Rock, Paper, Shotgun

“Oh boy! I can finally get into prison early!” Oh videogames, don’t ever stop allowing me to create phrases of such ear-perking outlandishness that people could mistake me as ringleader of a merry band of elves. Other gems now possible thanks to Steam’s paid-alpha-centric Early Access program include “Hooray! Frighteningly authentic war’s happening even sooner than I thought” and “I wasn’t planning on being shipwrecked with no hope of escape today, but I certainly can’t complain.” But Prison Architect, Arma 3, and Under The Ocean are only three of the 12 inaugural games on offer. The rest – and perhaps even some freshly baked wordthinks – are after the break.

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In case you’re in need of a reminder, the Oculus Rift virtual reality headset is really, really cool. But that won’t be here until the fuuuuuuture, right? You will play it atop your hoverboard, which you will rebelliously ride inside your hoverhouse, which will drift above the hoverground, which will perpetually bob above a void of infinite nothingness. Which will also be hovering. Or so you think. In non-virtual reality, however, the VR wonder device is right around the corner, with backer dev kits shipping this very month. And now, Oculus and Valve have teamed up to announce the first officially supported game for the eyeball-teleporting tomorrow glasses: the ever-experimental Team Fortress 2. Naturally, there will also be a hat involved. I hope it hovers.

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I think a lot of people were pretty surprised when Surgeon Simulator 2013 made the cut for Steam Greenlight. I mean, it’s an impressive, exceedingly hilarious little production, but it emerged from the bounty-filled chest cavity of Global Game Jam. It’s amazing that something with such high production values came out of such a short development period at all, but the fact is, Surgeon Sim’s roots show. It’s a silly sideshow, but it hardly seems primed for primetime. Fortunately, Bossa’s not hanging up its gore-caked coat just because it’s sharing a practice with the likes of TF2′s Medic and, er… yeah, mostly him. New additions are on the way, so as to make this the most realistic simulation of a deranged, depth-perception-less sloth creature performing surgery ever.  Contrary to popular belief, you don’t have to be a brain surgeon to operate the break, after which you’ll find a video conclusively proving that you also don’t have to be a brain surgeon to be, well, a brain surgeon.

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The strange and sordid saga of Xi3′s Steambox/apparently not a Steambox/grapefruit of the fuuuuuuuuture slogs on. You’ll remember that Valve publicly denounced the little-PC-that-could (cost $1000) yesterday, which came as a strange turn of events after it was first announced with an investment from the very same Steam-powered empire. Right hand, meet left? Or maybe this was all an evil plot hatched by none other than Nega-Newell, who’s spent the past couple years masquerading as the real deal and making a series of baffling decisions. It sounds just as plausible as anything else, I think, given that Xi3′s now revealed that the rabbit hole runs even deeper. Apparently, it was actually Valve who commissioned them to make the damn thing in the first place.

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Am I allowed to swear in headlines? Some guy might complain that his four-year-old daughter reads PC gaming blogs and now he’s going to report us to David Cameron. I’m so sorry, that guy. Anyway, I’ve taken the coward’s route. I can only pray that you somehow manage to decode my intricate encryption and ascertain what I meant to say.

You know the Xi3 Piston $1000 gaming PC that was supposed to be the vanguard of the Valve Steambox console-concept? Nuh-uh. Valve have revealed they’ve nothing whatsoever to do with it after all. A name that sounds a bit rude might be the least of this thing’s problems now.
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Hey RPSers! I have had three cups of tea, EXCESSIVE amounts of sugar and have bags of energy for news today: and here is the first story I have to report. Xi3 have announced that their apparently “uniquely shaped, grapefruit-size” PISTON, a system optimized for games on high-def television monitors, will be available for preorder at SXSW until the final day at 11:59 p.m. CST on March 17th.

The so-called “Steam box” console – which is a third party effort and certainly not Valve’s own Steam box, which is yet to be revealed – will be available to SXSWers for $100 off the actual, ludicrous $999.99 price.

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The Age of Empires series has seen better days. Days like the year 1999, for instance. That’s when Age of Empires II: The Age of Kings charged onto the itsy-bitsy adowwwwable killing fields, and oh what a grand thing it was. It even looked quite nice for the time, eschewing 3D razzle-dazzle in favor of goode ye-olde-fashioned sprites. Times, however, have changed, and monitors have grown wide and voracious in their appetites for tender, succulent resolutions. Thus, Microsoft’s deemed it high-time for a re-release, on that newfangled, installation-frisbee-free Steam contraption that’ll probably never catch on, no less. Graphics, however, aren’t the only thing getting a modern makeover here.

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Gabe Newell doesn’t just spend his time making himself look like Austrian Santa Claus – he also heads up gaming software titan Valve. And, soon, gaming hardware titan Valve. Their ‘Steambox‘ PC-as-a-console concept isn’t a secret anymore, and indeed Newell now claims the first units might well be in the wild within the next three to four months.
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Even those who are less knowledgeable about MOBAs than they’d like to be but plan to rectify that as soon as humanly possible (IT’S ME, OK FINE JEEZ IT’S ME OH GOD I’M SUCH A MESS) know this much about DOTA 2: it’s the hard one. Thus far, League of Legends has paved my road to vague competence with copious pointers, helping hands, and utterly heroic shoves in the right direction, but DOTA’s idea of a red carpet involves my blood. Lots of my blood. So Valve’s decided to change that. Well, a little, at least. The storefront, hardware, and fuuuuuture creator that occasionally develops games has added an in-game tutorial to its arena battling opus. But this is just the beginning, and it wants your help.

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Oh boy, gaming’s favorite brain-dissolving apocalyptic disaster is back! And in the game, naturally. After a sojourn away from Steam due to excessively shady dealings and unforgivably poor quality, The War Z’s been re-listed on Valve’s ubiquitous storefront. So then, the natural question: what’s changed? Well, this probably warrants further investigation (yuck) inside the game, but for now, the answer appears to be “not a whole lot.” You will, however, notice the omission of some flat-out untrue promises from War Z’s last wibbly wobbly go-’round.

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