Gaming News - Page 6

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%.

The revised 2023 PC hardware requirements for Cyberpunk 2077, image credit: CD Projekt Red.

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.