There was a flash of unhappiness earlier this week when Gamespot noticed a job listing for an “online experience design director” at Halo studio 343 Industries. According to the description, the successful applicant will “oversee and provide vision for multiple facets of design and its implementation” in the upcoming Halo Infinite, the listing states, including player progression, social and engagement features, and—uh oh—microtransactions. We don’t know much about Halo Infinite at this point, e

The big news on the Fortnite front is, once again, the cube—the mysterious purple block that’s been slowly working its way across the landscape. Actually, what happened is that it seemed to melt, turning the waters of the lake a soothing pale purple before disappearing entirely. Strange symbols are visible just beneath the surface of the water, but what they mean is anybody’s guess at this point. All I can say for sure is that something is happening, and we’ll keep you updated. You can watch the

Image source: FranceValve and Ubisoft have been fined by French authorities over the refund policies of Steam and Uplay, specifically their failure to specify that consumers in the country have 14 days to demand a refund from digital services. Ubisoft has no refund policy in place for Uplay—all purchases are final—while Valve offers a 14-day refund policy but only on games that have been played for less than two hours. “The DGCCRF recently decided to penalize several video games publishers inclu

And it’s this promise that SteelSeries embraces with its newest batch of Arctis headsets. Like that Roccat headset, the Arctis Pro + GameDAC features a frequency response range of 10Hz all the way up to 40kHz, way beyond the usual 20-20 we see from non-hi-res cans. As with previous Arctis models, there’s a volume scroll wheel at the back of the left earcup, and an easy-to-find mic mute button above it. However, on the wired version I’ve tested, there’s no game/chat balance scroll wheel on the ri

There are basically two reasons to buy the GeForce RTX 2080 Ti Founders Edition. I’ve reviewed the GeForce RTX 2080 Founders Edition separately, and even that card is tough to recommend at $799. GeForce RTX 2080 Founders Edition performanceI’ve retested every card you see in the following charts during the past few weeks. Image 1 of 26 Image 2 of 26 Image 3 of 26 Image 4 of 26 Image 5 of 26 Image 6 of 26 Image 7 of 26 Image 8 of 26 Image 9 of 26 Image 10 of 26 Image 11 of 26 Image 12 of 26 Image

Shadow of the Tomb Raider marks the end of Lara Croft’s ‘origin trilogy’, which began with Crystal Dynamics’ dramatic reboot back in 2013. Across these three games Lara is constantly covered in blood, yelping in pain, and being brutalised by wild animals and mercenaries. The worldBut swinging back to a positive, I do love the semi-open structure of the origin trilogy. I don’t know what direction future Tomb Raider games will take, but I would like to see this open structure return. This being th

Bandai Namco has announced that suave swordsman, Raphael will return for Soulcalibur 6. As you can see in the announcement trailer above, Raphael is serious about taking his opponents down—in the most grandiose way possible. First appearing in Soulcalibur 2, Raphael was born to the aristocratic Sorel family where he was taught the ways and customs of high society, his skill as a swordsman helped him defend his family against his many political enemies. Raphael will join a cast that—so far—includ

The Surge, the sci-fi action-RPG developed by Deck13 and released last year, is getting a new expansion entitled ‘The Good, the Bad, and the Augmented’—and we have new screenshots to prove it. According to Deck13, they’ll “feel like [they’re] torn straight out of a twisted Wild West TV show.” You’ll be able to change up the training rooms by combining four out of 16 different modifiers available. The enemies you’ll face will be equipped with new armour, weapons, and implants, all of which you ca

I mean, it’s no secret that its final boss battle was a bit of a stinker. To mark this year’s Day of Atonement—the holiest day of the year in Judaism—the series director expressed sorrow “for the naked Atlas boss battle” at the end of the first game. So I’m here to apologize for the naked Atlas boss battle at the end of BioShock. In conversation with Glixel, Levine said: “You have this great game, and then you end up fighting this giant nude dude. As for the apology, I’m taking Levine on his wor

Xenia, the free and open-source Xbox 360 emulator, has dropped Vulkan API support in favour of DirectX 12. In doing so, the dev team has shared a catalogue of in-progress Halo 3 PC screens. As detailed in this Reddit post, the Xenia team notes that the emulator first supported OpenGL, then Vulkan and has now moved onto DirectX 12. “Thanks to TriΔng3l’s amazing work, Xenia is now dx12 only, which also means Windows 10 only,” reads the post. ​Most notably, Halo 3 and Halo 3: ODST are making amazin

Frostpunk’s newest expansion, ‘The Fall of Winterhome’ is out now. The new story trailer delivers a rather sombre message, left by a nameless former inhabitant of Winterhome. Named ‘The Fall of Winterhome’, it shows what happened to the city before the timeline of the main campaign. Developer 11 bit studios promises “hours of brand-new content” and a “unique map with fresh visuals.” Alongside the above, comes the follow developer diary:With that, a host of balancing and bug fixes have also been

The GeForce RTX 2080 Founders Edition runs quieter than the 1080 Founders Edition, though the backplate does get quite hot to the touch. The GeForce RTX 2080 Founders Edition also comes with a 90MHz factory overclock, with further manual overclocking an option. GeForce RTX 2080 Founders Edition performanceFor the launch of the GeForce RTX 2080 and 2080 Ti, I’ve gone back and retested every card you see in the charts. Image 1 of 13 Image 2 of 13 Image 3 of 13 Image 4 of 13 Image 5 of 13 Image 6 o

If you’re looking for something to do this weekend, you could do worse than jump into Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon Wildlands, which is free to try from September 20—23. The free weekend will include the singleplayer campaign, four-player co-op mode, Ghost War, plus “a ton of Year 2 content.”And if taking down the Cartel turns out to be your thing—or if you enjoy its Ghost War PvP mode—your progress during the free weekend will carry over, should you decide to pick up the game thereafter. If that’s y

Have you ever dreamed of leaving your humdrum life on Earth, to set out on an adventure that takes you light years away to another planet, so you can try your hand at slime wrangling? But Beatrix LeBeau did and, as the video above shows, it looks like a lot of (silly) fun. Developers, Monomi Park have teamed up with VR studio, 3lb Games to bring Slime Rancher’s first VR update, free on Steam, later this year. The update will see give players the chance to roam in “unique VR playgrounds,” taken f

World of Warcraft game director Ion Hazzikostas has revealed the future of the Battle for Azeroth, which players will experience in a new update called Tides of Vengeance. Just as importantly, however, is that Tides of Vengeance will also address some of the bigger complaints that had the community riled up recently. The update will feature “a lot of core, quest-driven, story driven content,” Hazzikostas said, as both the Horde and the Alliance escalate the conflict. Incursions can also be used

Under this new system, teamkilling gives the offender a 30-minute ban that locks them out of all matchmaking, including Casual, Ranked, and Terrorist Hunt. ClashFixed – Clash’s Shield can be deployed while crouched. Fixed – Clash’s CCE shield can clip in the arm and clip in the pistol. Fixed – In the loadout menu charms are not equipped in the same place as during a session for Clash’s CCE Shield. Fixed – When a player is killed by the CCE shield, the generic death icon is displayed instead of t

Tyler Blevins, the Fortnite streamer and pro better known around these parts as Ninja, has become the first professional gamer to appear on the cover of ESPN Magazine. “When we decide whether I’m going to an event, the pay has to be there,” he said. “You can play every single day, you’re not practicing. “When you’re practicing, you’re taking every single match seriously, so you don’t have an excuse when you die. It’s an interesting and revealing profile, and of course the fact that Ninja is a co

If you haven’t played Binary Domain, now’s the time to do so: you can get it for a mere buck in the latest Humble Bundle sale, which supports the charity SpecialEffect. That dollar also gets you Streets of Rage, Crazy Taxi and Olli Olli 2. Frankly, even if you’re not a fan of third-person shooters (I’m not), I reckon Binary Domain is worth a look. If you donate more than the average (which at the time of writing, is $6.52), you’ll also get Surgeon Simulator, Grid 2, Operation Flashpoint: Red Riv

WHY I LOVE In Why I Love, PC Gamer writers pick an aspect of PC gaming that they love and write about why it’s brilliant. This week Tony analyses the way Life is Strange creates a powerful sense of loss. What impresses me is that Life is Strange attempts to make people feel this way at all. Life is Strange is that little bit more grown up in its approach. It’s an episodic detective adventure, and a high-school teen drama, but this is also very much a game about regret.

The new gameplay is designed to present truly cinematic carrier battles, and to bring the carrier game into line with the ‘all-action’ ethos of the rest of the game. “The top down, slower game, multiple squadrons… that’s not the thing we’re doing, so selling players the new mechanics is going to be tough.” “Because if you’re a good player now,” he adds, “it’s going to change a lot – you’re going to have limited salvos, less planes in the air, and you’re not going to be seeing the big picture l