PC News, Tips, Tricks & Ideas

Crystal Dynamics announced back in 2022 that it had started development on the next Tomb Raider game, and though official information on the title has been scarce since then, some new potential details may have arrived courtesy of a leak by Twitter user V Scooper.

Starfield is set to add some long-awaited features with its upcoming update, including graphics modes on console, expanded ship building options, surface maps, and much more, while later on in the year, Bethesda Game Studios will also finally be adding a land vehicle to the game. Beyond that, however, the developer is also working on a full-fledged expansion for the space-faring RPG in the form of Shattered Steel, and though not much is known about it yet, some interesting new details may have potentially been unearthed.

Mortal Kombat 1 is set to welcome its fifth DLC character soon in the form of iconic supervillain Homelander of Amazon Prime’s The Boys fame, and though WB Games and developer NetherRealm Studios still haven’t announced a specific release date for his arrival, they’ve shared another glimpse of what the deranged supe is going to look like in the fighter.

Sony’s recent decision to make PlayStation Network logins mandatory for Steam players to be able to continue playing Helldivers 2 hasn’t gone down well with the community, to say the very least. The game has been met with widespread backlash, and among several concerns, one that’s been raised by many is the fact that with PSN not being available in a number of countries, Helldivers 2 is going to become unplayable for players in those regions.

Helldivers 2 has had a hell of a few days. Sony announced last week that going forward, PC players would need to link their Steam accounts with PlayStation Network in order to be able to play Arrowhead Game Studios’ mega hit, and the decision was met with instant, widespread backlash. Over the last three days, the co-op shooter has accumulated over 230,000 user reviews on Steam, with its Recent Reviews average plummeting to Overwhelmingly Negative. That has also been accompanied by many users getting refunds issued for their purchase of the game.

Helldivers 2 has abruptly found itself in the middle of raging controversy, with Sony’s decision to make PlayStation Network logins mandatory for Steam players to be able to play the co-op shooter having been met with widespread backlash. With another first-party Sony game set to launch on PC imminently in the form of Ghost of Tsushima, maybe have wondered whether it will have similar requirements will be applicable as well, though developer Sucker Punch has offered some clarifications.

Things have taken a sour turn drastically and abruptly for Helldivers 2. Sony recently made PlayStation Network logins mandatory for Steam players, sparking significant backlash from the community, especially from those who live in the many, many countries where PlayStation Network simply isn’t available. Sony recently pulled the game off sale in all of those countries, but Helldivers 2 director and developer Arrowhead Game Studios’ CEO Johan Pilestedt says a more long-term solution is being worked on.

I need to take all the opportunities to write about Fall Guys that I can get, given how much time I spend playing it with my son. This is a pretty good opportunity, too: a set of Star Wars skins are coming to the bean battle royale, as announced yesterday on May 4th, and they coincide with some major changes to Fall Guys' platforming physics.

Earlier this week, Helldivers 2 players on PC were told that they'd soon need to link their Steam account to a PlayStation Network (PSN) account. Two days later and the game has received 100,000 new negative reviews on Steam.

The UK government has responded to a petition asking for "government intervention" to force the industry to keep video games "in a reasonably working state when support ends", rather than allowing them to become unplayable such as when online servers are shut down. The petition was prompted by the closure in March of ten-year-old Ubisoft racing game The Crew.

The prospect of a survival Terminator game set in a post-apocalyptic open world is one that instantly grabs attention, so it’s no surprise that Terminator: Survivors has turned a few heads since its announcement earlier this year. Developer Nacon Studio Milan has now also revealed new details on the game through an official FAQ page on Steam.

Other than its brief cinematic announcement trailer earlier this year, we’ve seen very little of Terminator: Survivor, but though it remains to be seen how long we’ll have to wait before Nacon showcases gameplay for the open world survival title, the developer has offered new details on the game via an FAQ published on Steam.

Helldivers 2 has enjoyed nothing but roaring success since its launch in February, though the last 24 hours have seen it on the receiving end of strong backlash. Sony recently announced that Helldivers 2 players on PC would have to link their Steam and PlayStation Network accounts to be able to play the game going forward, provoking strong criticism from the community. The game’s “Recent” user reviews rating on Steam – which takes into accounts user ratings for a game over the last 30 days – has fallen to “Mixed”, having received over 24,000 negative ratings on the platform just today.

"Nosophobia" is the fear of disease, "bathophobia" is the fear of depths, and "devlogphobia" is a mixture of nosophobia and bathophobia produced by reading Steam posts about Norland, a systems-rich and plague-ridden medieval colony sim from developers Long Jaunt and Hooded Horse, publisher of Manor Lords. Norland is sort of The Sims meets Dwarf Fortress meets RimWorld. It gives you charge of several new kingdoms that have sprouted from the corpse of a fallen Empire and are now feuding for supremacy.

The already controversial decision to add the anti-cheat tool used in shooter Valorant to League of Legends has seemingly caused developers Riot Games even more of a headache. The studio have issued a lengthy assurance that - at least as far as they know - the new anti-cheat software isn’t causing players’ hardware to end up bricked, despite various reports of major issues after its introduction.

Almost a decade after it set crowdfunding records on Kickstarter, and five years after its release, Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night’s developers have announced the final free update for the Castlevania: Symphony of the Night successor.

Thunderful’s deep dive trailer for SteamWorld Heist 2 is live, showcasing how the turn-based tactical RPG has evolved over its predecessor. The side-scrolling perspective, cover-based shooting and precise aiming remain as you ricochet shots creatively to overcome enemies. Check it out below.

2024 is looking like a packed year for Microsoft, and though the majority of the company’s first-party releases are likely planned for the back half of the year, one of the more prominent ones is not that far away. Senua’s Saga: Hellblade 2 is set to launch in under three weeks’ time, and ahead of its release, starting next week, Microsoft will be kicking its marketing campaign into gear.

First-person survival adventure game Serum will launch in Early Access for PC via Steam on May 23, publisher TopLitz Productions and developer Game Island announced.

After showcasing it in Ultrawide on PC, Ninja Theory has announced the system requirements for Senua’s Saga: Hellblade 2. All systems will require Windows 10/11 64-bit, a solid-state drive and 70 GB of installation space.

Nacon Studio Milan has offered new details on its upcoming open-world survival action game Terminator: Survivors, launching later this year for PC. A new FAQ explained the choice of setting based on the franchise’s Judgment Day occurring in 2005 since Sarah Connor averted it in 1997.

Wabisabi Games’ RKGK / Rakugaki will launch on May 22nd for PC courtesy of Gearbox Publishing. Retailing for $19.99, it’s a stylish 3D platformer where players control Vallah, who ventures through Cap City to bring back its color. Check out the first gameplay below.

Roguelite action game Realm of Ink will launch in Early Access for PC via Steam on May 17, publisher 663 Games and developers Leap Studio and Maple Leaf Studio announced. A full release will follow for unspecified consoles and PC later in 2024.

Free trials of Star Wars games have launched for Xbox and Nintendo Switch players.

From Software boss Hidetaka Miyazaki has ruled out making a second Elden Ring expansion, but left the door open for a potential sequel.

Elden Ring’s Shadow of the Erdtree launches next month and, for better or worse, is the only expansion the acclaimed open-world title will receive. However, that doesn’t mean it won’t get a full-fledged sequel.

Carceri is a fizzy and kaleidoscopic, first-person "chaotic Art-toy" in which you explore/hallucinate an island resort that's also a concentration camp ("carceri" is Italian for prison) for sentient computer programs. Out sometime in May, it's the work of James Beech - who describes himself as "an on-again, off-again AAA veteran" with credits on Metroid Prime 4, Remnant: From the Ashes, and Crysis 3. The environments take hefty influence from Carceri d'invenzione, a series of prints created in the 18th century by Giovanni Battista Piranesi, whose name has become a byword for impossible spaces.

Stunlock Studios’ V Rising exits Steam Early Access on May 8th for PC, with a PS5 version coming later this year. Available in early access since 2022, the survival action RPG has received a new gameplay trailer, showcasing what players can expect at launch. Check it out below.

Crossover fighting game Marvel vs. Capcom: Infinite first sauntered onto various videogaming mechanisms back in 2017. We forgot to review it. Oops. But others did, sometimes complaining about the art style, which was a chunky and plastic-looking departure from previous games in the series. It's now almost seven years later but at least one person has not forgotten this missed opportunity. A fighting game modder has been tinkering with shaders to bring the comic book style of previous games to Infinite. Looks cool.

If there's one thing that'll rile people up more than a robot blasting them with a laser cannon, it's having to create a new account. That's something Helldivers 2 players will have to do pretty sharpish, as Arrowhead announce mandatory account linking between Steam and Playstation Network. Why? Safety and security apparently.

With Resident Evil Village now three years old, demand for a new mainline entry in Capcom’s celebrated survival horror series is continuing to grow by the day, and it seems Capcom is going to oblige surprisingly soon. That’s as per prominent leaker Dusk Golem, who recently took to Twitter and stated that recent rumblings that he had shared about Resident Evil 9 potentially being delayed out of 2025 are, as it turns out, inaccurate.

Helldivers 2 has brought more success for Sony and developer Arrowhead Game Studios than they could ever have imagined, and a large portion of that success has come through the co-op shooter’s sizeable audience on PC. Soon, however, Sony will be implementing a new requirement on that audience in order to be able to play the game.

Happy May 3rd, Battlestar Galactica fans! Remember what John Dune said about living long and prospering? He said: Oh, look, objectively excellent dogfighter Star Wars: Squadrons is under two quid on Steam. As Edwin pointed out to me, that’s about the price of a third of latte, although he does pay London prices. Also, Edwin, are you going around trying to buy the dregs of people’s lattes? I cannot judge. Were it in short supply, I too would debase myself for caffeine in an instant.

Good news, people whose day-to-day lives are woefully short on blingy Clancified squad-murdering. Ubisoft's elusive free-to-play shooter XDefiant finally has a release date, 21st May 2024. Or at least, that's when the preseason launches, providing six weeks of access to the modes, maps and factions from last month's server test.

With CI Games and Hexworks releasing the final update for Lords of the Fallen, the Souls-like action RPG is allegedly bound for Game Pass in the last week of May.

After selling over one million copies and being claimed by 6.6 million players at launch, Landfall’s Content Warning has received its first big update. It adds a new map, 13 new monsters and a new item for players, the Rescue Hook.

Senua’s Saga: Hellblade 2 is coming up in less than three weeks’ time, and with its release drawing closer, developer Ninja Theory recently confirmed that it would be sharing something new from the game every day until its launch.

EA’s long-awaited Skate reboot has been in the works for a while, and though it’s still unknown how long it’ll be before the game is ready for launch, developer Full Circle has done an impressive job of continuing to share new details on the game, as well as how development is progressing. The studio has now released another episode in its dev diary series “The Board Room”, this time focusing on Skate’s customization options.

Texas Chainsaw Massacre Pinball is the next DLC coming to Pinball M.

The latest episode of Skate’s The Board Room has premiered, showing the reboot’s character customisation options.

Helldivers 2’s latest premium Warbond has been revealed

Nearly two years on from its launch, Nexon and Neople’s acclaimed fighter DNF Duel doesn’t have the most active player base, but it’s continuing to receive new additional content. Not, it’s next DLC character has been unveiled.

If I was writing What's Better, it would be a short series. The first entry would declare that the best thing in video games, obviously, was watching NPCs fight among themselves.

Star Wars: The Old Republic's ongoing development switched last year from creators BioWare to Broadsword, with promise that the 13-year-old MMO would continue to receive new story content and improvements.

On the one hand, you've got to deal with interdimensional horrors of various flavours, such as multiple-storey cryptids and squishy skinless wolves; on the other, invading squads of Combiney soldiers. Fortunately, you've got a big fat Ivy League brain stuffed with knowledge of killer gadgets, base construction, subterranean farming and battlefield medicine. My increasing phobia for survival games notwithstanding, I think this looks and sounds like a hoot - and it's out now in early access. Here's the launch trailer.

You might assume that Indika will be dour, given that it's a story-driven game about a nun in a grey, cold, alternative Russia. Then you watch its trailers and find surrealist imagery, genre-hopping, and a bleak sense of humour are part of its arsenal, and suddenly it seems, to me, irresistible.

Helldivers 2 oddly requires that I spend its in-game currency on items I don't want (capes, helmets, any emote other than the hug) just so I can gain access to the items I do (sniper rifles, SMGs, other weapons that ultimately turn out to be worse than what I already had).

Free-to-play multiplayer first-person shooter XDefiant will launch for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series, and PC via Ubisoft Connect on May 21, publisher Ubisoft and developer Ubisoft San Francisco announced.

ArtPlay’s final update for Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night, Version 1.5, goes live on May 9th for PS4, Xbox One and PC. Nintendo Switch players can expect it on May 16th.

After multiple delays and recent reports of development issues, Ubisoft said that the release date for XDefiant would finally be unveiled soon, and soon is finally here. The company has announced that the free-to-play multiplayer shooter will be launching later this month, on May 21.

Fun Dog Studios has released the gameplay reveal trailer for February-announced cooperative tactical survival horror third-person shooter The Forever Winter.

Single-player 3D platformer RKGK / Rakugaki will launch for PC via Steam on May 22 for $19.99, Gearbox Publishing and developer Wabisabi Games announced.

Arrowhead Game Studios has announced the next Premium Warbond for Helldivers 2 – Polar Patriots. Going live on May 9th, it offers armor sets for cold climates alongside new weapons, emotes, capes and more. Check out the trailer below.

The Summer of Gaming hasn’t even kicked off yet, but THQ Nordic already has a showcase lined up for August. The THQ Nordic Digital Showcase 2024 goes live on August 2nd at 12 PM PT/3 PM ET/8 PM BST, with a pre-show by HandyGames (of Endling – Extinction is Forever fame).

As reported by Chinese outlet Campfire Camp, spotted by GamesRadar, and machine translated by Ian Games of the Ian Games Network, and then delivered fresh to your eyeballs by me, Nic Reuben of Reuben Paper Shotgun dot com, Elden Ring expansion Shadow Of The Erdtree will be the only DLC released for the world stomping rpg game. That’s according to FromSoftware's sadistic DM and notable swamp troll Hidetaka Miyazaka, although it doesn’t sound like he’s trolling this time.

For someone who’s spent an embarrassing amount of my life staring at virtual maps, I am a downright directionless dunce when it comes to geography. Not ‘the country of Africa’ bad, but certainly not good enough that you’d want me on your pub quiz team. Also, I still do the Shredded Wheat rhyme internally when I have to follow directions. However, I do enjoy making maps turn a different colour in strategy games, Total War chiefly among them. Well, one such map is expanding before my confused idiot eyes, that being Total War: Pharaoh’s. It’s getting a new, distinctly Mesopotamia and Aegea-shaped bit. I believe that’s just south of Eastopotamia and Wegea.

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.

Sony is removing Horizon Zero Dawn Complete Edition from the PlayStation Plus Game Catalogue this month.

Ninja Theory has said it plans to share something from Senua’s Saga: Hellblade 2 daily in the run-up to the game’s release this month.

The next Call of Duty game could be revealed this month through an in-game event in Warzone.

American convenience store chain 7-Eleven is partnering with Tetris on a line of merchandise, including a handheld.

Cozy Caravan, a single-player top-down adventure game set in a cozy world, will launch in Early Access for PC via Steam on May 16, developer 5 Lives Studios announced.

Despite performance issues, bugs and other problems with its early access launch, Madfinger Games’ Gray Zone Warfare is off to a solid start. It’s sold 400,000 copies within two days, with player counts peaking at 66,944 per SteamDB.

Looking at the baffling lack of marketing from Microsoft, you wouldn’t think Senua’s Saga: Hellblade 2 is a major first-party game that fans have been waiting for for several long years, but even though Microsoft and Ninja Theory are being unusually quiet about the game, it seems like they do intend to change that to some degree as the game’s launch draws closer.

I haven't ever raided in an MMORPG like World Of Warcraft for several reasons, one of which is the time commitment. I've never put in the many, many hours needed to earn the requisite gear nor partied up with the many, many people necessary to slay a big dragon. If only raiding was possible without these things… well, my saviour seems to have arrived in a form I wasn't expecting: 2D anime bunny girls. Rabbit And Steel is a co-op action roguelike that's raiding without the pre-grind and it looks rather wonderful.

Remember that bit in that Guy Ritchie film where Dexter Fletcher shoot a guy and then throws a glowing jar over his soldier that summons a bunch of skeletons to help him out? Me too! Must have been the direct influence for Sea Of Thieves' new Season 12, which launched earlier this week with a bang - from two smoking barrels! Among the additions in this season of the ever popular salty sea-dog open-world adventure are double barrel pistols. They deal less damage per shot but have higher rate of fire, and you can charge them up to fire both barrels at once.

Dragon’s Dogma 2 emerged as the clear winner of video game sales for the United States in March, but Helldivers 2 wasn’t far behind. Arrowhead’s co-op shooter is not only the best-selling premium title of the year to date but also the seventh-best Sony-published title in the US in terms of dollar sales per Circana.

Unity has appointed former Electronic Arts and Zynga executive Matthew Bromberg as its new CEO.

Bethesda announces that its sci-fi action RPG is getting a massive new update on May 15. The update adds new features to ship customization, improved surface maps, new gameplay and graphics options, and more.

Private Division-owned studio Roll7 is being shut down, as per a report published by Bloomberg. The studio, best known for the OlliOlli series and Rollerdrome, will be shuttered soon as part of Private Division parent company Take-Two Interactive’s recently announced mass layoffs, which will see the company cutting around 5 percent of its workforce, which is about 600 jobs. Roll7 was acquired by Private Division in 2021.

Star Wars Hunters will finally be released for Nintendo Switch, iOS and Android devices on June 4, 2024.

Starfield’s biggest update since the Bethesda space game came out last year (remember that?) is arriving in a couple of weeks - with its Steam beta already live now, if you’re interested in poking around. The chunky patch finally tidies up the game’s oft-complained about surface maps to make them easier to navigate, as well as introducing new difficulty options, a decoration mode for the inside of ships and a bunch of other tweaks and fixes.

The next big update for Bethesda Game Studios’ Starfield is arguably its most exciting, with new gameplay options, proper Surface Maps and more display modes on Xbox Series X. But what about the future? The development team confirmed other features in development, including the game’s first land vehicle.

Your feelings on Funko Pop probably fall into one of two categories: you either hate the black-eyed, copy-paste figures modelled on pop-culture characters with a burning passion, or you own enough of them to construct a small fortress and defend your newfounded Funko nation from the government. Either way, it looks like the first video game starring the ubiquitous toy collectables might somehow scratch your itch.

While they ponder which developers should face the difficult task of following up one of the most acclaimed games in a long time by making a sequel by Baldur's Gate 3, the makers of Dungeons & Dragons are also putting their own money into making video games themselves. Over a billion dollars of their own money, in fact.

Bethesda Game Studios’ fourth major update for Starfield launches on May 15th with many quality-of-life features and improvements. As director Todd Howard promised, there are “other display modes” for console players, which means you can finally play the game at 60 FPS on Xbox Series X.

Last month, GTA 6 publishers Take-Two Interactive announced plans to "rationalize" their "pipeline" by laying off five per cent of their workforce - around 580 people - and cancelling various games. As part of that, they're reportedly now doing away with 70 positions at their Seattle offices - Seattle being the home of the Take-Two-owned Intercept Games, the current developers of space sim Kerbal Space Program 2.

Helldivers 2 ranks 7th in lifetime US dollar sales for Sony published games after just two months of availability.

Starfield’s largest update yet is launching on May 15th. It adds several much-requested features, like proper Surface Maps for planets, indicating points of interest and markers for vendors in the major cities. You can fast travel to the latter from the map or your Scanner, which should make it much easier to quickly sell excess items.

While Dragon’s Dogma 2 topped US software charts for March 2024 per Circana’s Matt Piscatella, Helldivers 2 wasn’t far behind. It ranked in second place and is still the best-selling premium title of the year to date. Furthermore, it’s the seventh best-selling title (in terms of lifetime dollar sales) published by Sony, despite only being on sale for two months.