Daggerfall Unity is the open source game engine built with Unity for running the 1996 classic The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall and it's coming along very nicely.

A new release just went up with Daggerfall Unity 0.10.28, which the developer mentions is now "feature complete" and so it will be moving from Alpha to Beta status soon. Going by their roadmap , that sure is a lot of completed items. It's not finished though, as they will move onto bug fixing, minor adjustments, modding, translations and so on.

What's new with this release? Large HUD support, along with the ability to have the HUD docked or undocked meaning it can either stretch or have a more fixed size - good for bigger resolutions where it might get too stretched.

There's more ways to configure the HUD now in the settings file too, and a big overhaul to the movement system to better match the original. They can't match the movement system exactly, instead going for a system that enables you to feel more powerful and faster when you're a higher level. The biggest change appears to be the jumping ability, with it now giving small jumps to low levels and bigger / longer jumps for higher levels.

Plenty more smaller and varied fixes also made it in, there was a lot of little bits of fine tuning.

Since it's such an old game, it's also freely available as Bethesda Softworks put it up as a free download back in 2009. This means it really can live forever with an up to date cross-platform game engine. Daggerfall Unity isn't quite the same though of course, as it does have some unique enhancements so it's more like "Classic Daggerfall Plus" as the developer calls it.

Find it on the official site and GitHub .

SC Controller is a pretty essential standalone user-mode driver and configuration UI for working with the Steam Controller, and it just got the first stable update in some time. It enables you to use your Steam Controller fully outside of Steam, and it works really damn well.

While the developer has been working on an experimental c port, others have submitted a few essential fixes so a new release went up. One major issue is with most modern Linux distributions moving to a major Python update, which broke SC Controller. Thankfully, as of the v0.4.8 release that's not so much a problem with the AppImage now working on Ubuntu 20.04 and comparable distributions.

Testing on an up to date Arch Linux install (using EndeavourOS), the AppImage worked perfectly!

Additionally, this update all pulls in these changes and fixes:

• Hip fire style action for trigger
• Added DualShock 4v2 over Bluetooth udev rule
• Button labels on Gyro Tilt mixed up
• Cemu hook not working with Dolphin Emulator
• Radial menu drawing broken on HDPI displays
• Gesture recognition not working with DS4
• "Confirm menu selection by releasing" not working at all
• Moving STICK and LPAD at once can make buttons stuck
• Issues with non-ascii (and especially Chinese) characters in profile name

You can find it on GitHub .

After being out for two years, Texel Raptor have now added online multiplayer to the theme park builder Parkitect. Not exactly a small feature for such a game, and it's a free update for everyone too.

You can team up with 7 people so there's a max of 8 players total, all working on the same park where you get to see exactly what everyone is doing. This is true for sandbox park and campaign scenarios too, and most mods should be compatible with multiplayer too. DLCs are supported too but people will need to own the DLC to play with you.

See the trailer for the update below:

Watch video on YouTube.com

Update highlights:

• added co-op multiplayer mode! Now you can build parks with up to 7 other people together
• added a new background music track
• improved decoration score calculation speed
• fixed fences not sticking to terrain when terraforming
• fixed a case where decoration could be seen through the terrain
• fixed a bug where guest money setting would not be stored properly when editing a scenario

The only downside is that right now the multiplayer is not cross-platform between Linux, macOS and Windows but they did make it clear they're going to continue working towards that goal.

You can pick up Parkitect from Humble Store , GOG and Steam .

The Long Dark is probably one of the most beautiful survival games, and quite brutal too. Ready to get cold again? A big new update to the Survival Mode is out now.

Gameplay in The Long Dark is split between playing through the episodic story (with Episode 4 due in 2021 ) and the open-world Survival Mode where you do whatever the heck you want. This latest free expansion named Hesitant Prospect adds in the Ash Canyon region where you "might find an abandoned mine that hides treasures worth more than gold to any survivor" but to get there you have to cross some worn out looking rope-bridges — eek!

That does not look particularly safe…

You also get access to Crampons, which will help prevent sprains and enable easier travel over weak ice. Plus there's a new Technical Pack that adds a permanent capacity buff to your inventory for all that burning wood you need.

A new challenge mode has been added too, based upon the Halloween event where you're being hunted by an invisible force. If you complete it, you will get a Darkwalker Feat to enable in Survival Mode to give you a stamina boost at night but it will drain you during the day. There's also a new setting where you can force an Endless Night for an extra challenging run - better wrap up warm.

See their roundup video below:

Watch video on YouTube.com

You can buy The Long Dark from Humble Store and Steam .

Pulling in some much requested features by users, the upcoming free December update for Civilization VI sounds like it's going to be quite nice. This might not be as big as some of the previous updates but still  some very useful additions coming.

One major addition is the City State Picker, allowing you to go that little bit further with your game customization by letting you hand pick what City States you want to be in your game. You can switch between the default random, or sort your own custom list.

There's also going to be the usual assorted balancing changes, with Firaxis mentioning a "significant" balancing pass on social policies and the tech and civic boosts. In addition they've done a few AI tweaks like them not making so many demands if you're clearly stronger than them or if they're doing badly in a war, plus there's finally a Stop Asking button if a particular civ is pestering you.

Here's the full video of what's to come:

Watch video on YouTube.com

What's really interesting though is that with the New Frontier Pass, that is coming to an end after the January and March 2021 content packs. However, as something of a hint the end of the video above has the team give a quick cheers to "one more year" after mentioning details of stuff to come in January. That could just be a celebratory 2020 being almost over, and only meaning they will give details on the last two packs or it could be a hint that more is planned.

The free December 2020 update arrives on December 17.

You can buy Civilization VI with Linux support from Humble Store and Steam .

Valve have pushed out the latest updates for the Steam Client to everyone, and this update is a little on the exciting side with new hardware.

When it comes to new controllers being released, Valve seem to act pretty quickly on getting it all hooked up with Steam Input. As of this Steam Client release, you should find that the Sony DualSense (PlayStation 5 controller) should now work including trackpad, gyro, lightbar, and rumble functionality with any games that support Steam Input. Valve also added in a directional swipe mode for trackpads and gyro, better support for games that use raw input and some bug fixes.

On the Linux side things get interesting too. Not only have Valve improved the performance of Steam's web browser they also noted all these fixes and improvements just for Linux:

• Updated steam runtime to v0.20201203.1
• Improved the filtering of available compatibility tools in the game properties dialog
• Fixed launching of non-Steam games over Proton 5.13
• Fixed games not getting stopped via the 'Stop' button in the client UI
• Added auto-migration of Steam libraries using the old 'SteamApps' directory casing to 'steamapps' when possible. Users will be warned if the transition is needed but auto-migration fails.
• Improved how host LD_LIBRARY_PATH settings are picked up and transformed for the Steam runtime
• Improved host LD_LIBRARY_PATH support
• Fixed blank UI windows appearing at startup on some systems

See the announcement here .

This might actually be my favourite class so far in Last Epoch, the impressive time-travelling action RPG.

Last Epoch 0.8 is out now and adds in the 5th playable character class with the Rogue, giving you the chance to dance around your enemies with some blades. This new class comes with 2 mastery classes with the Bladedancer and Marksman, 17 skills and specialization trees, 46 class-specific affixes for body armour and helments along with it having a unique character model, animations and some wonderful voice acting. Easily now my go-to character because seeing blades spinning around and throwing shurikens is ridiculously satisfying.

Not all though, they also improved the multiplayer with this update. While you can play it entirely solo, having multiplayer features is a nice touch to expand upon. The social features are more stable, you can now whisper to other players, you can adjust more chat settings and manage your friends list easier.

Lots more than that! It's a huge update. Love daggers? Good news, they're in with 11 subtypes available. There's also now Bows with 11 subtypes and they're currently Rogue-specific and Quivers as well that you use off-hand with bows and they also have 8 subtypes. So much experimenting now possible with all the different classes and equipment. Additionally there's 8 new unique items, a new 3-piece set, visual and sound updates, performance improvements and quite a lot more.

Check out their new overview video:

Watch video on YouTube.com

Even though it's in Early Access and so it's not finished, Last Epoch might now be my go-to action RPG when I want to run around questing, looting and cutting up horrible creatures with blades. Eleventh Hour Games are doing well with it and I'm seriously keen to see how much they expand it. Definitely one to take a look at if you're in need of a new RPG.

You can buy Last Epoch on Steam .

Mixing in elements inspired by Mega Man Battle Network along with the popularity of deck-building, One Step From Eden is quite a highlight from earlier 2020 and now it's bigger and better.

Getting the biggest update since the original release, not only is it a free expansion it's also an update to address some pain-points for players. Noticeably, there's now an "easy" mode and other accessibility options to make it not so difficult - which by default it certainly is.

• Here's what's new:
• +29 New Spells (Calamity for all Brands!)
• +32 New Artifacts
• Mod sandbox
• Lots of Accessibility settings ("easy" mode, hold movement, readability)
• Profiles/Save slots
• Pick and Choose Hell Passes
• New Saffron Bossfight

Watch video on YouTube.com

Even though it's seriously challenging, it's also a very good and thoroughly entertaining game. One that appears to be quite highly rated now, with it seeing an "Overwhelmingly Positive" user rating on Steam so it appears that Thomas Moon Kang has done well to modernise the idea of Battle Network. For me, I just love testing out all the different characters, along with the masses of card-based abilities you get to play with. There's so many possible builds you can make with it, and it's never dull.

Hopefully now with the new options, more people can enjoy it who can't handle the normal speed of it. Worth trying again if you bounced off it originally.

You can pick up One Step From Eden in the current Humble Choice bundle . Otherwise head to the usual: GOG.com , Humble Store and Steam .

Want to build your own crazy dream-world perspective puzzles? Superliminal now has a level editor available in Beta.

Probably one of my absolute favourite Linux releases this year, Superliminal works on what you see and how you see it. It's all about perception as you move objects around to resize them against what you see, and also line up what you see in the environment to make new objects pop out. It's absolutely wonderful.

When it released on Steam and came with Linux support in November, they allowed the important of any 3D model with the Steam Workshop but that was a small step. Now you can create entire puzzles and levels.

Check out the level editor in action:

Watch video on YouTube.com

Looks like the Steam Workshop is filling up too with lots of objects and levels being created by the community. Given the unique gameplay mechanic, I can't wait to see what elaborate designs people can come up with.

You can buy Superliminal from GOG and Steam .