The creators of Untitled Goose Game have unveiled their next, err, not goose game. Announced at tonight's Game Awards, Big Walk is quite a different proposition from Goose Game, not least because we've moved from the quaint environs of a classic English village to the wilds of the Australian bushland. It's also an online co-operative multiplayer game that will see and your friends solving all sorts of puzzles you find out in the wild. Come and watch the reveal trailer below.
]]>It’s episode 12 of Indiescovery and this week we’re being a bit cheeky as we dive into which indie game characters we’d love to do a pub crawl with. Who are we getting sloshed with? Who’s not making it past pre-drinks? Who are we sharing our end-of-night chippies with? All that and more this week! Summer has well and truly arrived here in the UK, but wherever you are, grab your sunnies, sip a pina colada, kick back, and have a listen.
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]]>Nerves have been sufficiently jangled as of late, not least thanks to the slew of action packed games that have landed in recent months. I crave an altogether more sedate beginning to next year, and so my mind turns to games in which violence, reflex or any other kind of unblinking attentiveness takes a back seat.
]]>Steam user genre tags can be awful. Cyberpunk 2077 was, for example, tagged ‘masterpiece’ for months before the first gameplay trailer, while the much more reasonable and catchy ‘looks cool sure but too early to say anything definitive if we’re being adults about it’ tag was strangely absent. Happily, they are sometimes wonderful, like the tag alongside ‘comedy’ and ‘indie’ that categorises avian arsehole adventure Untitled Goose Game as having a ‘villain protagonist’.
I’ve been thinking about villain protagonists a fair amount this week because GOG just graced our collective thinking tellies with 1996 Zelda-like Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain, in all its richly overwrought, gothic, inimitably voice-acted splendour. I would estimate this news finds you, reader, in one of two categories: those who give not a fig, and those who give so many figs they are currently scrabbling the world’s few remaining fig-bearing trees, searching vainly for an adequate quantity of figs.
]]>Hear ye hear ye, here's the top releases on Steam from the month of September. As ever, some big names like Marvel and Mafia are on the list, and so are some long-awaited favorites like Spelunky 2 and Serious Sam 4. More interesting though are the weird indie breakout games. Yup, Phasmophobia's on there and you can't stop me from talking about it.
]]>What's worse than one goose loose in the local garden? Two geese, especially if they're of one mind on how to best torture the villagers. Stealth chaos game Untitled Goose Game has launched a free update that lets you and your best goose friend terrorize the town together. It's also now available on Steam and Itch.
]]>The majority of us try to get through life without any unnecessary conflict. It's a hassle that most can do without. That's why I love games that allow for some tomfoolery. All the fun of being a bit mean, without any of the consequence. Although, I should say that I'm not talking about choosing the renegade option in Mass Effect; I'm talking about some wholesome rascality, like snatching a sock from the clothesline of an old lady or swiping spectacles from a child.
Untitled Goose Game embraces the art of mischief, without any malevolence. While you're encouraged to be a sleepy English village's number one nuisance, you're not an evil goose. You're a goose who just likes a bit of a laugh. A member of the gaggle that likes a giggle.
]]>What could village life more unbearable for Untitled Goose Game's tormented villagers? Another goose, of course. Cooperative multiplayer is coming to House House's breakthrough bird-nuisance romp as a free update next month, letting you tear around town with your fellow feathered friends alongside the game's debut on Steam and Itch.
]]>The playful piano of Untitled Goose Game will be inscribed in plastic, creating a physical record of the goose's havoc. To hear the piano is to know the crimes it accompanied. The merchmasters at Iam8bit today announced that the soundtrack's vinyl release will launch on September 29th, and that it has a clever little trick. Just as the game's soundtrack is different every time, the physical pressing is on a dual-groove record, so two different versions are on the same side and you won't know which it will play until you start it rolling on those wheels of steel.
]]>We all loved playing as the horrible goose in Untitled Goose Game last year, but Sam Person's Desktop Goose companion has now given me a taste of what it feels like to be on the receiving end of that terrible honking machine. The goose is, as you'd expect, a monster, slapping his tiny feet all across your monitor, dragging in goose-related pictures and notepad messages that he's apparently typed with his own feet, and if you try and shut them down he'll come after you and bite your mouse cursor.
Desktop Goose has been out for a while, but it's one of the many hundreds of games now available as part of the stupendously good value Itch Bundle For Racial Justice And Equality, which has just ticked over an incredible $7 million. But the goose isn't all bad. Occasionally he'll bring you notes of encouragement saying you're doing a good job, and it actually made my heart swell to one hundred times its normal size. Thank you, desktop goose, you're all right.
]]>Untitled Goose Game is a game about being a horrible goose, about making a mess and watching hapless Brits try to clear it up again. But under all that, it’s a game about things. Apples, hair brushes, keys, mallets, toy planes, tulips, teapots. After all, it takes things to mess things up.
“Items are the language of the game,” co-designer Nico Disseldorp tells me. “They’re both the tools and the reward. They play a really central role in so much of what we do, and how people play.”
]]>Right after A Short Hike won the Independent Games Festival Awards grand prize last night, the Game Developers Choice Awards declared Untitled Goose Game the game of the year. Other games to win prizes Dev Choice Awards include Disco Elysium, Control, and Baba Is You - some good stuff. They also handed the Pioneer Award to Roberta Williams, the Sierra co-founder known for adventure games from Mystery House to Phantasmagoria.
]]>The yearly D.I.C.E awards are officially wrapped for 2019's games and a familiar bandit reportedly sneaked into the event. Well, as much as one's sneaking when they've been nominated for a handful of awards. The Untitled Goose Game had its non-name thrown in the hat for Game Of The Year and the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences membership voted it in as winner. Congrats, horrible goose. Go add that shiny trophy to your collection of other stolen goods on top of the village bell and that lad's glasses. You've done good.
]]>Right, listen. There hasn't been a single good goose-based goof, joke, edit, photoshop, tweet or otherwise made in the five months since House House let Untitled Goose Game loose upon the world. Slapping the feathered devil into any old context just doesn't cut it, and the phrase "and you are a horrible goose" is a patter abyss - this is the hill I choose to die on. But VR developer Sam Chiet may have broken that trend with Desktop Goose, a digital companion that walks the walk, honks the honk, and causes chaos upon your poor PC.
]]>Put the 9mm down, for crying out loud. Not every game is about shooting your enemies in the shin bones. Honestly. Give me that, here, take this trowel. Now, follow me, through this tranquil landscape of blooming daffodils and perfectly arranged stone paths covered in happy moss. Yes, that’s it, you want a turn around the garden. A bit of soil on your fingers. And there's more where this came from. Here you go, 8 peaceful gardens in which to calm your trigger-happy soul. Breathe it in, shooter. Breathe it in.
]]>The yearly speedrunning event AGDQ is nearing its end but there are still a lot of PC runs to watch tomorrow, many of them new releases from 2019. The week-long winter edition of Games Done Quick is always fascinating even for older games with established speedrunning strategies. For new PC games, it will be a treat to see the earliest methods and discoveries that speedrunners have concocted.
]]>The Independent Games Festival Awards have announced their finalists, once more reflecting the esteemed opinions of RPS writers. Sad mutant blueberry simulator Mutazione is the favourite for the Seumas McNally Grand Prize, and is also in the running for the Art, Audio and Narrative awards. Two thirds of Alices agree that it is well good.
Other grand prize contenders include AI and sadness visual novel Eliza, uplifting flap-about A Short Hike, irresistible card-pusher Slay The Spire, and irritable waterfowl punter Untitled Goose Game. Also in the running is Anodyne 2: Return To Dust, the only game on the list that someone at RPS hasn't thrown lavish praise at. Soz, Anodyne.
]]>2019 was a great year for PC games - aren't they all? - but you might not yet know what the very best PC games of 2019 were. Let us help you.
]]>The winter half of the yearly charity speedrunning marathon Awesome Games Done Quick kicks off this Sunday, January 5th. Donations to Games Done Quick will benefit the Prevent Cancer Foundation. The week long marathon will cover a bunch of speedrunning mainstays along with some new additions from 2019.
]]>It's been an eventful decade for PC games, and it would be hard for you to summarise everything that's happened in the medium across the past ten years. Hard for you, but a day's work for us. Below you'll find our picks for the 50 greatest games released on PC across the past decade.
]]>We're all going mad for the goose, eh? I know we all lost it when the first trailer for Untitled Goose Game came out, but apparently it seems we were somewhat justified. It's nice to be a bit naughty in a video game, but where the naughtiness isn't eviscerating local monsters just trying to get by/the enemy group of soldiers [delete as applicable].
But I think the design of the goose is what holds it all together. That's why a lot of us like it, right? That bird is very gifable. Inscrutable, even. Why is this goose locking a small boy into a phonebox? That's up to you. For me, the goose is my untapped adolescent rage.
]]>To play Untitled Goose Game is to enter the mind of a goose, to feel mischief and malice fill you and flow through you. To enter the body of a goose is quite different, Twitch streamer Dylan "Rudeism" Beck discovered. Famed for his commitment to play games with wrong and weird and custom controllers (he's the lad who panned Mordhau players with a frying pan), today he took on Goose Game with a full costume controller. The goose honks when Rudeism honks into his orange beak. The goose waddles when Rudeism waddles in his flippers. The goose flaps its wings when Rudeism flaps his arms. Has technology gone too far?
]]>What's the deal with geese? It's a question I've been asking myself for the better part of a decade. Admittedly, it's a rather odd question to have been mulling over for so many years, but for my whole time at university I lived in extreme proximity to them, and it had an impact. My campus was stuffed with the things. As I'd fall asleep at night I'd hear them honking away outside, having a right old laugh with the resident ducks and swans. Those cackling honks would also be the first sounds I'd hear waking up in the morning, too, the conversation no doubt still flowing about their daring escapades playing chicken against cyclists, or snapping at drunks in the night.
They were, and are, obnoxious, belligerent birds (except barnacle geese, beautiful creatures about which I will not have a bad word said), and even now I still feel a small shudder in my soul whenever I catch sight of one. But those ungainly birds of years gone by have nothing on the goose from Untitled Goose Game. That hulking white menace is evil incarnate. And I absolutely love it.
]]>Nature's apex bully, the goose, will unleash its spite upon a small English village in Untitled Goose Game later this month. On Friday, developers House House announced a release date of September 20th for their sandbox stealth game, which stars a honking wee git stealing from, tricking, and generally bother the poor villagers. It's just banter, okay? I've been keenly awaiting this for so long, and my anticipation only grows seeing a new trailer demonstrating House House have made your goose's honk change when honked through different objects it's carrying. I adore you, you horrible creature.
]]>It’s a bit tricky to knock together a list of the best upcoming stealth games, because it’s a bit tricky to say what a stealth game even is anymore. Stealth is more frequently looking like a playstyle or bulletpoint rather than the crux of an entire game. Even the best stealth games in recent memory - yer Invisible Incs, Ian Hitmans, Alien: Isolations - have all layered their stealth within towering trifles of genre mashups. And that’s good! It just means we've had to flex the definition for this list.
Below, I’ve gathered together a few of the best upcoming stealth games that I’ve got my ridiculously over powered, patrol pattern-sensing eye on. Some of these aren’t strictly genre adherent, but all offer stealthy play as at least core element. Do feel free to suggest your own upcoming games in the comments.
]]>Bad news: The delightful stealth prank/bullying waterfowl simulator Untitled Goose Game has nothing new and fancy to show at E3 this year.
Good news: It is still on track to launch on PC this year.
News that will probably make you shout at me because you think I should be more or less shouty about it myself: it'll be exclusive to the Epic Games Store on PC at launch.
]]>Trying to keep up with E3 2019 is a fool's errand, and the foaming river of content streaming down the internet's face doesn't always make it easier. So here's a round-up of every news story from the show we think matters to you, with links to our full stories (and bantful liveblogs) where relevant. We'll be updating this hourly, so keep coming back.
]]>We'll need to wait a while longer to vandalise a village as a ghastly goose in Untitled Goose Game, as developers House House have announced they're delaying their sneak-o-antagonise 'em up from this spring to the vague time of "later in 2019." I'm happy to wait for a game this charming if it needs it, and this might also give me the summer to chase people around nearby villages as practice. East Linton, your knick-knacks and hats will be mine.
]]>At the end of my first day at EGX, I looked at my notes. I'd jotted down thoughts about eight games, and all but one of them revolved around a cute animal.
Does that say more about me, or the volume of developers that place animals at the centre of their attempts to lure in players and press coverage? Let's set that question aside for now. We've got animals to review.
(That's Dave up there, by the way. I meant to take a photo in the Phog bed but forgot.)
]]>Matt: After four days of hosting panels, interviewing developers, streaming games on camera and poking at as many as we could on the show floor, Team RPS has returned from the hallowed halls of EGX. Now that we’ve nestled back into our treehouse nooks, it’s time to talk about the best things wot we saw.
So, Katharine, Dave and Alice 3.0. Which game won the show?
]]>As we stare into the weary, craggy face of the final quarter of 2018, there is still a glimmer of hope. The games are not yet done. They will never be done. And the impending release of them, some close, some a little further away, stirs something within us. The delicate, easily crushed butterfly of excitement. We may catch it yet, to keep in our collection of emotions - the sharp pin of time pushed through and through it into the cork of eventual disappointement.
]]>There's just one week left until a borderline-biblical plague of developers descend upon Birmingham to showcase their up-and-coming games to all. This great gathering shall be known as EGX 2018 and starts on September 20th, running until the 23rd.
There's going to be hundreds of games on show there across all platforms, featuring developers of all shapes and sizes - both physically and business-wise. While I'll be sadly missing out on the fun (someone's got to man the news desk), here's a few choice PC games that'll be at the show, and everyone should be checking out.
]]>Watching Untitled Goose Game's eponymous git torment villagers in a new trailer brings joy to my heart. The slapstick sandbox stealth game will send us to steal, smash, and generally antagonise, following our goosey whims, and it's now expected in "early 2019". Developers House House (of Push Me Pull You fame) explain "It's a lovely morning in the village and you are a horrible goose," and you certainly are. Watch this honking bastardy below.
]]>One of the most hotly-anticipated games was not, you might have noticed, on show at E3. Where was it? Is it okay? Should we worry? Are our dreams dashed? What am I supposed to do now? How could this happen to us? Is this what we deserve? Steady on! Relax. Breath in, hold for two, and out. It's fine: Untitled Goose Game is still coming.
]]>As we lay 2017 to rest, let us remember all of the wonderful games that flickered across our screens and occupied our hearts and minds. But now we must promise never to think of them again because times have changed. This is 2018 and if we've learned one thing from the few hours we've spent in it it's that there are games everywhere. Every firework that exploded in the many midnights of New Year's celebrations was stuffed with games and they were still raining down across the world this morning. We cannot stop them, we cannot contain them, but we can attempt to understand them.
Hundreds of them will be worth our time and attention, but we've selected a few of the ones that excite us most as we prepare for another year of splendid PC gaming. There's something for everyone, from Aunt Maude, the military genius, to merry Ian Rogue, the man who hates permadeath and procedural generation with a passion.
]]>Consider the goose: nature's prick. The goose is a creature of pure wickedness, driven to intimidate and terrify. Its honk is calibrated to the resonant frequency of the human nervous system. The goose does not wish to eat your sandwiches, it simply doesn't want you to have them. The goose hates you and wants you to hate yourself.
The majesty and terror of the goose is captured in an upcoming and yet-untitled game [official site] from House House, who gave us the Cronenbergian wrestleball of Push Me Pull You. It's a stealthy sandbox with a goose antagonising innocent villagers, stealing their stuff, chasing them, and generally being awful. Watch this delightful vid:
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