Gaming - Page 408

Starbreeze CEO Tobias Sjogren gives an update on Payday 3's development, says progress is going smoothly.

Payday 3 is in full production and is still on track for its planned 2023 release. Parent company Starbreeze says the game's developer, Overkill, is currently making good progress with Payday 3. The sequel features a mix of modern-day trends like cryptocurrencies and hacking alongside mainstays like gunpoint robberies and original heisters (Dallas, Hoxton, Chains and Wolf) making a comeback.

"The development of PAYDAY 3 is proceeding according to plan and it's wonderful to see the game, now in full production, developing week by week," Starbreeze CEO Tobias Sjogren said in a Q4 earnings report.

Fill out Elden Ring's map as soon as possible with this handy guide.

One of the first things you should do when playing Elden Ring is unlock the map. Information is crucial in Elden Ring. You need to know where things are, and more importantly, where enemies are...and that's hard to do if you can't get do good scouting.

Unlocking the Limgrave map early on will help your adventures through the perilous region and (hopefully) reduce any unnecessary deaths along the way. You'll need to find two fragments to have full access to Limgrave's map.

Elden Ring is a big game, so you'll need a quick way to get around. Here's how to get the in-game mount and speed across the Lands Between in no time.

Elden Ring's horse mount can be found pretty early on in the game. FromSoftware is actually pretty generous with the basics this time around. To unlock Torrent, your faithful steed, you simply have to activate sites of Grace, which are Elden Ring's bonfires. Unlocking enough sites will trigger a cutscene where a maiden gives you the Spectral Steed Whistle item.

The quickest way to unlock these sites is to simply follow the road north. I visited five grace sites before I got the whistle.

Valve may end up being Nintendo's greatest competitor in the retro gaming market.

According to PC Gamer, Valve's new Steam Deck is an emulation dream machine. The Steam Deck has one-click access to all of the latest emulators, including Dolphin, DuckStation, PCSX2, BSNES, and even Yuzu, the Nintendo Switch emulator. Gamers can access this list of emulators by switching to the system's desktop mode by holding down the power button--there's no need to enter command lines.

This easy access, setup, and execution of emulators could eat Nintendo's retro gaming lunch. Nintendo is removing all Virtual Console games from sale, and by next year in 2023, the Nintendo Switch Online subscription will be the only way to buy and play old-school retro games on Nintendo platforms. Before now there hasn't been an easy way to play older games on handhelds without the use of configuring, jailbreaking and obtaining software downloads/patches, etc.

D2R's new ladder reset could happen as soon as April 2022, which is roughly six weeks away.

Today Blizzard dropped a new D2R roadmap update that outlines PTR timings and what to expect from the new patch. PTR 2.4 will pave the way for D2R's first-ever ranked ladder and will test a multitude of things including season rolls and item rollover. The devs haven't revealed exactly when the ladder will reset but hint at a possible April 2022 reset.

According to info from the roadmap update, Diablo streamer MrLlamaSC estimates that D2R ranked ladder reset could coincide with an early or mid-April timeframe.

Some of Valve's hardware projects have gone the way of the dinosaurs, but the Steam Deck is different.

The Steam Deck isn't just an experimental product for Valve: It's a new gateway for its hardware business. The Steam Deck's vale proposition is attractive--play all your Steam games on-the-go with PC-level performance. But the work isn't done. The Steam Deck is a stepping stone, and Valve says it's far from finished with its new hybridized PC platform.

In a recent interview with Axios, Valve's Greg Coomer says the company is invested in the Steam Deck for the long haul. "The Steam Deck is the beginning of a new category that we will be developing and iterating on for a long time to come."

Today Game Freak announced Pokemon Scarlet and Violet, the new mainline duo set to launch in late 2022 on the Nintendo Switch. Here's a closer look at the starter Pokemon for the new games.

No Pokemon game is complete without a trio of new starters, a tradition that stretches back 26 years. Scarlet and Violet have an...interesting new lineup of Pocket Monsters that will steal your heart including a fire crocodile, a grass cat, and a water duck (his name is Quaxly, and he's pretty awesome).

Game Freak has released a bunch of stats, info, and close-up shots for the new starters including personality types, move sets, and other tidbits.

Following Pokemon Arceus, the newly announced Pokemon Scarlet and Violet will help push Nintendo's 2022 earnings.

Today Game Freak announced Pokemon Scarlet and Violet, a new mainline dual-pack coming to the Switch in late 2022. The game promises to deliver realistic seamlessness between town/hub areas and the wilderness areas, creating a new level of immersion for the open-world RPG.

The timing is pretty important for Nintendo, who plans to lean hardware on software sales to make up for reductions in Switch sales from the ongoing chip shortage. Pokemon is almost like Nintendo's Call of Duty, and the most recent duo, Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl, sold 13.97 million units and accounted for over 16% of the Switch's entire Q3 game sales. Another Q3 release would bolster Nintendo's holiday 2022 period and possibly push software revenues to new heights.

Game Pass on Steam? Valve is all for it, and Gabe Newell wants to make it happen.

While Game Pass probably won't ever show up on the Nintendo Switch, it could eventually be integrated into competing storefronts like Steam. Valve boss Gabe Newell is interested in the prospect of Game Pass coming to Steam...now it's all up to Phil Spencer.

In a recent interview with PC Gamer, Newell said he'd be "more than happy" to allow Game Pass on Steam. And why not? Microsoft made over $12 billion from software and services driven in part by Xbox Game Pass' organic subscription model.

No, Elden Ring doesn't load faster from a mechanical HDD than it does from an SSD. Here's a look at how fast Elden Ring loads on PS4, PS5 vs Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S.

FromSoftware's new BotW Souls simulator Elden Ring has serious issues on PC. Thankfully consoles seem to fare better, and loading times are pretty speedy on next-gen SSDs. This is rightfully so given the advanced PCIe Gen4 x4 hardware and major OS tweaks used by the PS5 and Series X/S.

According to YouTuber El Analista de Bits, Elden Ring loads faster on the PlayStation 5 than it does on the Series X/S combo. This makes a lot of sense given the speed disparity between the two SSDs; the Series X/S hits 2.4GB/sec speeds on PCIe 4.0 whereas the PS5 is more than twice as fast at 5.5GB/sec.

FromSoftware says it is working on a fix for Elden Ring's frame rate issues on PC.

Elden Ring is one of the best-reviewed games of all time, but a a recent day one patch has borked the game on PC. Gamers with the most powerful graphics cards on the market still aren't able to hit 1080p 60FPS. Streamer DarkViperAU says the game hits anywhere from 20-60FPS in 1080p with an RTX 3090 and an AMD Ryzen 9 5950X CPU combo. At this point it's practically a tradition that FromSoft games have wonky PC performance.

Luckily FromSoftware is on the case. The developer has issued a FAQ post discussing updates and fixes it plans to roll out. The FPS problems on PC are a top priority.

DICE 2021 awards show host Greg Miller calls embroiled Activision-Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick out on stage.

Greg Miller, the co-host of the 25th annual DICE awards had choice words to say about Bobby Kotick

"Of course, we can't talk about the industry we love so much without talking about the recent stories of abuse and harassment at Activision Blizzard and other companies. But since this is a formal event broadcasted to audiences across the world, I'm only going to say F Bobby Kotick. I'm just kidding! Fuck Bobby Kotick," Miller said to applause from the audience.

Valve boss Gabe Newell says most of the purchases made with crypto on Steam were not legitimate.

Why did Steam ban all crypto games? It's not because of the blockchain tech itself, but the "shady activities" that typically surround cryptocurrency including scams and fraud. Valve simply do not want to do business with those types of people, Newell says.

In a recent interview with Rock Paper Shotgun discussed why crypto games were removed from Steam.

Chinese online giant NetEase reports its full-year earnings for 2021, showing significant growth.

Strong post-pandemic spending on an even stronger games slate has helped NetEase generate $9.8 billion from online games. According to data provided by NetEase, the company made $6.9 billion from mobile and $2.9 billion from the PC across a mix of online-based and more premium titles like Naraka Bladepoint.

Data indicates that NetEase is #2 in total online digital/network game services revenues. Sony takes the top spot with $11.5 billion combined revenues from add-on content (microtransactions) and combined network services. NetEase remains one of the most powerful forces in the industry and a leading top mobile developer that serves gaming's most lucrative market.

NetMarble is working on six P2E blockchain mobile games, the company has announced.

Korean mobile games giant NetMarble is jumping into the blockchain sphere with a swath of new games. The developer plans to release its first crypto game in March 2022 followed by five other blockchain-based titles. One of these games may be based on Marvel characters--in 2020, Marvel Games teamed up with Wax to make custom NFTs.

"The company is also aiming to launch six blockchain games, with the first coming in March. These include A3: Still Alive Global, Golden Bros, Ni no Kuni: Cross Worlds Global, Champions: Ascension, Monster Arena (TBD) and Everybody's Marvel: Meta World," reads a press release.

Sony's new PlayStation Spartacus subscription service will reportedly combine some of its competitor's best perks in one package.

Sony's new subscription, codenamed Spartacus, is said to merge PlayStation Now and PS Plus in one service. Official details haven't been announced but sources tell Venture Beat's Jeff Grubb how Spartacus might work (via Grubbsnax).

There's three tiers with separate prices, and the most expensive $16/month tier will offer access to classic PlayStation games similar to Nintendo Switch Online's treasure trove of NES, SNES, and Genesis titles.

Microsoft, Obsidian, and Bethesda reportedly have "high interest" in making a Fallout New Vegas sequel.

Now that Obsidian and Bethesda Game Studios are under the same roof, Fallout New Vegas 2 might actually happen. Sources have told Venture Beat's Jeff Grubb that very early talks about a New Vegas sequel are under way and that everyone involved with the discussions has a lot of interest and confidence in the project.

"This is very early, but people have begun to have talks and say the words 'Obsidian' and 'New Vegas 2' in sentences," Grubb said in today's episode of GrubbSnax

The next Mass Effect game will not be ready for at least a few more years, BioWare has said.

Mass Effect 5 is currently in the earliest phases of development and will not be finished for quite some time. Right now the project is in pre-production prototyping stage and doesn't yet have an actual blueprint. We do know the next mainline game will continue the original trilogy canon and that Liara T'soni will be a main character.

"We're also working on the next Mass Effect. The team, led by Mike Gamble, is made up of a team of veteran developers as well as some new, really talented people. They are all actively prototyping new ideas and experiences," BioWare general manager Gary McKay said in an update post today.

Dragon Age executive producer Christian Dailey has left BioWare, marking the second producer to recently leave the series.

BioWare has lost another major developer with the departure of Christian Dailey, who departed right in the middle of Dragon Age 4's production. Dailey was brought in after the previous Dragon Age executive producer, Mark Darrah, left the company after 23 years with BioWare.

"Hi friends. I wanted to pass on the news that I am leaving BioWare. The next Dragon Age is in great hands. Looking forward to cheering on the team and playing as a fan. Thank you BioWare Electronic Arts (EA) for the amazing adventure," Dailey said in a statement.

The new Dragon Age game is in middle phases of production, BioWare today confirmed.

BioWare is currently making significant progress in Dragon Age 4 following years of development and two major reboots. The developer gave a quick update on the new Dragon Age game in a blog post:

"For the next Dragon Age, we are right in the middle of Production, which is a great feeling," BioWare general manager Gary McKay said.