Since Microsoft started releasing its Xbox One exclusives for PC, there’s been renewed interest in the possibility of a Halo 6. Holding one’s breath for a matter of minutes – let alone weeks, let alone years – will result in death. Writing on the Halo Waypoint website, 343 Industries spokesperson Jeff Easterling said that a new instalment isn’t coming any time soon. Discussing fan expectations following last week’s Microsoft E3 press conference, Easterling took the time to address a new Halo spe

Nippon Ichi Software, purveyors of whimsical-yet-often-complex Japanese RPGs, has just launched Cladun Returns: This is Sengoku! “Set in Japan’s Sengoku Era, you wake up in the mysterious land of Arcanus Cella where the souls of the dead gather as they await reincarnation,” so reads the synopsis. “However, some souls have unfinished business that needs to be settled before they can reincarnate. As the player, you will assist these souls by traveling to real-world locations in feudal Japan and fi

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare Remastered was notoriously released as a “bonus” for special edition purchasers of last year’s Infinite Warfare. But now, roughly seven months after its release, it looks like the remaster will get a standalone release this month. The news comes via Charlie Intel, which has received some convincing photographic evidence of a PS4 standalone release. Now, obviously a PS4 standalone release doesn’t mean it’ll definitely come to PC. Here’s the image of the physical copy,

I’ve been applying my talents to Passpartout: The Starving Artist, a painting game where you create works of art and sell them to discerning customers. It’s not exactly like Diner Dash—the customers don’t order up the painting they want. But I want to make Benjamin happy, and so at the very least I attempt to keep my tree paintings interesting. I produce a few tri-color paintings—that’s it, just three quick stripes of different colors—but they take a long time to move because most customers don’

Friday the 13th did not have a particularly auspicious start for an online game. “We do want to make note that you are being heard and updates will continually be rolling in. There’s also a double XP weekend starting on June 23. Our team is looking forward to the future to get more features, more content, more updates rolling at a quick pace and we hope you enjoy!” Leaving a match while a party leader now prompts you to disband or take the party with you.

So in the same style as my weekly posting rounding up five new Steam games you probably missed, I decided to highlight some of the hidden gems of E3. Games that may not have taken the spotlight or been given long segments at press conferences, but are worth a closer look. It’s an extremely pretty game, with 2D animation that remind me of Rayman Legends and a color palette I haven’t really seen in many other games. Last Day of JuneRelease date: 2017Last Day of June is probably going to make me cr

If you’re in the market for some free gaming (and generally who isn’t?) then you’ll probably want to head over to Origin, where Medal of Honor: Pacific Assault is currently free as the latest “On the House” offering. To claim your free copy of Medal of Honor: Pacific Assault, just go to origin.com, click the “get it now” button, and do what it says. You will need to have Origin installed, so you’ll want to take care of that too, if you haven’t already. And if all this strikes you as a little fam

If you’re planning to build a system around one of Intel’s new Kaby Lake-X or Skylake-X processors, some of which went up for preorder today, you’ll need a new motherboard based on Intel’s LGA 2066 socket. One such option is MSI’s new X299 Tomahawk Arctic. Built for “ice-cold domination,” the X299 Tomahawk Arctic is essentially a white and gray-themed X299 Tomahawk with plenty of cooling potential. The motherboard is outfitted with six fan headers and offers full fan control through the BIOS and

If you’re looking for a relatively inexpensive gaming laptop to blow off some steam when you’re away from home, Newegg has a nice deal on an MSI model (GL62M 7RD-265) that pairs a Kaby Lake processor with Nvidia’s GeForce GTX 1050 GPU. After rebate, this 15.6-inch laptop comes to $649, down a good chunk from its $899 retail price tag. Obviously at that price you’re not getting a system that’s decked out with high-end hardware. However, the combination of an Intel Core i5-7300HQ and GTX 1050 GPU

The Finnish startup called Varjo emerged from stealth today and is now demonstrating what it claims is the world’s first human eye-resolution headset. That translates into 70 megapixels, compared to around 1.2 megapixels per eye for the Oculus Rift and HTC Vive. As Varjo explains it, the company’s patented technology “replicates how the human eye naturally works” by combining a super-high resolution image with “video-see-through (VST) technology for unparalleled AR/MR capabilities.” Having now e

Two Worlds 2 is a pretty old game—it was originally released in 2011—but it’s been in the news lately for a couple of reasons. And second, the bad: The expansion added microtransactions to the game, and players are not happy. Items available for purchase via microtransaction are “completely optional,” he said, and everything players can buy, then can also find in-game. As for the developer console, it was removed along with the DRM, but TopWare re-enabled it after players asked it to. The bigger

The most important part of any gaming PC is the graphics card. But the type of gamer who goes out and buys a GTX 1080 Ti is precisely the sort of person who is likely to buy a 1440p or 4K monitor. So what can I tell you about gaming performance right now? In other words, the two chips are basically tied for gaming performance. Either way, for everything from a GTX 1050 through a GTX 1080 Ti, you’ll get a great gaming experience.

We’ve covered the most impressive games and announcements from E3 already, but there was at least one cool piece of PC hardware on the show floor. And it’s the biggest, baddest, and gnarliest sounding hardware around: Threadripper. Dell and Alienware have secured exclusive first availability rights for AMD’s Ryzen Threadripper, at least if you want a prebuilt PC. And just because I don’t need the extra cores today doesn’t mean they won’t be useful in a few years. So thanks AMD, and thanks Alienw

A user on Reddit lamented that GTX 1060 pricing is “skyrocketing,” which is an exaggeration of the situation, though not totally off base. He also pointed out that he had the opportunity to grab a GeForce GTX 1060 card the other day for $210, only to now see that prices have jumped across the board. One of the cheaper GTX 1060 cards out there is MSI’s GTX 1060 Aero ITX 6TG OC. A similar situation seems to playing out in GeForce GTX 1070 territory as well. Take the Asus GeForce GTX 1070 8GB ROG S

At the same time, it’s entirely possibly everything will go completely sideways, and you should expect that in Shadow of War. I manage to stealth kill five or so of the marked guards using a new Wraith Pull ability. In Shadow of Mordor, you could teleport to an uruk and kill them instantly, and in Shadow of War, you can teleport them to you. I ask the person running the demo, who has mostly just laughed through all my mistakes, if I can also Wraith Pull captains. The real test will be in how Sha

“The Crimson Court is a parallel campaign experienced alongside the main Darkest Dungeon content that will provide you with new challenges and variation at every difficulty level,” developer Red Hook Studios explained in a blog post. Unfortunately, the changes made to accommodate the DLC will break some Darkest Dungeon mods until their creators update them. “We were unable to get all of the information out ahead of time, but stand by to assist mod creators in understanding the changes,” Red Hook

During the chaos of E3, I sat down with three strangers to demo Sea of Thieves. Wallace and Gromit are a duo of comedic genius because they have an amazing rapport—even when things aren’t going well—but Sea of Thieves doesn’t necessarily promise that same kind of chemistry. Sea of Thieves doesn’t enforce any kind of structure on your team or how you complete the objective. Sea of Thieves will surely be much more enjoyable with a squad of trusted mates by my side. When Sea of Thieves launches in

Much has been made of Sledgehammer Games’ commitment to authenticity and a realistic depiction of war in Call of Duty: WWII. For multiplayer action, however, Sledgehammer Games is taking a few liberties. “Multiplayer is this gritty, immersive experience, but it’s also about putting you—this is about you—in World War 2,” Condrey said. We want to be respectful of local customs and laws around the world,” Condrey said. Call of Duty: WWII is scheduled to come out on November 3.

It all depends on how DIY system builders react to the company’s first round of Core-X series processors, which are now available to preorder starting at around $250. Here are the processors that are available to preorder:The Core i5-7640X and Core i7-7740X are both Kaby Lake-X CPUs, and the other three are based on Intel’s Skylake-X architecture. Beyond more cores and threads, one of the advantages that Skylake-X introduces is having more PCIe 3.0 lanes to play. Newegg lists all of the above pr

With Total War: Warhammer 2 perched on the horizon—due September 28—it’s inevitable mod creators will set about the sequel in the same way they did the first. Creative Assembly has said that while Total Warhammer and Total Warhammer 2 are standalone games, there will expectedly be some crossover in terms of lore, mechanics and narrative. “The way it will work is that the mods that were created for the first Total War: Warhammer will be only for Warhammer,” says Sinclair. “They are two different