Posts By Mat Growcott

I woke up this morning to perhaps the most important low-key video game news of the year. The Kingdom Hearts series is finally hitting Steam. Those not in the know might shrug their shoulders at this news. There’s a good chance that most people in the know won’t give a damn. A hodge-podge of PS2, PS4, PSP and 3DS games reaching an app on a platform they were already available on? Yawn, right? Wrong. This signals a change in priorities…

It’s nearly that time of year when – for a week or two – there’s actual game news. And this not-E3 might be the most important yet. Since the actual E3 died a death, publishers have collectively decided that June is still a good time to share your big marketing push for the coming year and beyond. And while I miss the organisation, pomp and cringe of the proper show, what we’ve got now is still better than the nothing…

There was a time when I’d write about games. Now I write about how industry executives keep stepping on rakes. I should preface this by saying I’m not the multimillionaire executive of a trillion dollar company, so perhaps the line between “making customers happy” and “destroying an entire brand in a fire” is thinner than you might think. Xbox this week shuttered two popular studios for reasons beyond public comprehension. ...

It seems like five minutes ago that Xbox didn’t have the studios to maintain its first party offerings. Now they have the benefit of closing them down. It’s easy to be emotional over news like this. Tango Gameworks, Arkane Austin, Roundhouse Games and Alpha Dog will no longer exist. And while I’m sure there are internal things that we don’t see here, there is little that can justify studio closures outside of the obvious. It’s ...

Like the Series S before it, the Nintendo Switch 2 is the worst kept secret going. It’s getting to the point where it’s so unofficially official that even third party manufacturers are casually dropping details. So frequent are the Switch 2 info drops that the biggest takeaway from Nintendo’s announcement will be discussion of the varying degrees of rightness that have come over the last couple of years. Which leakers were correct, which can ...

I watched the trailer for Tales of the Shire yesterday, and instantly decided it wasn’t going to be my thing. You know what it is? Exactly the kind of gaming adaptations we need. Life sims are huge right now. Will any of these games still be rated especially well in a decade? Enjoy before the wave comes crashing down, because man the weight of some of these titles is starting to feel heavy. And I start this article from pointing…

When Ghost of Tsushima comes to PC it’ll bring with it something that many of us guessed would never happen. You’ll be able to earn PlayStation trophies through your Steam purchase. This is massive. I get it. It doesn’t feel massive. In fact, on the face of it, Ghost of Tsushima coming to PC massively outweighs that little nugget of information by an order of magnitude. But that’s only if you’re not paying attention. There was a ...

The Fallout TV series is very popular, and people are hungry to enjoy the games that inspired it. Four Fallout games were in the top ten on Steam in Europe following the show’s debut. So it’s fantastic news that the next game is probably still a decade out. Yes, we have the Fallout 4 update next week, and that’ll scratch the itch. And obviously there’s Fallout London and other fan made stuff on the horizon. But the point of this…

Oh lord, keep with me on this one, people. Tipping is controversial at the best of times. A suggestion that we bring a tip option to video games is going to be met with all kinds of resistance. But you know, it makes sense. When we look back over the last decade or so, it’s obvious that something was going to give. Games have become more expensive to make at the same time as gamers coming to expect more for…

I’ve been doing this since 2009, so I’ve heard a “consoles are dead” story or two. Each time they’ve been proven wrong. They’re based on faulty assumptions, or a misunderstanding of the gaming audience. This time feels different. I still don’t think consoles are going away. There will always be room for a box next to your TV. But it’s hard to see where the narrative falls apart in 2024. The whole notion of buying ...