Latest Articles (Page 666)

Sorry, Halo Wars fans - the series looks dead, at least for now.

After spending some time with The Medium on Xbox Series consoles, we were eager to try out the game on PC. It's an impressive title that at once pays homage to the survival horror titles of years gone by, while at the same time delivering some impressive - and technologically ambitious - new features. Bloober's dual viewport rendering concept clearly presents a huge challenge to the graphics capabilities of Microsoft's next-gen consoles, with even the mighty Series X employing dynamic resolution scaling that could see the title dip beneath a native 1080p - so how does the PC version deal with this and what are the extra features delivered to those with more powerful hardware? And to address the point raised by many PC users who've played the game - is it really 'unoptimised'? And if performance is poor, can Nvidia's remarkable DLSS AI upscaling technology turn it around?

The long-awaited custom game browser feature hits Halo: The Master Chief Collection as early as next week, developer 343 has announced.

Punky purple post-apocalyptic shooter Rage 2 is the next free title available for PC via the Epic Games Store.

A Call of Duty: Warzone player was this week surprised to find and play with an unreleased Modern Warfare pistol.

Tron has joined the world of Fortnite, with new themed outfits and a glider version of the franchise's iconic neon bike.

What Comes After is a game themed around death, with themes of suicide.

Chivalry 2 launches on 8th June 2021, developer Torn Banner Studios has announced.

Stardew Valley has now been updated to version 1.5 on Switch, PlayStation and Xbox, bringing with it a raft of new items, events, and local split-screen co-op.

Spiritfarer - the beautiful, touching afterlife adventure from Thunder Lotus Games - was a big hit around these parts when it released in 2020, and now the developer has unveiled a three-pronged content roadmap, promising new post-launch adventures later this year.

Director Eli Roth's Borderlands movie adaptation continues to pick up the pace with today's news that yet another big name has joined the cast, this time in the form of Jack Black, who'll play the Borderlands series' irrepressible robot Claptrap.

Flight Simulator's third World Update - which will give the game's rendition of UK and Ireland a welcome spruce-up - is once again set to launch a little later than anticipated, with its release now scheduled for next Tuesday, 16th February.

Axiom Verge 2, the eagerly anticipated follow-up to developer Thomas Happ's acclaimed retro-styled Metroid-a-like, will be making its debut on Switch and PC - in the latter case as an Epic Games Store exclusive - some time this spring.

It's been almost 20 years since Kingdom Hearts first sprinkled its Disney-fied action-RPG fairy dust on PlayStation, and while the series has (across many, many instalments) graced a multitude of platforms, its remained frustratingly elusive on PC - until now. Square has revealed a huge chunk of the series will be coming to the Epic Games Store on 30th March.

UPDATE: Capcom has officially confirmed Eleven as a DLC character for Street Fighter 5.

US rap star Post Malone will hold a virtual concert in the world of Pokémon at midnight UK time on 28th February.

Epic Games today lifts the lid on MetaHuman Creator - a new tool designed to bring the highest fidelity facial rendering to the wider development community. It's part of Epic's ongoing mission to democratise high-end graphics technology, giving a wider range of development studios the chance to deliver characters up there with the industry's best and to get the most out of today's hardware. According to Epic, we're looking at the kind of facial quality and animation seen in high-end titles like The Last of Us Part 2 - and you can see for yourself just how close Epic's technology gets via the embedded video on this page.

UPDATE 11/2/21: The auction of stolen CD Projekt source code has been closed, a report from darknet intel service KELA has now claimed, as a "satisfying offer" was accepted. It's not clear how much the source code was sold for, though the purchaser is said to have paid enough they could stipulate the data would not be distributed or sold further.

A US law firm is investigating a potential class action over PlayStation 5 DualSense drift.

We talk a lot about how well, or not-so-well designed a game is, but it's not often you get to talk about how much design there is in one, the sheer volume there is of it. League of Legends, which I've been playing again recently after an extended break (if anyone wants to stage an intervention, honestly please do), might have the most design-per-square-inch of game out of any. Systems on systems on systems, just the game's launcher is a game in itself: progression within progression, crafting keys to craft chests, unlocking skin shards to unlock skins, building out skill-tree-like rune pages to complement your in-game, skill-tree-like build of items. On and on, the forever game in motion.

Well-received 2005 Star Wars game Republic Commando looks set for a new launch on Nintendo Switch.

Cyberpunk 2077 developer CD Projekt has announced a Kickstarter funding program for a new The Witcher board game.

Pedro Pascal will play Joel and Bella Ramsey will play Ellie in HBO's The Last of Us show.

Chris: William Goldman, who wrote so many good things, once came up with a movie about a bottle of wine. It got made, too. I gather nobody saw it. In one of Goldman's books, he mentions that even his own kids didn't see it. A total bomb.

Telltale Games' wonderful Tales from the Borderlands, a deliriously daft narrative adventure inspired by Gearbox's popular series of first-person shooters, will finally return to digital storefronts next Wednesday, 17th February, following its delisting in the middle of 2019.

BlizzConline, the digital-only version of Blizzard's long-running fan convention, kicks off next week, and those eager to learn more about the highly anticipated likes of Overwatch 2 and Diablo 4 can now peruse the full event schedule in order to plan their diaries accordingly.

Final Fantasy was once a game in thrall to tradition; in the past 20 years, it has become an on-going revolution. Final Fantasy 9 was the last mainline instalment to make use of the Active Time Battle system, which had carried Square's flagship series for no less than six games across two console generations. Since then, no numbered Final Fantasy has given us the same battle system twice. Each entry has been an experiment, obliged by changing audience expectations and company dynamics such as the promotion or loss of key staff. All have sought to stand apart, but much as Active Time Battle isn't a clean departure from the turn-based systems that precede it, so most Final Fantasies circle back to ATB in some way, striving to rebottle the lightning.

2021 has already been a bad year for video game scalping - but it's just gotten worse. McDonald's Happy Meals, which now contain Pokémon cards in the US, have become the latest scalper target.

Steam hit Valheim has sold over 1m copies in just a week, its publisher has said.

We knew a Sonic the Hedgehog movie sequel was coming. We knew its release date - April 8th 2022, with full production starting next month. And now we know what it's going to be called.