Gaming - Page 513

Titan Quest 2 could be in development at THQ Nordic, but exact details are sparse.

Today Handy Games, a dev team subsidiary of THQ Nordic, shared an interesting Twitter post that has the exact same gladiator artwork as the newer Titan Quest re-release. The post teases a 2021 release date and shows four heroes this time and strongly indicates a new game is in the works--or possible a new expansion.

There's no info on Handy Games' website, and the job listings don't give any clues...but we don't exactly need them, do we? THQ Nordic owns the rights to Titan Quest and actually re-released the game on modern platforms like the PS4, Switch, and Xbox One in 2018, followed by an expansion.

Update: It seems EZ Optimizer has been in the headlines again, with Hybrid Analysis deeming the software as "malicious". TechRaptor reports that an open source alternative in CyberEngineTweaks can be used to tweak Cyberpunk 2077.

Even if you have some of the best hardware you can buy, Cyberpunk 2077 is beyond being the new Crysis in terms of PC hardware requirements. Hell, the game is so next-gen it has practically melted the PS4 and Xbox One consoles to the point of Cyberpunk 2077 being pulled from those platforms.

But what if you want more performance without having to do much? That's exactly what programmer CodeZ1LLa has done with his new EZ Optimizer for Cyberpunk 2077 that will offer up to 30FPS more performance in the game.

Cloud Imperium Games founder and CEO Chris Roberts has taken some time to write a rather large update to Star Citizen Fans, winding down 2020 and setting the bar for 2021. You can read the big blog post here.

In the post, Roberts talks about how good the year has been for Star Citizen -- noting the effects that the COVID-19 pandemic had on work-from-home policies. The developer had 4 separate updates for Star Citizen for 2020, ranging from Alpha 3.9 through to Alpha 3.12 and a bunch of new features and content along the way.

Star Citizen had record players in 2020 with gamers from over 200 unique countries and territories across the world, with over 740,000 players playing Star Citizen in 2020. This breaks down to people playing from 56,340 unique cities and pumping in a huge 26,576,364 hours into the game.

Housemarque just released a video detailing its new game Returnal, and it looks like Mass Effect Andromeda...only 10x better.

So far, Returnal looks to be one of the must-have PS5 games of 2021. The game features weird sci-horror elements and uses explosive third-person action combat that reminds me very much of BioWare's failed action-RPG mashup. In a very real sense, Returnal is an evolution of ME Andromeda and shows what the game could've been like if it had more time to bake in the oven.

Watching Returnal's gameplay, it's hard not to instantly imagine Andromeda. Selene, the main character, zaps back and forth from place to place with a third-person camera, complete with jumping, chaotic shoot-em-up elements, and even some melee attacks.

Tencent now owns Leyou Technologies and all of its associated subsidiaries, which means Tencent also owns Warframe devs Digital Extremes. Luckily nothing is changing for the developer.

Chinese juggernaut Tencent just made a big purchase that includes Halo dev Splash Damage and Warframe developer Digital Extremes. So what does this mean for the future of Warframe? According to the developers at Digital Extremes, nothing will change under Tencent's rule.

The studio will remain 100% independent and Tencent won't jump in and influence new content creation, upcoming updates, or future optimizations on PC/PS5/Xbox Series X.

Activision shares closed at $90.96 on December 24, setting a new all-time record high for the company's stock.

Activision stock is now higher than it has ever been in the company's 26-year history. The share spike was driven by Activision-Blizzard's successful releases including World of Warcraft Shadowlands, which is now the fastest-selling PC game of all time with 3.7 million copies moved in 1 day, and Call of Duty Black Ops Cold War.

Call of Duty hit an incredible milestone in 2020 by generating $3 billion in revenues as of December. The franchise has now made up nearly 40% of Activision's total trailing 12-month earnings. The new inter-connected ecosystem combines Warzone, Black Ops Cold War, Modern Warfare, and Call of Duty Mobile with monetization and full game sale earnings in a cohesive, cross-progression system.

Ex-Nintendo of America President Reggie Fils-Aime confirms Kanye West had approached Nintendo for a mystery game project...but the company shot the idea down.

Credit: Getty Images

In episode 3 of Talking Games With Reggie and Harold, industry vet Geoff Keighley shared some interesting tidbits about rap star Kanye West and his involvement in the gaming world. Then Reggie Fils-Aime confirms Kanye wanted to make a game with Nintendo (you have to donate to hear that part, though).

Redditor Heimgang made an awesome Cyberpunk 2077 build that brings back old-school Morrowind vibes.

Super jump alteration magic was a big part of what made Morrowind so fun. Being able to jump across the entre continent was unlike anything else, so when I see another game that's anywhere near similar, I get excited. Apparently Cyberpunk 2077 players can hop around Night City as if they had Morrowind's old-school powers.

The secret lies in a series of cyberware upgrades you assign to V:

Among Us, the addictive indie made by a three-man team, has now broken Steam's top revenue charts for 2020.

Among Us is one of the most popular games of all time, and now Valve is revealing some interesting metrics. Among Us is butting heads with platform titans and is now the fourth best-selling and most-played Steam game of 2020. The game managed to beat out Red Dead Redemption 2, Cyberpunk 2077, GTA V, and even Doom Eternal. Fall Guys still conquered Among Us, and rightly so, as Fall Guys has sold a whopping 10 million copies since release.

The small-indie-turned-megastar is also the fourth most-played Steam game of 2020. Among Us had more players than DOTA 2, Monster Hunter World, and even Steam's all-time concurrent titan, PUBG. This makes sense; analyst firm SuperData says Among Us is the "most popular game ever in terms of monthly players."

The Epic Games Launcher is raising temperatures in AMD Ryzen CPUs when running in the background, and you should close it and remove it as a startup app.

Unless you plan to use the Epic Games Launcher to play a game, you should definitely exit the app and make sure it's not a Windows startup app. Multiple gamers are reporting temperature drops in AMD CPUs when closing the Epic Games Store launcher. I can confirm a temp drop with my AMD Ryzen 3700X, which went from 48C with the EGS launcher open down to 39C when it was closed.

HotHardware's analysis shows the launcher is using Ryzen cores when the app is running in the background, even without a game being launched. Apparently some of the CPU usage is from data being collected by the launcher and sent out to Epic Games. This is probably usage metric data, but even still, gamers aren't happy about another CPU hog. Be sure to disable the Epic Games Launcher if you're not using it to free up CPU usage and lower temperatures.

Sony stealthily added a nice little PlayStation 5 feature that avoids lots of confusion for next-gen console owners.

Included in PS5's new v20.02.-2.3 patch is a feature that should've been available since launch: A pop-up telling gamers what version of a game they're about to launch.

The PlayStation 5 can have two versions of games stored on the SSD: a next-gen PS5 version with higher-end optimizations, faster loading times, and enhanced visuals, and the base PS4 version that's playable via backwards compatibility. For a long time gamers simply didn't know which version of a game they were playing because the PS5 didn't tell them.

CD Projekt is officially getting sued over the disastrous Cyberpunk 2077 controversy, and multiple law firms have filed class-action lawsuits.

After days of investigating, multiple law firms have filed class-action lawsuits against CD Projekt RED for securities fraud. Rosen Law and shareholder rights litigation firm Schall Law have both filed suits against the company for willfully misleading investors and causing material harm as a result of deceptive practices.

The suits allege CD Projekt RED knowingly withheld information from investors and consumers regarding Cyberpunk 2077's console performance. Interestingly enough, CD Projekt executives actually said this was true--in a recent call with investors, management confirmed they purposely hid PS4 and Xbox One gameplay footage because those versions simply weren't ready to be shown.

Thinking about buying Cyberpunk 2077? Microsoft now warns you about the game's bad Xbox One performance right on the store page.

Cyberpunk 2077 is still a hot mess on Xbox One, Xbox One S, and Xbox One X hardware, suffering from pop-in, low-res textures, and significant FPS drops. The game is so bad it's actually been removed from the PlayStation Store at CD Projekt RED's behest. Unlike CDPR, who hid the game's performance on older hardware, Microsoft wants to make sure all Xbox gamers know about Cyberpunk 2077's wonky experience on Xbox One.

The official Xbox storefront page for Cyberpunk 2077 outright warns consumers about the game's issues. The PSA reads: "Users may experience performance issues when playing this game on Xbox One consoles until this game is updated."

343i reconfirms Halo Infinite will release on weaker, last-gen Xbox One consoles and won't be an Xbox Series X and Series X exclusive.

No matter how much you might want it, Halo Infinite isn't skipping Xbox One consoles. UI lead Chad Mirshak's LinkedIn profile triggered lots of rumors when it didn't mention Xbox One as one of the game's target platforms.

This was a mistake, and Mirshak's LinkedIn profile has since been fixed to include Xbox One platforms.. Microsoft confirms to The Verge's Tom Warren that Halo Infinite is still planned for the Xbox One family of systems, which includes the base 2013 model, the Xbox One S, and the powerful Xbox One X.

More of Nintendo's internal documents have leaked out, showing what the Switch used to look like.

Nintendo's very early Switch concept design was pretty weird. The system was basically a PSP with a big screen and analog sticks set into the screen. The sticks were on the screen, not outside of the screen, making for a rather strange setup. It matches some of the early concept designs that leaked out with button-less touchpads with dual analog sticks.

These slides were from 2014 presentations, back when the Switch only had 1GB of RAM and would play 3DS games. That would've been a huge momentum-push for the Switch but would also cause significant issues with the system's more modern development infrastructure. Put simply, if the Switch used this lower-end hardware and played 3DS games, it wouldn't be able to carry the platform forward and allow more ports; releases like the Witcher 3 and Doom Eternal would be impossible.

While playing Cyberpunk 2077 on PS5 I noticed a peculiar glitch that forced me to auto-run and auto-accelerate while driving.

Have you ever used photo mode in Cyberpunk 2077 while driving and then suddenly couldn't stop your car? It's a bug that you can actually replicate with ease. If you're accelerating in a car, activate photo mode, and once you leave the car/bike/vehicle will stay locked with the pedal to the metal. You can't stop it from accelerating--you can still brake and eventually bring the car to a halt--but it'll keep revving and trying to blast forward. Luckily the glitch stops when you exit the car.

The glitch also works when V. is on foot. If you start sprinting, activate photo mode and exit it, V. will still be running forward without any input. It's frustrating at first, especially if the glitch leads you into a gang war you simply didn't want to get into just yet.

PC gamers don't have to worry about corrupted their Cyberpunk 2077 saves any more.

Today CD Projekt RED rolled out Hotfix 1.06 for Cyberpunk 2077 and stamped out one of the game's most annoying glitches: Save game corruption. Before the patch, Cyberpunk 2077 saves on PC would get corrupted if they exceeded 8MB in size. These saves became broken and couldn't be loaded and were essentially dead weight--no matter how much time you had spent, if your save went past 8MB it was unrecoverable.

These corrupted saves became broken and couldn't be loaded and were essentially dead weight--no matter how much time you had spent, if your save went past 8MB it was unrecoverable.

Sony plans to merge its movie/TV business with gaming in a bid to maximize exposure and increase cross-medium revenue streams.

Back in 2019, Sony announced PlayStation Productions, a new branch of Sony Pictures that will adapt TV shows and films based on PlayStation game franchises. The first of these is the Uncharted film starring Tom Holland, and there's also a Twisted Metal TV show in the works.

Now Sony Pictures CEO Tony Vinciquerra gives us a frame for the label's plans. PlayStation Productions is working on a big slate of content consisting of 10 entertainment releases: 7 TV shows and 3 feature-length films. The company hasn't exactly relayed how it will release these shows, and on what platforms, but it could be part of the PlayStation Plus subscription in some capacity.

Codemasters has just pushed out the v2.00 update for Dirt 5, which has the new 'Snow Limits' free content pack, and some tasty improvements for the 120FPS mode on Xbox Series X.

The new Dirt 5 update includes new Playgrounds items, new liveries, new Ice Breaker circuit, new customization options and the included option of Snow conditions in Playgrounds all added. The patch includes wheel support on the PC, PlayStation and Xbox consoles including major brands like Thrustmaster, Logitech, and Fanatec.

But it's the visual improvements for Dirt 5 in the v2.00 update that are of note with "Further general visual and performance improvements across the board, including visual updates to the 'Prioritise Frame Rate'/120hz mode on Xbox Series X".

We know that Gran Turismo 7 will push the next-gen PS5 console to its limits, where back in June 2020 we reported that Sony Europe exec Simon Rutter confirmed Gran Turismo 7 would be the PS5's crowning game.

Rutter said at the time: "Gran Turismo 7 is going to benefit from almost every single technological enhancement that we have in PlayStation 5. The loading times will be next to nothing compared to what they have been in the past".

Now we have even more confirmation, with Gran Turismo 7 director and series creator and Polyphony Digital CEO Kazunori Yamauchi said the team is "applying an incredible amount of attention" was what Polyphony Digital is all about.