Jotunnslayer: Hordes of Hel on Steam is a game sent to me by the good folks over at Grindstone and honestly if you are a fan of games like Vampire Survivor and need a new fix, the $10 is well worth the price. The game is played the same way, simply walk around kill monsters, and level up. They do allow you to change the options to give you more in-depth control of when attacks happen, but this is hardly necessary to enjoy or even have a deep run into the game.
Graphically the game is great, and the controls are equally as well done. The story is very basic, you fight to impress the gods and hopefully become the next chosen Jotunnslayer. If we are being the story in these games are always a means to an end to get the slaying going, and that is where the fun is.
Each level will allow you to choose a power-up randomly for either your chosen character or a god. Each god and character has their own skill tree to unlock as well so you can really dig into how you want to play the game. The game is quick to get into, easy to play but hard to master. For its price, this is easily one of the first games I have played this year I am happy to say is a must-buy, 9/10. Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.
Red Solstice from Ironward is a title they sent to me that I have some mixed feelings about. On the one hand, it functions great, on the other it simply isn’t fun to play. It looks great, but the UI for certain things is honestly kind of terrible and wasn’t translated over very well from a mouse and keyboard as the game was originally made for PC.
As for as the gameplay itself, it is a pretty standard twin-stick shooter that you can play alone or with others. Simply choose a mission, which isn’t always very intuitive at first, enter the map, and mow down a ton of enemies to achieve your objective. Many times optional objectives will also pop up, save civilians, or help other soldiers maintain a position. This usually rewards you with new materials to help upgrade your troops or your base.
That is kind of why the game isn’t all that fun though. It gets very stale very fast, and to make matters worse so much of it is counterintuitive. Recruiting new squad mates solo isn’t easy, but if they get injured enough they can die for good.
The amount of stuff in the ultimate edition is pretty great too as it comes with everything that was ever released for the game as far as I can tell. The price of the game also isn’t bad at all at $30. Personally, I would wait for a sale as the game is only a 6/10 for me but if you are into this sort of game the value and replayability are definitely there. Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.
Orcs Must Die! Deathtrap, which you can play on Gamepass, is a game that was tossed my way by Robot Entertainment to review which I always appreciate. Now I will be honest right out the gate, I never loved or hated this series it just always kind of existed. I had fun with them when I played them but they were never the type of game I felt I NEEDED to play. If you are looking to play this game and see some vast improvement into a AAA title, you will be disappointed.
If what you are looking for, however, is a fun game with better graphics, new weapons, and characters, well-designed levels, and just kill a ton of orcs, you will be happy. The game is pretty standard. Pick a hero, each one with its own passives, power-ups, and weapons, set traps along various paths the orcs will walk along, and protect a certain spot.
As you collect different types of currency after each run you can buy better passives for a character, or use them to buy new traps or boost your main stats that apply to everyone, the game will get a bit easier to manage. You will be able to employ a more varied strategy, and traps might become cheaper or stronger. You can even play solo or with others online.
How you play is up to you,I have tried everything from surrounding the point I am supposed to protect and just defending that ( pro tip, don’t do this) to blocking off entire paths to force them into one area and ignoring the rest ( also don’t do this) and the best method seems to be to funnel them to a few select choke points and setting traps there.
Weather on the maps will change the strategy you need to employ and will even change what enemies show up. Water elementals for example have a tendency to split into pieces. You may even run into a sort of substance that suddenly makes it impossible to put traps on walls.
The game has room for improvement, but I had a lot of fun with it. 7/10, if you like shooters and you have Gamepass you need to at least try it. Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.
V Rising is one of those games I had my eye on for a while, and recently Stunlock Studios was kind enough to send me a copy when their game hit 5 million sales. The game always looked like a cross between Diablo and Conan Exiles. Just a classic kill-everything and survival game where you have to build your own vampire castle. A small part of me is always worried, however, how good can a game trying to do that much actually be? Even more so when you start tossing RPG elements into it?
The game starts out when you awake from your slumber, after years of hiding away from the humans that rebelled against their undead overlords. You enter a world that you can mostly control the difficulty of. Do you want to play alone? with your friends? Let just any random person enter? These are all things you can control. I recommend getting a feel for the game before you start letting unknown people rampage around your world.
You start out collecting some basic things to build a wall and a coffin to protect you. Be careful, though. While this will keep enemies and such out, the sun will obviously come over the walls and kill you. You can build special fog equipment to block out the sun, but if you don’t, find some shade or stay in bed until the night comes. Going out and hunting,materials, enemies for their blood, and even bosses to gain new abilities is important. This is the main way to progress through the game’s many chapters and how you unlock new things to build. Rushing however can be deadly. New armor and weapons will increase your levels.
The graphics are great. I enjoyed getting lost in the woods and admiring the scenery most of the time. I say most of the time because often, I would forget the world changes as days turn to night and night turns back to day. Once safe places suddenly had a vampire hunter in them that I found myself no match for. Bosses I once beat had migrated to new areas to attack me. While chopping down trees and smashing stones to build a staircase for my castle bandits would be out on patrol and I would find myself having a quick meal instead.
This brings me to the next thing I loved about this game. The ever-changing environment. Enemies go about their days even if you don’t. Animals will seemingly live their lives and stumble across your base, and not all of them are friendly. This extends to your work benches. If you need planks or iron you can just toss materials into your machines and they will produce them until they no longer have the materials. weapons are made at work benches the same way. Simply toss your materials in, tell it what to make and just leave until it is done. I love this quality of life and more games need to make this standard.
Not everything is great however. In fact nothing about it is truly great outside of the fact that it is fun. The story has potential but it never really goes beyond being a great concept. The building is good and you can do a lot with it, there are better builders out there. It also isn’t a great surviving game because while drinking blood helps you heal and in combat you dont really need it to survive. The conbat is good, but its not Diablo level great or deep.
The game is good and it is a lot of fun,I will definetly be adding this to my list of games I keep playing after I review it. It is also a game i encourage friends to pick up and play together. If you want a game that is the best at any one thing, this isn’t it. If you want a game that is good everywhere however, definelty get this one. 8/10, best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.
aldera Interactive has unveiled its cozy farming sim / tower defense hybrid The Rabbit Haul, coming to PC and Switch in 2026. As a fleet-footed rabbit, you must nurture your garden by day, then defend it from mischievous raccoons by night.
The Rabbit Haul places players in the role of a cute cottontail trying to rebuild their hometown after it’s been ravaged by greedy raccoon gang the Trash Panda Posse. During the day, you must tend to your crops, replenish your food reserves and economy, water your farm, add harvested produce to your haul, and grow defensive tower plants that will help thwart off invaders. Be strategic in your placement, as an ideal garden will make use of synergies created between harmonious plants.
When you choose to switch over into nighttime, you must defend your haul against the assailing Trash Panda Posse. They’ll grow stronger with each wave, with different enemy types attempting to spoil your riches, so you must upgrade your weapons and defenses to ensure you can survive the night!
No two playthroughs are ever the same, as The Rabbit Haul features a sprawling, randomly generated world full of quests and treasures. Explore the overworld to discover unique items and allies that will help rebuild your town and reinforce your defenses even further. Between runs, you can upgrade your towers, unlock new merchants, and prepare yourself for your next adventure. With an array of unique weapons, upgrade paths, powerful towers and crops to unlock, The Rabbit Haul offers countless playstyles to master!
“With The Rabbit Haul we wanted to combine our love of relaxing cozy games with the strategy of tower defense titles and the random adventure of roguelikes,” said Titus Lo, game designer at Caldera Interactive. “We won the GDC 2024 Pitch competition for it, so it seems like there’s an appetite for The Rabbit Haul, and not just because the crops look tasty – though that helps!”
Every so often comes a movie that is so horrifically bad it circles back around to being good. The story is just bad,the concept is ridiculous,the CGI is so bad we can’t even describe it.
This is one of those movies. I honestly don’t have anything good to say about it. The concept is horrible. It takes place in New Orleans and a series of earthquakes release spiders. Not normal spiders, ancient spiders.
These spiders have evolved to live in lava it seems and breathe fire, because of course they did. They start small, and get a bit bigger and bigger and of course there is a huge one they fight eventually.
This movie was probably made for Syfy channel or something honestly, it’s a true horrible B movie. And everyone should watch this train wreck of a movie. I don’t have anything good to say about it. The acting isn’t great,the spiders look ridiculous and the story has been done to death. It is however fun. Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.
Leave the World Behind starring Julia Roberts and Mahershala Ali is a sort of horror thriller about an unexpected apocalypse. Amanda (Julia) and her family need a vacation and rent out a home for the weekend.
While enjoying the beautiful home there is an unexpected knock at the door, G.H. Scott (Ali) and his daughter talking about a black out in the city. Turns out he owns the house and needs a place to stay.
This leads to some racial tension on both sides. Obviously anyone showing up in the middle of the night would cause anyone to be nervous. This is mistaken by Scotts daughter for being specifically racist in nature from Amanda, which seems to be partly true.
As the movie goes on and things get weirder,animals start to disappear, phones stop working more and more questions start to emerge. What country is causing this? China? Korea? You will find an answer within the movie,not within this blog however.
The acting is very well done. At no point did I feel like these weren’t real people with real fears. The tension and chemistry between everyone is fantastic, Julia and the kids really felt like family and the husband truly felt like a guy that might be up to something. I definitely recommend checking this one out. Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.
This exciting update is the publisher’s response to months of enthusiastic player feedback and focuses on refining game mechanics, adjusting combat balance, and massively expanding content to better cater to the diverse preferences we identified in our community. Whether you’re a seasoned veteran, a new adventurer, a challenge seeker, or someone who enjoys a more laid back experience, this update offers a multitude of fresh perspectives and exciting new experiences for everyone.
The Mythic Epic update brings:
A brand new ending – bringing the total number of discoverable endings to six, each one of them entirely based on your decisions
Character Traits – to help you further tweak your characters enhancing all abilities from combat actions to crafting and trading in a number of ways
Four new melee-oriented professions – creating even more synergies with spellcasting professions and further enriching combat strategies
A “Heavy Warrior” profession – a beastly hulk who can use defensive stats to bolster offensive power, tailored for players who enjoy tanky characters
New Game+ – for those who have completed the game. Carry over your saves with new benefits, including additional trait slots for all characters, enabling them to create even more powerful builds to tackle tougher challenges in subsequent playthroughs
The new “Mythic Epic” mode – our gift to players who crave self-imposed challenges. This new mode introduces a Mythic phase for certain enemies, as well as unfathomably powerful Mythic-level foes
An “Unlimited Rest” mode – a more laid back adventure that allows you to rest your party as much as you want without sacrificing time-limited rewards and content, the best of both worlds!
Many new map events, character dialogues, and boss fights adding as much as 30% more content!
Exploration is as important as combat! Observe, listen, think, communicate, act, you need to use all possible skills to find your own path. Adventures are not only full of choices, but often require a bit of luck.
Wait… there’s more! The Nintendo Switch version of The Nameless: Slay Dragon is currently in active development and is expected to launch in 2025!
Available on Steam, The Nameless: Slay Dragon is a fantasy-themed, tabletop-inspired, turn-based RPG that took a solo developer six years to craft. Since its release on Steam in September 2024, it has received over 1,100 reviews with an overall 91% review rating (“Very Positive”).
A new era of warfare is almost here. Tempest Rising, the highly anticipated, modern real-time strategy game coming April 24, 2025, from Saber Interactive’s 3D Realms label and Knights Peak, is available to pre-order today on PC via Steam. Today also marks the world debut of Tempest Rising’s first official multiplayer demo, playable now until February 3 as part of Steam’s Real-Time Strategy Fest. Experience high-stakes base-building, resource management, and all-out action between unique factions in this true spiritual successor to the RTS classics of the ‘90s and 2000s.
The Standard Edition of Tempest Rising, featuring two faction-based campaigns as well as skirmish mode and competitive multiplayer, is available to pre-order today for $39.99. Players can also pre-order the game’s Deluxe Edition for $49.99, which includes:
One week of advanced access to the full game, including multiplayer and skirmish mode
A digital artbook showcasing the art and lore of Tempest Rising
The full digital game soundtrack, featuring 43 tracks from legendary Command & Conquer composer Frank Klepacki plus community favorites like Michael Markie, Hexenkraft, The Witcher composer Adam Skorupa,and Sigurd Jøhnk-Jensen
Pre-order either edition to unlock the “Commander Pack” DLC at no extra charge, featuring a variety of exclusive in-game cosmetics, including bonus player icons, skins, cursors and more.
During Tempest Rising’s first multiplayer demo, going on now through February 3, players can battle each other for dominance on three maps: Alps (2v2), Overgrown Oasis (1v1), and Altitude (1v1). Players can also experience the game’s PvE skirmish mode against AI opponents for the first time.
About Tempest Rising
Tempest Rising transports you to a battle-scarred 1997 in an alternate timeline where the Cuban Missile Crisis went nuclear. Experience two epic campaigns with unique factions and deeply rewarding gameplay that keeps the focus on strategy and skill. Take full command of the battlefield as you build up your base, lead your armies into combat, and execute bold strategies to emerge victorious.
Key Features
Classic RTS base-building with fast, fluid, hard-hitting combat and tons of customization
Command two asymmetrical factions, each featuring unique harvesting models, resource systems, and distinct rosters of units for drastically different playstyles
Two epic single-player campaigns with between-mission cutscenes to drive the story
Skirmish, custom games, and ranked multiplayer matchmaking with Glicko-2 rating
Grab your Tempest Risingpre-order today before the game launches on April 24, with one week of advanced access available for Deluxe Edition owners! For the latest news and updates, follow Tempest Rising on X/Twitter and Discord.
Following a livestream announcement by Yogscast last Friday, Gamersky and Yogscast Games are excited to announce not one, but two new strategy games set to launch on Steam — February 6, 2025. From Yahzj Games, Border Pioneer challenges players to build a pixel metropolis and defend it from outside forces. Meanwhile, chx games’ Stray Path offers a feline FreeCell take on the roguelike deckbuilder. Both games will be available on Steam next month.
As the saying goes, if you build it, they will come… and try to knock it down. The perfect blend of city-builder and tower defense, Border Pioneer gives players the opportunity to forge the fortresses of their dreams, and watch it all crash and burn before their eyes.
In deliciously nostalgic pixel style, this upcoming strategy game offers an array of treacherous terrains, diverse foes and unforeseen dangers to discover as players expand their borders. As unchartered territories are claimed and enemies are vanquished, players are rewarded with new elements to help grow and fortify their settlements.
Not all cities are ruled from the top – sometimes the strings are being pulled from the seedy back alleys of the towns themselves. Stray Path takes players on a journey through dark roads and twisted forests, where every choice is crucial as they attempt to find a way out amidst countless dangers and secrets.
From curious cats to buff beast tamers, players must select an adventurer and embark on their adventure. One by one, cards are flipped and the mysteries of the path ahead are revealed. Will there be treasure? Vicious adversaries? Or perhaps even a chance to run? Every decision has a consequence.
Gamersky and Yogscast Games will be bringing both exciting new titles to Steam on February 6, 2025. Both games will be available as part of a bundle at launch, offering players a 10% discount.
Savior Gaming 