Humble Bundle Blog announces that for 48 hours The Flame in the Flood is free to download and keep as a celebration of their Spring Sale. The Spring Sale features savings on thousands of games, as well as bonuses to be earned along the way. As for The Flame in the Flood, here's a description of the game, which is fulfilled for Windows or macOS through Steam:

A rogue-lite river journey through the backwaters of a forgotten post-societal America. Forage, craft, evade predators.

From the Art Director of BioShock and a team of veterans of the BioShock, Halo, Guitar Hero and Rock Band series comes The Flame in the Flood.

Travel by foot and by raft down a procedurally-generated river as you scrounge for resources, craft tools, remedy afflictions, evade the vicious wildlife, and stay ahead of the coming rains.

Features an original full length soundtrack by acclaimed Alt-Country rocker Chuck Ragan featuring The Camaraderie, The Fearless Kin and other special guests.

A statement from Valve from last week announces another developer banned from Steam for review shenanigans (thanks PCGamesN). In February, Valve dropped Insel Games for self-reviewing, and now Grzegorz Kubas is being punished for "trying to inflate the user review score for his titles." Here's word:

We've received a number of reports for Steam review manipulation on the titles Steam: Rails to Riches and Eight-Minute Empire, from Acram Digital. After investigating these reports we have found that the developer, Grzegorz Kubas, has been trying to inflate the user review score for his titles. This is against our policy, and something we take very seriously.

Because of Grzegorz's actions, we have removed all games/DLC developed by Acram from our store, and will no longer be doing business with him. Existing owners will be able to keep their titles.

Laser League is now officially available on Steam, offering a multiplayer virtual sport for Windows. Publisher 505 Games and developer Roll7 celebrate the game's graduation from Early Access with a 40% off sale as well as a free weekend that runs through midday Monday. Here's the launch trailer with a look, and here are the details from the announcement post:

This exhilarating, high-speed contact sport of 2150 pits players against the opposition for control of nodes that bathe the arena in deadly lasers. Evading rival colored beams, teams attempt to eliminate their opponents with speed, skill and strategy. Special offensive and defensive abilities – as well as game-changing power-ups on the arena floor – provide an edge at crucial moments. Like all great sports, Laser League is immediately accessible and understandable, but rewards dedication with deceptively complex strategic possibilities. Catch a glimpse of the fast-paced action in our new trailer:

Laser League launches with a wealth of content refined in its Early Access program, including:

• 6 unique classes; Blade, Smash, Thief, Ghost, Shock and Snipe
• 16 maps with unique laser patterns
• 15 power-ups with the possibility to drastically alter the match
• 12 modifier effects to adjust each class to best suit your playstyle
• 4 international stadiums packed with cheering fans
• Over 250 unique character customizations

Laser League on Steam also launches with seven additional maps, two stadiums and two new power-ups included in the price of purchase, along with six unique new modifiers, providing a new way to play each of the game's classes. On top of this, we are also excited to launch the NewMotion Brand DLC, which includes two new player models, eight kits, exclusive laser patterns, emojis and character portraits for $1.99. The added content and DLC will be available on console later in May.

Continue here to read the full story.

Strap on your six-gun, as Wild West Online is heading for the nineties for Windows on Steam after an early access run where pioneers tested the western-themed MMOG. Here's a Steam teaser trailer complete with horses, shooting, and ersatz Ennio Morricone music. Word is: "Wild West Online lets you and your closest friends ( and bitterest rivals ) delve into a thrilling world of action-packed PVP combat, world exploration, running errands for NPCs and social role playing. Whether you’re a gunslinger, explorer, crafter, miner or homesteader type, there’s fun to be had in the world of Wild West Online." Here's word on major changes since Early Access:

• Faction Territorial War – Join one of two rival factions waging war to control the valuable resources of Willwood Country, then fight with fellow faction members to control towns and territories. In upcoming expansions these factions will also battle over mines, oil rigs and train depots.
• Create A Posse Or Ride Solo – Choose to ride free with a gang of friends or alone, explore the expansive world, fight for the law or be a bandit, and participate in Public PVP events happening around the frontier.
• Expanded PVE Quests – Embark on PVE quests given by NPCs in the world to gain experience points in order to learn new skills, unlock new gear, upgrade guns and customize characters and trusty steeds.
• The Homestead Life – Or live a simpler life by buying a ranch, decorating it, farming the land, hunting wildlife, and using crafting skills to produce goods and alcohol for sale to town merchants and other players.

Continue here to read the full story.

Grinding Gear Games announces Path of Exile: Incursion will launch for the PC on June 1, offering the next expansion for Path of Exile, their free-to-play action/RPG. This page has images and details along with a countdown timer ticking off the seconds until this is released in about three weeks. Here's more:

Grinding Gear Games announced today that the next expansion to their hit ARPG, Path of Exile: Incursion, will launch for the PC on June 1, 2018 (with the Xbox One version out a week later). Path of Exile: Incursion sends players on a journey over a thousand years into the past to the long-dead Vaal Empire (introduced in PoE's very first expansion, Sacrifice of the Vaal, in 2014).

The ancient Vaal treasure temple of Atzoatl has been lost to the world for thousands of years, swallowed up by the jungle. Alva Valai, a relic hunter, has learned that she can locate the ruins of the temple by thrusting you back into the past, through a series of Temporal Incursions into the temple while it was being constructed. Path of Exile: Incursion examines the effects of temporal causality by allowing you to change the future of the temple through your actions in the past. During your Temporal Incursions, you can open doors and slay Vaal Architects, modifying and upgrading rooms in the future. Be careful with the direction that you modify the temple though, as upgraded rooms confer great risks alongside their great rewards.

Open alpha testing of Blood Ancestors on Steam offers the chance to play this team-based first-person multiplayer game for free. Here's the pitch on the game:

Arhan: The Bloodied are expelled from their world for playing with the dark arts and believing themselves superior to the Relic cult. They search for fodder until arriving in Vetland.

They discover a world devastated due to multiple wars between two factions, Light and Darkness. Promising that they would be able to repair their world with the power of the Relic, they are transported to Vetland to be used as an army.

Light: The fools, they want to use the promised power to repair Vetland.

Darkness: Their true intentions are to use the power to permanently surrender the Light to them. They are also interested in the dark arts of the Bloodied.

Take part in a war like no other in Blood Ancestors.

Features

• Unique melee combat
• Team-Based competitive first-person multiplayer gameplay
• Action set in a medieval fantasy world
• 3 factions, 6 character types, and 18 different classes
• Full skill configuration
• Different skins and colors for each class

• Dota 2 Update - May 10th 2018.
• Baldur’s Gate II: Enhanced Edition 2.5 Beta Update.

• Buy Infinite Space III: Sea of Stars from the Humble Store and save 75%.
• Buy Weird Worlds: Return to Infinite Space from the Humble Store and save 70%.
• Steam Daily Deal - Hidden Folks, 50% Off.
• Devolver Digital Publisher Weekend - Up to 90% off.
• Tinybuild 5th Anniversary Sale on Steam.
• League of Legends Champion and skin sale- 05.11 - 05.14.

• Dungeon Stars on PC & Video Gaming Examiner.

• Inside Xbox Episode 3 Debuts May 17.

• Advancing 5G, One Wireless Patent at a Time. Thanks Hypothermia.

• Tor Browser 7.5.4 is released. Thanks Ant.

• Valve debuts public bug bounty board in an effort to improve security.

• Net neutrality dies June 11th.
• Georgia Hacking Bill SB315 Gets Cybersecurity All Wrong. Thanks DSLReports via Ant.
• Belgian Gaming Commission recommends criminal prosecution over illegal loot boxes.

• Little Orbit acquires GamersFirst, APB Reloaded…
• Microsoft introduces PC Digital Game Gifting…
• An Empirical Study of Game Reviews on the Steam Platform. Thanks Kotaku…

Link of the Day: 'Rick and Morty' Scores Massive 70-Episode Renewal. Thanks [H]ardOCP via RedEye9.

VideoGamer reports that May 23rd may be the reveal date for the next installment in the Battlefield series of military first-person shooters. They point the way to this video about the secret zombie room in Battlefield 1 and an elaborate Easter egg it may contain. Here's word:

The Room, as it's called, is a pretty complicated affair though rewards gamers with a special dogtag featuring morse code that spells 'Secrets Revealed.' However, it goes just beyond that. Once the tag is unlocked, it'll cue a special music track, as well as a barely-discernible sound of dripping water coming from the hidden room.

This isn't just any odd dripping water coming from a leaky tap though; it's rhythmic, and later discovered to be morse code. When translated, fans discovered it points to this website.

Pay a visit to the site and you can see it simply features the hashtag Battlefield alongside a date of May 23, 2018. Further digging around the website turned up a countdown timer that stops on May 28, so EA's obviously got something big planned up its sleeves.

Continue here to read the full story.

Blizzard announces the first batch of BlizzCon 2018 tickets sold out promptly, as usual, leaving fewer opportunities to score a ducat to the festival going forward:

The first batch of BlizzCon 2018 tickets is now sold out, but you'll have another chance to snag some when the second set goes on sale Saturday, May 12 at 10:00 a.m. PDT.

As a reminder, tickets to a special pre-BlizzCon dinner to benefit Children's Hospital of Orange County (CHOC) will go on sale Wednesday, May 16 at 7:00 p.m. PDT, and tickets to BlizzCon Opening Week go on sale Thursday, May 17 at 8 a.m. PDT—check out the Opening Week ticket announcement for more details.

For those who want to join the fun online, the BlizzCon Virtual Ticket will give you a chance to experience the show from just about anywhere. Stay tuned for more information in the months ahead.

This Steam post announces testing gets underway today for the catchily named Sanhok, the map formerly known as game Codename: Savage for PLAYERUNKNOWN'S BATTLEGROUNDS. Here's word:

Welcome back to Sanhok (the map formerly known as “Codename: Savage”). Going forward, testing will be open to everyone who owns a copy of PUBG. Just download the “PUBG: Experimental Server” once it appears in your library.

We’ve still got some work to do before Sanhok is ready for live servers, so please give us the most detailed feedback you can! We couldn’t do this without you.

• Blade of Unagi by Black Sky Games, LLC — Kickstarter. "Blade of Unagi is an action, role playing game where you fight to restore order by defeating the five ruling kings. Built with Unity, incorporating Parallax Scrolling, Blade of Unagi is a technical marvel. Developed by Black Sky Games, LLC, Blade of Unagi is an epic tale of purpose and destiny which sees the growth of the protagonist and his quest to save his world. In order to accomplish this task, he must confront the rulers of the world - five kings who were given their powers by five mystical eels." Here's a trailer.

• E3 2018 - E3 - Electronics Entertainment Expo Wiki Guide.

• Laser League Is Now Available For Xbox One.
• ACA NEOGEO STAKES WINNER Is Now Available For Xbox One.
• Knights Of Pen And Paper +1 Deluxier Edition Is Now Available For Digital Pre-order And Pre-download On Xbox One.
• Nintendo Reveals Official Switch Charging Stand.
• Arcade Racer Onrush Getting Open Beta On May 17.
• Call of Duty: WWII The War Machine DLC Pack 2 available now on Xbox One.

• Adjust says mobile ad fraud rates doubled in the past year.

• Did YouTube Phenomenon Poppy Steal Her Style From Another Star?

• How artificial intelligence is reshaping jobs in banking. Thanks Slashdot via Ant.
• Apple ditches $1 billion Irish data center over planning delays.
• Supercomputers are driving a revolution in hurricane forecasting. Thanks Slashdot.
• Nvidia graphics cards flooding the shelves means new GPUs are still a long way off.

• You Can’t Handle the Truth About Facebook Ads, New Harvard Study Shows. Thanks Digg.
• Hacker Kevin Mitnick shows how to bypass 2FA.

• The curious case of the Fortnite cheater.
• Twitch counters popular CS-GO streamer’s lawsuit, demands compensation.

• The Swords of Ditto on Overclockers Club.

• Corsair HS60 Headset on LanOC Reviews.
• Intel Optane SSD 905P 960GB AIC NVMe PCIe SSD on TweakTown.
• MSI B350m Gaming Pro AM4 Motherboard on Modders-Inc.
• ROCCAT Kone AIMO Mouse on MadShrimps and TechPowerUp.
• Samsung 970 EVO 2TB M.2 NVMe PCIe Solid State Drive on CDRLabs.com.
• Vivo V10G ATX Case on Tom's Hardware. Thanks Hypothermia.

• Game on: Is David Price’s ailment linked to video gaming?…

We've got an unfortunate situation brewing with Jedi the Jindo, the hyper doggie owned by our friends and neighbors. Jedi and the Gunnar-man are like brothers, and he treats me as a surrogate owner, appropriate to the fact that I walk him twice a day and have minded him a couple of times when his family was travelling. But we've had three or four incidents recently where Jedi has gone after Gunnar in surprise attacks. The good news is that this seems like it may be play on some level, since he has not actually hurt Gunnar at any point, but the bad news is that it's terrifyingly over-the-top, filled with snarling and growling. The real bad news is that this can only go on so much before Gunnar develops an aversion to his buddy's behavior, as I will not force any of this on him. So hopefully we can get a handle on what's going wrong here, because if it gets to the point where Jedi goes after Gunnar while we are walking together or if Gunnar shows resistance to going to Jedi's house to pick him up, it will be all over between them, which would be a sad turn of events.

Snappy Links:	Thanks Ant.
Play:	3 Pandas in Japan. Toodee and Topdee.
Link:	Sous-Vide Cooking Has Many Fathers, Including A Retired Army Colonel. Thanks RedEye9.
Stories:	Sugar Crash: After Tanker Flips, Chocolate Bars Traffic On Polish Highway. Thanks RedEye9. $25K “diabetic alert dogs” were untrained, un-housebroken puppies, lawsuit says.
Science:	Researchers create a real cloaking device. Scientists build a database of animal farts.
Images:	CDC Tweets Picture Of Tick-Infested Poppy Seed Muffin To Raise Awareness.
Media:	Guy Brings A 'Paintball Flamethrower' To A Match, Ruins Everyone's Day. The Predator - Teaser Trailer.
Follow-up:	104-year-old Australian breaks into joyful song as he awaits death. Thanks ViperFour.
The Funnies:	Dog Complex Cartoon - Savage Chickens.