bit that's "dull" in a sitting or two, then when you're automating and running coal power generation, you've sat down in June and woken up in January.

I never got into RuneScape in my younger years. I only had room in my life for one video game addiction, and World of Warcraft laid claim to that ages before I had even heard of RuneScape. Nevertheless, something about RuneScape: Dragonwilds caught my eye. RuneScape: Dragonwilds has just launched out of Early Access, so I decided to give it a proper look.

2019’s Control was my game of the year for the year it released. It is also one of my favorite games of all time. The world that Remedy Entertainment crafted within it and spawning outward from it (along with their other games) has captivated me since my first playthrough. Due to this, I have been eagerly awaiting the release of…

If Activision is going to handle the Halo handoff successfully, it will likely require a major shift. 343 Studios, most recently known as Halo Studios, controlled the franchise for over a decade. During that time, they released titles that failed to capture the magic and fan response of Bungie's first three games. Here's the thing: I don't think Bungie had a special recipe or secret to their games.

I think it's reasonable to say that very few people (if any) ever expected the cult classic 1996 film Mars Attacks! to be revived after thirty years, especially not as a theme park management sim video game. Nevertheless, I present to you Mars Attracts, developed and published by Outlier. Mars Attracts has spent the past year in Steam Early Access, but has now exited Early Access and launched into primetime.

Many people now know Monolith Soft for the Xenoblade Chronicles franchise. However, as someone who adores the various franchises that they have worked with over the years, I hold a different Xeno series dear. While it is suspected that a lot of the source material for the Xenosaga series is considered Lost Media now, I think Monolith Soft should be allowed to dive even further back into its history.

Monday, Let's Build a Dungeon got a release date, but your dad is safe in his cage, WANE looks pretty (tell your dad he's a looker too), and Vaewolf got a new trailer. Two out of three ain't bad. Tuesday, The Hollowing looks lo-fi and spooky, with a demo out now, and even scarier, Bungie says Destiny isn't dead…

It’s the hope that kills you. I certainly had hopes when I saw that our director this week, Yana Gorskaya, edited the movie What We Do in the Shadows, before also directing 22 episodes in five seasons of the same show. As well as several other Taiki Waititi projects. Then I saw the writing this week came from Strange New Worlds…

When Dragon Quest XI was released in 2017, it was my first foray into the historic Japanese RPG franchise. It feels like forever ago, especially since the game was released on the 3DS rather than a home console. Now, the home-and-handheld console split is one, thanks to the Switch 2's hybrid nature. That still gives fans handheld portability while packing modern console power.

Ah, it always lifts my spirits when I get an email from Steam telling me a game I’ve had on my radar for ages has finally launched. This time around, it’s Nighthawks, developed by The Curiosity Engine and published by Wadjet Eye Games. Steam tells me I’ve had Nighthawks on my wishlist since I first heard about it, all the way back in late April of 2020.

I have been frothing at the mouth for Stupid Never Dies like a zombie drooling over brains. GPTRACK50’s new action game oozes style and gives me vibes not dissimilar to Lollipop Chainsaw and Devil May Cry. With the release date creeping up on us, the devs have revealed another deep dive into Davy’s adventure. In a new video shared by SEGA and GPTRACK50, titled “Deep Bite #2”, some core gameplay details have been showcased that we haven’t seen before.