Brutal Deluxe is back: Rebellion’s Speedball reboot slams onto PC, Xbox, and PS5 Feature By Nate Drake 🪩 @Rebellion #GameDev #IndieGame

If you grew up in the late 80s/early 90s there was one place to go if you wanted you and your friends to scream at each other over a metal ball in a bare steel cyberpunk arena: Speedball (1988) and its successor Speedball II:Brutal Deluxe were future sports games where no-holds-barred violence mattered just as much as scoring goals.

Rebellion’s latest reboot of the franchise leans fully into this brutality and comes out the other side with a 3D epic. Speedball’s Lead Designer Jim Stimpson and Art Director Sam Beattie were good enough to agree to speak to me about their dystopian creation.

This was an interview I'd been itching to do since Rebellion's acquisition of the Bitmap Brothers catalogue in 2019, which includes likes of Xenon, The Chaos, Engine as well as the Speedball series, though there was never much doubt about which the company would focus on first:

“It was more a group decision," Sam explained. "What games people here loved, and what we thought the market would be excited by. Speedball just naturally presented itself as the frontrunner, because tons of people in the studio were super excited about the idea of bringing it back.”

Britt's iOS Odyssey - Adventure To Fate: Dungeons iOS Review 9/10 "A dungeon that begs to be delved into" 🧙‍♂️ @AdventureToFate #IndieGame #GameDev

This is effectively part 2 of my iOS odyssey into finding the best single player RPGs on mobile. In the previous instalment I covered both Dawncaster, and Caves of Lore – both very different games with the linking factor that they were both awesome, a theme that I’m glad to say very much continues on here, with Adventure To Fate: Dungeons.

I want to say upfront that developer Touchmint is a very active dev, with this being a one-cost game, meaning that you pay just once and get full access not only to the entire game, but also any future packs that may be added. Very cool stuff, and this openness is bolstered through the accessibility features that Touchmint has added to ensure that as many people as possible can enjoy the game, regardless of their abilities.

WWE2K26 PS5 Review 7/10 “Core Gameplay and GM Mode Save The Stagnation Issues” 🤼‍♂️

I always brace myself whenever I’m about to play a new WWE 2K game after years of ‘two steps forward, one step back’ for over a decade in the 2010’s. I’m always nervous, 2K have been on a good run for the last few years, there have been improvements and 2K have been taking what they have and building onto it instead of taking things out... to then only put them back in years later and claim its a new feature. 

So, when I booted up WWE 2K26 I wondered if, just like The Undertaker at WrestleMania 30 was the streak about to end? I can thankfully report that, no it hasn't...but it has run into a bit of stagnation. 

The core game is solid but I would say this edition doesn't feel like the jump that previous years have had, and a few new issues have been brought into play.