"What I am about to do has not been approved by the Vatican." So utters Faith: The Unholy Trinity's protagonist on his descent into the supernatural. Developed by Airdorf Games and published by boomer shooter boy band New Blood, Faith: The Unholy Trinity is an 8-bit horror game where you play a priest investigating a Satanic possession.

Faith has an immediately arresting art style, with graphics reminiscent of PC games from the 1980s⁠—I immediately think of Castle Wolfenstein by Muse Software, released in 1981 (can you believe that id's seminal FPS was actually a reboot?). Everything's presented on a black background, with characters and details represented in simple, primary color sprites.

For cutscenes, Faith pairs those stark colors with shockingly good rotoscope animation like the kind used in Prince of Persia or Another World. Faith's uber-retro style and the uncanny effect of rotoscoping contribute to a supremely unique atmosphere⁠—there's not really anything out there exactly like Faith.

The game's first chapter was released for free all the way back in 2017, and since then Airdorf has expanded on the concept with support from New Blood. The full Faith experience seems like just the thing to help get into the Halloween spirit, and you can get it for $15 on itch.io or snag it for an early bird $13.50 on Steam until it goes full price on October 28.

Faith isn't New Blood's only foray into 8-bit PC gaming. The fantastic retro shooter Dusk got an even more throwback prequel with Dusk '82, also available on Steam. If you're looking for something else suitably Halloweeny from the indie label, I might turn your attention to the horror stealther Gloomwood, as long as you don't mind early access.

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Games has paid its respects to a young Valorant fan who died of cancer earlier this year with a new gun charm called Corbin's Light that's available for free in the current battle pass.

Corbin was a teenage Valorant fan who submitted a request to work with Riot on a design for a Valorant gun skin through the Make-A-Wish Foundation. Sadly, he died a few days after making his request, but his family shared his wish on social media, and it eventually caught the attention of Riot fans and developers. Valorant designers got in touch with Corbin's older brother, who shared Corbin's ideas with them.

Riot said the design of Corbin's Light is inspired by his love of stars and space, and includes the coordinates of a star that was named after him by the Make-A-Wish Foundation.

"Corbin’s Light holds deep personal meaning," said Catalina Faerman, an associate integration artist at Riot games who worked on Corbin's Light (via Instagram). "It was made for one of our players who sadly passed away during his battle with cancer. The Make-a-Wish Foundation named a star after Corbin, so we decided to honor him by creating a Gun Buddy inspired by his star, and additional design notes from his brother.

"I wanted to make something that he would’ve been proud of but also represented him. Thankfully I had help from our awesome concept artists to come up with the design. We chose blue for the crystal as it was Corbin’s favorite color, and I added the coordinates to the Make-a-Wish star as an engraving on the frame. I haven’t been on the Valorant team for long, so I’m honored and grateful beyond words to the team who entrusted me and supported me with this task. Most of all, I’m indebted to Corbin and our players for inspiring us and giving me the opportunity to make art for them. I’m incredibly proud of Corbin’s Light and I will carry this experience with me always."

Corbin's Light will be free to all players in Valorant's episode 5 act 3 battle pass. Riot Games is also making a donation through its Social Impact Fund to the C-Squad Foundation, a charitable organization founded by Corbin's family that aims to ease the financial burden faced by families seeking treatment at the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York City.

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UFOs seemed like a big deal when I was a kid. Everyone seemed to have a story about a UFO sighting, or at least knew someone who did. The way we yammered on about aliens in the 1980s, you'd think you were more likely to look up and spot a flying saucer than a passenger jet.

In the decades since that's pretty much tapered off, probably due to almost everyone in the world now carrying a camera in their pocket and yet capturing precious few photos of UFOs. Go figure. But recently it feels like UFOs are creeping back into the mainstream, what with the Pentagon hearings and military footage showing strange stuff in the sky. There's even a new name for UFOs these days: UAP, or unidentified aerial phenomena.

Now NASA is getting serious about saucers by forming a real-life XCOM squad to handle this potential alien incursion. Barely a month after beating up an asteroid as a show of force for any E.T.s watching (officially, it was to alter the asteroid's course with a collision) NASA has announced it has formed an elite team to kill any aliens that dare step foot (or tentacle) on our planet.

They didn't really say it like that, but they should have.

"NASA has selected 16 individuals to participate in its independent study team on unidentified aerial phenomena (UAP)," said NASA. "Over the course of nine months, the independent study team will lay the groundwork for future study on the nature of UAPs for NASA and other organizations."

We all know what "future study" means, right? It's code for "figure out the best way to kill those gross gray-skinned invaders from beyond the moon."

NASA also announced the names of the 16-member team, which I assume, as in XCOM 2, were randomly generated. Just look at the list. David Grinspoon. Matt Mountain. Karlin Toner. Those are some randomized NPC names if I've ever heard them.

The team will "identify how data gathered by civilian government entities, commercial data, and data from other sources can potentially be analyzed to shed light on UAPs," NASA said, with a report on their findings to be released to the public in mid-2023. Hopefully, that's not too late to save the planet.

What's unclear is what happens after that report is finished. Presumably when a UAP sighting occurs, a squad will be formed from the available team members and issued orders, and one-by-one they'll strategically move around cover until they're six inches from an alien. Then they'll pull the trigger of their mag cannons and miss despite having a 97% chance of success. I wish them good luck. For all our sakes.

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