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

[JEMC]

Tuesday gaming news, part two:

Phasmophobia devs say all that live service malarkey can do one: they focus on making 'a fun game that people want to play because it's fun'
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/phasmophobia-devs-say-all-that-live-service-malarkey-can-do-one-they-focus-on-making-a-fun-game-that-people-want-to-play-because-its-fun/
Phasmophobia is one of those unproblematic success stories. It launched in early access with such a well-conceived and executed core experience that I breathlessly proclaimed it "the best ghost game ever made." In the five years since, developer Kinetic Games has slowly but surely built Phasmophobia into the PC's definitive spook-buster (to the extent there's now a small niche in Phasmo-alikes).
(...)
Kinetic's clearly doing something right and, at the recent launch event for a comprehensive rework of Nell's Diner, CEO Daniel Knight and art director Corey Dixon told PCGN that dodging the usual live service trappings is kinda the point.
>> Expect more Phasmophobia articles coming from this interview in the coming days.

There's a valuable LEDX you can grab in Escape From Tarkov's tutorial—and it's lost forever if you don't
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/fps/escape-from-tarkov-tutorial-ledx/
Digging into Escape From Tarkov's 1.0 release? In classic Battlestate Games fare, there's an ultra-rare LEDX that spawns in the tutorial, and if you miss it you'll need to find a whole extra LEDX later to either upgrade your MedBay to level 3, or hand it in for the late-game quest, Private Clinic.

Silent Hill f fans reckon that its recent casual difficulty patch was inspired by the lead actor's livestreamed struggles with the game
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/horror/silent-hill-f-fans-reckon-that-its-recent-casual-difficulty-patch-was-inspired-by-the-lead-actors-livestreamed-struggles-with-the-game/
Silent Hill f recently received a big update that adds a casual difficulty, speeds up NG+ runs, and reduces the number of areas where players are forced to engage with combat. The patch seems like a sensible response to some general criticisms of the acclaimed horror revival. But fans of the series are convinced that the update originated from a much more specific source—the game's lead actor.

Microsoft's updated anti-cheating measures go far beyond Secure Boot, including 'Remote Attestation' for online system verification
https://www.pcgamer.com/software/microsofts-updated-anti-cheating-measures-go-far-beyond-secure-boot-including-remote-attestation-for-online-system-verification/
I think most of us would agree that cheating is a scourge upon multiplayer gaming. Anyone who's seen a blatant wallhacker or obviously-bot-assisted player rampaging their way across the map like Rambo after too much sugar would likely agree that something should be done. Well, Microsoft appears to be doing that something, as it's laid out its latest anti-cheating features alongside the launch of Call of Duty: Black Ops 7.

'I've had so many projects that have been discontinued lately': Nier creator Yoko Taro says he's been working on plenty of games—but they keep getting cancelled before he can announce them
https://www.pcgamer.com/gaming-industry/ive-had-so-many-projects-that-have-been-discontinued-lately-nier-creator-yoko-taro-says-hes-been-working-of-plenty-games-but-they-keep-getting-cancelled-before-he-can-announce-them/
As one of the gaming industry's most treasured oddities, Nier series creator and masked enigma Yoko Taro contends with the fickle patience of a fanbase that's eager to know what he's working on next. As reported by 4Gamer (via Automaton), Yoko said during a G-Con 2025 discussion panel with Bayonetta director Hideki Kamiya that—while his fans might joke that he doesn't do any work—he's actually had plenty of games in production recently.
The problem is they keep getting cancelled before anyone gets to see them.

'Hytale is saved': Riot sells cancelled game back to original co-founder, who promises to take it 'back to the original vision for Hytale'
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/adventure/hytale-is-saved-riot-sells-cancelled-game-back-to-original-co-founder-who-promises-to-take-it-back-to-the-original-vision-for-hytale/
Five months after cancelling the development of Hytale and closing the studio working on it, Riot Games has sold the whole thing back to original co-founder Simon Collins-Laflamme. And yes, that means work on the game has resumed: Collins-Laflamme said more than 30 former developers "who know this game inside and out" have been brought back to continue development, and more are expected to follow soon.

Take-Two boss Strauss Zelnick says gaming is 'moving towards PC' as the industry shifts away from closed systems, but we still don't have a GTA 6 announcement
https://www.pcgamer.com/gaming-industry/take-two-boss-strauss-zelnick-says-gaming-is-moving-towards-pc-as-the-industry-shifts-away-from-closed-systems-but-we-still-dont-have-a-gta-6-announcement/
I've been around long enough to remember a time when "PC gaming is dying" was something people said without irony: A declaration that the convenience and power of consoles would soon put an end to the headaches and expense of playing games on PC. It didn't work out that way, of course, and these days it seems like the pendulum is swinging in the opposite direction: PC gaming is thriving, and the walled-garden approach of conventional consoles is increasingly being called into question.
Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick expressed just that feeling in a new interview with Squawk Box on CNBC. "I think it's moving towards PC and business is moving towards open rather than closed," Zelnick said. "But if you define console as the property, not the system, then the notion of a very rich game that you engage in for many hours that you play on a big screen—that's never going away."

The Game Awards 2025 nominees are here, and—surprise—Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 was nominated for every qualifying category
https://www.pcgamer.com/gaming-industry/events-conferences/the-game-awards-nominations-are-here-and-surprise-clair-obscur-expedition-33-was-nominated-for-every-qualifying-category/
With less than a month to go before Geoff Keighley's combination accolade blitz and advertising bombardment, The Game Awards has just announced its 2025 slate of nominees, determined by a yearly panel of critics, journalists, and industry personalities. And it is, without a doubt, the most French set of TGA nominations to date.
>> Alex_The_Hedgehog  has made a bingo thread about The Game Awards, in case you want to take part in it.

Blizzard hit the $90 dinosaur mount emergency button to fill the gap before the next WoW expansion and players are already dumping millions of gold into the ether to buy it
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/world-of-warcraft/blizzard-hit-the-usd90-dinosaur-mount-emergency-button-to-fill-the-gap-before-the-next-wow-expansion-and-players-are-already-dumping-millions-of-gold-into-the-ether-to-buy-it/
It's a bit of a quiet time for World of Warcraft as players wait for the release of its next expansion. In this pre-Midnight lull, there's not much to do except prepare yourself for the removal of combat mods and the sweeping class balance changes. This, along with it being WoW's 21st anniversary, is probably why Blizzard decided now is a good time to drop that $90 mount again.

Krafton CEO allegedly asked ChatGPT to help him find a way out of paying Subnautica 2 devs their bonuses because he wanted to avoid the 'professional embarrassment' of being seen as a 'pushover'
https://www.pcgamer.com/gaming-industry/krafton-ceo-allegedly-asked-chatgpt-to-help-him-find-a-way-out-of-paying-subnautica-2-devs-their-bonuses-because-he-wanted-to-avoid-the-professional-embarrassment-of-being-seen-as-a-pushover/
A pre-trial brief filed by lawyers representing the ousted former heads of Subnautica 2 studio Unknown Worlds alleges that Krafton CEO Changham Kim was "desperate" to avoid paying them the bonuses required by their acquisition contract because of the "professional embarrassment" that would result from the perception that he overpaid for the studio. The filing claims Kim went so far as to consult with AI to figure a way out of paying, but even ChatGPT told him he was probably stuck.