The release of SIGIL, John Romero's DOOM megawad, is being delayed until April, announces The Romero in a new blog post (thanks holodecker). The project was announced in December and the release was planned for this month. Word is this hit some snags, and as was previously announced, the free version will not be released online until those who are paying for the boxed versions get their copies:

I just wanted to update you on SIGIL. There were a few snags in production trying to make sure everything is top-notch for fans! I just wanted to let everyone who purchased either the Big Box or the Beast Box know that it is now looking like it will ship sometime in April. Thank you for your patience, and I am sorry for any inconvenience this may have caused. This also means the free version of SIGIL will have to wait until after the boxes are in the hands of customers.

Razer announces they are closing their online game store as of the end of this month, which is less than a year after this first openend (thanks PC Gamer via Neutronbeam). A FAQ on the topic informs us that Games purchased through the store were fulfilled through either Steam or Uplay, so they will remain in the libraries of their customers. They also promise to complete any outstanding preorders, and offer details on how elements of their customer loyalty program will live on after the closure. Here's the news:

We regret to announce that Razer Game Store (gamestore.razer.com) will cease operations on February 28, 2019 at 0100hrs Pacific Time as part of the company’s realignment plans.

It has been a privilege for us to recommend and deliver great digital game deals to you. We have been extremely fortunate to have you as part of our awesome community. Thank you for the support and making all this possible.

We will be investing in other ways to deliver great content and introduce game promotions through Razer Gold, our virtual credits system (https://gold.razer.com/). Do visit us there and stay tuned for more news.

A thread on the Roberts Space Industries forums explores the potential impact of supporting NVIDIA's new RTX technology in Star Citizen, Cloud Imperium's long-in-development space game(s). This is from a couple of weeks ago, before being uncovered by DSOGaming. A supporter presented an odd theory that supporting this would "save you devs so much work farther along and look absolutely spanking." CIG's Ben Parry disagreed, saying, "Not in the slightest. I expect, if we use it, it'll be a massive headache and time-sink but might give us some subtle improvements in looks or performance if we get it right." He expresses doubts that they will pursue this, saying: "I'd love to, it looks like fun, but at the moment we have other high priority tasks on the roadmap." In another post, he describes more of what he thinks supporting RTX would entail:

It's more likely to be a case of "We've got a test-bed scene for a ray-based environment lighting technique, it works for one type of light so far, here's a list of things you can no longer safely have in a room without it breaking, with rough probabilities of how likely we are to work out a solution" ☻

The added headache is that whatever we offered would have to be an "as well" feature rather than an "instead", developing a feature for a single manufacturer's top-end cards means also maintaining feature parity for everyone else's hardware.

Personally I'd like to use it to make the shadows crispier.

Steam serves up a triple-decker Sid Meier sandwich as the list of last week's bestselling games in Valves online store:

1. Sid Meier's Civilization VI: Gathering Storm
2. PLAYERUNKNOWN'S BATTLEGROUNDS
3. Grand Theft Auto V
4. Far Cry New Dawn
5. ASTRONEER
6. GOD EATER 3
7. MONSTER HUNTER: WORLD
8. The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt - Game of the Year Edition
9. Sid Meier’s Civilization VI: Rise and Fall
10. Sid Meier’s Civilization VI

• Left 4 Dead - Update.

• Steam Daily Deal - Shenmue I & II, 35% Off.

• New controller patent could show the PSVR's future.

• Electric truck startup announces $700 million funding round led by Amazon.

• Quadriga: The cryptocurrency exchange that lost $135m.
• Netflix Nabs Chris Evans' "Red Sea."

• Apple buys the voice tech startup behind Hello Barbie.
• The Secret History of Women in Coding. Thanks RedEye9.
• Updated Debian 9- 9.8 released. Thanks Ant.

• Bomb Threat Hoaxer Exposed by Hacked Gaming Site. Thanks Slashdot via Ant.
• Etsy sellers say their bank accounts were emptied in major billing snafu.

• Anthem on PC Gamer and USgamer.

• DREVO Tyrfing V2 RGB Backlit Tenkeyless Mechanical Keyboard on Nikk Tech.
• GeIL Super Luce RGB Sync DDR4-3200 16GB Memory Kit on TweakTown.
• Silicon Power XPOWER Turbine DDR4 Gaming Memory Kit on Mad Shrimps.

• Overwatch gets nine swell action figures — including a huge Reinhardt — from Hasbro…

Scott Burns To Heavily Re-Write "Bond 25" has word that the script for the next Bond movie is getting a re-write. This is often a sign that the end-product will be no bueno, but I feel there have been some recent examples of movies that required last-minute re-writes and even reshoots after test screenings that have turned out fine. I certainly hope this is the case, in particular because it looks like it will probably be Daniel Craig's last outing as 007, and it would be nice for it to be in a movie that lives up to his debut outing in Casino Royale.

Bonded Links:	Thanks Ant.
Link:	Sci-Fi Author Robert Heinlein Was Basically MacGyver. Thanks Neutronbeam.
Science:	Vaccine U-turn: Measles surges as campaigners ride populist wave of distrust in government. Get set for ‘super snow moon’ next week, the biggest supermoon of the year.
Media:	DiabLoL 1 Ep 5 "Cave Man." Feel like making love. Awww. Eating banana in 1 second...
The Funnies:	S.P.M. - FoxTrot.