Over 30 years since release, this classic PC platformer built with the tech that led to Doom just got a remaster

It’s strange to think that first-person shooters—and arguably the PC’s arrival as a major gaming platform—emerged from an attempt to create the PC’s equivalent of Super Mario Bros 3. John Carmack’s reproduction of the smooth scrolling effect seen in Nintendo’s platformer ultimately led to the founding of id Software and the creation of Commander Keen….

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Roguelite city builder Super Fantasy Kingdom has been a big success, and now its developer can afford a luxury he’s always dreamed of: ‘A real winter jacket’

Some developers react to success by going all rock star—like Cliff Bleszinski purchasing a flashy Lamborghini when he was living it up at Epic. Solo dev Feryas Beer is a little bit more grounded after the success of Super Fantasy Kingdom, the Hooded Horse-published roguelite city builder. No cars, no luxury pads, not even a…

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Obsidian’s Josh Sawyer leads the charge of RPG fans playfully roasting Stranger Things for its D&D rule flubs: ‘The oldheads are going to catch all these things’

“Season ruined,” Obsidian studio design director Josh Sawyer (Pentiment, Fallout: New Vegas) declared on BlueSky alongside a clip from Stranger Things’ recently released fifth season. In the video, Finn Wolfhard’s Mike Wheeler expounds on the power of Dungeons & Dragons’ Cleric class⁠—specifically AD&D 1st Edition’s Cleric. “Even cooler, she can cast a Dimension Door,” Wheeler…

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You might think reimagining Washington DC as a nuclear hellscape for Fallout 3 would have been grim, but it made the lead designer want to set the next game in his hometown: ‘It’s just kind of fun to blow things up’

Far from the deserts of the Mojave and SoCal, Fallout 3 takes place in the shadow of a striking image: the United States Capitol building, partially blown to chunks in an abandoned, irradiated mire. The team working on the game at Bethesda was based in Rockville, a short jaunt from Washington, so they got a…

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Fallout: New Vegas lead writer worries Caesar’s argument for authoritarianism ‘was done a little too well,’ but still believes ‘you can’t just make your tyrants cardboard villains’

If you’ve played New Vegas, you’re familiar with Caesar’s Legion. Slavedriving, overtly fascistic, and wrapped in the aesthetics of the Roman Empire⁠—but with football pads instead of lorica segmentata. It seems like the kind of faction that would be hard to present as anything but one-dimensional, abject evil. As it turns out, giving the faction’s…

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The process of creating cosplay from scratch is incredibly intimidating to me, but Emily White found a new love for it post-lockdown: ‘It can take anywhere from a month to a year to bring a costume to life.’

I’ve always admired people who make their own costumes. Even when it’s for something as simple as a Halloween party, if someone’s gone an extra step to create something from scratch specifically for their costume, it just shows that little bit of extra creativity and dedication. That’s something I tend to lack. A lot of…

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The process of creating cosplay from scratch is incredibly intimidating to me, but Emily White found a new love for it post-lockdown: ‘It can take anywhere from a month to a year to bring a costume to life.’

I’ve always admired people who make their own costumes. Even when it’s for something as simple as a Halloween party, if someone’s gone an extra step to create something from scratch specifically for their costume, it just shows that little bit of extra creativity and dedication. That’s something I tend to lack. A lot of…

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