Dishonored 2 New Game Plus mode coming today

Exciting Dishonored 2 [official site] news arrives in the form of an update that adds new stuff to the game rather than fixing what is already there. First of all, there's a new game plus mode, allowing you to start fresh with all the abilities and bonecharms you've discovered at the end of a playthrough carried across into the next one. In a wonderful turn of events, you can play as either character in your new game plus, but will have access to both Emily and Corvo's powers, allowing you to mix and match. The update will be available in beta later today and launches proper on Monday.

In January, a second free update will add a mission select screen, for replaying your favourite areas, and customisable difficulty modes.

We've already covered Dishonored 2 in our Advent Calendar, which involved a little bit of grumbling from John and I about the fact that it didn't take the top spot (though in a year with so many fantastic games, it really was only a little bit of grumbling). It's great to see that a wonderful game is set to become even better. The option to combine the two characters' abilities will open up new playstyles - there's so much fun to be had in seeing how abilities work together already - and the customisable difficulty options sound fantastic, and should really emphasise Arkane's whole philosophy of letting people play in their own way.

We don't know what the new difficulty options will include but Bethesda promise a "wide array of settings".

Even more options to customize your experience will arrive in January with the game’s second free update that will include two new features: Mission Select and additional Custom Difficulty Settings that further tailor to your playstyle and adjust the challenge based on a wide array of settings. Stay tuned in the coming weeks for more details on the second free update.

And if you'll excuse me, this is all the prompting I need to play again.