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Reports from The Verge indicate Microsoft is raising the price of its premium games subscription before the merger either passes or terminates.

Microsoft is making good on its warning of price increases for its Xbox brand. The company will reportedly raise the price of both of its Xbox Game Pass subscription options, including the base console version and and its Game Pass Ultimate subscription, in nearly all worldwide markets.

Starting July 6, the regular Xbox Game Pass subscription will raise from $9.99 to $10.99 a month, and Game Pass Ultimate will move from $14.99 to $16.99 in the United States. The price of PC Game Pass will not change.

It's finally happening; Nintendo is officially remastering Mario's first and only turn-based RPG.

Today Nintendo announced a big surprise for 30-something gamers who grew up with a Super Nintendo back in the day: A fully-fledged Super Mario RPG remaster is releasing later this year on the Switch. The original isometric game was released in 1996 by none other than Squaresoft, who was then at the height of their role-playing glory. The game garnered a cult following that grew into a devoted fan base as decades went by, but ultimately the RPG didn't hit it big due to the N64's launch just a few months later.

The new Super Mario RPG remaster will feature upgraded visuals and graphics befit of the Switch, but the core turn-based action remains intact. The remaster will launch on November 17, just a month after the ultra-weird new Super Mario Bros. Wonder game.

Star Wars Jedi: Survivor is a game that's been blighted by performance issues since its launch, with gremlins in the works that are still to be cured - but one enterprising PC gamer has taken matters into their own hands.

Wccftech spotted that 'Snight01' took to the Steam forums with a post linking to their DIY mod (that you stick in the PAKS directory) which fixes some of the most annoying problems with Jedi: Survivor.

Namely the game crashing with ray tracing turned on, plus the mod fixes occlusion culling pop-in (that causes horrible flashes of white to appear fleetingly).

Nintendo's new Mario game is weird...really weird.

Today Nintendo announced Super Mario Bros. Wonder, a new 2D side-scroller that hearkens back to the old-school days of SNES platforming. The game looks pretty familiar on its surface, but things get truly strange when Mario touches a "wonder flower." After that, all bets are off.

The game basically goes into a psychedelic trip that makes Alice in Wonderland look tame; Mario literally turns into an elephant, gets stretched out like a giraffe in a strange shadow world, power flowers start talking to you, and pipes even come alive and wriggle around like caterpillars.

The Sims 4 is getting a new expansion that's broadly cowboy-themed and introduces horses, according to heavy hints dropped by EA.

This follows recent rumors of a horsey expansion, fueled by listings at retailers for 'The Sims 4 Horse Ranch' (as PC Gamer pointed out).

With EA announcing on Twitter that a 'rootin' tootin' expansion' is coming that'll allow you to 'take the reins,' there's not much doubt that horses are inbound for The Sims 4. Especially as in a following tweet, EA tells us that there's a trailer due to arrive on June 22 (tomorrow) and to "giddy up for good news coming soon."

It was confirmed on Sunday that an OceanGate expedition to the wreck of the iconic Titanic went terribly wrong with the group of five individuals inside of a submarine lost communication with the main research ship.

The group of five have been missing ever since, with search parties underway in both the air and underwater. OceanGate Expeditions conduct purchasable trips down to the Titanic, which is 12,500 feet below the surface of the Atlantic Ocean. Each trip costs $250,000 and totals five people aboard the Titan submersible. Reports indicate that an hour and forty-five minutes into the submarine's descent, it lost communication with the main research ship called Polar Prince.

Following the shock announcement, details began to emerge about the submarine's unconventional design and the complete lack of regulation that took place throughout its construction. Notably, the submarine is controlled by a $30 Logitech F710 wireless PC game controller that was released in 2010. The controller is wireless, features a dual-thumbstick gamepad, 2.4 GHz communications to a USB receiver, and is typically used for PC gaming.

A new BIOS update is available to download for ASUS ROG Ally gamers, and while the update may solve some issues, it also introduces some brand new ones, such as regression in gaming performance.

The ASUS ROG Ally was released some time ago, and since then, the portable gaming device has grown in popularity as mobile gamers look to the Ally as a potentially better option than Valve's Steam Deck. The Ally, which runs Windows 11, comes with the "fastest" AMD APU and is built on a custom 4nm process with Zen 4 and RDNA 3 architecture, 16GB of LPDDR5 memory, and a 512GB M.2-2230 PCIe Gen4 SSD. All of the aforementioned specifications make the Ally twice as powerful as the Steam Deck.

While the Ally can pack a punch, reports indicate that ASUS has rolled out a new BIOS update that reduces total gaming performance. Testing from The Phawx indicates that BIOS update 319 introduces a performance regression. ASUS has recognized this and has cautioned Ally gamers from immediately updating their portable console. Suppose you have already updated your Ally and want to roll back your BIOS to regain performance. In that case, you can manually downgrade the BIOS by using the ASUS EZ Flash utility.

In the desktop PC space, rocking an ultrawide display or two displays side-by-side is a surefire speed boost for productivity. More screen real estate equals free real estate. When it comes to laptops though, being on the go means you can pick up and work or create no matter where you are. And for many, the idea of a portable dual-screen setup doesn't get a tiny blip on their radar.

This is where Mobile Pixels comes in, and its range of DUEX portable laptop monitors is designed to add a second screen to help bridge the gap between the desktop and portable space. And with the shift to working from home and a hybrid setup that means many aren't simply working out of a single office, this solution is worth celebrating.

These lightweight DUEX screens, attached to an existing laptop via magnets, feature their own support and stand for durability. They can also be oriented on the left or right side of a laptop too, and best of all, Mobile Pixels notes that they are compatible with any laptop (via USB-C or USB-A), so you can get that dual-screen experience anywhere.

A few months ago, we reported on Syntech's new 6-in-1 USB-C Docking Station for Steam Deck, which is packed with features and sports a compact and great look. As a 6-in-1 USB-C Docking Station, it features 4K 60Hz output over HDMI 2.0, a Gigabit Ethernet input for fast transfer, three USB-A 3.0 outputs, and USB-C 3.0 for full-speed charging.

And now we can add ASUS ROG Ally support, alongside Valve's Steam Deck, with this docking station now being a great choice for ASUS's Windows-based portable gaming handheld. The high-end ROG Ally is powered by the impressive Ryzen Z1 Extreme processor capable of playing modern PC games on its 1080p display.

And with devices like the Steam Deck and ROG Ally being designed for portable PC gaming, something like the Syntech 6-in-1 USB-C Docking Station is great for those looking for an easy way to connect either handheld to a TV or gaming display for some big-screen action. Plus, you can benefit from not worrying about battery life and pushing the ROG Ally to its performance limit.

Here's a strange one, with all props going to the team at Wccftech for doing a little sleuthing when it comes to recent major PC game releases. It might be a case of 'tin-foil hat conspiracy' thinking, but the evidence does point to a very noticeable trend.

And that is, regarding PC game releases sponsored by AMD and Radeon, titles with FSR do not feature NVIDIA DLSS support - widely considered the superior rendering tech for boosting performance with a minimal hit to visual fidelity. The flip side to this, NVIDIA sponsored PC games with DLSS support; these games also feature support for AMD's FSR.

Some of the notable AMD-sponsored games without DLSS support include new AAA titles Star Wars Jedi: Survivor, Dead Island 2, and Resident Evil 4 Remake, with older releases like Far Cry 6, Callisto Protocol, Saints Row, and many more making up the list.

With the recent launch of the GeForce RTX 4060 Ti, there has been a lot of discussion around the card's switch to a 128-bit bus for memory and the overall capacity remaining stagnant at 8GB. But with NVIDIA bumping up the L2 Cache, delivering improved 1% lows in our benchmarks, and additional features like DLSS 3 proving to be worthwhile even at 1080p, our favorable review focused on these new Ada Lovelace features and the GPU's impressive efficiency.

But it looks like these features don't make up for the overall downgrade to the memory bus when it comes to PC emulation of the Nintendo Switch hardware. With the recent release of the groundbreaking The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, Switch emulation is a hot topic right now, and the team behind the YUZU platform has shared some not-so-kind words about the new GeForce RTX 4060 Ti.

The team calls NVIDIA's latest GPU "a terrible investment" for those interested in Switch emulation, with the complete statement pulling no punches. Check it out.

We're now well and truly into the latest generation of graphics cards from NVIDIA and AMD, with the former set to release its new mainstream GPU offering, the GeForce RTX 4060, on June 29. On the AMD front, we've seen the flagship Radeon RX 7900 XTX and 7900 XT, alongside the recent release of its mainstream offering, the Radeon RX 7600.

With the MSRP of the GeForce RTX 4060 set to USD 299 and AMD's Radeon RX 7600 at USD 269, these entries, although not exciting when it comes to raw performance, both feature competitive price points compared to their previous generation counterpart launches.

With the RTX 4060 arriving soon and the Radeon RX 7600 still relatively new on the scene, we thought we'd look at the current best-selling GPUs over at US-based retailer Newegg to gauge the market for new graphics cards.

Traditional console and PC gaming segments are expected to comprise less than half of 2023's total revenues in the United States,

New data from analyst firm Pricewaterhouse Coopers (PwC) indicates that console and PC gaming are expected to shrink from 2023 onwards, driven by gains in the social and casual gaming segment. According to the figures that were published by VentureBeat, the firm expects console and PC gaming to generate $15.514 billion in the United States throughout 2023, comprising about 27% of total regional earnings.

Casual gaming, which includes mobile titles, is expected to make $34.459 billion in 2023, driven primarily by advertisements (over $20 billion) and in-app spending like microtransactions.

A new patch has arrived for Cyberpunk 2077 which makes an important fix for some PC gamers, plus a bunch of other tweaks and honing across console and PC platforms.

The significant development for those with a gaming PC that pairs a new AMD processor with an NVIDIA Lovelace GPU is that CD Projekt Red has improved the performance of DLSS 3 with Ryzen 7000 CPUs in patch 1.63.

You may have seen reports online that the game engine (REDengine) doesn't play nice with Ryzen 7000 chips, with players experiencing bad stuttering (highly off-putting, of course - and also affecting The Witcher 3, it should be noted).

Google Chrome is getting some big new features on the iPhone, and they're all free upgrades to the app that's already available in the App Store. Most of the new features are rolling out starting today.

There are four new features in total, and they're all specific to Chrome - none of these Google features will be available on Safari, so you'll have to use Chrome to take advantage of them. Note that you can also use the Chrome app on your iPad and benefit from all of these improvements as well.

At the top of the list is the new ability to see an address in Google Maps right from within Chrome. Now, users will be able to tap and hold on any address that Chrome detects and then see a mini version of Google Maps without switching apps.

The iPhone SE that you can buy today for $429 is looking a little long in the tooth, to say the least. That's thanks to the Home button and huge chin and forehead, but those who had hoped for a refresh are set to wait for a long time, it seems.

That's because two analysts claim that after multiple conversations with Apple's supply chain, they don't believe that Apple will launch an updated iPhone SE in 2024. That would mean that the current iPhone SE will have to see Apple through to 2025 at the earliest, a point at which it will look even more old-fashioned.

This is all according to Barclays analysts Blayne Curtis and Tom O'Malley who, in a research note seen by MacRumors, say that Apple is "unlikely to launch" a refreshed version of its budget iPhone in 2024.

Spotify is expected to be launching a new premium subscription tier that will finally bring high-fidelity audio to the platform.

Bloomberg has published a new report revealing that Spotify is preparing to launch a new subscription tier that will be it's most expensive yet. The predominate music streaming service has been looking to expand its content offerings for quite some time, flexing into podcasts with the signing on of Joe Rogan, and now audiobooks. Spotify already offers a range of audiobooks, but according to sources close to the matter, the platform is planning on pairing audiobooks with its coming premium subscription tier.

These sources informed Bloomberg that Spotify would offer high-fidelity audio and some kind of benefit with audiobooks, perhaps a free credit every month like Amazon's Audible. According to reports, Spotify was planning on rolling out HiFi audio quality for quite some time, but before the company launched, Apple and Amazon both rolled out their own versions of the feature at no extra cost to paying subscribers.

Apple has today updated its Self Service Repair Program to add support for some of its most recent Mac laptops as well as the company's very latest iPhones, too.

The Self Service Repair Program allows Apple device owners to repair their own hardware at home, using genuine Apple parts and using the same tools that Apple's own technicians would use. In some cases that involves shipping some big and heavy items around the globe in order to perform repairs like replacing the display on an iPhone, but Apple seems fairly comfortable with that. In fact, it continues to say that the Self Service Repair Program is a win for the planet, likely because it ensures that devices can last for longer when they are repaired.

In this latest update, shared via a post on the Apple Newsroom, we learn that the iPhone 14, iPhone 14 Pro, iPhone 14 Plus, and iPhone 14 Pro Max are now included in the list of iPhones that can be repaired using this program. There are some new Macs on the list as well including the 13-inch MacBook Air powered by M2, and MacBook Pro models powered by M2 Pro and M2 Max. The 15-inch MacBook Air isn't included, however.

Artificial intelligence is taking a lot of flak on all sorts of fronts of late, and the latest shot to be fired is the suggestion that AI might effectively mess up the worldwide web.

As you may be aware, the current surge of AI is based on those driven by Large Language Models or LLMs (like ChatGPT), meaning these are basically giant data hoovers, training themselves, and picking up their answers, from multiple sources online.

As The Independent reports, the problem that a new study has highlighted is that AI chatbots training themselves on content produced by other AIs could lead to a "downward spiral of gibberish on the internet," or so we're warned.

The hugely popular instant messaging service WhatsApp has announced that it is bringing two new privacy features to its apps, making it safer and easier for people to use it.

The new features were announced in a blog post by the meta-owned company and they should be rolling out to users starting right now, and they're both well worth taking a proper look at.

At the top of the list is the ability to silence unknown callers. When enabled, this feature will prevent calls from unknown people from coming through as normal. They'll still appear in the call history and you'll still get a notification, but you won't get the usual ring on your phone. You can of course call back if it's important, but this change should help cut down on the number of spam calls people have to deal with.