Author: Miri Teixeira

NME

The recently released HD mod for third-party Old School Runescape client, RuneLite, just got a major lighting upgrade.

• READ MORE: Xalavier Nelson Jr. on the rocky development and military questioning of ‘Can Androids Survive’

Announced on the Patreon page for RuneLite HD, the Linear Space upgrade by the modder known as 117 will change how light is calculated in the game. As explained by 117, “previously, lighting was applied to colours in gamma colour space. Now, colours are converted to linear space before lighting is applied, then the result is converted back to gamma space before being displayed on the screen.”

“This new method is physically accurate and should produce more natural-looking lighting, instead of the odd, high contrast, washed out lighting that would often give things a plastic-y appearance. All lighting had to be updated to facilitate this change, so be aware that there will be some places and things that look worse than before the update.”

The update also fixed some “major visual bugs” while using the RuneLite HD plugin, but requires a restart before it will take effect.

Several other changes were implemented, all of which can be read about via the RuneLite HD Patreon page. The plugin was released earlier this month, after the creator negotiated its release with Jagex, the owners of Runescape.

Some controversy initially arose when Jagex allegedly told 117 that the mod, which had been in the works for “approximately 2000 hours of work over two years”, needed to be cancelled because the studio has its own graphical improvement mod that is “relatively early in the exploration stages”.

Jagex later walked back their statement, saying it had begun “actively exploring options on how we can work together to offer 117’s plug-in as a bridge until our own version is ready for release”.

117 later confirmed that “discussions with Jagex have been fruitful and we have reached an agreement that I am personally very happy with.”

In other news, Dolby Vision is now available for Xbox Series X|S consoles.

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A preview for the latest League Of Legends patch, 11.20, has revealed several details regarding upcoming nerfs and changes.

• READ MORE: Daniel Drakos explains how music became the defining aspect of Europe’s ‘League Of Legends’ scene

In a tweet from a Riot dev, details about patch 11.20 were previewed, as the game reverts to a more “normal” build after the League Of Legends World Championship final on October 5. The tweet specifies this, saying that “now that Worlds is locked in, we’re back to a more normal patch. We’re following up on a few changes that overshot a bit and otherwise doing some adjustments for soloq champs.”

The main reduction changes appear to be nerfs to systems Lord Dominik’s Regards and Smite’s Healing, and nerfs to Champions Taliyah, Amamu, Singed, Jarvan IV, Irelia, and Shen. Conversely, champions Senna, Darius, Elise, Hecarim, and Udyr appear to be getting a buff.

Patch 11.20 will be released on October 6, with fans anticipating it for a while thanks to Riot’s patch notes schedule. New skins are expected with the update, but so far the only information present is the above preview.

Riot Games has recently shared a development blog discussing how the Behavioral Systems Team is approaching the problem of AFK (away from keyboard) players in League Of Legends.

The maximum AFK punishment was previously just five games where players had to wait 15 minutes before queuing, the introduction of three new tiers of this queue lockout means that players will be entirely prevented from queuing up for one, three, seven and 14 days respectively.

In other news, The Witcher 3 and Cyberpunk 2077 quest director Mateusz Tomaszkiewicz has joined Riot Games to work on its upcoming League Of Legends MMO.

Tomaszkiewicz announced the news on Twitter, saying he was “excited and looking forward to this new challenge”. The former quest director said he had spent “the last few months” weighing up his options, and was pleased to announce the change.

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It has been announced that the ID@Xbox team will open GI Live with a speech and developer roundtable session next week.

• READ MORE: Now is the time to try ‘Marvel’s Avengers’, but it’s still not perfect

Kicking off proceedings for this year’s GI Live, an annual event hosted by GamesIndustry.biz, the ID@Xbox team will give a talk titled ‘Independent Creator Success On Xbox’. The talk will focus on how indie developers can hope to thrive with empowerment from ID@Xbox and how publishers can maximise their success.

The live session will be available to watch for those who hold either a physical or digital event ticket, and will be streamed alongside the majority of the event. The following roundtable discussion, also held by Xbox, will be a private event open to physical ticket holders only.

GI Live: London takes place alongside EGX at the Excel centre between Wednesday, October 6th – Friday, October 8th. Tickets are available from the website.

PlayStation’s Jim Ryan will be headlining the event, speaking about the past and future of Sony. His talk will take place on October 7, starting at 5 PM BST.

Valve will also host a Q&A available only to physical ticket holders, discussing all things Steam, and exploring the Steam Deck.

Other speakers include Warner Music, GSD, Sega, Hiro Capital, Twin Suns, and more awaiting announcement.

In an announcement today (September 28) on the Xbox Blog, it was revealed that Marvel’s Avengers will be coming to Game Pass at the end of this month (September 30). The game has recently celebrated both its first anniversary and launched a massive expansion – Black Panther: War For Wakanda.

Elsewhere, the upcoming Xbox Games with Gold titles for October have been revealed, with four games up for grabs at different times across the month.

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As Total War: Warhammer 3 gets closer to release, Creative Assembly is showing off details on various legendary lords coming to the game.

• READ MORE: ‘Total War: Warhammer 2’ at four: from humble beginnings to one of the greatest strategy games ever created

This week, the Total War blog focused on Zhao Ming, also known as the Iron Dragon. As the ruler of the Grand Cathayan Western Provinces, he will be a prominent figure in the game’s lore and gameplay.

The blog introduction to Zhao Ming says that he “starts off his campaign in a bit of a pickle to be honest”, as the volatile situation around Cathay will be one of the key elements of his campaign. “The Skaven in the desert are acting up and there are even rumours of rebellion,” the post explains.

“Even so, he is a Dragon, a force to be reckoned with, and commands an impressive following”. The post continues. “The cabals of Metal Wizards are welcomed within his realm, much to the irritation of the Jade Dragon who sees the encouragement of sorcerous organizations outside of the Celestial Court as dangerous to the empire. These sorcerers help the Iron Dragon in his experiments, and many magical weapons and armour are forged in the Dragon’s cities.”

A full rundown of The Iron Dragon’s abilities, history, and attributes are detailed in the blog post.

Grand Cathay, a Chinese-analogue faction that is often referred to as one of the ‘lost’ nations, has never made an appearance outside of background lore and mysterious snippets of information. Fans are understandably excited, therefore, to see the faction in action when Total War: Warhammer 3 launches. A trailer released earlier in the month unveiled details about play style, army roster, and rulers.

Recently, it was announced that Total War: Warhammer 3 has been delayed from a 2021 release and will now launch in ‘early 2022’, as confirmed on Twitter.

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Fortnite will be getting a selection of immersive in-game musical shows from around the world during the new Soundwave Series.

• READ MORE: How ‘Lost Judgment’ became the first global launch for the ‘Yakuza’ franchise

Announced today (September 28), the Soundwave Series will kick off on October 1 with Egyptian musician Mohamed Hamaki, who has previously been featured on Fortnite Radio. Other acts will include Australian singer-songwriter Tones And I, Brazilian rapper Emicida, Japanese pop artist and music producer Gen Hoshino, and French-Malian singer Aya Nakamura.

The first show, taking place between October 1 – 3 will include an exclusive first look at one of Hamaki’s new songs and will also have a special emote created just for the first show of the Soundwave Series. The emote, titled the Leilt Elomr Emote, is named after this new song.

To access the musical show, and any that come after across Soundwave Series, Fortnite players will need to enter the corresponding playlist with the artist’s name as the title. The show will repeat inside this playlist for 48 hours non-stop, so it can be accessed at any time over this period.

Players who attend the shows will be rewarded with special Sprays that symbolise the artist and their work. Content creators are urged to read the official guidelines regarding DMCA issues on the Epic Games blog post before recording.

More details will be announced as the Soundwave Series shows begin to roll out.

In other news, Fortnite dataminers have discovered a host of Monopoly-themed assets in the game files, suggesting that the board game will come to the battle royale in Season 8 Chapter 2.

A playable Tom Hardy skin was also recently introduced into Fortnite, with the ability to turn into Venom from the new movie using a built-in Emote.

Eddie Brock, Hardy’s character, also comes with a Symbiote Scythe Pickaxe, along with the Emote, and can be purchased with just these three items or with a Venom Bundle. The bundle includes all of the above alongside a selection of other items including the Different Tasty Snack Emoticon and the comic-based Venom outfit.

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Marvel’s Avengers will be coming to Xbox Game Pass on September 30, including all post-launch heroes and missions.

• READ MORE: Now is the time to try ‘Marvel’s Avengers’, but it’s still not perfect

In an announcement today (September 28) on the Xbox Blog, it was revealed that Marvel’s Avengers will be coming to Game Pass at the end of this month (September 30). The game has recently celebrated both its first anniversary and launched a massive expansion – Black Panther: War For Wakanda.

Black Panther: War For Wakanda is the biggest expansion in Marvel’s Avengers history, including a new hero, two new villains, a new area, enemies, and missions. The expansion will be free to Xbox Game Pass players, along with the Avengers Initiative – an online multiplayer world.

The announcement made clear that following the Black Panther expansion, all other releases would also be included in the Xbox Game Pass experience. “Beyond this expansion,” the post reads, “Marvel’s Avengers is an evolving game with ongoing updates that add new playable Heroes, missions, villains, campaigns, and events – and Xbox Game Pass members will get to experience all of it!”

The post goes on to describe the benefits of playing the game through Game Pass. “If you’re gaming on Xbox Series X|S, you’ll get to play the optimized version of Marvel’s Avengers to take advantage of faster load times and higher frame rates resulting in a smoother gameplay experience. The game also supports Smart Delivery, giving you the best version of the game automatically delivered to your console, regardless of generation, with no extra steps required from you.”

For those interested in Marvel’s Avengers future, an updated roadmap for the rest of 2021 was released on September 8. Alongside this, a new state of the game blog was released, including the team’s plans for the future of the game, and a look back at the development so far.

Although there is no word on when Spider-Man will join, Crystal Dynamics has confirmed that the PlayStation-exclusive hero will have his own cutscenes and story.

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The classic point-and-click adventure games Syberia and Syberia 2 are available for free on Steam during the Microids sale.

• READ MORE: ‘Timberborn’: part pleasant ant farm, part desperate survival

The sale will run for a limited time, but once downloaded the games are free to keep forever. The Syberia series also includes Syberia 3, which is heavily reduced at 85 per cent off for the duration of the sale.

Syberia was released in 2002 and follows the adventures of Kate Walker, an American lawyer who stumbles onto some complicated and conflicting history in a town owned by a single company.

The official description for the first game sets the scene: “Kate Walker, a young ambitious lawyer from New York, is handed what seems a fairly straight forward assignment – a quick stopover to handle the sale of an old automaton factory hidden in the alpine valleys, then straight back home to the US.”

“Little did she imagine when embarking on this task that her life would be turned upside down. On her expedition across Europe, traveling from Western Europe to the far reaches of Eastern Russia, she encounters a host of incredible characters and locations in her attempt to track down Hans, the genius inventor – the final key to unlock the mystery of Syberia. Her voyage across land and time throws all she values into question, while the deal she sets out to sign turns into a pact with destiny.”

Combining elaborate puzzles, a gripping storyline, and a memorable atmosphere, Syberia and Syberia 2 are considered some of the finest examples of the genre. The third game – Syberia 3 – was released in 2017 but as mentioned, doesn’t form part of this giveaway.

Syberia: The World Before is currently available to pre-order on Steam, and will release on December 10. The game rounds off the story by combining two narratives, allowing players to explore two time periods and stories in parallel.

The creator of Syberia, Benoît Sokal, passed away earlier this year after battling a long-term illness. Sokal was instrumental in combining the iconic art nouveau and clockpunk style, making the game series so distinctive.

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A new gameplay trailer for Rise Of Humanity has been released before the game hits Early Access.

• READ MORE: ‘Hitman III’ review: absurd international assassination at its absolute finest

Rise Of Humanity is a survival game seen through the lens of a strategic deck-builder. Pitting players against a Hivemind AI, the game combines tabletop deck-builders with turn-based strategy atop a 3D tactical battlefield – aiming to encompass the best bits of each genre.

The trailer provides some examples of the detailed maps and sprites within the game, along with battle animations and cinematics.

Each character (on either side) is controlled by a deck of cards, with each playthrough being procedurally generated to encourage replay value. The new trailer shows this complex battle strategy in progress and acts alongside the announcement of Early Access to provide prospective Rise Of Humanity players with a glimpse at what is to come.

Rise Of Humanity will be released in Steam Early Access on October 21, complete with two game modes. One will take each player through the conventional plot, while the other gives players the chance to compete at three random challenges per day.

The Rise Of Humanity developers said that “We plan on adding 270 cards for its full release as well as a total of 8 characters and various enemies. This is a game that requires a lot of balancing and we want to make sure we get it right before we release it to everyone.”

“Since we don’t have an exact release date for it is safe to say it will be in Early Access for 6 to 18 months.”

In other news, IO Interactive says that there are “more people working on Hitman 3” than at the game’s launch eight months ago.

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An advert has appeared looking for a “PS4 pro games tutor” for an elderly couple who are “having trouble” with The Last Of Us Part II.

• READ MORE: HBO’s ‘The Last Of Us’ live-action TV series: cast, release date and everything we know so far

The advert was shared on Twitter by Gene Park, where it won the hearts of many, explaining how the couple needed assistance with The Last Of Us Part II. The ad stipulated that the tutor should be fully vaccinated and know how to work a PS4 controller.

“My husband and I (senior citizens),” begins the advert, “need a personal tutor to come to our home and to teach us how to play PS4 games – particularly The Last Of Us Part II – which we are having trouble with.”

“Need a person that knows the games and how to work the controller. We need someone who is patient and can teach without judging us, without getting frustrated or irritated for 2-3 hours. We want to enjoy this diversion.”

Many of the replies to the original tweet were very encouraging of the elderly couple’s search for a tutor, but one in particular stood out. Shannon Woodward, the voice actor who plays Dina in The Last Of Us Part II, replied asking “Gene how do I apply”.

The couple is situated in San Jose and posted the ad on Craigslist, specifying that the successful applicant should have a Covid-19 vaccination card and that “references would be a plus”.

The Last Of Us II recently got its own guitar line, with two special edition guitars available for preorder. The line also includes picks and straps, along with a range of clothing and accessories.

In other news, Naughty Dog has explained that it will reveal its The Last of Us multiplayer game “when it’s ready”.

In a blog post on the Naughty Dog website to celebrate The Last of Us Day, senior manager of communications Rochelle Synder explained that the company was “working on it”.

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Windows 11’s release version is now available for those in the Microsoft Insider Program to try, releasing to the public next month.

• READ MORE: ‘Far Cry VR’ is a terrible VR game, but a fun way to spend an hour

The launch build of Windows 11 releases on October 5, but Windows Insiders are already getting a preview of the upgraded operating system. Previously tested in the Beta channel, the current build is now in the Release Preview channel.

“In the Release Preview channel, you’ll get the upcoming version of Windows before it’s released to the world, with advanced quality updates and certain key features. These builds are also supported by Microsoft if you’re in the Windows Insider Program for Business,” Microsoft explains in a blog post announcing the release.

This stage of development suggests Windows 11 is basically ready to roll out to the public. With not long now to wait, those looking to get a head start on the new OS can still register for the Insider Program provided they have an eligible PC.

From there, Insiders can download Windows 11 in its current state, although as it is still technically pre-release, there may be a select few issues that should be stamped out by October 5. As such, users are advised to back up their PC data before installing the new OS.

In a blog post released in August, Microsoft called the new OS “the first version of a new era of Windows”. It also outlines the improvements it aims to deliver with Windows 11, with a “modern, fresh, clean and beautiful” approach to design and, interestingly, sounds; a refined Start menu; better multitasking through the new ‘Snap’ feature; and chat from Microsoft Teams integrated into the taskbar.

It’s gaming that gets the biggest focus though, with Microsoft hyping Windows 11’s ability to deliver “technology like DirectX12 Ultimate, DirectStorage and Auto HDR”. It also highlights the benefits of Xbox Game Pass for PC, which provides access to a rotating library of games for a monthly subscription.

In other news, it has been announced that PlayStation boss Jim Ryan will be headlining GI Live: London, speaking about the past and future of Sony.

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