Gaming - Page 299

In case you haven't been following the latest goings on in Night City, alongside a massive story expansion dropping later this month, developer CD Projekt Red is dropping the longa-awaited Update 2.0 to the game for all players on PC and current-gen consoles next week on September 21.

As we're closing in on the game's third anniversary, it's safe to say that as of writing, and with the arrival of Update 2.0, Cyberpunk 2077 is a very different game than what was delivered at launch back in 2020. With most bugs and performance issues now sorted, Update 2.0 is about overhauling the game by adding new gameplay systems and reworking some of the stuff already there.

In addition to making the policing system more in line with something like Grand Theft Auto, adding dynamic vehicle combat, and improving enemy AI to enhance the moment-to-moment action, Update 2.0 and the Phantom Liberty expansion also see the addition of DLSS 3.5 to make the stunning in-game ray-tracing even more incredible.

Meta has been developing Horizon Worlds for quite some time now, and the company is now announcing an expansion to new platforms for the VR social app.

In a new blog post on its website, Meta announced that Horizon Worlds is making its way over to web and mobile, in an effort to expand the user base that is currently limited to people who own the Quest VR headset. This announcement comes at a time when it appears Horizon Worlds' userbase is dwindling, and despite Meta never releasing official player statistics, reports citing internal documents revealed the social space is barely populated.

For those that don't know about Horizon Worlds, it's a game that players can either join or create "worlds" to socialize and play in. The ecosystem also features a store where users can sell virtual items. However, Meta snags a 47.5% cut of every sale. Meta writes in a blog post that a small number of people can now access the Meta Quest app on Android and iOS, and early access is currently available to anyone on a web browser at the following link here. https://horizon.meta.com/

Nintendo just got finished with its September Direct and there was one title announced that is worth highlighting, as it seems to have created a mixed response among gamers.

Introducing Nintendo's newest battle royale title, a re-release of the classic racing title F-Zero, but in the form of complete chaos. Nintendo announced F-Zero 99, it's newest game in the series in nearly 20 years, and from the reveal trailer it can be gathered that players are going to have a hard time making it all the way to first place as games contain 99 racers per track.

The newest title in the series is based on the very first F-Zero game that was released in 1990 on the SNES, with players having the ability to change vehicle designs, pick up power ups, and even use a skyway that allows for a quick safe skip ahead to a higher position in the race. Nintendo announced during the direct that F-Zero 99 is already out and all users subscribed to Nintendo Switch Online will be able to play for free.

Nintendo is converting one of its old fabrication laboratories into a museum honoring its long participation in the video game industry.

Nintendo announced during its September Direct event that was held last night that it's nearing the completion of the Nintendo Museum that was originally announced in 2021, and during the livestream, you can see the iconic question mark block that's painted onto the roof of the building. The Nintendo Museum is converted from an old Nintendo building located in Kyoto, Japan, into a gallery displaying various products that represent the company's long participation in the video game industry.

There is currently no word on the official opening day, but Nintendo has announced that the park is expected to be completed by March next year, which means we can assume a likely official opening within the following months. As for what will be inside the museum, anyone's guess is good, as Nintendo has kept that news under wraps. If I were to guess what will be on display, I'd say at least a timeline of all the Nintendo devices up until the Nintendo Switch, along with some of the biggest and most popular games produced by the company.

The internet is ablaze with speculation for the next-generation Switch, a handheld console that is rumored to come with a substantial performance jump compared to its predecessor.

The rumors began swirling when it surfaced that Nintendo showcased Nintendo Switch 2 hardware to developers at Gamescom, revealing the system was capable of using DLSS to deliver PS5-level graphics. The rumors suggest that Nintendo held private backstage meetings with select developers, showing off a high-end Matrix Awakens tech demo and an upgraded version of The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild.

The speculation pointed to the Nintendo Switch 2 being powered by NVIDIA's 8nm Orin-based T234 SoC that would come with ARM-based DLSS support that features Ray Tracing capabilities. Now, Nintendo has announced a new 40-minute Nintendo Direct that it says will deliver information on new Switch games releasing this coming Winter. However, there is a chance that Nintendo will drop a small teaser for the coming next-gen console.

Adobe Premiere Pro will be getting a new AI tool that is designed to remove the fat, background noise, or filler on audio, making for a much smoother listening experience depending on the content.

The new tool is called filler word detection, and according to Adobe, it's designed to remove any unnecessary sounds by deleting them from the audio timeline. For example, the new tool, officially called Enhance Speech, and will be able to convert any "recorded in a professional studio." For example, the new tool would be able to detect the "ums" and "hmms" in a conversation, say on a podcast, and automatically remove them.

The release of this new tool is part of Adobe's push to integrate AI-powered tools into its suite of products, as the company is planning on generative AI across Photoshop, Adobe Express, and Illustrator, which has been in beta since March. These new tools can be accessed via a "generative credits" subscription plan that allows users to "turn a text-based prompt into image and vector creations." Furthermore, the AI tools can be accessed through a Creative Cloud subscription plan.

Starfield isn't even a month old, and we are already seeing a slew of different mods making their way to the public, and now one modder has decided to make taking off and landing just that much cooler.

The new mod is being developed by YouTuber "Bub" who posted a video to their channel showcasing the capabilities of the first-person takeoff/landing mod that enables players to view both through the first-person/third-person viewing options. The official modding tools for Starfield aren't out yet, but this coming mod seems to be working extremely smoothly with what appears to be zero problems.

Looking at how awesome it is to take off and land, particularly in the third-person perspective, it makes me wish this was an already option in vanilla Starfield. Bethesda certainly dropped the ball in this regard, as I believe the third-person perspective adds a degree of immersion to both sequences.

Bethesda has outlined its plans for updating Starfield, with the first batch of updates to the game set to focus on community-requested features - which includes official DLSS support for the game on PC. With Starfield currently being restricted to AMD's FSR 2 upscaling, this has led to modders releasing DLSS 2 Super Resolution and even DLSS 3 Frame Generation to meet the demand for NVIDIA's popular tech.

"First, an enormous thank you to all of you playing Starfield and your support," Bethesda writes. "We are absolutely blown away by the response and all you love about the game. We're also reading all your great feedback on what you'd like to see improved or added to the game."

Adding, "Our priority initially is making sure any top blocker bugs or stability issues are addressed and adding quality-of-life features that many are asking for." The post doesn't put a timeline on when we can expect updates or which quality-of-life features will come first - but the initial list is very welcome news and will definitely please the Starfield community. And yes, DLSS is officially coming - though no word on whether this will also include Frame Generation.

A senior developer over at CD Projekt Red has confirmed that the upcoming 2.0 update and Phantom Libery expansion for Cyberpunk 2077 will greatly increase CPU utilization for multi-core processors. The developer in question, Filip Pierściński, took to Twitter/X to confirm that those with 8-Core CPUs could see utilization hover at around 90%.

And with that, he warns players to "please check" the "cooling systems" in their PCs by running a CPU-intensive benchmark like Cinebench to ensure stability. And avoid a situation where Cyberpunk 2077 crashes their PC because the CPU has hit a thermal threshold.

The good news is that this multi-core support will make better use of Ryzen CPUs - where currently, players with AMD CPUs are resorting to using mods that better utilize Ryzen's multithreading capabilities. This should also lead to better Ryzen X3D performance, as 3D V-Cache is about leveraging multi-core performance.

Bethesda confirms they are far from finished with Starfield and have plans to update the game over time.

Starfield just come out a week ago, but Bethesda is already listening to fans and making some big changes to the game. The studio today announced that it would be adding much-requested features into their space sim including a much-needed FOV slider on PC (maybe consoles too) as well as other major compatibility upgrades like ultra-wide support for 32:9 monitors.

A big part of Bethesda's updates is also quality-of-life improvements. Starfield will be tweaked so that it's more player-friendly, and this includes listening to the community for feedback. One of the smaller but impactful requests was the ability to eat food outside of an inventory menu, especially since food is almost useless in Starfield unless its gourmet or used under specific conditions.

More game developers are rallying against Unity's new highly controversial fee structure.

Yesterday, Unity made one of the most unpopular decisions in gaming history. The company plans to enact what it calls new Unity Runtime Fees that will charge game distributors money every time a game is newly installed past a certain threshold (a game that has been installed 200,000 times and made $200,000 in revenue will be charged $0.20 per install). These fees are also retroactive.

Now developers are pushing back. We've seen a handful of indie developers speak out against the Runtime Fees, including prominent developer Rami Ismail and multiple studios like:

Microsoft's new replacement for Xbox LIVE Gold is actually pretty impressive.

A bit ago, Microsoft announced plans to retire Gold and remove the Xbox LIVE branding from its subscription plans. The plan is to scrap Gold, keep the same price, and remove the free monthly games while instead offering access to a slowly-rotating pool of titles. Starting tomorrow, Xbox LIVE Gold will transform into Xbox Game Pass Core, further illustrating that Xbox is now synonymous with services.

Game Pass Core is actually a pretty good value in terms of what is offered. Subscribers will get the original Gold benefits--online multiplayer, promos etc--alongside the ability to download and play three dozen first-party and third-party titles.

It's official: A new State of Play is on the horizon, but it's not the big one we've been waiting for.

Sony announces a new surprise impromptu State of Play stream for tomorrow, Thursday September 14 at 5PM EST. The stream won't be a big first-party blowout or teasers about Sony's upcoming live games--instead, this State of Play will focus more on games from partners. Viewers should expect to see third-party titles, PSVR2 games, and indies.

"Tomorrow's broadcast will focus on updates to previously announced games coming to PlayStation consoles. From indie and PS VR2 highlights, to major upcoming titles from our third-party partners, our latest show has something for everyone!" reads the PlayStation Blog post.

In a quest for profits following a heavy share price drop, Unity aggravates practically the entire video games industry with its new updated fee policy.

Unity has made the significantly controversial decision to start charging game developers a fee based on how many times their games have been installed. It's called a Unity Runtime Fee, and it has proven to be one of the most disruptive and universally-despised updates in the history of game dev. Unity has faced waves of push back over the decision as game devs everywhere criticise the decision.

Under the new Unity Runtime Fee, which goes into effect January 2024, developers will have to pay a "small flat fee" depending how many times a game has been installed. The fee only kicks in if a game has met both revenue and install threshold requirements How much a developer pays depends on what Unity subscription tier they have and how many new installs the game has had for that month.

The future is here: Apple's latest iPhone 15 Pro will be able to natively play console versions of video games.

Activision CEO Bobby Kotick made an interesting comment in the recent FTC v Microsoft trial, saying that pretty soon mobile phones will be able to play games at console quality: "Well get to the point where that content is playable on mobile phones," Kotick had said.

Apple's latest iPhone 15 Pro proves that Kotick was right all along.

Embracer Group could sell Gearbox Entertainment, one of its largest operating divisions, in an effort to save money and reduce costs.

The games industry is currently at a crossroads. Record years of pandemic spending has also catalyzed investment costs as boards and investors try to sustain continued growth. But nothing is certain in the games industry--games are expensive, take millions of dollars, and many long years to make. Salaries are also rising to offset inflation, throwing another bit of volatility to an already-hazardous medium.

Now publishers are trying to get control over spending budgets, costs, and debts as much as possible. This has led to the layoffs of thousands of game workers across some of the biggest names in gaming. Others, like the once-mighty Embracer Group, are now open to selling off parts of their video games

Microsoft is releasing its own Xbox Credit Card that will come with a number of perks that will certainly entice gamers into picking one up.

Officially called the Xbox Mastercard, Microsoft has announced via its website that the Xbox Mastercard will come with no annual fee and has been created in partnership with Barclays US Consumer Bank. So, what will players be able to get with the new card? According to the press release, players will be able to earn card points with everyday purchases that can then be used to redeem games and add-ons.

Notably, for every $1 spent on purchases, players will earn points, with players earning 5x card points on eligible products at the Microsoft Store, 3x card points on eligible streaming platforms such as Netflix and Disney+, 3x card points on eligible dining delivery services such as Grubhub and DoorDash, and 1x card points on everyday purchases.

Starfield players are sinking their teeth into what the game has to offer, and with it being a little over a week since the game launched, a player has already discovered what seems to be the best ship build.

For those that don't know, Starfield lets players design their own ships to take out to the void of space and engage with enemies and even friendlies. However, ship combat can be tricky, and players can be blown up pretty quickly if they aren't adept at maneuvering. But what if I told you that you didn't need to dodge and maneuverer, just shoot?

Well, it seems you can, as a Starfield player noticed that all enemy ships fire their shots directly at the center of the the ship they are attacking. So, the player decided to make the center of his ship empty space, meaning that all enemy shots go straight through the ship, thus making the player immune to all enemy fire. The above video showcases the ship in action, while the below video is a guide on how to build it yourself.

A new Starfield mod that was uploaded to NexusMods on Sunday brings Star Wars over to Bethesda's newest title, which has been out just over a week.

It's no surprise that mods are already starting to pop up for Starfield, as Bethesda's titles are notorious for having some of the largest support from the modding community. Despite the official Bethesda modding tools not even being released yet, a new mod was uploaded to the NexusMods page on Sunday called "GALACTIC CIVIL WAR CONVERSION," which replaces the United Colonies' police force with stormtroopers from the Star Wars universe.

At the time of writing, the mod has gained more than 3,000 unique downloads despite the mod being entirely visually centered. It seems that not only do the United Colonies' police force get the visual switch to stormtroopers but also players, as the below image showcases a player wearing the iconic stormtrooper armor. It seems that the mod simply switches out the visual aspects of the United Colonies' police force gear, which, by that standard, means the above player is wearing that gear.

Built on the next iteration of the Creation Engine (the same tech that powered Skyrim and Fallout 4), Starfield is set to become one of the most modded games in PC history, with Bethesda Game Studios noting that once it releases full mod tools and mod support for the game on PC players and modders will be able to generate entire planets to create brand-new games effectively.

Bethesda Game Studios has called the engine powering Starfield 'Creation Engine 2,' a more powerful, versatile, and technically advanced version of the tech it has been working with for decades - with several improvements made to the rendering and visual side. As seen when firing up the game, some of the planets and details in Starfield are truly impressive.

In a new interview with Japanese publication Famitsu (translated), Starfield director and Bethesda Game Studios chief Todd Howard states that official mod tools and support for the game are on track for 2024.