Twitch was all set to hold a giant maskless convention in San Diego this October in the midst of monkeypox and the continued threat of COVID-19 — but after an outcry that included both attendees and some of its own streamer partners, the platform has decided to require masks and proof of vaccination once again.
“We’ve been listening to all of your feedback and know that many of you–especially those who are immunocompromised and the people who support them–want stricter health measures in place to help you feel safe attending TwitchCon San Diego in person,” reads the beginning of a major update to the company’s blog post announcing that tickets were on sale.
To attend TwitchCon, attendees 5 years and older now need to wear a snug mask that completely covers the nose and mouth, and that need to either present proof of at least two doses of a COVID-19 vaccine or a record of a negative COVID- 19 test no more than 72 hours before the event, according to TwitchCon’s updated health measures FAQ. Can’t handle that for whatever reason? The company’s offering refunds until August 19th.
Hello! I’m excited to share that masks will be required at TwitchCon San Diego. I look forward to seeing you there 🙂 I want to personally thank you @CrevLMTV for creating the uservoice that helped lead to this change, as well as each and every one of you who voted on it. pic.twitter.com/AkREOdmidO
Yesterday, the CDC relaxed its COVID-19 guidelines, and is no longer telling people they should necessarily stay six feet away from others or strictly quarantine if they were merely exposed to COVID-19.
However, it still says that anyone who was exposed should wear a high quality mask for 10 days and get tested after five — and that who actually tests positive for COVID-19 should quarantine for at least five days, wear a mask for at least 10 days, and stay away from people who could get sick for at least 11 days.
Masking, like the pandemic itself, has not yet gone away.
THQ Nordic teased another South Park video game at the end of its digital showcase yesterday (August 12) in collaboration with South Park Digital Studios.
The reveal came right at the end of the stream, when THQ Nordic said it has 26 unannounced games still in development, which it then scratched out and reduced to 25 after showing the South Park Digital Studios logo alongside audio of South Park character Randy Marsh screaming “Hot hot hot hot”.
The exact moment in the stream can be seen below.
As of publication (August 13), it’s unclear what platforms this game will be on, or if it will be similar to other major Triple-A games in the franchise.
In recent years, South Park you have stuck to RPGs. 2014’s The Stick Of Truth was developed by Obsidian Entertainment in collaboration with South Park Digital Studios, while 2017’s The Fractured But Whole was developed by Ubisoft San Francisco.
However, a new video game on the televisionfranchise was mentioned by creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone back in 2021. According to that report, a “3D video game” was in the works but there’s been no indication yet if the two projects are the same. If it’s the same project as the one teased by THQ Nordic, it will be quite the departure from the previous two Triple-A titles.
South Park: The Stick Of Truth. Credit: Ubisoft
This same report mentioned a number of new ventures from Parker and Stone, which apparently include “a documentary series” and “a weed company.”
In other news, THQ Nordic has announced a reboot of classic ’90s horror franchise Alone In The Dark with the writer of ‘Soma’ and multiple ‘Amnesia’ games onboard.
Players won’t need to have played any previous games as it will be a completely original story, although “it does incorporate characters, places, and themes from the original ’90s trilogy, but fans of the series will find plenty that is familiar. ”
It’s been over six years since the release of the Nintendo Switch. But the popularity of the hand-held console doesn’t seem to go down. Instead, the demands are increasingly higher than Nintendo’s current production rate. But it won’t result in a rise in prices.
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Nintendo is a Japanese multinational company that made a big name for themselves with their consoles and games. The Big N has always offered the best gaming experience, primarily hand-held gaming. Nintendo has developed many hand-held consoles like GBA, DS, 3DS, and the latest Switch.
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The Switch has been the most successful product that Nintendo has come up with. The Japanese video game company currently offers three Switch variations: the standard, the Lite edition, and the OLED display edition. Further, the prices differ for each version of the hand-held console.
Nintendo Switch prices won’t skyrocket
Nintendo Switch has been in a lot of headlines lately. The famous media outlet Nikkei announced that Nintendo wouldn’t release new hardware in the fiscal year. Further, the new hardware is meant to be the much-awaited Switch Pro, an advanced version of the current Switch.
According to sources, the reason behind this rumor was the shortage of components. However, the media outlet that first reported on this issue couldn’t correctly understand what CEO Shuntaro Furukawa meant. According to Shuntaro, they will keep selling the current three kinds of Nintendo at a reduced price for the Lite version.
Nikkei: there will be no new Nintendo hardware this fiscal year, which ends in March 2023. Not immediately clear whether that part of the article is from Nikkei’s own reporting or what Nintendo President, who Nikkei interviewed for the story, said. https://t.co/HJVqk9Kbef
Further, Shuntaro claimed that the Japanese company is not having trouble getting components. The problem is the increased demand, which exceeds their expectation. Moreover, the global pandemic affected them, like most businesses, as there has been a rise in the prices of materials and shipping.
But Shuntaro claims the increasing prices of materials and transportation don’t worry them right now. And they will continue to offer Switches at a reasonable price. he said, “In order to offer unique entertainment to a wide range of customers, we want to avoid pricing people out.” He also shared that the OLED version is less profitable than the other two Switch versions.
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WATCH THIS STORY: Ranking The Highest Selling Nintendo Games of All Time
So, the Nintendo Switch fans can be at ease about the console prices for now. What are your thoughts about the Switch prices? Share your thoughts in the comments.
A NEW begin in soccer was precisely what Millie Brown wanted to rekindle her love for the sport. After sitting on the sidelines for psychological well being causes final season, the proficient 21-year-old is again with new colors for season seven.
“It has actually been good going again to the preseason. It has been a giant change for me once more contemplating I’ve closed the season. However it was actually enjoyable and now I really feel like I am getting again on monitor. Brown, who moved to the Western Bulldogs within the low season, stated: lady.afl.
After being chosen as a father-daughter decides to Geelong within the No. 11 decides previous to the 2020 season, Brown performed each recreation that 12 months, damage made his second season grim and restricted him to only three video games. However when he hit the park, Brown confirmed actual energy on the defensive, standing tall alongside the likes of Meg McDonald and Maddy McMahon.
This grueling second 12 months on the AFLW has precipitated Brown to step up and reassess whether or not he now desires to be a footy participant.
Millie Brown of Geelong is at work within the first spherical of 2020. Picture: AFL Images
“I wasn’t actually having fun with taking part in soccer anymore, I had misplaced some ardour,” Brown stated.
“I used to be going by means of a little bit of psychological well being stuff. Some anxiousness and melancholy and that kind of factor that I do know lots of people are going by means of however in that standing atmosphere, I discovered it very difficult and really demanding and I used to be sort of not performing very effectively and received injured.
LIST CHANGES All delistings earlier than the seventh season
“I assume I needed to stroll away from it to determine if it was one thing I actually needed to do. At first I did not assume you’d remorse it as a result of ‘Oh rattling, I want I had thought. I am again.”
Millie Brown and her father Paul after Millie was drafted by Geelong forward of the 2020 season. Picture: AFL Images
However to return, Brown needed to transfer to a brand new membership. Not being reminded of those adverse feelings each time she entered coaching was key to her return from her to footy.
“I assume it might be actually arduous for me to return to that atmosphere the place I wasn’t feeling very effectively, however it’s not towards the Cats. I needed to reset, renew and take a look at a brand new place,” she stated.
AFLW LUMINAIREWho’s your staff taking part in with in season seven?
However now, Brown, who lives in Melbourne, “attunes to metropolis life and trams” and trains with Bulldogs, is best outfitted to do a greater job than ever earlier than in his life.
“I believe I’ve gotten loads higher on the psychological facet of issues, it is time for me to be a bit proactive if I really feel a bit drained, and the physiques and everybody right here is in search of me fantastically, I really feels fairly good,” he stated.
The Oppo Reno8 series was launched in China in May and made its global debut last month, and the next market it’s heading to is the Philippines.
Oppo will introduce the Reno8 series in the Philippines on September 1, and while the Chinese brand hasn’t revealed how many Reno8 series smartphones it will launch in the Philippines, it has confirmed that Reno8 is one of the phones launching in the Southeast Asian country .
The Oppo Reno8 is powered by the Dimensity 1300 SoC, runs Android 12-based ColorOS 12.1 out of the box, and has two memory options – 8GB/128GB and 8GB/256GB. It’s built around a 6.4″ FullHD+ 90Hz AMOLED screen with a punch hole for the 32MP selfie camera and a fingerprint reader underneath for biometric authentication.
Around back, we get a 50MP primary camera, joined by an 8MP ultrawide and a 2MP macro unit. The smartphone packs a 4,500 mAh battery with 80W wired charging and also supports reverse wired charging, allowing you to juice up other devices with Reno8.
Oppo Reno8
The rest of the highlights of the Oppo Reno8 include a USB-C port, NFC, and 5G support. You can read our Oppo Reno8 detailed written review to learn more about it.
Other smartphones in the Reno8 lineup include the Reno8 Lite, Reno8 Z, and the Reno8 Pro, which is a version of the Reno8 Pro+ sold in China (the Chinese Reno8 Pro has different specs).
You can read our global Reno8 Pro’s review here and head this way to check the detailed specs of the Reno8 Lite, Reno8 Z, and Chinese Reno8 Pro.
Zoom’s automatic update option can help users ensure that they have the latest, safest version of the video conferencing software, which has had multiple privacy and security issues over the years. A Mac security researcher, however, has reported vulnerabilities he found in the tool that attackers could have exploited to gain full control of a victim’s computer at this year’s DefCon. According to Wired, Patrick Wardle presented two vulnerabilities during the conference. I have found the first one in the app’s signature check, which certifies the integrity of the update being installed and examines it to make sure that it’s a new version of Zoom. In other words, it’s in charge of blocking attackers from tricking the automatic update installer into downloading an older and more vulnerable version of the app.
Wardle discovered that attackers could bypass the signature check by naming their malware file a certain way. And once they’re in, they could get root access and control the victim’s Mac. The Verge says Wardle disclosed the bug to Zoom back in December 2021, but the fix it rolled out contained another bug. This second vulnerability could have given attackers a way to circumvent the safeguard Zoom set in place to make sure an update delivers the latest version of the app. Wardle reportedly found that it’s possible to trick a tool that facilitates Zoom’s update distribution into accepting an older version of the video conferencing software.
Zoom already fixed that flaw, as well, but Wardle found yet another vulnerability, which he has also presented at the conference. He discovered that there’s a point in time between the auto-installer’s verification of a software package and the actual installation process that allows an attacker to inject malicious code into the update. A downloaded package meant for installation can apparently retain its original read-write permissions allowing any user to modify it. That means even users without root access could swap its contents with malicious code and gain control of the target computer.
The company told The Verge that it’s now working on a patch for the new vulnerability Wardle has disclosed. Ace Wired notes, though, attackers need to have existing access to a user’s device to be able to exploit these flaws. Even if there’s no immediate danger for most people, Zoom advises users to “keep up to date with the latest version” of the app whenever one comes out.
These Tower of Fantasy codes will get you free Golden Nucleus and upgrade items, so not having to go out and farm things. There aren’t many codes and they will expire so you don’t want to miss your chance – claim them now before it’s too late and redeem all the rewards on offer.
Coming up below we’ve got all the latest Tower of Fantasy codes, and how to redeem them so you can grab all that free stuff. And, while they do expire, we’ve kept all the old ones listed as well, just in case. So here’s everything you need to know. If you’re still getting used to the game, or looking to start, we can also help you with picking a Tower of Fantasy character and explain how that all works.
Tower of Fantasy codes
(Image credit: Perfectworld)
These are the active codes you can redeem right now (last tested on August 12). Note that codes are only available for a limited time, so don’t wait too long!
ILOVETOF – Support Pack containing one Gold Nucleus and five Weapon Batteries II (upgrade material).
TOF666 – Starter’s Welcome Pack containing 8,888 Gold and an SR Relic Shard Box.
TOF888 – Channel Event Pack containing 8,888 Gold, a Black Nucleus, and ten Crispy Grilled Fish dishes.
Tower of Fantasy expired codes
(Image credit: Perfectworld)
Some Tower of Fantasy gift codes have already expired. The ones below no longer seem to work. Just to inform you which codes to ignore, we’ll still list them:
ht520
ht666
ht888
huanta520
huanta666
huanta888
YL666
YL777
YL999
How to redeem codes in Tower of Fantasy
(Image credit: Perfectworld)
Tower of Fantasy codes can only be redeemed in-game, so there’s no need to go to the website. The code redemption feature is pretty well-hidden though. Start by launching the game, and then do the following:
Click on the reward icon in the upper right corner of the screen (see picture). Hold ALT to move your mouse freely. Note that this icon does not appear in the main menu.
Near the bottom of the screen, click the tab that says ‘rewards’.
On the left side of the screen, there’s a new list with tabs. Click the lowest one, ‘exchange’.
Type or copy the active codes in the bar, then choose ‘confirm’. You will see a pop-up telling you whether the code redemption was successful.
Important: after successfully redeeming a code, exit the menu and click on the mailbox icon in the upper left corner of the screen, just below the mini map. The code rewards are sent to you through the in-game mail system, so don’t forget to claim them!
How to unlock rewards in Tower of Fantasy
(Image credit: Perfectworld)
Don’t see a rewards feature? That means you’re still in the game’s tutorial stage. It will take a while before you can redeem codes. In short, after running around with Shirli until you’re around level 5 or 6, complete the main quest that tells you to ‘eliminate the intruding hyenas’, then talk to the nearby Scrapper. This should unlock the rewards feature.
Your iPhone offers a built-in Health app through which you’re able to track your health and fitness, monitor medical conditions, and access records from supported hospitals. Now, with iOS 16, you also have the ability to manage your medications.
Apple’s iOS 16 arrives in the fall, but early adopters can check it out now via the public beta. Download it and you’ll have the ability to add and track each of your medications, set reminders, and even learn about possible interactions between different medications that you take. Here’s how the new feature works.
Add Medications
In the Health app, swipe down the summary screen and tap Add a Medication under the Set Up Medications section. You can also click Browsethen select Medications under Health Categories and choose Add a Medication.
Start typing the name of your medication. If you see a match, tap the appropriate listing. Make sure you select not just the name but the correct dosage, if listed. If the medication doesn’t appear among the results, tap the camera icon to take a picture of it.
Tap the Get Started button and position the medication in the frame of the camera as instructed. If the medication is identified through the scan, tap the correct match. Again, be sure to select the correct name and dosage, if available.
Some medications are available in multiple forms, so you may be asked to choose between a topical cream, tablet, oral solution, or capsule form. If the dosage was not included when you added the medication, the next screen will ask you to choose the medication strength. Select the correct dosage and tap Next.
Any standard, FDA-approved medications should be identified by a search or scan. However, if you can’t find your meds, you can also manually add the name. To do this, tap Search by Name to add the medication, then tap Next.
If you manually add a medication because it can’t be identified by search or scan, you are asked to choose the medication type, such as capsule, liquid, cream, drops, or spray. You are then asked to choose the unit of measurement, eg, mg, g, or mL.
Set Frequency and Time
After you have entered a medication, you are then asked how often you take the medication and at what time of day. Tap Frequency and select the interval; At Regular Intervals, On Specific Days of the Week, As Needed. Then choose a start date and tap donate.
Select Add a time under Time of Day and enter the time that you take the medication. You can add more than one time if you take it more than once per day. Tap the 1 tablet link (assuming the medication is in tablet form) to change how many doses of the medication you take at each interval, then tap Next.
Confirm Shape and Color
You will need to confirm the shape and color of the pill you take. Tap the shape that best matches how the medication looks, then tap Next. Select the color that best matches the medication.
You can also assign a specific background color for the medication, if you need to differentiate one medicine from another, or to simply better highlight the image. Tap Next when finished.
Finalize Medication
Confirm the name, dosage, and schedule for the medication. If you need to change any details, tap the Back arrow at the upper left until you reach each previous screen. Otherwise, you can add optional details at this summary screen. When done, tap Next.
The next screen informs you of any potential interactions as you add more medications to the list. Select any of the displayed items that you use to see if there are any interactions between them and your medications. When finished, tap donate. You can then tap Add Medication if you need to add another medication.
Track Your Medications
Once everything has been added, you can view all the medications you take from the Summary screen. Check the Log section to see when you need to take each medication. The Your Medications section will display the names, dosages, and frequencies of the medications you take. You can also check drug interactions from the Interactions section.
Tap a specific medication to see its summary screen. If you need to change the schedule, tap the Edit link next to Schedule and enter a new interval and time. Swipe down further to see the details you entered. Tap Edit to modify any of these details.
Further down is the About section, which displays information about the medication. Tap side effects to read about any potential side effects for that medication.
You can edit the list of medications to remove any or change their order. Tap the Edit link next to Your Medications, then select the trash can icon next to any you no longer take and wish to remove. That medication is then added to the archived list in case you need to add it back to the active list in the future.
To modify the order in which the medications are listed, press down on the hamburger icon next to a specific listing and then drag and drop it up or down.
When it’s time to take one of your scheduled medications, your iPhone will remind you with a visual notification and audio tone. Tap the notification to see the scheduled medications. Tap the Taken button to indicate that you took a medication or choose the skipped button to indicate that you skipped the dose for now.
The Logged section of the Summary screen will display any medications you have taken for the day and indicate the time you took them.
Meta-owned application, WhatsApp is working toward managing the phone number visibility when starting a chat with certain businesses, reported WABetaaInfo, the website that tracks the latest WhatsApp updates.
The feature of phone number sharing will be available for a future update of the app. The website also shared a screenshot of the update. In some situations, the app plans to ask its users if they wish to share their phone numbers when starting a chat with businesses.
In some cases, WhatsApp will automatically share and hide the customer’s phone number when they send a message to businesses via Click to WhatsApp ad. It is crucial to note that, all interactions with a WhatsApp ad will not be eligible for hiding the phone number, Times Now reports.
WABetaaInfo has written that when contacting a certain business and the phone number is hidden in that specific case, as it happens with the phone number sharing option for sub-groups of a community, customers will be able to choose to share the phone number with them. The feature is still in the under-development stage and its release date is yet to be announced.
WhatsApp is also working in a group setting for the approval of new participants.
On the precipice of release day, Cult of the Lamb’s creative director Julian Wilton was still pinching himself: “I haven’t taken it in yet, because my priority has been getting the game out,” he told ABC Arts.
“I was refreshing the Steam store page yesterday, and watching the numbers continue to go up… this is in a totally different league to our previous games.”
In the year since his studio Massive Monster’s fourth game was announced at the European trade fair Gamescom, Cult of the Lamb has become one of the most keenly anticipated video games of 2022.
Ahead of its global release on Friday, pre-orders alone had driven the Melbourne-made indie to the top of the sales charts on digital video game marketplace Steam.
At its Gamescom debut in August 2021, Cult of the Lamb immediately distinguished itself from other games. The announcement trailer focused on narrative and aesthetic rather than the mechanics of gameplay; In stunning cell animation, it dramatized the game’s titular protagonist as it escapes the sacrificial altar to start its own cult of adorable animal followers, exacting revenge in the name of a mysterious entity known as The One Who Waits.
Cult of the Lamb is animated by Half Giant, an Australia studio.(Supplied: Massive Monster)
Set to a groovy, ethereal beat by First Nations musician and producer Narayana Johnson (who wrote the game’s soundtrack), the trailer triggered a flurry of activity on social media that has continued to grow in the year leading up to Friday’s release.
When Massive Monster released a demo of Cult of the Lamb a few months after its trailer, it was clear that the game’s blend of creepy and cute ran deeper than its aesthetic: it combines action-packed dungeons and tightly designed combat with gentler gameplay such as fishing, community building and home decoration elements inspired by titles such as 2020’s smash hit, Animal Crossing: New Horizons.
It’s a game that puts fun first, welcoming in a wide variety of players without sacrificing (no pun intended) the strategic edge and replayability of a challenging title.
Speaking to ABC Arts ahead of the global launch, Wilton graciously ascribed the game’s reception to the marketing campaign by the game’s US-based publisher (“Devolver Digital really know how to do their job!”). But the game’s early success also has something to do with his studio’s respect for the breadth and diversity of the people who play video games.
Julian Wilton, the creative director of Massive Monster, won an Australian Game Developer Award in 2019.(ABC Arts: Kate Disher-Quill)
Making approachable games
Massive Monster’s first official title was 2018’s The Adventure Pals, but the studio’s three co-directors have been working together for more than a decade, since they met online as teens.
Making approachable games has been a guiding principle for their collaborations from the get-go.
Wilton met art director James Pearmain and design director Jay Armstrong through chat forums dedicated to Adobe Flash, a piece of computer software used to make games and animated shorts.
Widely proliferated, free, and easy to use, Flash was the backbone of the creative internet in the 00s, and Wilton was drawn to it from his teenage years.
The online Flash game community encouraged “jumping in and making something weird, and people would check it out,” Wilton says.
This community allowed all three developers to hone their sense of the kind of mechanics that people could pick up quickly.
Rather than offering complex narratives or high skill thresholds, successful Flash games were generally short in length, and designed to be played for fun by anyone with an internet connection; for a small, browser-based game, approachability is key.
Wilton enjoyed early success through this community with a Flash game called Angry Bees, which was published on popular video game website Miniclip, earning the then-teenager a cool $20,000 (which promptly saw his PayPal account shut down for suspicious activity).
These formative experiences with the Flash game community led to a game design approach that Wilton describes as iterative, unprecious, and audience-led.
In fact, the way the Massive Monster team worked together in the early stages of Cult of the Lamb sounds less like the work of three software developers and more like a band jamming together, layering different approaches and ideas until something sticks.
However their goal was clear: they wanted to make a strategic video game based on layered systems that offered players lots of ways to play and replay – something more complex than their previous adventure games, Never Give Up (2019) and The Adventure Pals. Crucially, however, it had to be fun first, challenge second.
The Adventure Pals (2018) is a platform adventure game about friendship and exploration.(Supplied: Massive Monster)
“We always like to make things very accessible and easy to pick up. When we make a game, we want your grandma to be able to pick it up and play with it – or at least to have fun with it,” Wilton says.
“It’s important to us to make things approachable and casual.”
Bringing roguelikes to a broader audience
Despite its mass appeal, the gameplay in Cult of the Lamb was initially inspired by a genre that is notoriously challenging: the roguelike. The term is named for the 1985 computer game Rogue, and refers to video games that share a set of challenging gameplay features.
Typically in a roguelike game, the player journeys through a series of randomly generated rooms fighting enemies to gain power-ups, weapons and loot, becoming stronger as they go — but when they die, they die permanently, and any new run will see the player starting again with none of their previous spoils, at square one.
Because roguelikes reset the character’s skills with each death, they particularly reward the player’s strategy; really skilled roguelike players become so familiar with the kinds of enemies and opportunities that can arise, and the frequency with which they do, that they can strategise their way through each unique run based on percentages, making strategic decisions and taking risks as they go.
As a result, playing roguelikes can be incredibly rewarding; however, they are also notoriously unapproachable to new players.
In the last 10 years, the roguelike genre has seen a resurgence through titles such as the hugely popular Darkest Dungeon and Binding of Isaac. At the same time, the genre has seen pushback from players who are left out due to these games’ high barrier to entry.
For someone unfamiliar with the genre, playing a roguelike can be punishing – they take a long time to start feeling fun.
Cult of the Lamb isn’t the first recent indie hit to remix the roguelike for a broader audience and find success. In 2018, Supergiant Games’ Hades swept awards season with the story of Zagreus, son of Hades, whose repeated attempts to escape the underworld reveal new aspects of the story, in addition to skills and weapons.
Hades, by Supergiant Games, was released in 2018. (Supplied: Supergiant Games)
By using narrative to motivate a player through each ‘failure’, Supergiant Games found a way to make the roguelike appealing to an audience who cared more for story than strategy.
The game also featured a ‘god mode’ that increased the player’s defenses every time they died; it meant that the assistance they received was commensurate to their personal skill level, and evened out as their skills improved (rather than making the game easier by removing elements of gameplay completely).
Difficulty modes for everyone
Like Hades, Cult of the Lamb draws on the challenge and replayability of the roguelike, while offering accessibility and difficulty modes that help open the game up to more players.
While there are some differences in Cult of the Lamb’s four difficulty settings that are discernible to the player – you have fewer health points in harder modes, for example – there are also subtle assistive aspects built into the game’s standard mode that respond directly to player behavior .
“The game tries to figure out if the player is struggling, and adjusts the combat or the dungeons accordingly,” Wilton explains.
“[But] in the two harder modes, those settings are turned off.”
Knowing that they wanted the game to break through to wider audiences, Massive Monster chose to treat these assistive aspects as the game’s standard; the ‘unassisted’ challenge of a typical roguelike is available for players who want it, but on an opt-in basis.
Combined with accessibility options that allow players to turn off flashing lights, camera motion, and alter the size of the text, these design decisions offer a highly customizable game experience.
Play how you want
Cult of the Lamb also welcomes in a broader player base by facilitating play styles that favor less combat and more community building.
While the core gameplay is the same for every player — venture out to a dungeon, combat enemies, return with supplies, build your community with those supplies — the game supports a range of methods for approaching these challenges.
Cult of the Lamb is set in the Evermoon Forest, a mythical place ruled by warring cults and dark magic.(Supplied: Massive Monster)
Spending time developing your cult can generate resources that make each dungeon run easier, and visiting neighboring villages offers the opportunity to gather resources through trade or quests, minimizing the player’s time in combat.
Massive Monster took a similar approach to darker elements of the gameplay, too – the player can be a relatively benevolent leader or a vicious tyrant.
“Our approach is: it’s okay if some of that dark stuff is there, so long as we’re not forcing any of this stuff on the players,” says Wilton.
Video games are for everyone
Cult of the Lamb’s design is founded on a deep respect for the diverse reality of video game players.
In the 2022 Digital Australia report from the Interactive Games and Entertainment Association, a survey found that 17 million Australians play video games. Of those surveyed, 46 per cent identified as female, and 1 per cent as non-binary.
The age range of players is also more diverse than video games’ youthful reputation would suggest: the average age of a video game player in Australia is 35, and 42 per cent of adults who are 65 years and older also play video games.
Not only do a wide variety of people play games, but they play for a wide variety of reasons, including socialisation, creativity, and relaxation.
This is reflected in the sales charts; Alongside Cult of the Lamb, the top-charting games on Steam in August include university management simulator Two Point Campus and cat adventure game Stray, as well as more aggressive, action-packed games such as Elden Ring and Rust.
With over 60,000 pre-orders on the Steam store alone, Massive Monster’s approachable design looks like a winning strategy – but even if it wasn’t, Wilton wouldn’t want to make games any other way.
“I also designed the medium difficulty mode after my own skill level,” he says.
