It’s been another week of finely crafted words about PC games on Jank. Graham spoke the hard truth that VR still just doesn’t work, most of the time.

John Wick doesn't have these kinds of problems. John Wick has never died because he was unable to access the gun on his belt because his belt was clipped through the floor while he was crouched. Jack Reacher neither. Jack Reacher has never died because his reality phase-shifted to a living room because his head strayed too close to a Ikea Strandmon footstool.

In the Lie-In, he topped his list of links worth clicking with a plea for favourite critics, which prompted some interesting discussion in the comments and on BlueSky.

Who are the videogame reviewers that, to you, have a definable point of view? I don't mean that you like their work, or that you agree with it. I mean, tell me the writers who have a coherently expressed set of aesthetic principles that they apply, resolutely and consistently, in their work?

Marsh Davies reviewed Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy, and found it much more surprising than its appearance or predecessors suggested:

It is a

Welcome back to another week of Jank. We are steadily accumulating more freelance contributions thanks to the slowly expanding number of smart and generous people who are supporting the site - this week's new arrival is Joshua Rivera, who railed against playtime metrics.

I read those words and I feel foolish about the practice of counting all these hours, as if I know how many I have to draw from, or that I'm even wise enough to know how best to spend them. If I find that I've racked up 300 hours this year swearing at roguelikes and clicking through RPGs, what am I meant to do with that knowledge?

Nic Reuben marvelled at the detail of Total Warhammer 3, and the stories it implies but does not tell:

I'm thinking about the wolf and the granaries and the docks because it's taken me facing the end of the world - courtesy of three new apocalyptic end-game scenarios that devastate the planet's surface - to finally stop and smell the roses.

Sin's adventures in the archives surfaced Stellar Monarch 2, which hands off the main 4x burdens to your middle management layer:

Its recent-ish

The week is over and it's definitely autumn now, which I don't care for, but there are some good games and good words to comfort us as the evenings draw in. For the latter, we did some important financial journalism to find out who could make the most without spending any money in Wardogs, and I won't say who won on money but Brendy definitely won on depravity:

I crawl forward to a screaming teammate, lying in the grass ahead of me, and take his machine gun, helmet, and armour. I turn to crawl away, and then think better of it. I turn to revive him. Because it will earn me money. Unfortunately, two other people have had the same idea. We all crowd around our fallen comrade, rubbing our hands together like three fuckbois warming their hands over a Tinder profile.

Sin reviewed Ostranaughts, which is entirely our sort of game (derogatory):

You also get lowercase jank. Lots of it. "Bordering on a professional dilemma" kind of jank. There is so much going wrong with this game that I'm unsure if this will be a recommendation or an SOS.

We passed 900 wonderful, attractive, charismatic

Another week has passed and we managed to fit two reviews into it, because that's the sort of thing you can do when you are powered by reader support rather than advertising. Brendy pondered the single innovative thing and the hundreds of non-innovative things in Sprawl Zero.

This isn't to say I had a bad time. I enjoy throwing chunks of concrete and rebar at the legs of my enemies. That's a good weekend. But I was never truly surprised. That's why I'm not worried about spoiling the plot for you, because if you've played any other shooter in the last 20 years, it basically spoils itself.

Meanwhile Nic judged Blood of the Dawnwalker, a good game that is nevertheless aiming higher than it can reach.

You could argue that just having the option to abstain from drinking humans and gorge on rats allows you to roleplay in ways that reflect your own morality, but I'd say that pales to how thematically incoherent and jarring it feels for Coen's vampirism - which he frequently laments to the point of tears - to mean functionally nothing to the player besides a happy power boost