Parp parp! A demo for Forza Motorsport 7 [official site] is waiting outside, inviting us to pootle around three tracks for free. The full game will launch in October but the demo is here early, packing three tracks, three cars, and some dramatic weather conditions. The demo is available through Microsoft’s Store and yup, it does require Windows 10. Read the rest of this entry »
“PES 2018 should not suck on PC this year,” Alice wrote back in May. She was referring to FIFA’s great rival finally running with current-gen console graphics on our platform of choice, rather than using the previous-gen engine as has been the case for FAR TOO LONG. Well, all the fancy bells, whistles and advertising hoardings are in place, and you can see all of those glorious multi-million dollar haircuts in glorious detail.
That’s not to say everything is shiny though because there seem to be serious problems with the online portion of Pro Evo 2018 [official site]. I haven’t been able to test it myself, bit hopefully it’ll be fixed soon given that the game has been out for a day now.
Playing the newly-released free demo of FIFA 18 [official site] and its slice of the story campaign, I was delighted to see events kick off with a grandpa cooking a fried breakfast. Video game bellies are filled with cheeseburgers, meat on the bone, and fizzy pop, yet the humble fry-up is rarely featured. It’s not right. Assuming that the full game continues this focus on sizzling pans, I’m suddenly a lot more interested in FIFA 18. Oh, and for fans of plain ol’ football, the demo has lots of kicking too. Read the rest of this entry »
4v1 teens versus psycho killer (qu’est-ce que c’est?) chase ’em up Dead by Daylight [official site] has launched another free weekend, inviting all and sundry to play the full game for free for several days. When Rich McCormick recently visited the game to see how much a year of updates had improved it, he was jolly pleased with the game it has become. If you want to hang teenagers on hooks to sacrifice them to dark gods or try to escape a manifestation of your anxieties about your transition to adulthood, you might fancy giving it a go. Read the rest of this entry »
Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony [official site] has a free demo ahead of its full launch on September 26, and it’s about as weird as you’d expect. You’re trapped inside a school with an evil robotic bear called Monokuma, and the only way to escape is to murder a fellow student and get away with it by not getting found out during the ensuing trial.
It’s half-visual novel, half-adventure game in which you have to complete “high-speed, logic-action” mini games to find flaws in various arguments presented in the trials and find out the culprit. You can lie to confuse your fellow classmates as well. I didn’t get as far as a trial in the demo (you can skip straight to one if you want) but I have walked the schools’ corridors and spoken to its characters. I’m suitably impressed with the stylish presentation, although I had a few technical issues.
One of the developers behind the rock solid top-down shooter Teleglitch: Die More Edition is working on an FTL-inspired spaceship roguelike that, judging by the bits of the demo I’ve played, looks promising. Shortest Trip to Earth [official site] has just hit Indiegogo, looking for $35,000 (£27k), and the demo contains a tutorial and two sectors of space to blast through. Read the rest of this entry »
If you’ve not played XCOM 2 [official site] yet but Alec’s War of the Chosen review has you excited for the game it’ll be once the expansion hits, er, this weekend you can see what the turn-based tactics ’em up is like before that. Not as good? But still possibly up your spacestreet. Until Sunday evening, the full version of XCOM 2 is free to try. If you want it for keepsies, it’s on sale too. Read the rest of this entry »
Oh, nice! After trying to highlight a few games that have PC demos recently (I do like a demo – it’s far friendlier than a refund scheme and can actually be really interesting as a piece of curation or editing in and of itself, although obv it then requires more work and doesn’t contain the possibility of someone forgetting to get a refund or straying outside the no-questions refund period) there’s now one for the sci-fi adventure, Prey [official site]. Read the rest of this entry »
Today I’ve been trying to find and push some games with demos because demos are a dying art (or at least a shrinking art because of Steam refunds and the like) so let’s look at Epitasis [official site]! Epitasis has a demo to support a Kickstarter campaign which is running until 20 August. The game itself looks to be a non-linear dreamy puzzler with influences like Myst and Talos Principle. In his email the developer, Lucas Govatos, mentioned that people sometimes compare it to No Man’s Sky and I think that would be because of the setting – all big moons on horizons and red grass and strange structures. That said it actually reminds me far more of the monthly-ish walking simulator projects of Connor Sherlock because of the colour palettes combined with the alien landscapes. Read the rest of this entry »
The Universim [official site]- the planetary management/god game we last wrote about in… *checks* 2014? That can’t be right?! Oh dear! Has a new demo up on Steam and GOG. It came out last month and I’ve just started tinkering with it this morning, spinning its pretty planet and plonking down water wells and pumps. Read the rest of this entry »
What happens to forgotten games? I’d like to think some of them just turn into after-hours parties, like a lock-in at proper old boozer. When nobody new comes to play, the characters just grab a pint or do a line of shots and hit the dance floor.
Village Monsters [official site] sees things differently. Here, the baddies inhabiting an abandoned RPG have moved on and are now living the good life. You can join them in this Harvest Moon inspired indie game.
At first I thought Law Mower [official site] was going to be a nice little game about keeping your garden tidy (the Steam description talks about you mowing “every blade of grass in the world”). Nope. I’ve just played the demo, and I got turned to a pulp when I ran over an exploding gopher.
If I’d watch the new trailer first then I would’ve had a better idea: you’re a man with a mower, and you have to run over dogs, avoid missiles (mowing is serious business) and run over other people trying to peek over the garden fence. There’s a single player campaign that frames the madness, and online multiplayer too – it’s all out on 8th August.
A demo is now out for The Surge [official site], the new Dark Souls-inspired sci-fi action-RPG from the studio behind Lords of the Fallen. Our boy Brendan declared it a “serviceable” action game, one he had fun with for a bit but ultimately didn’t feel compelled to finish. Which sounds like a game that might be a lark to poke in a demo. Read the rest of this entry »
If you were on the fence about whether you’d enjoy Butcher‘s [official site] chainsaw-wielding, blood-splattered, ultraviolent take on 2D platforming, then you can now dip your toe into the red pool without paying anything. The game, from Transhuman Design, the developer of Soldat, just got a free demo.
There’s also 50% off the full game until Monday, so if you like the free stuff it’s only £3.49/4.99€/$4,99 to get the full shooty-bang experience.
If you’ve been holding off on Mass Effect Andromeda [official site], which is entirely understandable whether you’re a fan of the series or not, perhaps a ten hour free trial is just what you need to decide whether the trip is worth your time and money. Previously available to EA Access subscribers, the trial is now open to everyone. It gives you ten hours of play-time, which you can spend in singleplayer (up to the first planet) or multiplayer, and saves will carry over to the full game if you choose to buy it. You’ll need Origin, EA’s digital storefront, and post-trial, the game is currently £24.99.
The good news keeps on rolling for murder’s favourite slaphead. After establishing themselves as an independent company and securing the rights to Hitman, developers IO Interactive have released the prologue chapter of the recent episodic Hitman [official site] for free. Consider it a demonstration. I did think it strange that Square Enix didn’t release a demo of the stealth ’em up back before they ditched IO but hey, one’s here now. Thanks, independent IO Interactive. Thaioi. Read the rest of this entry »
RPS Feature Get in lane
It’s not enormously likely you’ve heard of Nadia Was Here [official site]. It came out at the end of last month and I’m not sure anyone noticed. Turns out, after stumbling on it today, everyone really should have. My early impressions are that this pixel RPG is something rather special. And that’s a lot to do with some completely intriguing combat. Read the rest of this entry »
I’ve sunk a fair chunk of time into Mirage: Arcane Warfare [official site], the first-person melee brawler in which you can both fling magic spells and lop a man’s head off with a giant axe, and I’ve enjoyed nearly all of it. But it does have one flaw: there just aren’t enough players. You’ll often run into empty servers, and those that are full contain a mix of every skill level. That can make it difficult for new players to settle in.
Well, the game is currently free to try on Steam, and will be until 9pm on Sunday (1pm Pacific). Player numbers are already picking up, which is promising.
Fantasy stealth game Styx: Shards of Darkness [official site] has released a free demo, letting all and sundry try sneaking around as a little goblin with gross magic powers. Our Alec’s review in March was not fond of Styx himself, the unfunny protagonist, but he did say that “The stealth game underneath this miserable skin is solid.” That’s got to be worth a crack, especially as the full game is on sale now too. Read the rest of this entry »
Post-apocalyptic packrat simulator Fallout 4 [official site] will be free to play in full this weekend. The free weekend on Steam will start at 6pm today (10am Pacific) and run until 9pm (1pm Pacific), letting all and sundry and play the base game and poke at mods. (Expansions not included.)
If you dig it and want it for keepsies, the game will be on sale until Monday evening. And for those who already have it, the DLC is going on sale too. Read the rest of this entry »
