Gaming - Page 93

Intel has told us that XeSS 3, its next-gen upscaling tech - which comes with MFG, mirroring NVIDIA's DLSS 4 in that respect - will be backwards compatible with games that support XeSS 2.

As VideoCardz reports, XeSS 3 will be a drop-in affair as confirmed by Intel's Tom Petersen in an interview with PC World on YouTube (see above).

In other words, if a developer has provided support for XeSS 2 in any given game, when XeSS 3 emerges - hopefully early next year - it'll simply work straight off the bat without the dev needing to do anything.

Halo art director, Glenn Israel, joined Bungie 17 years ago and began work on one of the most iconic video game franchises in history. Israel spent nearly two decades curating the artistic direction of the series, but has now announced his departure.

In a recent LinkedIn post, Israel wrote that he is no longer officially "contributing to the Halo universe", adding that there is little he can say at the moment, but "I intend to share the particular story in its entirety when it is absolutely safe to do so next year."

The art director goes on to leave a message to the video games industry, writing that while the "state of our industry seems dire," never forget that you are free to choose. No illusion of security nor promise of wealth or fame or power is worth trading away your health, your dignity, your ethics or values - and no one can force you to."

Gamers are patiently waiting to hear more news about Grand Theft Auto 6, which could be the most anticipated game of all time, and now we have a date for when we could expect the GTA publisher Take-Two Interactive to mention the upcoming title.

Take-Two Interactive has scheduled its Q2 2026 earnings call for November 6, which is when the publisher is expected to discuss its upcoming titles, along with the performance of its already released titles. For those who don't know, Grand Theft Auto 6 is scheduled to launch on May 26, 2026.

Since the second trailer was released, we haven't heard anything significant about the title, aside from a wealth of details about the characters, environments, and locations. The release of the second trailer was five months ago, which means we could hear something regarding GTA 6 during the earnings call.

Microsoft's next-gen Xbox is still on the way according to leaks, with the full specs and even pictures of the custom Magnus APU that will power Xbox Next. Check it out:

In a new video from leaker Moore's Law is Dead, we're getting full specs and photos of the semi-custom AMD Magnus APU that will power the next-gen Xbox. We have a huge 68 CUs of RDNA 5 GPU power, which means the new Xbox has more RDNA 5 CUs than the PlayStation 6 which reportedly has 52-54 CUs of RDNA 5.

MLID says that Magnus has at least 24MB of L2 cache for the GPU, up to 3 x Zen 6 CPU cores joined by 8 x Zen 6c cores with 12MB of L3 cache. The next-gen Xbox will reportedly have a 192-bit memory bus with up to a whopping 48GB of GDDR7 memory. This is once again more than the PS6 from recent leaks (also from MLID) stating the PS6 would have a 160-bit memory bus and up to 40GB of RAM support.

Laura Fryer, who helped launch the original Xbox console in 2001, shares insight on the current Xbox fiasco and indicates that Microsoft could just be experimenting to see what works.

Xbox isn't very popular right now. After heavy layoffs, project cancellations, and studio closures, Microsoft seems to have burned the other end of the bridge by raising prices on Xbox consoles and Xbox Game Pass. As a result, there's now a modern generation that includes a $800 games console.

Original Xbox founding member Laura Fryer has a particularly interesting take on the situation. She says that it's entirely possible that team Xbox simply doesn't know what they're doing--not in a derogatory way but more of an assessment. The higher-ups at Xbox might be trying everything to see what does and doesn't actually work. After all, Fryer says, no one really knew what they were doing when the original Xbox released decades ago.

Dead Space has made a comeback, but gamers aren't happy about it.

Dead Space is a cult classic franchise beholden to many. It's been dormant for a while: EA's refusal to greenlight a new sequel led original series creator Glen Schofield to make a spiritual successor, The Callisto Protocol, which was ironically hamstrung by EA's own Dead Space remaster. So when Dead Space shows up anywhere, it can be a big deal for fans.

The franchise has popped up in an unlikely location: EA's new Skate game. Dead Space protagonist Isaac Clarke has been shoehorned into the new free-to-play Skate game as a paid skin. It's not just Skate using Clarke's likeness that has disgruntled fans, but the game's microtransaction conversion scheme means players will pay $35 minimum for the cosmetic bundle.

Project Amethyst is evolving, and it looks like Sony and AMD are creating a runway for the rumored PlayStation 5 handheld.

Today, Sony and AMD revealed three new tech breakthroughs coming to future PlayStation hardware as part of their multi-year Project Amethyst collaboration. The advancements, which are theoretically substantial, have interesting potential to carry over to other devices--not just new consoles like the PS6. Project Amethyst's new tech takes strain off CPU, GPU, and memory in a number of creative ways, which is great for comparatively weaker mobile chips that are used in handhelds.

PlayStation architect Mark Cerny specifically mentioned something that caught my ear during the presentation, affirming that these three technologies in conjunction could lead to "lower power consumption," which is also quite ideal for a handheld device. Maybe like Sony's rumored dedicated PlayStation handheld that's reportedly capable of natively playing PS5 games.

New reports indicate that Ubisoft had cancelled a new, all-original Assassin's Creed game based on the Reconstruction Era that followed the American Civil War in the 1870s.

Ubisoft had been developing a new Assassin's Creed game with a rather unique story. Sources close to the matter tell Game File reporter Stephen Totilo that the new Assassin's Creed would take place during 12-year-long Reconstruction Era after the Civil War. This period, which saw the United States abolish slavery and recognize freedoms, was fraught with violence and brutality.

Five sources reveal the plot of the game, highlighting a cinematic scope for the project. The cancelled AC game would've seen players take control of a black man who had been freed, chronicling his journey as he goes out West, exposing one of the most turbulent times in American history in the process. Eventually, players join the ancient assassin clan and even take on the Ku Klux Klan at one point of the game.

Sony has unveiled a new special edition PS5 controller that is inspired by the blue lighting associated with the PlayStation brand, which was introduced during the PS4 era of the consoles.

The new special edition controller is called the Icon Blue, and as you can probably imagine, the entire controller features different hues of the iconic lighting blue. The controller will be released on October 20 in the United States and Canada, and then it will debut in Mexico and Chile on October 28. Sony has priced the Icon Blue Special Edition at $84.99 USD, CA$109.99, MXN $1,899, and CLP $93,490. As for where you can buy the Icon Blue, the upcoming controller will be sold exclusively at Walmart stores and through Walmart's official website.

The Icon Blue features different shades of the iconic blue hue, with the grips and outer shell of the controller featuring a darker hue, and the inner shell and trackpad featuring a lighter blue. It should be noted that there isn't anything functionally different about the Icon Blue, and that it's simply a new PS5 controller intended to pay homage to the legacy of PlayStation consoles; it still has all of the same features as a standard PS5 controller.

Today, Sony and AMD outlined experimental new technologies in their multi-year Project Amethyst initiative that will be utilized in future PlayStation consoles, including Sony's next-gen PS6.

Sony and AMD have announced three new technologies for next-gen PlayStation hardware: Neural Arrays, Radiance Cores, and Universal Compression. All three features are built specifically for efficiency, optimization, and performance, with emphasis on offloading work from the CPU and GPU via dedicated blocks, smarter features, and drastically improving the rate of speed for data rendering. In short, Sony and AMD have created a trio of features that will supercharge the PS6 and maybe even Sony's rumored PlayStation handheld.

Perhaps the most immediately useful of the three is Universal Compression, which should have a net benefit to all games that are built on the new PlayStation systems, not just those that use ray tracing or machine learning features.

The release of Battlefield 6 is only a matter of hours away, and the technical director has revealed what could be considered the "magic trick" behind Battlefield 6's impressive in-game destruction.

In a recent interview with PC Gamer, Christian Buhl, the technical director on Battlefield 6, explained that what could be the "only magic trick" behind Battlefield 6's fully destructible environments is that developers weren't required to get the game to run on PS4 and the Xbox One.

Buhl said that by dropping the previous generation consoles, developers were given far more headroom when it comes to memory and CPU speed, essentially raising the performance floor of the game, enabling better performance in general, and giving the developers access to a wider variety of destructible environments.

Left 4 Dead 2 RTX NTD, created by the Nostalgia Drive Team, is a new RTX Remix project that aims to give the iconic co-op shooter the full ray-tracing or path-tracing treatment, similar to Portal RTX or the still-in-development Half-Life 2 RTX. What makes this project interesting and something that shouldn't take too long to develop is that it focuses on the 'No Mercy' campaign.

This is the iconic first mission from the original Left 4 Dead, and the sort of level or campaign that fans know back to front and back again. The first playable build of the Left 4 Dead 2 RTX NTD project is available now over at Moddb, and although it's incomplete, the new PBR (physically-based rendering) materials, 4K textures, and ray-traced lights, shadows, and reflections, present Valve's iconic shooter in a, well, new light.

Literally, as the developers note that RTX Remix cannot capture native lights, the team has had to manually go in and add lights to every scene and location. In fact, one of the issues with the current work-in-progress build is that some areas are too dark or shadowed, as this process is ongoing.

The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time for the Nintendo 64 might have come out all the way back in 1998, but it's still widely considered as one of the best games of all time. It's a legendary game, and this ambitious and impressive-looking Unreal Engine 5 remake from 'CryZENx' is something we've covered in the past.

It's a project that Zelda 64 fans should definitely be watching, especially since it's been receiving playable builds. The project aims to recreate and remake the entirety of The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time using the latest Unreal Engine 5 technology. The latest Unreal Engine 5.7 release includes the Lake Hylia and Zora Fountain areas of the game.

The playable demo locks the performance to 30 FPS (with developer CryZENx offering a 60 FPS version to their Patreon subscribers), but it allows gamers to explore these iconic Zelda 64 locations with modern, updated visuals and lighting effects.

We are only a few days out from the launch of Battlefield 6, and NVIDIA has confirmed EA's upcoming title will launch with DLSS 4, NVIDIA Reflex, and Multi Frame Generation.

For users looking to push Battlefield 6 to its maximum graphical fidelity, and achieve the highest frame rate possible, DLSS 4 will be available to utilize alongside Multi Frame Generation, with NVIDIA writing in a new blog post that at 4K Ultra settings, with DLSS 4 with Multi Frame Generation and DLSS Super Resolution enabled, GeForce RTX 50 series frame rates increased by an average 3.8x.

The GeForce RTX 5090 managed to push in-game FPS to over 470, while the RTX 5080 reached 330FPS, RTX 5070Ti hovering around 300FPS, and the RTX 5070 achieved 230FPS.

Bungie has kept the lid sealed on Marathon since the title was revealed a few months ago and met with a mixed reception, but it was only recently that the developer announced it was opening up sign-ups for a Closed Technical Test, where participants would have to sign a Non-Disclosure Agreement (NDA) to enter.

That Closed Technical Test is scheduled to take place on October 22, but ahead of that event, a well-known leaker called Colony Deaks, who is known for providing accurate Marathon details in the past, which some publications have independently verified, has shared new details on Bungie's upcoming title.

According to Deaks, Bungie will be pricing the base game of Marathon at $40, and the Deluxe Edition will be $60. Deaks also states the Deluxe Edition will contain approximately $30 worth of "season pass tokens," which we currently don't have an explanation for what those tokens will be used for, presumably to purchase cosmetics. Deaks also writes that the Season Pass for Marathon will cost about $10 and will be cosmetic-only, meaning there will be no pay-to-win elements.

The head of publishing at Larian, Michael Douse, has fired flak at Elon Musk's suggestion earlier this week that his xAI game studio will release a 'great' AI-generated game.

On X, Musk told us that: "The XAI game studio will release a great AI-generated game before the end of next year." As PC Gamer noticed, though, Douse remains distinctly unconvinced as you can see from the post about Musk's assertion on X (see above).

The Larian publishing director goes on to observe that what we need is more human-human expression, not less of this, and to avoid further 'cash grabs' - in an industry which has become a "game of headless chickens racing to the P&L sheet".

Discord confirmed an unauthorized third party gained access to one of its third-party customer service providers, exposing user data, which Discord claimed only affected a small number of users. Now, reports are surfacing that the group is claiming to have stolen 1.5 terabytes worth of age verification images of users, totaling an astounding 2,185,151 images.

The update has been provided by the X account Discord Previews, which writes that it has learned the perpetrators of the attack have secured the age verification images of Discord users, and are now using them to extort Discord.

As for the hack itself, Discord confirmed the breach took place in late September, and the unauthorized third-party managed to gain access to user information such as names, Discord usernames, emails, and other contact information, along with limited billing information, such as payment type, last four digits of credit card numbers, purchase history, IP addresses, messages with customer support agents, and limited corporate data such as training materials and internal presentations.

Blizzard's Diablo 4 debuted in 2023, and since its release, the game has received one major expansion alongside multiple seasonal updates that have improved the game, overhauled systems, and limited-time content for players to enjoy. The latest, Season 10, the 'Season of Infernal Chaos', overhauls the game's popular horde mode, alongside introducing Chaos Armor, which has introduced several new viable builds for some of the game's most challenging content.

With Diablo 4 set to get a new expansion next year, Blizzard will be overhauling key aspects of the game, namely crafting and combat, as part of Season 11. Diablo 4's lead community director, Adam Fletcher, took to X to post that the game's Season 11 update features numerous "big" changes, so it will hit the PTR (Public Test Realm) earlier than usual.

A detailed breakdown of what changes are coming will be revealed soon, with Adam teasing changes to Diablo's Masterworking and Tempering crafting systems, as well as updates to combat and the Renown system. The latter has been a part of the game since launch and relates to regional or zone progress and rewards.

The release of Battlefield 6 is only a few days away, and Battlefield Studios has released the official specifications for what you will need to max out the game at the highest graphics settings.

If you want to play Battlefield 6 at the highest possible graphics settings, you will need quite a beastly PC, as the upcoming title will need an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5080, paired with an AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D CPU, along with 32GB of RAM at 4800MHz. With that hardware, you will get 4K at 144Hz at High Settings with DLSS On, or 4K at 240Hz at Ultra Settings with DLSS On + Multi Frame Generation.

The official specs page doesn't list what level of Frame Generation will need to be enabled to hit 240FPS, but considering our previous benchmarks of the title, I would assume it would be at least 2x Frame Generation.

It seems Activision has never been more concerned that Battlefield will steal away a portion of its player base, as the publisher has now announced Black Ops 6 will be completely free to try between the following dates: October 9 to October 16.

In the seven years I have been a gaming industry journalist, and the many years prior to that of being an avid gamer following industry movements, I have never seen Activision more concerned about potentially losing some of the Call of Duty community to EA's Battlefield franchise.

The publisher's recent movements, in my opinion, signal nothing but concern for the upcoming launch of Battlefield 6, as Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 is now offering a free trial period just two days before Battlefield 6's launch.