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We got the chance to try out ASUS's ROG XREAL R1 Gaming AR Glasses at CES 2026 earlier this year. We were immediately impressed with its micro-OLED technology and ability to project a massive 171-inch virtual screen with a 240 Hz refresh rate and 0.01ms response time. This week, ASUS announced that global pre-orders for ROG XREAL R1 Gaming AR Glasses are now open, with current pricing at $849.99 on Best Buy.

ASUS notes that since their debut at CES, the ROG XREAL R1 Gaming AR Glasses have undergone "months of meticulous optimization" and are now positioned as a device offering "universal compatibility" with the gaming handheld market, including the ROG Ally lineup. When paired with the right gear and software, you've got intuitive controls and the ability to manage multiple PC, console, and handheld inputs via the included ROG Control Dock.

Some of the coolest features we got to experience at CES 2026 have also made their way into the final retail model, including the ability to anchor the virtual screen in an environment, making it feel more like a large physical display. On top of this, you've got the sort of direct control you'd expect from a premium display, with the ability to adjust brightness, screen size, aspect ratio, tint levels, and more, in real-time.

PC gamers playing the latest titles will be more than aware of shader compilation, a process that can take a few minutes to complete, and one that's a requirement before you can jump into the action. Microsoft's Advanced Shader Delivery, part of the DirectX ecosystem, is designed to remove this requirement by creating hardware-specific profiles that download and install alongside a game, reducing initial load time by up to 95%.

In addition, like the shader compilation process, it eliminates shader stutter for a smoother gaming experience. In partnership with AMD, Advanced Shader Delivery (ASD) was first deployed and available for ROG Xbox Ally handheld gamers in preview form, and this week that partnership is expanding to Windows 11 PCs with discrete Radeon GPUs. And it's already available for Forza Horizon 6.

Microsoft notes that on compatible GPUs, it reduces initial load times by up to 95%, getting you into that first race in seconds rather than minutes. "With Advanced Shader Delivery, Forza Horizon 6 loads in 4 seconds, as compared to almost 1.5 minutes - that's an overall 95% time savings," the announcement confirms, noting that this refers to running the game on a Radeon RX 7600 GPU.

MSI has unveiled a new gaming monitor first, with the MSI MAG OLED 271QPX32 being the world's first 27-inch WQHD QD-OLED with five-layer or Penta Tandem panel technology. This represents a notable evolution in Samsung's QD-OLED technology and includes five stacked blue-emitting layers that improve brightness, efficiency, HDR performance, and panel lifespan.

With its advanced 4th-generation QD-OLED panel with Penta Tandem technology, the new MSI MAG OLED 271QPX32 sports impressive specs, with a 2560x1440 (WQHD) resolution, 320 Hz refresh rate, VRR support, and 0.03ms (GtG) response time. With its 60-degree viewing angle and 83% brightness, it joins MSI's full QD-OLED lineup in receiving QuantumView verification from UL Solutions. MSI notes that this is a big improvement over the 44% luminance retention on conventional OLED monitors.

Other notable certifications include VESA DisplayHDR True Black 500 and VESA ClearMR 15000, which basically mean you're getting uniform brightness with excellent shadow detail alongside MSI's DarkArmor Film technology for additional enhancements like a 40% improvement to "pure black levels" and better scratch resistance on the screen.

The Resident Evil franchise breaks 200 million cumulative sales as the franchise celebrates its 30th anniversary, highlighting one of gaming's best-selling series of all time.

The iconic Resident Evil franchise is one of the most enduring mainstays of the gaming world, helping define multiple console generations across the last three decades. As the series celebrates 30 years of terror this year, Capcom has announced that Resident Evil has now crossed over 200 million copies sold, with the major sales threshold broken by the highly successful RE9 Requiem.

Capcom's latest earnings report gives an update on its top sellers, including Resident Evil, which is now at 201 million driven by the strong sales performance of the franchise throughout FY25. According to the numbers, the publisher sold 26.76 million Resident Evil games in the period, and a quarter of the franchise's total-year sales alone were from the ninth game, Requiem.

AMD launched the Ryzen 9 9950X3D2 Dual Edition in March 2026 to mixed reviews. While reviewers and enthusiasts appreciated the technological achievement of the dual 3D cache design, it was not a significant upgrade over the regular 9950X3D in gaming tasks, and it was way more expensive. Carrying a hefty $900 price tag, the Ryzen 9 9950X3D2 is not a cheap processor to buy, so you can imagine how one would feel if you got shortchanged for a 9950X3D instead.

That is what happened to one Personality-Pleasant over on Reddit, who claims to have bought a Ryzen 9 9950X3D2 Dual Edition from Amazon, only to get a Ryzen 9 9950X3D in the box instead. The redditor posted on the r/GamersNexus subreddit that they can clearly see through the packaging that the CPU's heatspreader says "AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D." This leaves them with a CPU that is currently $200-$250 cheaper.

What's more important in the poster's story is that the box was fully sealed, yet the processor was not correct. This leaves us with three possibilities. One: an error was made in the packaging of the CPU at AMD, which put a 9950X3D in a 9950X3D2 box. Two: an error was made in engraving the heatspreader, and that is indeed a 9950X3D2 CPU. Third, and by far the most likely, the CPU inside was replaced after removing and carefully reapplying the factory seal.

Grand Theft Auto 6 is probably the most anticipated game of the decade, and it's hard to think about a comparable piece of media that has had such a cultural and social impact. We recently covered the rumor that GTA 6 pre-orders might open on Monday, May 18th. However, new information has recently surfaced about the GTA 6 early access process and the game's marketing cycle.

The gaming industry saw three major game leaks this year, with Forza Horizon 6 likely the most impactful. The game leaked online a whole 10 days before release, and something similar happened to Subnautica 2 and PRAGMATA as well. Although the source of the leak has not yet been confirmed, Playground Games suspects an insider, while it is widely speculated that the source of the leak for these games was a third-party reviewer.

With these developments in mind, it looks like Rockstar Games is about to change the review and early access cycle for Grand Theft Auto 6. According to a Brazilian journalist with a solid track record, Rockstar Games will not send any review copies to journalists, media, or content creators ahead of the GTA 6 launch. The early review process will instead take place on-site, with Rockstar sending creators to a specific physical location to play GTA 6.

Final Fantasy XI celebrates its 24th anniversary by making it easier than ever for new players to try it out.

Square Enix's original Final Fantasy XI MMO launched on the PS2 way back in 2002 in Japan, making it the first such game to launch on the PlayStation 2, and the first-ever cross-play MMORPG.

Now the publisher is marking the 24-year anniversary with a major promotion that extends FFXI's free trial in perpetuity. With the free trial, users can play the base game for free up until level 75.

Google was very stingy with information about the new Googlebook series of laptops, said to be designed around the Gemini AI model. The company did not unveil much about the hardware at all; instead, it focused on a few new features, such as the Magic Pointer and Widget Creator. Then, Intel officially announced its partnership with Google on the hardware powering the new Googlebook. Thanks to an old shipping manifest, we may have a hint about what CPU lineup will actually be used in Googlebooks.

Last year, a shipping manifest surfaced mentioning a Chromebook laptop with Intel's Panther Lake 12 Xe3 CPUs. This Chromebook, "Felino," was spotted in the manifest before Panther Lake was even officially unveiled, which makes it rather interesting. The code on the manifest is PTL 12Xe, which corresponds pretty well with Panther Lake as we know it today. Furthermore, this "Chromebook" had this CPU months before anyone knew about Googlebook.

We do not know which Panther Lake CPU is specifically mentioned, but all Core Ultra 300-series CPUs with 12 Xe3 cores are high-end SKUs, with up to 16 cores. Therefore, this laptop was a high-end model, probably targeting a premium segment. Looking back, this high-end Chromebook was either scrapped or, more likely, it will be repurposed into a top-end Googlebook variant. Of course, Panther Lake was delayed multiple times, so this laptop might have been released with a different CPU.

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.