Gaming - Page 100

The Xbox Ally X isn't out yet, but Microsoft's new handheld-specific Xbox app can actually be loaded up on handheld PCs that run Windows 11 2H2.

Windows isn't fun to use on a small touchscreen, so Microsoft created a version that's tailor-made for handheld gaming PCs. It's called the Xbox Fullscreen Experience, and it's basically a custom version of the Xbox app that can shut off non-gaming Windows functions to free up system resources. It's a lot like modern Xbox consoles--these systems also run Windows, but highly-specialized versions with tons of processes and features stripped away.

The new version of the Xbox app can be accessed right now via the Windows 11 25H2 preview build. The Fullscreen Experience can be enabled via this tutorial, but be forewarned that you'll have to get into registry files.

Microsoft is betting big on indie games, and its ID@Xbox program is helping fund more titles to launch into Game Pass.

While subscriptions can eat into game sales, Xbox Game Pass is helping fund indies that may otherwise not have been made. Since the Xbox 360 days, Microsoft has fostered a platform to create and sell indie games, and the more modern-day ID@Xbox program uses Microsoft's billion-dollar coffers to fund interesting new games to fill out Game Pass.

Now we have more of an idea of how this works, at least on Microsoft's side. In a recent interview with Eurogamer, Xbox@ID program creator Chris Charla says that investment into indies, especially those coming to Game Pass, is at an all-time high for 2025. The recent explosive success of Hollow Knight Silksong is proof of this investment--that was a big get for the Game Pass catalog.

A developer has revealed new info about the cancelled Perfect Dark reboot from Xbox while also showcasing some art from the cancelled project.

People who worked on Microsoft's cancelled Perfect Dark reboot have opened up about the game, with one developer giving website MP1st access to art assets and key details on the FPS.

According to the internal sources close to the project, the Perfect Dark shooter would have used an interesting-sounding Adrenaline System that would essentially fuel the flow of gameplay. Adrenaline was a resource, not unlike fatigue or even mana, that would regenerate over time and dictate battle. Joanna Dark would use adrenaline to perform more high-octane stunts and other death-defying feats like healing and even a Dead Eye slow-time mechanic.

Borderlands 4 was released and was met with some performance issues on PC, but despite these criticisms, the game has gone on to sell 2.5 million copies in just 10 days.

A new report from Games Industry.biz cites data from Alinea Analytics, which claims Borderlands 4 has reached 2.5 million copies sold since launch, with 1.3 million of those copies being sold via Steam. Notably, Borderlands 4 has surpassed 300,000 concurrent players on Steam following its launch, marking the highest concurrent Steam player count in the Borderlands franchise.

The data analytics firm also shared insights on how many Borderlands 4 players have played previous games in the franchise, with the firm stating that 59% of gamers played Borderlands 2, 51% played Borderlands 3, and 22% played Tiny Tina's Wonderlands.

Activision has just released the official multiplayer trailer for the upcoming Call of Duty: Black Ops 7, and it confirms the title will feature wall running.

The new multiplayer trailer was posted to the official Call of Duty YouTube channel and showcases a bunch of new weapons and mechanics players will be able to sink their teeth into on November 14 when the game releases.

Probably the biggest highlight of the trailer was the quick glimpse of the wall-running mechanic, along with the omnimovement system that was introduced in Black Ops 6. Alongside the new trailer is a blog post, which confirms which game modes will be available during the upcoming beta and launch.

Battlefield 6 is only a few weeks away, and the official launch times have been confirmed, revealing when gamers can sink their teeth back into the highly anticipated first-person shooter.

Battlefield 6 is arriving on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC on October 10. The upcoming title will be dropping an entire month before the competing Call of Duty: Black Ops 7, which received quite a lot of criticism following its unveiling at Gamescom 2025, with the gameplay reveal trailer being hit with a staggering number of dislikes and vitriolic comments.

As for Battlefield 6, massive hype was built up during the open beta weekends that ran from August 9 to 10th, and from August 14 to 17th. While there was community feedback for the title, and many of those requests have been implemented, the general consensus was pretty good for Battlefield 6. Notably, there won't be a staggered release time for Battlefield 6, which means everyone will be able to jump into the action at the same time. While that is awesome to hear, it also raises concerns for server stability.

For the second time this year, Microsoft is raising the price of Xbox console hardware in the United States, leading to a generation with an $800 video games system.

Microsoft is planning another price hike for its Xbox Series X/S console duo, the company has confirmed. The most eye-catching part of this update is that Microsoft now has an $800 console with its Xbox Series X 2TB Galaxy Black edition, which has gone up by $70 since the summer price hike.

The new prices go into effect on October 3 in the United States, and see increases on all systems. The Xbox Series S is now $399, up from $379, with the 1TB model also increasing by $20 to $450. The disc version of the Xbox Series X is now baseline $649, up $50. The all-digital Xbox Series X is now $599, the same price that Sony attached to its unpopular PlayStation 3 in 2006.

PC gaming's largest storefront will stop being supported on legacy 32-bit Windows machines at the turn of the new year.

Valve has officially confirmed that it will be ending support for Steam on PCs running Windows 32-bit installs. Starting January 1, 2026, Steam will no longer support Windows 10 32-bit (the only such OS in use on its platform). This deadline is months after Microsoft's own impending Windows 10 cut-off in October. Interestingly enough, as The Verge points out, the current version of Steam is actually 32-bit but future versions after the end support date will be 64-bit.

Valve confirms that the launcher itself will still function "in the near term" on 32-bit, but won't receive security updates nor can Steam Support help 32-bit users with technical issues they may face.

Borderlands 4 has been one of the biggest releases of the year, but its PC debut has been met with mixed reviews at best. When it comes to the core gameplay experience and the 'looter shooter' action of the series, the game has been widely praised for being a return to form and a modern extension of the iconic Borderlands 2. When it comes to performance, well, that's a different story.

Ahead of the game's launch, everything from the high 'recommended' PC system requirements to NVIDIA's DLSS 4 benchmarks painted the picture of another heavy Unreal Engine 5-powered release. However, once the game launched and several reports of poor performance and stuttering emerged, Borderlands 4 development studio Gearbox Software boss Randy Pitchford began responding to criticism (and that's putting it mildly) by stating that the PC version was already in an 'optimal' state.

He went on to add that GeForce RTX owners should enable DLSS and Frame Generation in the game to ensure a smoother experience. Our own in-depth analysis of the game's performance is set to go live soon, and we conclude that, in its current state, it's essentially the first AAA PC game that requires upscaling and frame generation. But, there's good news.

Techland's Dying Light: The Beast is out today, and like the well-received Dying Light 2, the PC version features a suite of ray-traced lighting and effects covering ambient occlusion, global illumination, reflections, and shadows. And as the headline release in NVIDIA's weekly DLSS round-up, we've got 1080p, 1440p, and 4K benchmarks for the game running with max settings.

These come from NVIDIA's GeForce RTX team, so the numbers include DLSS 4 with Multi Frame Generation (4X) enabled. This includes DLSS Super Resolution using the Performance preset with the new 'Transformer' model, and in 4K with the Ultra preset and all ray-tracing effects enabled, the flagship GeForce RTX 5090 averages 336 FPS, with the GeForce RTX 5080 averaging 227 FPS.

NVIDIA notes that with DLSS 4, performance is increased by an average of 7.6 times at 4K; however, according to the chart, you will need at least a GeForce RTX 5070 Ti to play the game at this resolution.

The release of Battlefield 6 isn't too far away now if you can believe it, with EA and Battlefield Studios revealing the performance targets for the game on the PlayStation 5, PS5 Pro, and Xbox Series X/S consoles.

Battlefield 6 includes Fidelity and Performance modes on the PS5 Pro + PS5 as well as the Xbox Series X/S consoles, with no other graphics modes available, instead featuring a maximum. Fidelity mode will prioritize resolution while Performance will prioritize performance.

Fidelity Mode on the Xbox Series X console will hit a maximum resolution of 1440p and targets 60FPS, compared to the PS5 on Fidelity Mode that targets the same 1440p @ 60FPS. Performance Mode on the Xbox Series X and PlayStation 5 consoles are also the same, with a resolution of up to 1280p and a higher 80FPS target.

Valheim is coming to PlayStation 5's early access in 2026, Swedish indie game studio Iron Gate has announced.

The PS5 version of Valheim's beta testing version will launch sometime next year, complete with cross-play with Xbox and PC. The Viking-themed survival game launched in early access on Steam in 2021, then on Xbox in 2023--by that year's end, Valheim had sold over 12 million copies on just those two platforms. Expanding the game with a PlayStation release could boost sales and overall players, as noted by Iron Gate co-founder Henrik Tornqvist:

"We're thrilled for Valheim to soon reach even more players with the upcoming launch on PlayStation Bringing both new and longtime players to a new platform allows even more people to explore the world we've worked so hard to build, and we can't wait to hear their stories as they're able to dive into their Viking adventures."

Pocketpair aims to bring Palworld out of early access with an official release in 2026, and the devs are prepping a ton of content for the game's eventual launch.

Palworld could get an actual launch sometime next year. There's just one problem (well two, if you count the ongoing litigation with Nintendo): the game isn't optimized enough for a 1.0 release. To make sure Palworld can hit its target, Pocketpair has announced that it will be focusing on bug fixes and performance updates rather than substantial content drops for the MMO. Right now, the goal is shoring up the rough edges rather than expanding or invigorating the player base--that comes with Palworld 1.0.

In a recent video update, Pocketpair's communications director John "Bucky" Buckley laid out the plan while also teasing a staggering amount of goodies: "Palworld 1.0 will be a major milestone for us, and we have a truly massive amount of content planned for the 1.0 update."

Netflix will continue Sam Fisher's story with a new canon TV series, Splinter Cell Deathwatch, set to release mid-October.

The latest trailer for Splinter Cell Deathwatch has been released, giving fans a look at the show's plotlines and story beats. Deathwatch looks like it spins a web of political intrigue, deception, and action--all staples for the franchise. Meanwhile, Ubisoft has been developing a new Splinter Cell remake since 2021.

The footage shows a tech entrepreneur, Diana Shetland, leading a shadowy corporation called Xanadu. Diana's father, Douglas Shetland, was an old friend of Sam Fisher's whom Sam had slain, and Xanadu may be a spiritual successor to Douglas' Displace International PMC. There's a mysterious watch, and some great infiltration footage where Sam dons his iconic night-vision goggles.

The OG extraction shooter is finally coming to Steam in November, but it'll come at a price--even for users who bought the game on the Battlestate launcher.

After five long years of beta testing, Escape from Tarkov's version 1.0 will officially launch on November 15, 2025. Once the shooter is formally released, Battlestate Games is bringing it to the biggest storefront on PC and breaking the game's exclusivity from its own proprietary launcher.

The developers outlined some key info in a recent FAQ, confirming that anyone who already purchased the game on the Battlestate Games launcher will also have to buy it again on Steam. Your content entitlements are account-bound, however, and will cross-over to Steam; if you bought the Unheard Edition on the Battlestate launcher, you can play that edition on Steam.

Battlefield 6 has always had a variety of modes, but the series' bread-and-butter has always been Conquest played out on large maps with 64 players. Divided into two teams of 32, various squads roam the, well, Battlefield, capturing points and taking down enemies on foot, inside a vehicle, or in the sky.

Battlefield 6's brand-new game mode, joining Conquest and Breakthrough, is called Escalation, and during a recent multiplayer preview session where we got to check out two new maps - Mirak Valley and Operation Firestorm - we got the chance to experience all three modes to see how they stack up in terms of variety.

The best way to sum up how Escalation plays is to say that it's a spin on Conquest that doesn't stray too far from the formula - it's basically Conquest Remixed. It's a little faster because the intensity increases and ramps up throughout the duration of a round, and the focus on capturing and holding points plays into Battlefield's strengths.

The recent Battlefield 6 Open Beta was huge, with EA and Battlefield Studios confirming that over 420 million matches were played, with almost 5 billion "enemy kills" and over $196 billion in destruction and damage caused to buildings and infrastructure.

With it being the biggest Beta in the series' history, and the positive feedback making it one of the most highly anticipated releases for the Holiday 2025 season, the teams at Battlefield Studios have taken all that data and made several subtle and meaningful changes to the core game.

We got to check them out as part of a recent multiplayer preview session, where we also got to explore the new Mirak Valley map and the return of Battlefield 3's sprawling Operation Firestorm. Which looks and feels like a modern version of that map - tuned for Battlefield 6's vehicles and destruction. As part of a pre-brief before we jumped into the action, the Battlefield Studios team gave us a quick rundown of some of the key changes that have already been made to the game, so we've decided to list those here for you now.

Although the Battlefield 6 Open Beta has come and gone, giving players a taste of what to expect at launch, there's still a lot of goodness coming. As part of a special hands-on preview session, we got the chance to play what is set to be Battlefield 6's largest map at launch, Mirak Valley. Although we only got to play through three rounds on Mirak Valley in Conquest, Breakthrough, and the new Escalation modes, it's safe to say that this one has the potential to be a fan-favorite.

And the reason for this is simple: it plays into the strengths of both Battlefield as a series and Battlefield 6's destruction-filled take on all-out warfare. The overcast Mirak Valley presents a once-scenic countryside engulfed in modern warfare, with open areas and dense buildings that lend themselves to infantry and vehicle combat, and it leans into what many believe to be Battlefield's secret sauce - the mix of on-foot, in-tank, and in-the-air chaos.

As someone whose first real, "hey, let's play this for months" obsession with 64-player Conquest arrived with Battlefield 2, Mirak Valley brought back some of those classic memories playing Dragon Valley and Strike at Karkand. This is not to say that it's a direct copy of either of these maps, but Mirak Valley already feels like it tops the Open Beta's popular Liberation Peak map in every conceivable way.

Microsoft has just updated the Xbox app for Windows PCs and handhelds, which consolidates the Xbox library, Battle.net, and other PC storefronts, including Steam, the Epic Games Store, and GOG, into a single interface.

"When you install a game from a supported PC storefront, it automatically appears in 'My Library' within the Xbox PC app, as well as the 'Most Recent' list of titles in the sidebar, so you can jump back into your favorite games with just a click," Microsoft's Jason Beaumont, VP of Experiences, Xbox, writes.

The announcement also confirms that you'll be able to explore and browse 'third-party apps and storefronts' to browse your libraries, install games, and even launch them all within the Xbox app without having to switch between apps. Although it's great to see this feature arrive on PC, according to Microsoft's announcement, it's a feature that will greatly benefit Windows gaming handhelds, such as the upcoming ROG Xbox Ally gaming handhelds.

Borderlands 4 currently has a 'Mixed' user review score on Steam, primarily due to a single, significant complaint: performance issues. The consensus among the PC gaming community right now is that it's the latest Unreal Engine 5-powered release that has launched in an unoptimized state. Furthermore, its demanding hardware and system requirements have made it 'unplayable' without enabling technologies like DLSS and Frame Generation.

As the head of development studio Gearbox Software, Randy Pitchford is renowned for being extremely vocal about projects that he's attached to or is ultimately in charge of. And with that, he's been highly active on social media platform X, responding to complaints about the game's poor performance on PC and the current state of Borderlands 4.

"The game is pretty damn optimal - which means that the software is doing what we want without wasteful cycles on bad processes," Randy Pitchford says in one post in a long thread. And for those experiencing low FPS or wanting to hit higher than 60 FPS on PC, he adds, "Use DLSS. It's great. The game was built to take advantage of it."