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

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The news, the sequel:

Bungie continues recent streak of Ws by making most Destiny 2 expansions free to everyone
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/fps/bungie-continues-recent-streak-of-ws-by-making-most-destiny-2-expansions-free-to-everyone/
It's a long-running adage among Destiny fans that Bungie does its best work when its back is against the wall. (...)
The new Onslaught horde mode, and its Brave weapon loot, has brought grinders back in droves. The Pantheon boss rush event is also proving popular, with raid virgins popping their cherries and hardcore teams targeting the hardest version for bragging rights. Hell, we even got new PvP maps this week!
All those additions were aimed squarely at keeping the existing player base occupied in the run up to the release of The Final Shape, which closes out the 10-year-long story arc Destiny is on, on June 3. Today, Bungie revealed how it's going to tempt back long-lapsed and completely new players to the Saga: By making all but one of the current expansions free from now until The Final Shape launches. 
>> Not only that, but you can earn four daily deepsight weapons.

Making good, profitable games 'will no longer keep you safe': industry expresses fury and heartbreak over closure of Hi-Fi Rush and Prey studios
https://www.pcgamer.com/gaming-industry/making-good-profitable-games-will-no-longer-keep-you-safe-games-industry-expresses-fury-and-heartbreak-over-closure-of-hi-fi-rush-and-prey-studios/
After laying off thousands of employees over the past couple years, games industry executives appear to be adopting a more efficient method of what they euphemistically call "reprioritization": closing entire studios. Take-Two axed two studios just last week, and now Microsoft has bulldozed four more, including Arkane Austin and Tango Gameworks, which it acquired when it bought Bethesda in 2021.
The dissolution of these talented, well-respected teams has reinforced the feeling among gamers and developers that nothing is good enough to earn security under big publishers today. In one popular tweet, indie developer Maisie Ó Dorchaidhe listed 11 things "that will no longer keep you safe in this industry," including "a good game," "a profitable game," and "long hours and sacrifice."

Manor Lords' upcoming patch plans involve fine-tuning archers and fixing one problem that robbed my town
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/city-builder/manor-lords-upcoming-patch-plans-involve-fine-tuning-archers-and-fixing-one-problem-that-robbed-my-town/
We've got some concrete plans for the first Manor Lords patch, and it looks like it could fix some unpopular problems in the new early-access city builder, including one that has bankrupted my town.

Final Fantasy 14 suffers from global round of DDoS attacks, Square Enix 'investigating the attack and taking countermeasures'
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/mmo/final-fantasy-14-suffers-from-global-round-of-ddos-attacks-square-enix-investigating-the-attack-and-taking-countermeasures/
Final Fantasy 14 has been undergoing a series of DDoS attacks over the last few days, causing players to lag, be logged out at random, and even leaving some data centers inaccessible for hours.  The attacks started on Monday, May 6, which was when the majority of problems were occurring for players. While North American and European servers appear to have bore the brunt of the issues, Japanese and Oceania servers were also impacted. The initial round of attacks lasted over 24 hours, from around 1pm GMT on Monday to 2:30pm GMT on Tuesday.  Unfortunately for fishers, gardeners, and raiders, things aren't over yet. A second wave hit the game yesterday, around 11pm GMT. That one is still ongoing, this time primarily affecting European, North American and Oceanic data centers. In a post on the Lodestone, Square Enix said it is "investigating the attack and taking countermeasures," adding that "additional information will be provided as the situation develops."

Activision Blizzard set to cough up $23.4M after losing a 9-year-long patent infringement battle, but claims 'We have never used the patented technologies at issue in our games'
https://www.pcgamer.com/gaming-industry/activision-blizzard-set-to-cough-up-dollar234m-after-losing-a-9-year-long-patent-infringement-battle-but-claims-we-have-never-used-the-patented-technologies-at-issue-in-our-games/
It's a bad time to be Activision Blizzard. The publisher is set to fork out $23.4 million to tech incubator Acceleration Bay after a jury ruled that it infringed on two of the company's patents. 
According to Reuters, the patents are related to the "simultaneous sharing of information" used in multiplayer aspects of Activision Blizzard's games. Acceleration Bay originally filed the infringement complaint back in 2015, before being dismissed and refiled a year later.

Metaphor: ReFantazio is 100% shaping up to be medieval Persona and I cannot wait
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/rpg/metaphor-refantazio-is-100-shaping-up-to-be-medieval-persona-and-i-cannot-wait/
With Metaphor: ReFantazio just five months away, there's been surprisingly little information for us to glean about Atlus' medieval fantasy RPG. Thankfully, the developer has released in-depth info on some mechanics and dungeons we can expect in the game, and it really is looking to be modern Persona with an aesthetically archaic flair.

Redfall's devs were reportedly building out its massively delayed Hero Pass content 'very recently'—before Microsoft closed Arkane Austin for good
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/fps/redfalls-devs-were-reportedly-building-out-its-massively-delayed-hero-pass-content-very-recentlybefore-microsoft-closed-arkane-austin-for-good/
In case you missed the news, yesterday Microsoft's Xbox division announced the closure of four studios—which included Arkane Austin (Prey, Dishonoured) as well as Tango Gameworks (Tokyo: Ghostwire, Hi-Fi Rush).
(...)
Despite that, it seemed there was a serious effort to try and make Redfall an underdog revival. Updates would follow, and while Redfall was a long way off from a Cyberpunk 2.0 style 'redemption', stranger things have happened. According to IGN's Wesley Yin-Poole, the dream itself didn't die until the shutdown announcements yesterday.

Helldivers 2 patch sneaks out the revelation that when we killed 2 billion bugs in a day, that was actually a bug
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/third-person-shooter/helldivers-2-patch-sneaks-out-the-revelation-that-when-we-killed-2-billion-bugs-in-a-day-that-was-actually-a-bug/
A new day for democracy, a new Helldivers 2 patch. Though this one is perhaps arriving to a more muted reception than usual, as both Arrowhead Game Studios and the game's players lick their wounds following last week's big controversy over Sony account linkage. (...)
Remember how the Helldivers collectively annihilated two billion bugs in less than 24 hours? What a great day for democracy though, even at the time, some wondered if game master Joel had put his thumb on the scale to help out with this major order. Turns out that, appropriately enough, there was a bug in the system:
"Major orders with the 'Kill task' now track score correctly. Previously it counted the entire squad’s kills once for each player, meaning it would multiply the score by the number of people on the mission; this is now amended."

Helldivers 2 players' new battle: A petition for the reinstatement and 'canonization' of community manager fired for supporting review bombing and refunds
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/third-person-shooter/helldivers-2-players-new-battle-a-petition-for-the-reinstatement-and-canonization-of-community-manager-fired-for-supporting-review-bombing-and-refunds/
Fresh off their campaigns against a Sony-imposed PSN sign-in requirement, Helldivers 2 fans are diving into a new battle. This one's with Arrowhead itself, and it comes in the form of a player petition to get the studio to reinstate its recently fired community manager (CM), Spitz (via RPS).
()
Originally, Spitz told the community after the rage had died down that their actions had "Almost. Not quite" gotten them fired. Not much later, Spitz returned to update fans with the news that they had, in fact, been let go from their CM position: "Every war comes with casualties," said Spitz.