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Rockstar Games has officially added several new ways to look at the highly anticipated Grand Theft Auto 6 following the release of An Extended Look on Netflix and YouTube.

The media hub now hosts 99 screenshots, many of which are new and were released after the NDA was lifted on Grand Theft Auto 6 when the Extended Look was published. 29 new screens were added, expanding Rockstar's main GTA 6 screenshot gallery from 70 images to a total of 99.

Each set is available as a downloadable ZIP file, offering developers, journalists, and fans a centralized resource for GTA 6 media, without relying on unofficial leaks or early builds.

The GTA VI Extended Look has been viewed tens of millions of times on Netflix and was the top-viewed video content in multiple geographies, Variety reports.

The most recent GTA VI gameplay premiere has garnered 31.1 million views on Netflix in just four days' time. The GTA VI Extended Look was also #1 across 87 of 93 countries under Netflix's purview, making the recent partnership deal a resounding success.

The Extended Look was later released on YouTube where it has since accumulated 17 million views, and out of curiosity, I charted and tallied up all of the total views of GTA VI trailers on YouTube and Netflix. Not including views on Rockstar's own site, and views on platforms like the PlayStation Store and Xbox marketplace, GTA VI promos have been viewed over half a billion times--around 537 million views between five marketing videos.

Valve has reached a new milestone with its Deck Verified program, now featuring over 30,000 games in the Steam Library being verified as playable on Valve's handheld gaming PC. According to SteamDB, 21,080 games are Steam Deck Playable, 8,960 games are Steam Deck Verified, and a further 6,848 games have been confirmed by Valve to be unsupported (at the time of writing). The list gets even better if you factor in SteamOS compatibility, which accounts for 31,297 games (at the time of writing).

These playability lists are by no means complete, with the Steam Library featuring over 130,000 games in total, but it confirms that Valve is continuously testing games for Steam Deck compatibility, helping improve Steam Deck accessibility for less tech-savvy gamers. Every game added means less chance a Deck gamer has to test the game out for themselves or check Reddit or Steam forums to see if the game they want to play works on the Deck.

That said, compatibility roadblocks, including anti-cheat, are still a problem for Valve. Only 40% of Steam's top 10 games are certified as playable thanks primarily to anti-cheat incompatibility on SteamOS, and out of Steam's top 100 games, the Steam Deck's playability metric only improves by 5%. Out of the top 1000 games on Steam, only 35% of games are playable on the Deck.

The console market is facing price hikes, supply chain disruptions, and reduced sales...but CD Projekt's co-CEO thinks consoles will pull through.

Gen 9 has been a rocky period for consoles; the PS5 and Series X/S launched during COVID-19, which hampered supply. Then AI datacenters drove up demand and costs for storage and memory, leading to new sticker-shock prices including an $800 Xbox Series X and a $900 PlayStation 5 Pro. There are rumors of Gen10 (PS6 and Project Helix) being delayed to avoid a $1000+ MSRP for the consoles.

It's not all doom and gloom, though. Execs with behind-the-scenes know-how like CD Projekt co-CEO Michal Nowakowski don't think this is the end for consoles. "We're not worried about the commercial side of it. I think consoles are here to stay. I'm a big believer," Nowakowski said in a recent interview with The Games Business.

The official Rockstar-supported version of nopixel will enter beta testing next week on the Rockstar Games Launcher, but it's a closed, invite-only affair and users can't apply.

Rockstar today announced that nopixel V--the official sanctioned version of the original nopixel custom GTA V server--will enter beta testing starting September 8, 2026. Everyday gamers can't apply, though. What Rockstar essentially revealed is you'll be able to watch GTA V RP streamers play the nopixel V server on September 8, but you won't actually be able to play it unless you are one of these 439 invited players.

"For years, nopixel has set the standard for the genre through its ambitious releases. Now, nopixel V overhauls the experience once more: A reworked character customization system gives roleplayers more ways than ever to create characters as unique as their backstories, while new corners of the city - from the brand new Pixel Hotel & Casino to a six-block revamp of Cypress Flats - set the stage for new stories," Rockstar said on their site.

By now, gamers and PC gamers in general are no strangers to ridiculous hardware prices, but a recent report from TechSpot has given a bleak snapshot of what we are all experiencing.

According to the data, which TechSpot gathered by tracking the latest GPU prices across 10 countries, including the US, Australia, the UK, Canada, India, the Philippines, and more, graphics cards are now selling for approximately 28% above their launch MSRP. Notably, across all tracked graphics cards, the analysis showed a 15% price increase between July and August 2026.

NVIDIA's GeForce lineup was hit hard, with the report citing a 19% increase in a single month, while AMD rose by 11%. Zooming out to the wider market, the report found an average 28% increase above the original launch MSRP for each card, which actually excludes the GeForce RTX 5090 as it's an extreme outlier and would skew the numbers.

GameStop has published its preliminary Q2 results, showing a slide in overall revenue but a mighty profit boost from its stake in eBay.

GameStop's Q2 estimates give insight into the retailer's current market position. The company expects to have made $780 - $800 million in revenue in Q2, down a significant -19% from last year; revenue was higher in 2025 due to Nintendo Switch 2's release.

Q2 profits are a different story. GameStop management expects to recognize tens of millions of dollars from its conversion of eBay derivatives into a direct equity investment. Essentially, this means that GameStop previously went through intermediaries for its eBay share value, but has now instead converted that to a direct investment, and these direct investments can pull in more profit.

Rockstar Games has confirmed that GTA 6 will not let players freely switch between Jason and Lucia whenever they want, a restriction meant to preserve narrative immersion and story logic.

Rob Nelson, Rockstar North's co-studio head, explained in an interview with Famitsu that the ability to switch protagonists is limited by story progression. There are missions where you're forced to use a specific character, others that require you to switch at key moments, and some where you can swap at will. The goal, Nelson said, is to ensure that players experience the story through the right character's eyes at the right time.

One example of a moment where players can seamlessly switch, and it makes sense within the on-screen context, is the bank heist escape in the game's trailer, where you start by playing as Jason taking cover in the car, then the player switches to Lucia, who is driving.

Apple is accusing OpenAI of actively destroying evidence and using stolen trade secrets in a high-stakes legal battle over alleged misconduct by former Apple engineer Chang Liu.

The company claims Liu not only downloaded confidential Apple schematics but also used them in his work at OpenAI, violating employment agreements.

Apple's latest filing details how Liu, who left Apple for OpenAI in January, allegedly instructed a colleague to destroy evidence, while continuing unauthorized access to Apple's cloud storage via an Apple-issued MacBook. The filing also claims that Liu used an internal Apple tool in his work at OpenAI. Apple is seeking damages and an order to halt OpenAI's use of its proprietary materials.

In addition to improving the model and developer controls, NVIDIA has spent considerable effort over the past six months optimizing the performance of its latest potentially game-changing technology, DLSS 5. When we first saw DLSS 5 earlier this year, NVIDIA confirmed that its real-time demos of the still-early, in-development technology were running on two GeForce RTX 5090 cards.

"We have really tremendous progress since we initially debuted DLSS 5 back at GTC," Edward Liu, Director of Applied Deep Learning Research at NVIDIA, explains. "There we were showing it running on two 5090s. But, even after just two months, we managed to make it run on a single GeForce RTX 5090. And today, DLSS 5 is running over five times faster compared to where we started."

It's already an impressive achievement to go from foundational models that couldn't run on a modern GPU in real time without becoming a slideshow, to a version built for one specific purpose that required two RTX 5090s to deliver a playable experience. NVIDIA chalks up the 5X improvement to hardware and software optimizations, kernel optimization and co-design, and training and research model-side improvements.

When NVIDIA debuted DLSS 5 earlier this year, its transformative visuals drew plenty of negative feedback. Many compared DLSS 5 in Resident Evil Requiem and Hogwarts Legacy to a generative AI filter that alters how characters and objects look, with some calling it "AI slop." Fast forward to September 2026, and NVIDIA has partnered with developer Visual Concepts to launch DLSS 5 in NBA 2K27.

Based on the DLSS 5 Off and DLSS 5 On comparisons, it's clear that the technology has come a long way, alongside confirming that, in its release-ready state, NVIDIA is offering tools for developers to fine-tune the output in a way that adds its transformative photorealistic effect without impacting the original art direction or look of the game.

"We can set the overall tone and style to match our existing art direction," Peter Kavic, a Senior Producer on NBA 2K27, says. "And then really get precise where it matters most using a per-pixel control mask to fine-tune detail on characters, given that we want to respect their likeness with the utmost care."

DLSS 5 and its 3D-guided neural rendering are on track to be the next big thing in real-time graphics and game visuals. Like the arrival of the original DLSS and ray tracing with the GeForce RTX 20 Series, what we're seeing here is the first version of something that will mature and evolve over years and generations of GeForce RTX hardware. Still, the impressive photorealism it brings to NBA 2K27, the first game to support DLSS 5, is already up there in terms of "wow" factor.

And it all comes down to two things: DLSS 5's model, designed to deliver photorealism and cinematic lighting in a way that would be impossible even with modern path tracing on a GeForce RTX 5080. And second, how it has been trained to 'preserve artistic intent.' On top of that, NVIDIA is giving developers detailed tools and controls over how it's applied and how it looks in any given scene.

Although its controversial debut several months ago led many to believe DLSS 5 worked like other generative AI tools that create images and videos, that's not the case. NVIDIA confirms that a generative model simply isn't suited for real-time graphics, which is why DLSS 5 was built and trained to take information from a rendered frame and enhance it.

DLSS 5, which introduces 3D-Guided Neural Rendering to deliver realistic, cinematic, photorealistic lighting, is built to run in real-time on the GeForce RTX 50 Series generation of graphics cards. Although its initial, controversial debut earlier this year ran on two GeForce RTX 5090 GPUs, NVIDIA has confirmed that after several months of optimization, DLSS 5 will run on a GeForce RTX 5060 8GB graphics card when it officially launches in NBA 2K27 this week on September 3.

Per the headline, NBA 2K27 with High settings and ray tracing enabled hits an impressive 258 FPS with DLSS 5. However, this figure also includes DLSS's advanced Transformer-powered Super Resolution in 'Quality' mode, as well as Multi Frame Generation 6X. This means that with a more conservative Frame Generation 2X mode, performance should still be in the 100+ FPS region.

DLSS 5, like NVIDIA's full DLSS 4.5 suite of technologies, is meant to be the final step in a complex, detailed AI-rendering pass that delivers image fidelity simply not possible with traditional native or raster rendering.

For PC gaming enthusiasts, the past week has brought plenty of DLSS 5 discussion after a leaked version of NVIDIA's groundbreaking real-time Neural Rendering model hit the internet. Without an official response from NVIDIA or the GeForce team, we've seen dozens of impressive DLSS 5 demos from modders, and the discussion has shifted from the technology's controversial debut earlier this year to a more positive, nuanced take on its transformative capabilities. Is DLSS 5 the next big thing? Based on what we've seen, that's entirely possible.

First and foremost, NVIDIA created DLSS 5 to deliver photorealism, which it says has been GeForce's goal for over 20 years. This is evident in NVIDIA's leadership in bringing programmable shaders, CUDA, ray tracing, DLSS, and path tracing to PC gaming over the years. With DLSS 5's 3D-guided neural rendering, it's positioned to deliver the next major step toward photorealism, with image fidelity that can rival the visual effects we see in movies.

And with that, NVIDIA sees DLSS 5 as the next "revolutionary technology to come along that will make image fidelity and real-time rendering leapfrog the previous generation." And PC gamers will be able to see DLSS 5 in action for the first time, officially at least, in NBA 2K27 on September 3, where it will use its 'Pixel Space Diffusion Transformer Model' to improve character and environmental detail and lighting in a way that looks more cinematic and realistic without impacting the overall tone and look of the game.

Sony is now legally arguing that digital PlayStation games cannot be owned, only licensed. In a recent court filing, the company claims it is "not plausible" for consumers to believe they own a game when multiple users can download the same title from the PlayStation Store.

In what now seems to be a mask-off moment for Sony, the company's lawyers' argument stems from a class-action lawsuit alleging that Sony failed to adequately disclose the nature of digital game purchases under California's 2025 Digital Goods Law. Sony's defense hinges on the idea that if one user owns a game, then the next user cannot obtain it, a contradiction in the digital world. The company points to its Software Product Licensing Agreement (SPLA), which states that "the Software is licensed to you, not sold."

This stance comes as Sony faces significant backlash from its fanbase over its decision to phase out physical media by 2028. The announcement has sparked backlash from fans, and now, with Sony's lawyers revealing the company's firm stance on how it believes it sells, or rather, licenses its products, it appears PlayStation's shift toward a subscription, licensing, purely digital model is cemented.

It's undeniable there is extraordinary anticipation for Rockstar Games' Grand Theft Auto 6, but to really put that anticipation into perspective, economists have provided some new numbers.

During the November 19 launch week for Grand Theft Auto 6, the U.S. economy is expected to lose over $1 billion in productivity, as economists estimate the launch day will also be a coordinated sick day many people plan to take. Some fans are seeing November 19, and even the following five days, as public holidays. For example, Bud Burruss, a software engineer, told The Wall Street Journal he intends to take five working days off following the launch, while Anna Ray, a medical-sales representative and pro wrestler, said she will be taking from Thursday to Thursday off.

On a broader scale, economists have estimated the US economy will experience approximately a 2% short-term drop in productivity, equating to that estimated $1 billion figure. Reports indicate that young men aged 18 to 30 are most likely to take time off to play Grand Theft Auto 6, with the technology sector expected to feel the biggest hit. The anticipated, though relatively short-term, productivity hit to the U.S. economy from the release of GTA 6 further highlights how much of a cultural phenomenon this piece of media is.

Over the weekend, news spread that a massive 12 Terabyte leak of Valve data included Steam and PC builds and prototypes for many classic games. This includes early playable versions of Portal 2, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, and Left 4 Dead, as well as what many believe to be a concept weapon (the 'Weaponizer') for the canceled Half-Life 2: Episode 3.

Apparently, access to over 12TB of historical Steam and Valve data wasn't the result of a hack or breach, but of an old, accessible repository that Valve didn't take offline after migrating to SteamPipe in 2013. This means the Steam files (called "depots") represent things stored on Steam servers from 2003 through 2013.

For Valve fans, it's been a treasure trove of sorts, as the Portal 2 Beta, included in the data files, features a different story from the final retail version of the game. Another piece of Valve history is the canceled puzzle game and Portal prequel called F-STOP. In addition to early demos and game prototypes, the Steam leak also contains assets like artwork, trailers, soundtracks, and more.

ASUS has published the full specs and details for one of the first premium laptops set to launch with NVIDIA's new RTX Spark SoC, pairing a 20-Core NVIDIA Grace CPU with 6,144 CUDA Cores of RTX Blackwell graphics. With RTX Spark laptops set to arrive with up to 128GB of unified memory, the ProArt P14 creator laptop specs confirm a minimum spec of 24GB of LPDDR5X memory.

The specs show a wide range of memory options: 24, 32, 48, 64, and 128GB. Alongside 512GB and 1TB PCIe 4.0 SSD storage options, this confirms that RTX Spark laptops will be available in a variety of memory and storage configurations. With the RTX Spark chip, the ProArt P14 supports up to 12K video editing with 4:2:2 color, local 4K AI video generation, and rendering large 90GB 3D scenes thanks to its raw processing power and RTX technologies. It also delivers 1 petaflop of AI performance for demanding AI workloads.

The CNC-machined ProArt P14 is both ultrathin and ultralight with a 13.9mm thickness and 1.48kg weight. Designed for creators, it also features an ASUS Lumina Pro OLED display. With its 14-inch size, 3K resolution (2880 x 1800), 120Hz refresh rate, 100% DCI-P3 color gamut, 283 PPI, and up to 1,600 nits of peak brightness, it's the sort of display built for creators and designers.

We're starting to see several native PC ports for classic Nintendo 64 games, with the latest covering Rare and Nintendo's 1999 3D platformer, Donkey Kong 64. DK64 Rekongpiled recompiles and recreates the original game's source code in a modern format that most operating systems and PCs can recognize, including Windows, Linux, and macOS.

Although a backup or ROM of Donkey Kong 64 is required for art assets and music, being a native port means this version of the game isn't emulating N64 hardware. That opens the door to proper modding and support for modern systems. Here, that means high-resolution rendering, a widescreen presentation, and an uncapped FPS for smooth performance. As the trailer shows, DK64 Rekongpiled runs in 4K at 200 FPS on a modern PC.

This port has an interesting backstory: the project's development accelerated in response to a separate effort to recompile Donkey Kong 64 with vibe coding, or AI. And with that, contributor 2dos confirms that this DK64 Rekongpiled has been created with "no generative AI used at any point in the process."

NVIDIA's latest game ready driver 616.56 reportedly delivers up to an 8.1% performance improvement in path tracing workloads, making this one of the rare times where an NVIDIA driver brings noteworthy performance improvements over previous driver iterations. The performance improvements were discovered by PC hardware enthusiast Osvaldo Pinali Doederlein on X, who benchmarked the driver with an RTX 5080 in Geekbench 7, Blender, and 3DMark.

3DMark's path tracing test is where the headline 8.1% performance result was achieved. In Geekbench 7, performance improved by up to 5.5% in its CUDA test and 21.7% in its OpenCL test. Blender saw a 6.1% improvement in version 5.2.0, and Cinebench R26 saw a 6.7% improvement in its GPU benchmarking mode.

However, the driver offers very minimal performance improvements in games and AI workloads, which will be disappointing mostly to gamers. Doederlein recorded a mere 2% performance improvement in Horizon Forbidden West, and 2.5% uplift in Dying Light 2. Similarly, in 3DMark gaming-focused Steel Nomad and Speedway benchmarks, the performance uplift for both with driver 616.56 was only 1.8% and 2.5% respectively.