Gaming - Page 206

Hogwarts Legacy recently surpassed 30 million in sales, making it the best-selling game of 2023 and one of the best-selling games ever. Warner Bros. Discovery, the new publicly traded company formed in 2022, is looking to capitalize on the Harry Potter franchise with new TV shows and other new things. However, Hogwarts Legacy 2 is one of the company's biggest priorities.

"A successor to 'Hogwarts Legacy' is one of the biggest priorities in a couple of years down the road," Warner Bros. Discovery's CFO Gunnar Wiedenfels said. "So there is certainly a significant growth contribution from that [games] business in our strategic outlook here."

For a brand as big as Warner Bros., you'd expect a video game to sit lower on the list of things to focus on after movies and television, but that's not the case here. Even after the failure of Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League earlier this year, the company's games division is a "strategic asset" - and Hogwarts Legacy 2 will play a role in shaping the future of the Harry Potter brand.

Bethesda Game Studios is one of the most celebrated RPG game development studios ever, thanks to iconic releases like The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim and Fallout 3. Although its games can be rough around the edges, they offer players a level of freedom and customization that is rarely seen.

The studio's most recent game, the sci-fi epic Starfield, is arguably its most ambitious - with a thousand planets to explore, factions to discover, companions to enlist, and spaceships and outposts to build. However, it's also Bethesda's most polarizing release to date, thanks partly to how the studio's aging Creation Engine makes space exploration feel disjointed and cumbersome.

The big problem for many was that Starfield felt like a never-ending sequence of loading screens. In Skyrim and Fallout, entering a city or building brings up a loading screen, too, but in Starfield, there were exponentially more due to the sheer size and scope of the game. Modder PanConKeso is looking to fix that with the new Seamless City Interiors mod, which turns interior locations into exterior locations, removing the need for a loading screen.

Steam Game Recording is out of Beta and available for all Steam users as part of the latest client update. It is similar in functionality to something like NVIDIA's ShadowPlay for GeForce GPU owners, AMD's Adrenaline Software, or the Xbox Game Bar.

Steam Game Recording allows you to record and share gameplay clips using NVIDIA or AMD GPU hardware encoding with Background Recording and On-Demand Recording modes. However, there's a lot more to it than that. Valve has developed some innovative features for its take on recording gameplay as it's built into Steam.

The first is the ability to bring the Steam Overlay and the new Steam Timeline to 'jump back in time' and review your recent Background Recording as if it were a sports broadcast replay. The second feature is the ability to quickly clip footage that you want to keep with a simple, lightweight interface.

You probably saw the launch of Nintendo's alarm clock (called Alarmo) recently, and if the immediate question on your lips was 'Can it run Doom' we've now got a definitive answer - yes.

The latest in the long line of attempts to get the weirdest gadgets and pieces of tech playing the classic 30-year-old shooter (yes, it really has been that long - actually just over three decades) has been shown off by GaryOderNichts on X.

You can see Doom running on the Alarmo in the above post, with it being the shareware version of the shooter (albeit with the WAD compressed and then uncompressed to the memory upon boot, to get around USB loader memory size limitations, we're told).

Insomniac Games, the developers of the popular Spider-Man games, and Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart, have highlighted what they believe to be the best feature within the soon-to-be-released PlayStation 5 Pro.

In a recent video published to the PlayStation YouTube channel, Insomniac Games has sat down to discuss PS5 Pro Enhanced and what that means for gamers. With only a matter of days until the release of the PS5 Pro, Insomniac Games, a Sony-owned studio, has highlighted the PlayStation 5 Pro's PSSR, or PlayStation Spectral Super Resolution as its best feature. This new feature is Sony's version of the upscaling technology being used by PC gamers, such as NVIDIA's popular DLSS, or AMD's FSR.

The new upscaling technology frees gamers from having to choose between Performance and Quality mode in games, which, on the PS5, forces gamers to decide between smoother gameplay and less visual fidelity or more visual fidelity and rougher gameplay. However, that is no longer the case, as pointed out by Jahrain Jackson, Principal Engine Programmer at Insomanic Games, "What excites me the most about the PS5 Pro is that you're basically getting both Performance and Fidelity in one package. There's no fear of missing out on something by choosing one or the other; it's really a game-changer."

Ubisoft plans to address its swaying away from the original story of its immensely popular Assassin's Creed franchise. The franchise was popularized through the story of Desmond Miles, a descendant of numerous familial lines that had sworn allegiance to the Assassins he rein-bodies through a device called the Animus.

Assassin's Creed boss Marc-Alexis Coté recently sat down for an interview where he reflected on Ubisoft's past installments into the Assassin's Creed franchise, and how the games released more recently have become somewhat detached from the meaningful past, present, and future connection players derived from the earlier titles. Coté goes on to say it was a difficult decision to end Desmond's storyline in Asssasin's Creed 3, and since then, the studio has struggled to find its footing.

The studio plans to fix this as the Assassin's Creed boss plans on making Assassin's Creed Shadows, which was recently delayed to next year following controversial artistic choices, will be the foundation for the new direction of the franchise. Assassin's Creed Shadows was originally planned for launch in October, but following major pushback from fans of the franchise Ubisoft decided to officially delay the title and push back its release to February next year.

Halo 2 is widely considered the franchise's high watermark, a landmark console first-person shooter, and one of the greatest Xbox games ever. With its cinematic campaign, fantastic multiplayer, and responsive controls, it still holds up in 2024 - even if the visuals are now a little dated.

Ahead of the game's launch in 2004, Microsoft and Bungie presented the game for the first time at E3 2003 with an epic early look at the game that quickly became one of the most talked-about demos at the show - and is still remembered fondly today.

As with any pre-release demo, it was an early build of the game that differed from the final launch version. With Halo 2 celebrating its 20th anniversary this year, as a special treat for Halo fans, the iconic Halo 2 E3 2003 demo will be playable for the first time as a remastered free mod available via the Steam Workshop on November 9 for Halo: The Master Chief Collection.

Ubisoft's open-world action-adventure Star Wars Outlaws launched on August 27, 2024, to mixed reviews. Most criticism focused on the game's lack of polish, bugs, simplistic mechanics, and inconsistent visuals. And with poor sales, it did little to reverse Ubisoft's current troubles as a major game publisher.

However, Ubisoft and the development teams at Massive Entertainment and Lucasfilm Games are committed to improving the game with a massive Update 1.4 on November 21 alongside the game's Steam launch. In addition, Drew Rechner is replacing Julian Gerighty as the game's Creative Director, who will lead the post-launch development and improvements being made to the game.

In a new blog post outlining the studio's plans for the game, Drew Rechner outlines the "three key areas in which we're looking to improve the game."

Sony's mid-generation console refresh, the PlayStation 5 Pro, is officially launching on November 7. It is a more powerful console with a beefed-up GPU that includes advanced ray-tracing hardware from AMD's unreleased RDNA 4 GPU architecture. The console also introduces the new PlayStation Spectral Super Resolution or PSSR upscaling, which developers and press are hailing as the console's DLSS-like secret weapon.

The PS5 Pro's additional power will not only be tapped into with new game releases, like the highly anticipated Grand Theft Auto 6, but several existing blockbusters and classics already available. From Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 to Apex Legends to Stellar Blade, each title's 'PS5 Pro Enhanced' update will expand the game's visual fidelity - from improved frame rates pushing Fidelity modes to 60 FPS to more advanced ray-tracing and enhanced image clarity thanks to PSSR.

Ahead of the console's debut, Sony has confirmed that 55 titles will feature PS5 Pro enhancements at launch, with "many more to follow."

Helldivers 2 quickly became one of the most popular releases from PlayStation in quite some time, and undoubtedly what helped propel the title from Arrowhead Studios to where it is now was the co-release between PC and PlayStation 5.

The success of Helldivers 2 proved to Sony that it doesn't have to wait a year after its console drop to release a PlayStation game on PC for it to drive sales. Simply, if the product is good enough it will sell. Helldivers 2 is a representation of that and due to its success it spawned many theories that suddenly Sony was going to pivot PlayStation to release games on all platforms - including Xbox. While that may be true in some cases, such as the recently announced LEGO Horizon Adventures heading over to the Nintendo Switch, PlayStation's perspective on the gaming market isn't the same as Xbox's.

Xbox is pivoting its business to releasing its games on multiple platforms, including PlayStation, and has already tested the waters with titles such as Hi-Fi Rush, Sea of Thieves, Pentiment, and Grounded, along with the upcoming Indiana Jones and the Great Circle slated to release in 2025. However, Sony doesn't have the same perceptions and would much rather gatekeep its titles from other platforms to bolster its hardware sales - and for good reason. Xbox is already deeply integrated into PC and is more or less interoperable, while PlayStation doesn't even have a launcher on PC (yet).

As part of a new GTA Online Community Update, Rockstar confirms that "the much-requested PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S features of GTA Online" will be coming to the PC version early next year. It's only taken a few years, but PC fans can finally look forward to several technical and graphical improvements.

Including real-time ray-tracing, which is currently only available in the PS5 and Xbox Series X|S versions of Grand Theft Auto V and GTA Online. GTA 5's console RT only covers shadows cast by the sun, so it's limited in how it alters the game's look, but the PS5 and Xbox Series X|S enhancements cover a wide range of visual upgrades.

Ray-tracing is joined by increased detail and draw distances, higher resolution assets, and more things like grass and trees populating Los Santos. This visual overhaul left the PC version behind, which Rockstar is now looking to rectify.

Epic Games has announced that Fortnite Chapter 2 Remix is now live, with the island being reset to the Chapter 2 map, with a bunch of twists, Eminem, Mom's Spaghetti, Kicks, and more. Check out the trailer:

The Agency grounds have been renamed to The Doggpound, with it being the new headquarters and home base for Snoop Dogg's enterprise. If gamers visit, they'll have the chance to fight Snoop and get him to work with them, as well as receive Snoop Dogg's Drum Gun Mythic weapon.

Meanwhile, in the second week of Fortnite Chapter 2 Remix, Enimem will take ownership of the Grotto cave and establish a restaurant called -- and I love this -- Mom's Spaghetti. Once you're at Mom's Spaghetti you'll need to fight Eminem, win his support just like Snoop, and you'll get his Mythic RG Minigun which is a lyrical, rapid-fire weapon.

Sony's new PlayStation 5 Pro has received its full specifications, and an awesome first teardown revealing the innards of the beefed-up PS5 Pro console. Check it out:

The new PlayStation 5 Pro console has been opened up and torn down by Brazilian YouTuber "Tez" which has officially broken Sony's embargo, but we all love to see the insides of the new PS5 Pro ahead of its November 7 launch.

The PS5 Pro teardown video shows that the new console has easier access to the CMOS battery, meaning that if your PS5 Pro has any major issues that require a system reset, it'll be easier to do that. In comparison, the standard PS5 required a complete teardown to get to the battery.

Oasis AI, from Decart, is described as "the world's first real-time AI world model" for gaming. It offers a real-time playable AI-generated version of Minecraft running on a single NVIDIA H100 GPU to demonstrate its capabilities. It takes user input, from movement to using a tool, to generate the next frame.

It's an impressive little tech demo because what you see isn't rendered in the traditional sense that we associate with gaming; however, in its current state, playing Minecraft at a heavily compressed 720p at 20 FPS isn't exactly immersive or engaging. It's more proof of concept - generating entire frames, physics, lighting, and mechanics after being trained on watching hours and hours of Minecraft gameplay.

After playing the demo, which you can do via the Oasis AI site, you will see one pretty big flaw with how it works as a game - there is no real object permanence.

EA expects Dragon Age: The Veilguard to sell well enough to help supercharge its Q3 holiday earnings.

Electronic Arts just reported its latest quarterly financials and the results were stellar: The publisher delivered over $2 billion in net bookings throughout the Q2 period, largely affected by live services on console followed up with heavy-hitting sports sales of College Football 25, NFL 25, and FC25.

As for the critical holiday Q3'25 period, EA is expected even more growth. Q3'25's net bookings are to deliver up to $2.55 billion revenue, up nearly 8% from $2.36 billion delivered in Q3'24. So what's behind this $190 million increase? EA is counting on BioWare's latest Dragon Age: The Veilguard release to help boost the numbers.

Sony's PS4 Pro actually did well sales-wise, but the newer PS5 Pro has one major roadblock: Price.

The PS5 Pro is an expensive console. Sony is charging $700 for its new mid-gen PS5 Pro upgrade, a price tag that heavily stresses the once-wide gap between console gaming and enthusiast gaming. A $700 console feels like a tough proposition in 2024, especially when consumers are being impacted from rising costs and inflation.

Sony's other mid-gen system apparently did well. In a recent interview with Variety, PlayStation platform business CEO Hideaki Nishino said that the PlayStation 4 Pro had a 20% attach rate. It's hard to know exactly what this refers to--did the PS4 Pro sell 20% of total sales, or just launch sales? According to Niko Partners analyst Daniel Ahmad, the PS4 Pro "accounted for less than 15% of total PS4 lifetime sales." That means the PS4 Pro sold less than 18 million consoles, and that was at a $400 price point, significantly less than the PS5 Pro's $700 price.

PlayStation Studios CEO Hermen Hulst discusses why Sony laid off hundreds of workers earlier this year, reiterating that it was a business decision.

Over the last few years, we've seen a difference in how CEOs talk about gaming. The Microsoft-Activision merger brought much closer scrutiny to Xbox's financials, leading to clear messaging from executives like Phil Spencer and Sarah Bond, both of which highlighted the realities of running a games business. Former PlayStation CEO Jim Ryan also testified, in length, about numbers and trends in the industry during the FTC v Microsoft federal trial in 2023.

With this spell broken, CEOs are now being more open about business dynamics, merging the internal email-speak we've seen in mass layoff announcements with the mentat-like calculations of executive leadership. The results are light--but still quite eye-opening--explanations of what's going on in gaming.

EA has made the decision to block Linux gamers - including, of course, Steam Deck owners (at least those who haven't switched away from SteamOS) - from playing its popular battle royale, Apex Legends.

In a Reddit post, EA explains that it has "identified Linux OS as being a path for a variety of impactful exploits and cheats."

Due to that, there's been a decision made to block those running a Linux distro from partaking of the game, due to balancing up the small number of Linux players with the apparently considerable instances of cheating that take place.

AMD has dropped a heavy hint that Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 could be the first game to get its next-gen FSR (presumably FSR 4) that'll leverage AI for the first time.

If Black Ops 6 isn't the first, the game is certainly getting this tech, as AMD's Jack Huynh, who heads up Team Red's Computing & Graphics group, made clear as part of the reveal of the new Ryzen 9800X3D on YouTube (check out the above clip).

So, it appears work is underway on what might be FSR 4 support already, which as we've heard incorporates AI (ML-based meaning machine learning, of course).

BioWare's long-awaited Dragon Age: The Veilguard is finally out. On PC, it looks stunning thanks to real-time ray tracing and is exceptionally well optimized to run on a range of hardware. And for those with a GeForce NOW Ultimate subscription, it's playable over the cloud with full RT, DLSS, and even G-SYNC on a GeForce RTX 4080-powered rig.

GeForce NOW, NVIDIA's cloud gaming platform that lets you play the games you own on Steam and Epic Games Store and have access to via PC Game Pass, is set to have an even bigger November thanks to the inclusion of one of the most anticipated PC releases in years - S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl.

The new FPS and sequel from GSC Game World will be released on November 21, and GeForce NOW subscribers will have access to it via their Steam, Xbox, or PC Game Pass libraries.