The seminal Half-Life turns 25 this weekend, and Valve are celebrating with a substantial update which restores launch day content, introduces fresh multiplayer maps, and provides insights into the original development team’s work. As part of the festivities, there’s also an excellent documentary produced by the Noclip production crew.

Australian game designer Luke Muscat has put out a great, 40 minute retrospective on the history and challenges of designing the mobile classic, Jetpack Joyride. His last one, ‘How I designed Fruit Ninja’, was also terrific - love hearing these stories.

Baldur’s Gate 3 and Alan Wake 2 are in the spotlight with eight nominations each for the upcoming Game Awards on December 7. Considered by some as the ‘Oscars of the gaming industry’, the ceremony promises heightened competition this year with a myriad of acclaimed releases. Be sure to getcha votes in!

gamesindustry.biz have kicked off their Australia Games Week with a great deep dive into the Australian market, its expanding audience and flourishing community of developers, and overall growth. Lots of interesting insights here, and this is part of an ongoing series of articles this week, all of which you can check out here.

Made as a response to so-called immersive sims which provide you with precisely what you need in a lock-and-key fashion to “solve” problems in just the way the game intended. Mosa Lina goes in the complete opposite direction; giving you completely random tools each time, enabling emergent and unique solutions. It’s clever, funny and rewarding. Really good.

In its 41st year, the Golden Joystick Awards returned to an in-person format in London lastnight. Larian Studios’ Baldur’s Gate 3 stole the spotlight, securing a record-breaking seven awards, notably Ultimate Game of the Year. Check out complete list of winners here.

2023 was bittersweet. It was a year so full of great releases, but also saw record industry layoffs. Acknowledging the amazing work and contributions of all these talented teams and people, these are my favourite games of the year (so far). Order is just alphabetical.

Valve have announced the Steam Deck OLED: 7.4-inch 90Hz OLED custom Samsung screen, 1,000-nit HDR peak brightness, 50 watt-hour battery, and a bunch of other little improvements. It’s not the Steam Deck 2, but it looks very nice. The Steam Deck OLED ships November 16th - unless you’re in Australia, in which case we’re still boned.

Ten years after the release of GTA V, and in line with their 25th anniversary, Rockstar have confirmed the first look at the next in the franchise will be dropping early next month. In a series of tweets, Rockstar president Sam Houser reflects on the company’s history and speaks to his excitement for “many more years of sharing these experiences”.

Terrific art direction, ghostly music and atmosphere underpinned by a gripping story (by ’60s Polish sci-fi author Stanisław Lem) make for a tantalising but ultimately underwhelming experience. The characters are likeable and acted well, but they can only do so much to make up for what is so bound by its story that it leaves so little room for compelling gameplay… I’m up for walking simulators, but the walking has to be enjoyable. All that said, the story is the hero, which is enough to drive home an admirable adaptation.