Rare released performance improvements in patch 1.0.2 and now they are at it again, patch 1.0.4 will bring optimization improvements across the board.

In this patch Rare will be fixing quite a lot of problems that Sea of Thieves was facing, these problems include: rain appearing in the Legend Hideout Tunnel, text bugs in the Reputation menu UI and ships unfortunately spawning with damage already taken.

Rare will also be adding performance and stability improvements in this patch, more specifically "Improved performance on high resolution PCs running at lower than native resolution." Rare has also added a "Increased quality of island rendering at a distance when using the spyglass on all quality settings on both platforms." Rare also addresses that there will be "Further improvements and optimisations for all platforms are ongoing." There is much more that has come with this patch so if you are interested in reading the full patch notes visit the official Sea of Thieves website patch notes post here.

A well known leaker called 'chinobi602' has taken to Twitter to leak a couple of screenshots of the upcoming Spider-Man title from Insomniac Games, the screenshots reveal two villains.

Usually leaks should be taken with a large tea-spoon of salt, as most of the time it is very hard to tell if the leak is authentic or just a publicity stunt. This time round though we can see from the below images that they are quite legit, so legit that some could even go as far to say that these villains are 100% confirmed based off the image quality.

Of course there is no official confirmation, so still take the leak with a tiny amount of salt. Even if the villains are not officially confirmed, that doesn't mean fans can't enjoy the idea of Spidy swinging down and kicking The Shocker and Norman Osborne's butt. Check out the below screenshots to see Norman Osborne and The Shocker.

The big fight this year is going to be in the realm of Battle Royale dominance, with Fortnite and Battlegrounds to soon be joined by the likes of Battlefield V and Call of Duty: Black Ops 4.

Polygon is reporting that COD: Black Ops 4 will not feature a single-player campaign, with developer Treyarch working on the multiplayer side of things and their infamous zombie mode. Eurogamer has chimed in, reporting that Raven is working on a Battle Royale mode for Black Ops 4, which shouldn't surprise us at all.

What do you think of Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 including a Battle Royale mode? Would you want to see Black Ops 4 or Battlefield V with a Battle Royale mode? Which developer do you think would do it better?

It looks like Treyarch and Activision might have done EA and DICE a big favor by reportedly throwing away the single-player campaign in Call of Duty: Black Ops 4.

VentureBeat is now reporting that Battlefield developer DICE are "ecstatic" over the news, with the team happy that Black Ops 4 won't feature a single-player campaign as it believes it will have an advantage over its competitor. It's all marketing at this point in the game, with EA DICE able to market Battlefield V as a more engrossing package with single and multiplayer, but who the hell buys these games for the single-player campaign?

Treyarch is marketing Black Ops 4 with the competitive multiplayer (hahaha) and cooperative zombies mode (ugh) which keeps the millions of Call of Duty players happy. Battlefield V will go down its usual path that DICE set with Battlefield 1 and their vignette-style storytelling that gamers seem to like.

Battlegrounds needs to keep the fight against Fortnite at crazy levels, with tens of millions of gamers playing both games the enticement of updates and new things in both games is going to be what keeps their user bases strong.

PUBG will be changing some things up in a big way with their new limited time Event Mode that is coming to their new Codename: Savage 4x4 map. The new mode is teasing gamers with an armored version of their UAZ off-road vehicle, something that has been confirmed by a PUBG Corp. representative on Reddit, where they said it was specifically designed for an unannounced Event Mode.

Not only that, but the developer has teased expansions to the Codename: Savage map that will still be a 4x4 affair, but it will rock an exciting new set of underground tunnel that are inspired by real-world cave networks that are found in Thailand. An underground cave system will be a game changer for PUBG, something that will provide players with a totally new feel to the game that is mostly fought outside.

The first screenshots for the Shenmue 1 & 2 Remaster have been released by SEGA, the screenshots showcase the classic title beautifully updated.

The remaster will be coming with everything that players remember from the original release on the Dreamcast, jujitsu combat, investigative encounters and an RPG immersive world. Thrown on-top of all those classic facts is now a fully scalable screen resolution, choices between controller layouts, PC graphics options and more.

Below you will find four more screenshots, we hope that this is just the first batch of screenshots from SEGA as I'm sure Shenmue fans would like to see as much as possible of the classic remaster.

Saber Interactive have announced that a new arcade title called NBA Playgrounds 2 will be on the way to NBA fans this year, the title will be arriving on the PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch and PC in 2018.

According to Saber Interactive, the new game is going to be featuring over 200 current and retired NBA players, as well as a new worldwide ranked league system. The new system will introducing multiple solo and co-op division ladders that players can enjoy competing in.

The arcade baller will also have a new single-player mode, the mode is titled 'Season Mode' and will take players through a traditional NBA season, resulting in a battle for the NBA Championship. For more information regarding the upcoming NBA Playgrounds 2 check out the below Tweet where the official NBA Playgrounds Twitter answers some questions from some fans.

Epic Games has taken to Reddit to answer a few questions regarding the decision to implement the Guided Missile weapon, the developer has said the idea has been officially vaulted for the time being.

Epic Games' Reddit post on the Fortnite subreddit consisted of the developer throwing some clarity around the recent changes, topics that were discussed include: Peeking, Weapon Swapping and the Guided Missile.

On the post Epic Games addressed the Guided Missile and said "We've gotten a lot of feedback around the Guided Missile, in particular concerns over fairness and strength of the weapon. We share your concerns, so we've put the Guided Missile into the vault while we figure out the next steps for its future." This decision was probably for the best as there was quite a lot of concerns regarding the sheer power of being able to control a missile, if you are interested in everything Epic Games addressed in the post visit the official Fortnite subreddit thread here.

Iron Harvest, the upcoming real-time-strategy title from KING-Art Games has announced on their Kickstarter page that they are closing their very successful campaign.

KING-Art Games announced on their Kickstarter page that they have received a massive $1,530,887 in total before closing the campaign, "We made $1,298,626 on Kickstarter plus an additional $232,261 via our PayPal shop, for an astonishing total of $1,530,887!" This huge achievement means that Iron Harvest is one of the "most successful video-game Kickstarters in recent years." That also means that the real-time-strategy genre is not completely dead as of yet, there still is quite a decent player-base waiting for a solid title to be released.

On the Kickstarter announcement, KING-Art Games explains the process they will have to go through to filter everyones pledges and support, here is what they had to say "We will get a list of everybody who actually paid, including their e-mail addresses, by the end of next week. After that (by the end of next week or the week after), we're going to send all supporters (regardless of whether you supported us on Kickstarter or at our shop) an email with information on how to access our KING Art Portal website." If you are interested in checking out the Kickstarter for Iron Harvest, the official website is here.

Insomniac Games' upcoming Spider-Man title has had a book announcement from Titan Books, the announcement was for two books to be released relating to the game. One addressing the events before the game takes place, and the second being an art book revealing never before seen images of Spider-Man.

The announcement was shared through Polygon and explained that a novel written by David Liss titled "Marvel's Spider-Man: Hostile Takeover features some of Spidey's most famous friends and foes, including the Shocker, Echo, the Blood Spider, J. Jonah Jameson, Mary Jane Watson, and Wilson Fisk - the Kingpin." According to the announcement, the novel will also connect past character relationships to that of which will be featured in the game, essentially this novel is a prequel and definitely something you should pick up if you really want that full Spider-Man experience.

The second book is an artbook, titled "Marvel's Spider-Man: The Art of the Game", the book is written by Paul Davies and will feature exactly what you think it will, art. More specifically though it was detailed in the announcement that the book will be "Packed with never-before- seen images of Spider-Man, his costume and equipment, the Marvel version of his hometown New York, and the deadly villains he battles, fans will learn about every facet of the game, from the initial designs, blueprints, and the breathtaking final concepts." Check out the below images which also came with the announcement.

Intel has announced new plans that would see the integrated GPUs on their processors used to scan for malware and viruses, something that will improve both performance and battery life on some PCs.

Rick Echevarria, Intel's platform security division VP explains: "With Accelerated Memory Scanning, the scanning is handled by Intel's integrated graphics processor, enabling more scanning, while reducing the impact on performance and power consumption. Early benchmarking on Intel test systems show CPU utilization dropped from 20 percent to as little as 2 percent".

Intel's new Threat Detection Technology is available on Intel's 6th/7th/8th gen processors, where it will move virus scanning abilities to the GPU, offloading it from the CPU. Right now virus scanners use the CPU to detect memory-based attacks, but entire system performance drops because of this. The company is hoping that offloading virus scanning to the integrated GPU that performance and power consumption will improve, as most PCs aren't using on-board GPUs to their full potential at all times. Might as well make use of that unused GPU power.

I exclusively reported that the PS5 would feature a discrete GPU when it arrives, but then all the hype train started again with reports that the PlayStation 5 would be released this year - which is kind of ridiculous, and now we're hearing new reports that it won't arrive until 2020, which sounds much more reasonable.

Now there's news from Eurogamer and Digital Foundry editor Richard Leadbetter, who said that Sony's lead console architect that is the brain child behind the PlayStation, Mike Cerny. Cerny has reportedly been "hitting the road" to talk with developers to see what they want inside of the next-gen PS5, and that's the only development in the PlayStation 5 so far. Developer kits are reportedly not in the wild, period.

Sony will use a discrete GPU according to my sources, and I wouldn't be surprised to see an 8C/16T processor in the form of the Ryzen 7 2700. I think we'll need to see at least 16GB of RAM, and at least 2-4TB of HDD space for future-gen games that will be in 4K. I'm hoping the PS5 is completely 4K exclusive, pushing next-gen games at 60FPS minimum. Anything else would be a disappointment, really.

Detroit: Become Human will be one of the biggest PS4 exclusives of 2018, with Heavy Rain developer Quantic Dream now teasing that Detroit will be rendering at native 4K on the PS4 Pro.

Quantic Dream's art director Christophe Brusseaux said in a recent interview with IGN that the PS4 Pro "allowed us to release a game in native 4K", which is exciting for current, and future PS4 Pro owners. Brusseaux said: "Our IGN First month of coverage with PS4's exclusive Detroit: Become Human continues! In this new look at the cinematic PS4 adventure game from inside Quantic Dream's Paris-based development studio, we look at the custom, made-for-PS4 tech that powers the game, including the native-4K benefits of PS4 Pro".

Detroit will render at 1080p 30FPS on the normal PS4 while the beefed-up PS4 Pro will push it out at 4K 30FPS, with both versions featuring HDR support. This will be impressive to see, but remember that earlier this year at GDC the developer said Detroit would render at 4K "checkerboard" at 30FPS, so the art director could've said something wrong... but I really hope he didn't.

Spotify as a new event on April 24 that it has sent to the media, inviting them to enjoy presentations from their R&D boss Gustav Soderstrom, the VP of Product Development Babar Zafar, and the Global Head of Creator Services Troy Carter.

We should expect that there will be multiple new announcements, with a look at the future of the Spotify mobile app, as well as their ventures into the hardware world. We should expect a spiffy new mobile app that will hopefully debut not long after April 24 for Android and iOS, but the hardware side of things has me just as interested.

We should expect changes to their free subscription service, something that Bloomberg reports will be easier to use, especially for people accessing Spotify on mobile devices.

NVIDIA could most likely feel the voodoo doll that AMD has of them being poked and prodded overnight, with AMD coming out with a body slam against the GeForce Partner Program, or GPP.

For those who don't know the GPP is a new program that will see AMD add-in board partners who make both GeForce and Radeon graphics card need to have a very fine line between Radeon and GeForce. For the last few years we've seen AIB partners market GeForce and Radeon graphics cards in the same brands like ROG by ASUS, but now that the cat is out of the bag with AREZ, things are going to heat up.

Funnily enough, Scott Herkelman used to work for NVIDIA but is now the Corporate VP & GM of Radeon Gaming at AMD posted on the Radeon blog, where he said:

We all knew it was coming with a bunch of rumors flying through the internet, but now it has been 100% confirmed: ASUS has given up their ROG brand for Radeon graphics cards by introducing their new AREZ brand.

AREZ is derived by Ares, the Greek god of War, with ASUS explaining in their press release: "AREZ-branded graphics cards are built using industry-leading automated manufacturing to provide AMD gamers and enthusiasts with superior cooling technology and a robust software ecosystem".

This pretty much confirms that ASUS has dropped the Republic of Gamers brand from Radeon graphics cards, which will be reserved for NVIDIA's GeForce GTX line of products. ASUS is expected to sell multiple different cards in the AREZ brand that include Expedition, Phoenix, Strix (non-ROG), and Dual.

Far Cry 5 has been cracked on PC less than a month on the market, despite multiple layers of copy protection.

Cracking group CPY recently confirmed that Far Cry 5's DRM has been successfully circumvented--which is undoubtedly welcome news to gaming pirates everywhere. The game itself uses three layers of protection from Denuvo, EAC, and VMProtect, and actually uses the latest Denuvo 5.0 version to boot.

Ubisoft will likely handle this by releasing a patch that locks players out of the game via an update, and it'll be interesting to see if the publisher keeps using Denuvo to secure its games in the future. Before Far Cry 5, Assassin's Creed: Origins was the latest game to feature multi-layer protection, which stood in the way of cracking for multiple months.

Activision's hugely anticipated Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 won't have a traditional singleplayer campaign, key sources have told Polygon.

Up until 2018 (if reports are accurate) campaign modes have been the peanut butter to the Call of Duty franchise's multiplayer jelly, and the two essentially merged make a complete game. But it appears this age-old formula is getting scrapped because of dev timelines. Anonymous industry sources have told Polygon that Black Ops 4's campaign mode wouldn't have been finished in time for the game's planned October launch. A tipster told Charlie Intel that Blops 4's campaign was "too outlandish, too out there" and it was scrapped by Activision. It's possible the truth lies on either side or somewhere in the middle.

In a bid to fill the singleplayer-sized hole, Treyarch is reportedly putting more dev effort into multiplayer. This means incorporating the Black Ops zombies mode as well as some new/expansive co-op modes and content. It's also possible that the game's story will be synergized with the co-op aspects, possibly something like a Firefight + campaign mish-mash scenario.

The Dark Souls remaster port on Nintendo's handheld console hybrid will miss its original May 25 release date, publisher Bandai Namco today confirmed.

The upcoming Dark Souls remaster is still on target for Xbox One, PS4 and PC, but the devs behind the Switch flavor need extra time to ensure optimum performance on the system. Dark Souls on Switch is now slated for "Summer 2018" and might be pushed back a few weeks or so. No definite timeline was given. Since the Switch uses lower-end hardware when compared to the easier scalability between today's modern consoles and PC the console can be a bit more complicated to develop certain games onto.

"Due to the nature of causality, we must announce that the Nintendo Switch version of #DarkSoulsRemastered will be pushed back to summer of 2018, and with it, the release of the Solaire of Astora amiibo. PC/PS4/X1 versions will maintain their May 25th release date," the Dark Souls Twitter account wrote.

A modder has taken to Kingdom Come: Deliverance to release a PC mod that allows for players to view their character from the third-person point of view.

Modder 'Fuse00' has explained that this mod is for keyboard and mouse users only as there is currently no gamepad support. Fuse00 also recommends that players that desire to implement this mod should use a mouse that has 5+ buttons.

Now you might be thinking that is this mod is 100% perfect and looks amazing, unfortunately though there is still quite a few creases that need to be ironed out. An example of this is that currently the game will not allow the players to interact with anything high above their character, as well as there is no archery support at the moment as there is no way to aim in third-person mode. To view the full mod advantages and disadvantages check out the official Nexus Mods website here.