Intel's Wildcat Lake is finally making its retail debut, with the first wave of laptops hitting shelves in China tomorrow. Honor is among the first out of the gate with its MagicBook X14 2026. Though the company is keeping the official price sticker under wraps, the storefront's installment calculator suggests a sharp ~$650 entry point for the mainstream 16GB/512GB model.

Honor's MagicBook X14 is part of its thin-and-light, affordable Windows laptop series. For now, listings remain exclusive to Honor's Chinese storefront, with sales expected to go live tomorrow, May 18th. A larger variant, the MagicBook X16, should follow in short order as well, being among the teased models at the Wildcat Lake launch.

As it stands, we've seen only one global listing for Wildcat Lake: HP's Omnibook 5 at an eye-watering $1,229. In any case, Intel has a sizeable list of partners with an international presence, including Lenovo, MSI, Acer, ASUS, and Dell. It is projected that Google's forthcoming Googlebooks may also be powered by these chips.

As AI continues its meteoric growth, security and privacy concerns are rising along with it. On a massive video-sharing platform such as YouTube, these concerns are doubly important, since AI-generated content can not only misappropriate someone's likeness in photographic form but also "deepfake" a person into saying and doing things they would never have. Thankfully, YouTube is now taking steps to minimize the threat posed by deepfakes to its creators.

According to a post on the community page by Team YouTube, the platform is giving all creators over 18 access to a deepfake detection tool that can determine whether their face or likeness has been used in other AI-generated videos across the platform. This is a major security and privacy feature that can help creators stay alert about whether their face has been used in other users' content without their permission.

Team YouTube states that the goal behind this initiative was to provide its creators with "peace of mind" by giving them early access to the unauthorized content if it is detected. The creators can then request the removal of said content if an unauthorized likeness is detected. YouTube spokesperson Jack Malon told The Verge that anyone can use the tool, even though it is technically only available to creators.

It seems Microsoft is steadily making good on its Project K2 promise to improve Windows 11. As part of that ongoing initiative, Microsoft has already delivered several notable changes, including improved responsiveness for WinUI 3 apps, a new Low Latency Profile mode, and meaningful Windows Update improvements. Now, Microsoft is turning its attention to one of the most frequently requested features in Windows 11's history: a movable taskbar.

According to a blog post published by the Windows Insider team on May 15, Microsoft is rolling out the ability to reposition and resize the taskbar to users in the Experimental channel. Windows supported moving the taskbar for decades before the feature was removed with the launch of Windows 11, and it is now making a return as one of the first Project K2 changes to enter testing.

With this update, users can place the taskbar on any edge of the screen: top, bottom, left, or right. Icon alignment is also adjustable for each position, and flyouts such as Start and Search will open relative to the taskbar's location. This is a notable improvement for users who prefer a different layout.

Nexon's latest Q1 earnings report highlights record-breaking revenues and profit, thanks in no small part to Arc Raiders' thunderous success.

Extraction shooter Arc Raiders is one of the most popular new games in recent memory. The shooter has now amassed more than 16 million sales in little over six months on the market. Back in January, Embark had confirmed 12 million sales, and while Nexon expects the game to start slowing down, Arc Raiders managed to sell 4.6 million copies in the Q1 period.

"ARC Raiders, which globally launched in October 2025, has also maintained its momentum, selling 4.6 million units in Q1 2026 and achieving a total of 15.5 million units sold from its release to March 31, 2026. The game has now sold over 16 million units," reads Nexon's latest earnings report.

Capcom's persistent efforts have paid off as the company has successfully leveraged the strength of PC storefronts.

Capcom is one of the most interesting companies in gaming. The Japanese group has successfully grown its operating profits for nine years in a row thanks to its aggressive sales blitz strategy. Capcom aims to sell as many game copies as possible, and its efforts have worked well, with nearly 60 million sales in FY25.

The games-maker is able to sell so many units because it makes steep discounts to its games, often selling titles for $5 or $10. Capcom's strategy is a boon for price-conscious gamers, especially new users who haven't accumulated a library. Now as we've seen, PC is also a big part of Capcom's formulaic approach to success, as PC has surpassed console as Capcom's top sales platform for the past three years in a row.

Intel's Core Ultra 300 "Panther Lake" processors have been out for a while now. We have seen plenty of high-end laptops with Intel's latest mobile chips, but we might have a new addition on our hands. A new "Panther Lake R" processor type was just spotted in a Linux kernel patch.

What's interesting is that the R does not stand for "Refresh," which is what Intel typically uses that letter for. Apparently, the R stands for "ruggedized," as the new Panther Lake R is a variant of Panther Lake designed for use in rugged, harsh environments. The patch was posted by Intel, so the information is solid. Intel's exact description of Panther Lake R is as follows:

Intel's Raptor Lake i9-14900K has outdone itself once again, cementing its legacy as the only modern processor in the top five global frequency slots. Having already snatched the world record away from the ASUS team last year, Chinese overclocker "wytiwx" has returned to break his own record, once again.

The road to this milestone began in March 2024, when legendary overclocker Elmor and his binned Core i9-14900KS first breached the 9 GHz barrier. The following year, wytiwx stepped into the arena, eclipsing Elmor's historic run with two back-to-back records of 9.12 GHz and 9.13 GHz under Liquid Helium cooling.

It appears we're closing in on the 10 GHz barrier, as wytiwx has broken his previous record, hitting a staggering 9.20 GHz. The test bench this time centered on the ASUS ROG Maximus Z790 Apex, specifically designed for such runs, along with 16GB of DDR5 memory and the ROG THOR 1600W Titanium PSU. Interestingly, the test was conducted using Windows 7 (6.1) to minimize OS overhead during validation.

ASUS is back with what might be its most over-the-top gaming mini PC yet. Three years after taking charge of the Intel NUC division, the company continues to push the format with the ROG NUC 16, available in black or white with an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5080 GPU and Intel's Arrow Lake-HX platform.

The ROG NUC 16 is ASUS's fastest NUC and arguably the most console-like in terms of design. It keeps the same basic shell and 3-liter chassis of the NUC 15 but steps up to an Intel Core Ultra 9 290HX with 24 cores (8 Performance, 16 Efficient), 40 MB L2 cache, 36 MB L3 cache, and an onboard NPU with 13 TOPS.

The ROG NUC 16 offers a modest performance boost over the NUC 15. ASUS's benchmarks show a 2.3% improvement in 3DMark Time Spy over the previous generation, using the same RTX 5080 16GB GPU. Depending on the workload or game you are running, the gains may be more noticeable in practice. GPU options are confirmed to include the RTX 5080, 5070 Ti, 5070, and 5060, all paired with the same CPU, though the product page has not yet listed all variants.

Capcom is on a roll as the company reports its ninth consecutive year of profit growth.

FY25 was a big year for Capcom. The company sold nearly 60 million games, overshooting its sales target by over 7 million. Resident Evil 9 was a big driver of sales and the publisher leaned heavily on its treasure trove of yesteryear games, strategically discounting titles throughout the year to boost unit sales. As a result of these savvy practices, Capcom is reporting its best-ever year for earnings.

For the FY25 period, Capcom made 195.365 billion yen (about $1.2 billion) in net sales, up 15% year-over-year, with operating profit at 75.295 billion yen (about $500 million). This represents a ~38% operating profit margin, which is quite strong for a games company.

ASUS has announced the ROG Crosshair 2006 motherboard, paying homage to the first ROG motherboard, released 20 years ago. It is described as a cousin to the Crosshair X870E Dark Hero, but with a design language that transports gamers back to the early 2000s, featuring a retro copper aesthetic and classic ROG blue elements.

While the design offers a nostalgic look, that's about the only retro thing here. The rest of the motherboard offers the most advanced gaming technology available in 2026, including features that 2006 gamers could only dream of. That includes a 2-inch OLED screen on the main M.2 slot that can display CPU clock speeds, temperatures, custom GIFs, animations, and more.

Another prominent design theme is the blue-and-white color scheme for memory, PCIe, and SATA connectors. In addition, rather than hiding components under plastic shrouds, the board boldly exposes its copper heatsinks alongside much of the PCB and its components.

Thanks to Valve's APIs and sites like Steam Charts and SteamDB, PC gamers have long had player count data for just about any game on Steam. Console gamers on PlayStation and Xbox have had no such luxury, left with rough estimates, in-game numbers, or waiting for developers to share what their player base looks like. That could be about to change for PS5 users.

Sony is testing a new Community Activity widget in the PS5 Welcome Hub as part of its beta program, spotted by YouTuber Mystic. The widget will list weekly player counts for popular and trending games in your country, bringing SteamDB-style visibility to PlayStation for the first time.

The widget operates in two modes. Top 10 shows the most played games by weekly player count, while Trending Now highlights which games saw the biggest surge in popularity. Beyond these, customization is currently limited, with no way to view historical data for specific games.

Capcom sold a record 59 million games in FY25, making it the most successful year for the company to date.

It's not all dour news in the games industry as Japanese games publisher Capcom has reported strong results for its Fiscal Year 2025 period. The company sold an impressive 59.07 million games throughout the year, up by over 7 million from last year (+14%). The volume was driven mostly by catalog game sales, but Resident Evil 9 Requiem delivered a heavy boost at the tail-end of the year.

Capcom overshot its sales estimate for the year, beating its original 54 million game sales target for FY25. According to the results, Capcom also had its best-ever Q4 of all time with 24.4 million games sold in the quarter alone, and RE9 represents about 1/3rd of these sales, or 8.3 million.

The Steam Controller initially debuted as a Steam-exclusive device that only worked within the confines of Valve's ecosystem. But now, according to Phoronix, the Steam Controller has received SDL support, making the device functional on other storefronts on PC outside of Steam and making the controller functional on iOS and Android (outside of Steam Link).

Testers have confirmed the Steam Controller is almost fully functional with SDL. Control mapping, touchpads, haptic feedback, gyros, and joysticks all work. The only issues that remain are some minor functionality issues with the touchpads and a couple of Steam-specific issues that also exist on the Steam Deck. Adding and playing a non-Steam game with the Steam client will ignore SDL on the controller, and running Steam in the background can result in double inputs occurring due to SDL and Valve's native controller stack running simultaneously.

For the uninitiated, SDL stands for Simple DirectMedia Layer and is a cross-platform development library designed to provide low-level access to a variety of hardware and devices, including graphics cards, audio devices, mice, joysticks, and controllers. SDL is the reason for the wide variety of game controller support that works effortlessly across multiple operating systems, featuring Windows, Linux, Mac, iOS, and Android. If you've ever plugged a controller into your PC and it "just works," there's a good chance SDL is responsible for making that possible.

Xbox revs up the RPMs with its latest release, showing that consumers are willing to spend $120 to play specific games in early access.

Forza Horizon 6 looks to be a success on PC even before its official release. Microsoft's strategy of 5-day early access is apparently paying off in the new Forza game, at least on Steam.

According to SteamDB's tracked figures, Forza Horizon 6 has amassed over 172,000 players. Since those users have to pay a hefty $120 to even play FH6 right now, a quick bit of math shows that the game has made at least $20 million in gross sales revenue on Steam alone.

Thermal Grizzly has just added a delidded Intel Core Ultra 7 270K Plus to its TG Delidded CPUs lineup, which includes pre-delidded CPUs readily available for consumers to purchase. The Intel Arrow Lake Refresh CPU is priced at $525.33, including VAT, but for that price, Thermal Grizzly delids the CPU, cleans it, and even sands it a little bit for flush contact with the heatsink.

Intel's recommended selling price for the Core Ultra 7 270K Plus is $289-$299, so Thermal Grizzly is charging a significant premium for the added service. However, delidding a CPU is a difficult and risky process for most regular users, so if you want to avoid the risk and let the experts handle it for you, the extra $225 might be worth paying. What's important is that Thermal Grizzly provides its own warranty for the delidded CPU, since the process voids the manufacturer's warranty.

The pre-delidded CPU is meant for direct-die cooling, where the CPU cooler makes direct contact with the die rather than the heatspreader. This makes for even better heat transfer, since there are fewer obstacles between the die and the cooling solution (often a water block). The company claims that using liquid metal can reduce load temperatures by up to 22 °C, a significant improvement that can also lead to better overclocking numbers.

New reports suggest Microsoft is working on a new disc-to-digital conversion program for its next-gen Project Helix console PC hybrid.

It's believed that the next-gen Project Helix will be digital-only be default, meaning users won't actually be able to hook up a disc drive and play old Xbox games. This seems to go against the very core promise of the device itself--that it can play Xbox console games--however it also makes sense given Microsoft's aggressive digital-first business strategy.

If Project Helix is indeed digital-only, and it lacks the open-ended flexibility of Windows and doesn't allow users to hook up their own third-party disc drives, then it stands to reason Microsoft needs to find a way to preserve physical disc game libraries. That's where codename Positron comes in.

Sony's PlayStation division just reported record-breaking operating income...and the company now expects similar results for this fiscal year, even as it invests in its next-gen PS6.

PlayStation's latest FY25 results were a cause for celebration at Sony, with the games division pulling in a new all-time gross revenue record of $31 billion and a new operating profit high of $3 billion throughout the period. While that's a ~10% operating profit margin, Sony has increased its revenues and its operating income through FY25. Sony's Game & Network Services division had a double-digit 23.3% return on invested capital through FY25, up 4.8 pp from last year.

These records were in spite of the unpopular hardware price hikes and the lowest-ever console shipments in the PS5 generation set during the Q4'25 period, and would have been higher if PlayStation didn't make a $700 million+ impairment charge due to Bungie's shortfalls.

Following multiple years of heavy investment and lower returns, PlayStation is expected to deliver a strong 32.2% return on investment this year.

Sony's latest earnings results were triumphant for PlayStation, with record-breaking $31 billion revenue and $3.1 billion operating profit and a new all-time high of 125 million MAUs. Amidst the overperformance was a hefty $700 million+ impairment charge to Bungie's assets--two charges were made, one in Q2, likely due to Destiny 2's Edge of Fate missing expectations, and another in Q4, tied to Marathon's missed expectations.

It's not all doom and gloom for PlayStation, though. Far from it. Sony expects PlayStation to make even more operating profit in FY26, about $3.7 billion compared to last year's $3.1 billion. Another big overlooked metric is the division's return on invested capital (ROIC), which is exactly what it sounds like: Sony puts money in, the returns come out, and that's tracked as a %, denoting a certain level of business operating efficiency.

Two new Xbox controllers have leaked--a small, portable cloud controller and the next-gen premium Elite 3, which looks to be a descendant of Microsoft's Sebile prototype controller accidentally revealed during the FTC trial.

Microsoft is continuing its cloud gaming efforts at Xbox with two new accessories that will enable direct-to-cloud game streaming. Similar to Amazon's Luna and Google's Stadia controllers, Xbox's new peripheral duo have two modes: local mode and cloud mode. Both of these require pairing and cloud mode will essentially optimize the controller to ensure smoother latency.

According to Technoblog's findings, the smaller, cheaper device is more of a paddle and is more designed for on-the-go play. It's about 5-inches in length and looks like it fits into a pocket.

Subnautica 2 is off to an incredible start as the hotly anticipated game goes platinum in its first hour of availability.

Unknown Worlds is seeing massive success with the release of Subnautica 2, and the developer today announced the game has surpassed over 2 million copies in its first 12 hours on the market. That's double the sales of the game's previous milestone listed above, making Subnautica 2 among the fastest-selling games of 2026.

The sequel, which was at the center of a contentious legal battle, is seeing strong engagement on Steam where it is currently the #1 top selling game with over 467K concurrent peak players. The game's success also pushes total Subnautica franchise sales past the 20 million mark--before the announcement was made, the series was at 18.5 million copies. The game is currently being sold on Steam, the Epic Store, and Xbox, all via early access.