Carzy Zarx’s PC Gaming Emporium - Catch Up on All the Latest PC Gaming Related News

[JEMC]

Monday news, part two (this time with actual gaming news):

Surprise! Valve is releasing a new game set in the Portal universe
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/aperture-desk-job-new-valve-game/
What the heck? Valve is releasing a new game. No, it's not Portal 3, but it is set in the same universe.
Aperture Desk Job is a free "short" game designed for the Steam Deck that teaches you how to use the new device. Releasing March 1, it looks like even if you don't have a Steam Deck you'll still be able to try the game out on your desktop if you have a controller. (Mouse and keyboard is not supported.)

Destiny 2 PSA: Stop what you're doing and buy this gun from Xur right now
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/destiny-2-psa-stop-what-youre-doing-and-buy-this-gun-from-xur-right-now/
n the run up to this Tuesday’s release of The Witch Queen, many Destiny 2 players I know were still running the Presage exotic quest mission in the hope of snagging a Dead Man’s Tale with the perk Vorpal Weapon. Previously, you only had one chance per account, per week, at a roll on the gun, and with seven possible perks in the relevant column it was, to be frank, a crapshoot. The Presage mission was vaulted with the launch of The Witch Queen, but to offset that frustration Bungie announced that Xur, the weekend vendor, would be selling one randomly rolled Dead Man’s Tale per week. And wouldn’t you know, he’s come up with the goods immediately.
(...)
You have until reset at 12PM EST on Tuesday 1 March to buy this DMT.

Fortnite item shop: X-Men's Gambit and Rogue join the battle royale
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/gambit-fortnite-rogue-x-men/
X-Men's most star-crossed lovers, the card-slinging Gambit and the white-haired Rogue, have joined the Fortnite universe as the latest item shop skins. The pair are also joined by a bevy of new X-Men-themed cosmetics. It's a little late for Valentine's Day, but we don't mind when love (and explosive cards) are in the air.

DICE disables Battlefield 2042's Russian attack helicopter weekly mission reward
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/dice-disables-battlefield-2042s-russian-attack-helicopter-weekly-mission-reward/
Following Russia's invasion of Ukraine earlier this week, DICE has disabled the Weekly Mission in Battlefield 2042 and its reward, a skin for the fictionalized Russian Mi-240 Super Hind attack helicopter, is no longer available to unlock.

Factorio is experimenting with controller support and Steam Deck optimizations
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/factorio-is-experimenting-with-controller-support-and-steam-deck-optimizations/
When Valve first showed off the Steam Deck, elaborate and top 100 games worthy Factorio was right there. That makes sense: The Steam Deck runs Linux, Factorio has a native Linux build. There's no messing around then, it works great and a low graphical requirements mean it should have pretty good battery time.
But anyone who has played Factorio can tell you it's a hotkey-heavy, mouse-heavy game with a lot of clicking and finesse mouse usage. That means you'd have to do a lot of remapping and profile construction to make it work super smooth on a Steam Deck. Developers Wube Software are aware of the problem, and in a recent dev blog outlined some work they've been doing to get Factorio going with controllers.

Nobuo Uematsu explains the vocals added to Final Fantasy 6 Pixel Remaster's opera scene
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/nobuo-uematsu-explains-the-vocals-added-to-final-fantasy-6-pixel-remasters-opera-scene/
The final Final Fantasy to receive the pixel remaster treatment, Final Fantasy 6 was released on February 23. Many things remain as they were in the original game, including the fact you can suplex a train (which wasn't a sure thing, as a tweet from two weeks before launch showed a version in which the Phantom Train didn't flip over). One thing that has changed is the famous opera scene, which received a visual overhaul, with the 2D characters in front of 3D backgrounds à la Octopath Traveler, and vocals in seven languages.
In a recent promotional video (thanks to RPGSite for the translation), original composer Nobuo Uematsu explains that he suggested the idea of adding vocals to Square Enix "half-jokingly", not expecting it to actually happen. "I thought it would be impossible or difficult," he said.

Total War: Warhammer 3 data miners find voice file for Chaos Dwarfs
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/total-war-warhammer-3-data-miners-find-voice-files-for-chaos-dwarfs/
A single line of advisor dialogue datamined from Total War: Warhammer 3 has all but confirmed that the next faction coming to Creative Assembly's masterpiece is the expected one: Chaos Dwarfs.

An early Elden Ring chest is sending players straight to hell
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/an-early-elden-ring-chest-is-sending-players-straight-to-hell/
There’s a handy feature in Elden Ring that helps guide players down a suggested critical path with beams of light shooting out of checkpoints. If you're new to Souls games, following that path is a lot safer than what my friend did. You see, my friend started wandering around carefree as soon as he was allowed to, opened up a random treasure chest, and then ended up in hell.
>> And that's all that can be posted without spoilers.

Elden Ring creator feels 'apologetic' to anyone frustrated by his games
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/elden-ring-creator-feels-apologetic-to-anyone-frustrated-by-his-games/
Hidetaka Miyazaki, creator of the Souls series and Elden Ring, gave an interview to The New Yorker covering his inspirations, artistic goals, and some ruminations on his meteoric rise through the games industry in the past decade.

Silent Hill creator Keiichiro Toyama answers questions about his new game, Slitterhead
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/silent-hill-creator-keiichiro-toyama-answers-questions-about-his-new-game-slitterhead/
Slitterhead was unveiled at the 2021 Game Awards with what can only be described as one hell of a teaser. It's being headed up by Silent Hill creator Keiichiro Toyama, but as we noted following its reveal, it looks to be a different sort of experience—bright, loud, and really gory—although the grotesquely terrifying horrors with too many too-sharp limbs are obviously still plentiful.
In a new Q&A video, the founders of developer Bokeh Game Studio—Toyama, Slitterhead creator and Bokeh CEO, along with CTO and game director Junya Okura and COO and producer Kazunobu Sato—revealed more about the game. The session doesn't get into a deep examination of the game, but it does reveal some interesting details, including that Slitterhead isn't actually a straight-up horror game at all.

Konami let the silenthill.com domain expire and some joker bought it
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/konami-let-the-silenthillcom-domain-expire-and-some-joker-bought-it/
The fact that publisher Konami doesn't really care about Silent Hill or its legacy is basically a meme at this point, the series seemingly relegated to perpetual limbo in the form of DLC for unrelated multiplayer games. The publisher has now let its ownership of the silenthill.com domain name lapse long enough for someone else to buy it, an example of how little Konami cares so pointed that if a satirist came up with it you'd think it was a little on-the-nose.
>> This kind of puts an end to any rumor regarding a new Silent Hill game, doesn't it?

MiHoYo's spending that Genshin cash on an experimental fusion reactor
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/mihoyos-spending-that-genshin-cash-on-an-experimental-fusion-reactor/
Developer miHoYo has been around since 2012, but 2020's Genshin Impact was its first global success: the game remains enormously popular, but in its first year made over $2 billion from the mobile version alone. The company has quite a charming motto—Tech otakus save the world—and, with this big ol' bunch of money burning a hole in its metaphorical pocket, has decided to have a go at living up to those words.
>> That's cool, but also a bit scary.