After 24 years, an infamous cute-em-up finally makes its English debut, but it has the devs struggling to define the difference between a remake and remaster

There was a 16-year gap between the 1990 release of Final Fantasy III on Famicom and its 2006 remake on Nintendo DS, and a 31-year gap before the Pixel Remaster brought something more akin to the original game to a new platform. That might be because the original game's legendary programmer was so good nobody could replicate his code.

A new update has resolved long-standing issues with some of its most broken weapons. Version 1.000.302 is a huge update, making sweeping changes to balance and patching out a wide variety of gameplay issues. This comes less than a week since the previous patch, which did more harm than good by introducing more bugs to an already-struggling game.

Medieval city builder Manor Lords was Steam's most-wishlisted game prior to release, and has now managed the feat of transmuting that anticipation into broad enthusiasm and very healthy sales. Not too shabby, considering that it's mostly the work of just one person, Grzegorz Styczeń of Slavic Magic, who has hopefully found time to sleep now and then between fielding bug reports and preparing the game's first patches.

Bethesda has only just properly unveiled Starfield's May update, and the studio is already teasing what's next - including a proper land vehicle.

Elden Ring's Shadow of the Erdtree DLC apparently has no definitive ending, and won't impact the plot of the main game.

Microsoft has announced the timing of the next Xbox Games Showcase, to be livestreamed on June 9 at 1 pm ET. Just like last year, the event will unfold on the Sunday of Summer Game Fest, which kicks off on June 7 via livestreams and in-person events in Los Angeles. Also similar to last year, where Xbox’s showcase was followed by the Starfield Direct livestream, this year’s showcase will be followed by a deep dive on an upcoming game — and according to The Verge’s reporting, that’s Call of Duty.

Hearken to this, my fellow retro gaming sickos: Nintendo is finally catering to our very unusual tastes with the latest updates to the Nintendo Switch Online retro game library. This time, we've gotten a pair of N64 games that I'd wager you've either never heard of or entirely forgotten up until this moment.

We all knew this was coming. Destiny 2: The Final Shape will make sweeping changes to the MMO's overly complicated Power system, streamlining the grind and making it easier to play with friends. The kicker is that all "legacy" items – you know, the ones that were sunset years ago – are coming back. Except they're also not, because most players already deleted them after they were sunset, and developer Bungie admits "we have no recovery mechanism." 

As an Assassin's Creed girlie, I enjoyed Assassin's Creed Mirage, a pared down (but still big game, which is really just proof of how bloated AAA games have gotten, but I'll stop because it's not time to take my personal bugbear for a walk) Ass Creed game that was closer to the simplicity of the older games in the stab 'em up stealth-action series. Yesterday creative director Stéphane Boudon and art director Jeal-Luc Sala took to Reddit for an AMA, and in response to a question about plans for Mirage DLC, Boudon said no - but that they have ideas for more stories for Basim.

The success of the Nintendo Switch has clearly inspired the rest of the major players in the video game world to give handheld gaming another try, or in some cases a first try. The Steam Deck has been a hit, and there are rumors that Xbox might be dipping its toe into the handheld gaming world in the future. PlayStation went a different route despite having previous when it comes to handheld consoles by releasing the Portal, and it has been more popular than anyone could have imagined.

Nestled within a seemingly ho-hum patch for Horizon Forbidden West’s PC edition is a change I’ve been crossing fingers and ritualistically sacrificing metal dinosaurs for since release. At last I can behold those glorious words: "Resolved performance regression when enabling Nvidia Reflex On+Boost." Finally!

This is not a drill: Team Fortress 2 has received a brand new update in 2024, and fans are ecstatic, despite the patch notes themselves being very brief.