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

[JEMC]

Let’s go with the Friday gaming news:

SALES/PLAYER COUNTS & DEALS

Fanatical has the new BYO Titanium Collection, with 22 games to choose for your 3+ or 5+ bundles during 37 days: https://www.fanatical.com/en/pick-and-mix/build-your-own-titanium-collection.

SOFTWARE & DRIVERS

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MODS, EMULATORS & FAN PROJECTS

inFamous Second Son, Driveclub, and Killzone Shadow Fall Running on PC via Latest Version of PlayStation 4 Emulator shadPS4
https://www.dsogaming.com/pc-performance-analyses/infamous-second-son-driveclub-and-killzone-shadow-fall-running-on-pc-via-latest-version-of-playstation-4-emulator-shadps4
YouTube’s ‘BrutalSam’ has shared a video showing inFamous Second Son, Driveclub, and Killzone Shadow Fall running on the latest version of the PlayStation 4 emulator, shadPS4. So, let’s take a look at them, shall we?
All of these three games display proper graphics. Emulation is not 100% accurate in inFamous: Second Son or Killzone: Shadow Fall, but things are WAY better than they were a couple of months ago.
The game that is close to being 100% emulated is Driveclub. I’m pretty sure there are still some bugs, but Driveclub feels like a game can finally enjoy with this emulator. From what I could see, there aren’t any major visual glitches or artifacts. You can wait a couple of months to get a more polished experience. But if you can’t wait, you can go ahead and play it.
It’s also worth noting that shadPS4 can also launch The Order: 1886. The Order: 1886 is one of the best-looking PS4 games to date. Sadly, the emulator still needs more work. So, it might take some time before we can play it smoothly. Still, I’m really excited to try it once it is fully working.
Some other PS4 exclusives that can run on shadPS4 are Fist of the North Star: Lost Paradise, Alienation, and The Witch & The Hundred Knight 2. Plus, the emulator can launch God of War 3 Remastered.
>> The video is almost 11 minutes long.

I wouldn't have thought I'd be playing Starfield again in 2025, but this Star Wars total conversion mod is a real blast(er)
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/rpg/i-wouldnt-have-thought-id-be-playing-starfield-again-in-2025-but-this-star-wars-total-conversion-mod-is-a-real-blast-er/
I know Starfield has kind of a bad reputation these days, but I never thought it was a bad game. It's a good game, and I should know: I played over 100 hours of it when it launched.
But it's not a great game, and it simply doesn't have the staying power of other Bethesda RPGs like the Fallout and Elder Scrolls games. I can always find a reason to hop back into Skyrim or Fallout 4, but I kinda figured when I was done with Starfield, I'd stay done with it.
To my surprise, here I am in 2025 playing Starfield again, and it's all thanks to a mod. More specifically, a whole bunch of mods. There's a modlist called Star Wars Genesis that collects hundreds of Star Wars mods and rolls them up into one big total conversion, transforming Starfield into a huge hunk of the Star Wars galaxy.
I haven't played a ton of Genesis yet, but whether I'm following a quest chain or just freewheeling around the dozens of star systems, it's a delight to see just how much Star Wars is packed into this thing. One of the first things I did was visit Tatooine and land at Mos Eisley. You know the place: scum, villany, hive, wretched, yadda yadda yadda.
Just walking around and spying a Gonk Droid here, a pack of jabbering Jawas there, and maybe one of those awesome hammerhead alien dudes from the cantina scene in A New Hope—it was so enjoyable, even for a lapsed Star Wars fan like me. Within a minute or two the modded version of Mos Eisely became a better place to hang out than any city in vanilla Starfield.
In fact, before I even started playing the mod properly, it was a delight just to see a choice of aliens in the character creator. You can play as a Rodian (like Greedo), Trandoshian (like Bossk), Duros (the classic-looking blue-headed alien dudes from the cantina), Mon Calamari (it's a trap!), and a bunch more. Yes, you can even be a Gungan, if your dream has always been to inhabit Jar-Jar Binks. I suspect that isn't your dream.
It really highlights that baffling decision Bethesda made with Starfield to have a galaxy full of only human characters. This is the company that made us fall in love with Argonians and Khajiit. But going humans-only in a game with 1,000 alien planets? It's still a head-scratcher to me.
>> The article has several screenshots.

Nightdive's System Shock 2 remaster now supports 26 years of mods and fan missions
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/fps/nightdives-system-shock-2-remaster-now-supports-26-years-of-mods-and-fan-missions/
Tucked at the bottom of System Shock 2: 25th Anniversary Edition's 1.2 patch notes is the whammy I'd been waiting for: "Added support for custom campaigns (fan missions)." Balance mods were good to go from launch, but now 'Shock 2's extensive back catalogue of modded missions and campaigns is fair game too.
The new "FMs" folder in the game's directory has cryptic instructions on how to install them, but the process is largely identical to installing other mods (like balance or QoL changes). Thanks to a brilliant help thread on the SystemShock.org forums from voodoo47 about installing non-FM mods, I was able to suss out my issues and get the well-liked Ponterbee Station FM working in the remaster.
Mods and fan missions both have to be in a ".kpf" file format unique to the SS2 AE. Mod authors can just release their new projects in .kpf format, but thankfully it's very easy to convert older projects to the new format. These instructions work for both mods and FMs, with the only differences being which folder you put them in, and how you activate them in-game. To convert the files to an uncompressed .zip format, I used the free, open-source 7-zip.
>> The article has a couple of screenshots, but they don’t show much.

'Legal inquiry' shuts down one of Final Fantasy 14's most popular mods, adding yet another blurry line in the sand from Square Enix
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/final-fantasy/legal-inquiry-shuts-down-one-of-final-fantasy-14s-most-popular-mods-adding-yet-another-blurry-line-in-the-sand-from-square-enix/
Square Enix is putting its foot down once again when it comes to modding in Final Fantasy 14. The creator behind Mare Synchronos—a player-made plugin for synchronizing and sharing appearance mods between FF14 players—is shutting the three-year-old project down after apparently receiving a cease and desist order from Square Enix. It's not the first mod to catch Square's ire this year, but its latest demand certainly seems like an escalation.
The tool's creator, DarkArchon, announced his decision to end Mare after he "received a legal inquiry concerning the project" and reviewed his options with counsel. The plugin is easily one of FF14's biggest in terms of both scope and popularity, as glamour mods are among some of the most popular player-made changes in FF14. It's an awfully big scene, and the Mare Synchronos Discord has just over 200,000 users at the time of writing.
While Mare isn't the main mechanism for adding things like modded hairstyles, outfits, and other visual changes to FF14, it is the tool for sharing those changes between users in-game. Using the plugin required a suite of other add-ons to work, in addition to completing a registration and verification process through Discord and FF14's Lodestone.
DarkArchon has already closed new user registration, and has removed the client, server, and API repositories. So if you were looking to try it out before tomorrow, you're out of luck. As for anyone hoping to have one last hoorah with the mod, DarkArchon gave a specific deadline:
"The server will continue to run until Friday, August 22, 2025 5:00 AM, after that, the server will shut down, and the main repository will be removed as well. Enjoy your last doomsday party."
This doesn't put an end to FF14 players modding their appearance, but it does effectively kill the easy way to see whatever outfits your buddies have put together. The game was filled with players modding their appearances long before Mare launched in 2022, but those client-side changes had no way to sync between users before DarkArchon's mod provided an intermediary.
>> The article only has one screenshot, the note that the author has posted.

I modded guns into Baldur’s Gate 3—and now I’m an unstoppable angel of death
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/rpg/i-modded-guns-into-baldurs-gate-3-and-now-im-an-unstoppable-angel-of-death/
As I passed 480 hours of playtime in Baldur’s Gate 3, messing around with a solo druid run, I realised that maybe it was time to put the best fantasy RPG of all time down. Simply put, I was getting serious déjà vu, and not in a good way.
While there are absolutely some things that I still haven’t seen in Larian’s masterwork, I suddenly found myself petering out on desire and willpower to re-run through parts of this magical fantasy adventure that I’d already run through countless times.
Because, despite running more than 50 mods on top of the base experience to add in extra content to keep new runs fresh, I think I reached a point where I had finally, after approaching three whole weeks of my life constantly playing Baldur’s Gate 3, burnt out on the game and its mechanics.
However, just as I was about to delete the game from my rig, I thought I’d go look one more time at the BG3 mod scene to see if there was anything that would relight that fire in my heart for another build and another run through The Sword Coast.
And then I found just what I was looking for—guns, LOTS of guns! And, as the video below shows, I’m now a repeating rifle-wielding angel of death, blasting my way through foes like the world’s foremost sharpshooter assassin.
The mod that has granted me my explosively lethal powers is the Vintage Firearms Pack from talented modder Skirbie. Skirbie’s fine work can be found both in the official Baldur’s Gate 3 in-game mod menu (just search for ‘Skirbie’ and it will pop up), as well over at mod.io, where it can be downloaded manually.
>> The article has some screenshots and an almost 3 minutes video.

GAMING NEWS

Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection will include Mythologies Sub-Zero and Special Forces
https://www.dsogaming.com/news/mortal-kombat-legacy-kollection-will-include-mythologies-sub-zero-and-special-forces
Digital Eclipse has revealed the next two – and most likely final – MK games of the Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection. So, MK fans. Mortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub-Zero and Mortal Kombat: Special Forces will be included in it.

Elden Ring Title Update 1.16.1 Released – Full Patch Notes
https://www.dsogaming.com/patches/elden-ring-title-update-1-16-1-released-full-patch-notes
FromSoftware has just released Title Update 1.16.1 for Elden Ring and shared its full patch notes. So, let’s see what this new patch brings to the table.

Star Fox-Inspired Wild Blue Gets Extended Gameplay Trailer
https://www.dsogaming.com/videotrailer-news/star-fox-inspired-wild-blue-gets-extended-gameplay-trailer
Humble Games has released an extended gameplay trailer for its upcoming on-rail shooter that is heavily inspired by Star Fox, Wild Blue. Wild Blue is basically a modern take on Star Fox. So, if you are fans of it, you should definitely check it out.

Here are 22 minutes of new gameplay from Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater
https://www.dsogaming.com/videotrailer-news/here-are-20-minutes-of-new-gameplay-from-metal-gear-solid-delta-snake-eater
Metal Gear Network has shared a video showing 22 minutes of new gameplay footage from Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater. Moreover, Konami has shared the game’s launch trailer, which you can also find below.

Here are 18 minutes of gameplay from the Gamescom 2025 demo of Directive 8020
https://www.dsogaming.com/videotrailer-news/here-are-18-minutes-of-gameplay-from-the-gamescom-2025-demo-of-directive-8020
SECTOR has released a video, showcasing 18 minutes of gameplay from the Gamescom 2025 of Directive 8020. Directive 8020 is a new sci-fi survival horror game from Supermassive Games. So, if you are interested in it, you should check it out.