The Tuesday news:

SALES /PLAYER COUNT & DEALS

The Humbe Store has a new Lost in Space Sale, with up to 80% discounts for the next 6 days. While most keys are for Steam, there are also some for GOG and the Epic Store: https://www.humblebundle.com/store/promo/lost-in-space/

Fanatical has two new deals:

• The Star Deal, that's the one that started yesterday, is Shadow of the Tomb Raider: Definitive Edition, 77% off for the next 24 hours: https://www.fanatical.com/en/game/shadow-of-the-tomb-raider-definitive-edition
• And the new Build Your Own New Year Bundle comes with 20 games to make your 1, 5 or 10 games bundle: https://www.fanatical.com/en/pick-and-mix/build-your-own-new-year-bundle

SOFTWARE & DRIVERS

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MODS, EMULATORS & FAN PROJECTS

A Witcher’s Adventure for Skyrim is a must-have mod for all The Witcher 3 fans
https://www.dsogaming.com/pc-performance-analyses/a-witchers-adventure-for-skyrim-is-a-must-have-mod-for-all-the-witcher-fans/
Modder ‘Gardden’ has released a pretty cool mod for both Skyrim Legacy and Skyrim Special Edition. According to its description, A Witcher’s Adventure brings elements from The Witcher games to The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim.
Going into more details, this mod adds three main quests that are heavily inspired by The Witcher games. Moreover, it adds 43 sword models, ported directly from The Witcher 3.
Additionally, players can find a lot of The Witcher’s 3 alchemical components and recipes. Furthermore, A Witcher’s Adventure adds the 5 Witcher’s Signs from the Witcher 3. Each Sign has a Regular and an Alternate effect, and is cast using Stamina.
>> The mods are available from Nexus Mods, here's the one for Skyrim and here's the one for Skyrim Special Edition.

Stardew Valley's appetising new mod overhauls the cooking experience
https://www.pcgamer.com/stardew-valleys-appetising-new-mod-overhauls-the-cooking-experience/
It's safe to say that cooking in Stardew Valley is a bit rubbish. Click a few times and you've magically made a meal Gordon Ramsey would give you a backhanded compliment on. While some small quality-of-life changes came with the new 1.5 update, it's still one of the more overlooked aspects of an otherwise wonderful game. But now, a new mod is looking to change that.
Thanks to Nexus Mods user bblueberry, The Love of Cooking mod gives your kitchen cookbook a shiny new makeover, with plenty of new additions and quality-of-life upgrades. The new cooking menu adds a search and filter system as well as the ability to toggle whether or not you want to use gold-star ingredients. You can also bulk-craft recipes up to nine at a time.
Meals now dynamically heal over time depending on how much health you have, offering a slower release when topped up and give a much-needed healing boost when you're being battered by cave monsters. The rate at which these recipes heal is determined by the new cooking skill, with higher levels offering faster healing. It also affects the chances of food burning, if you wish to opt-in to a more stressful culinary experience.

GAMING NEWS

Atomic Heart Early Official PC System Requirements
https://www.dsogaming.com/news/atomic-heart-early-official-pc-system-requirements/
Mundfish has shared some early official PC system requirements for Atomic Heart. According to the PC specs, PC gamers will at least need an Intel Core i5-2500K or AMD FX 6300 with 6GB of RAM.

Crytek is working on a new unannounced triple-A game, possibly a sandbox FPS
https://www.dsogaming.com/news/crytek-is-working-on-a-new-unannounced-triple-a-game-possibly-a-sandbox-fps/
Crytek is currently working on an unannounced triple-A game, according to some recent job listings. Although we don’t know much about this new game, the job listings suggest that this may be a sandbox FPS.

The Medium will offer two Ray Tracing modes, will support reflections, RTAO, hybrid translucent & shadows
https://www.dsogaming.com/news/the-medium-will-offer-two-ray-tracing-modes-will-support-reflections-rtao-hybrid-translucent-rt-shadows/
Bloober Team has detailed all the Ray Tracing effects that The Medium will support on the PC. According to the team, the game will feature ray-traced reflections, ambient occlusion, hybrid translucent, and shadows.

The news, part two:

Hitman 3 will retroactively optimise the first two games
https://www.pcgamer.com/hitman-3-will-retroactively-optimise-the-first-two-games/
Hitman 3 may be looking awfully sharp in Game Informer's new gameplay footage—but it appears Agent 47's previous outings will also be getting a spit-shine when the trilogy-closer arrives later this month.

Bethesda teases 'the future' of The Elder Scrolls with a map and a cryptic tweet
https://www.pcgamer.com/bethesda-teases-the-future-of-the-elder-scrolls-with-a-map-and-a-cryptic-tweet/
On December 31, the cusp of the new year, Bethesda tweeted a cryptic message over the official Elder Scrolls Twitter account: "Transcribe the past and map the future. Here's to a Happy New Year!" On the surface it had the ring of a fairly standard year-end message, but the bit about transcription and mapping—and the presence of a map—has fans wondering if there's more to it than meets the eye.

The next big Teamfight Tactics update will swap in 20 champions this month
https://www.pcgamer.com/the-next-big-teamfight-tactics-update-will-swap-in-20-champions-this-month/
Teamfight Tactics is due for a major shakeup in just a few weeks. Though the Fates expansion launched several months ago, the mid-set refresh, called Festival of Beasts, is coming on January 20 and swaps in 20 new champions, seven new abilities, a new battle pass, and a lot more.

Runescape celebrates its 20th anniversary with a 'Grand Party' and special rewards
https://www.pcgamer.com/runescape-celebrates-its-20th-anniversary-with-a-grand-party-and-special-rewards/
The fantasy MMO Runescape launched on January 4, 2001, which means that as of today it is 20 years old. That's absolutely ancient in videogame terms, and so developer Jagex is marking the big birthday with a "Grand Party" that will feature anniversary-themed content that will run throughout the year.

A contentious Call Of Duty: Warzone app let players manipulate SBMM
https://www.pcgamer.com/a-contentious-call-of-duty-warzone-app-let-players-manipulate-sbmm/
A third-party Call Of Duty: Warzone app for flagging cheaters has been forced to make sweeping changes, after players started abusing the tool to manipulate the game's skill-based matchmaking (SBMM).

By the way, tomorrow is festive here in Spain (and probably in other places too), and as such, there won't be news... unless one of you wants to make them.

I'm not sure I have enough experience about good office chairs or the best gaming chairs, but my experience with office chairs so far has been far better than with gaming chairs. I currently have a fairly cheap Ikea chair, and it's probably the most comfortable office/gaming chair I've ever used - and that's including the gaming chairs we have at work, and those seem fairly high quality to me. The biggest factor is probably that I hate armrests with a passion due to how they restrict movement.

Well, the Steam Winter Sale is over.

I have to admit that I overdid a little bit and ended up getting more than I thought I would.

Thanks to the generosity of Conina and Rhonin with the keys they offered (you cna find more at boffer's thread), I got:

• IL-2 Sturmovik: 1946
• Epistory
• Sniper ELite III.

And then I went and bought another eleven (!) games:

• Deus Ex Mankind Divided
• Rocketbirds 2
• Sky Force Anniversary (who doesn't love a bit of a shoot'em'all every now and then?)
• Fox 'n' Forests
• Farm Manager 2018
• Deponia Doomsday
• Army Men RTS (old, yes, but it will still give me some hours of entertainment)
• Halo Wars D.E.
• Aragami
• Grim Dawn
• And Assassin's Creed Origins Gold Edition (yes, I went for the DLCs)

One thing that has surprised me is that, after getting that AC game, I remembered that I had gotten one of the previous games for free and still hadn't played it, so I checked both Epic Store and UPlay/Ubisoft Connect and... it turns out t hat I have both Unity and Sindicate! One at each store.

I'll probably play them before Origins, because I have the feeling that after trying the new ones, there's no going back.

Unity is an absolutely infuriating game at times, so don't judge the rest too harshly because of it! It also has some interesting potential, sadly most of it wasted though. Syndicate on the other hand is fairly easy and perhaps a bit bland, but has no major flaws either. It just... is, I think.

The real winning move here is, in my opinion, Grim Dawn! What a great game! If you liked Titan Quest, you'll love Grim Dawn as well, except for the setting perhaps. If you didn't love Titan Quest, well, Grim Dawn is in many ways more of the same but better (except for the setting, which to me is not that interesting mainly because of its, uh, grim look). I have currently clocked 377 hours in Grim Dawn, and I'm sure there will be plenty more at some point.

Me, I finally got Noita after keeping an eye on it for a long time. I also got some other games that are probably going to my backlog, but we shall not talk about them.

I hate how those strap-on pillows have become an integral part of most gaming chairs. If the seat were properly cushioned and supported, there would be no need for them in the first place. It's like admitting that your product is lacking and needs a flimsy add-on. Pretty ridiculous for an expensive chair if you ask me.

If you couldn't tell, I'm Team Office Chair (Executive Branch).

Thanks for the tips with the AC games. I'll try to be patient with Unity when I get to play it.

I liked Titan Quest a lot, and that was part of the reason I got interested in Grim Dawn in the first place as it's made by part of the team that made the former game. Also, Steam did a free to try weekend a while ago and I took advantage of it, so I know where I'm getting into.

Noita is a very interesting game, but I'd need to try it first to decide if it's my thing or not. But congratulations on your purchases.

The chair I got, a cheap gaming one, came with those cushions but I only use the one for the head, and only after finding a new positicon for it. The lumbar cushion is, to me, very uncomfortable.

This game is soooooooo good. really underrated imho. I recommend replaying Deus Ex HR first for complete immersion.

I have a 2080Ti, but I had trouble in 4k and the fps was really low. Swapped to 1080p and the game ran like charm.

Grim Dawn is pretty good, a tad long and the grimdark ambience is a bit overwhelming. I had a lot of fun with this one.

I actually got the game because I played Human Revolution and, after a rough start (the constant swap between 1st and 3rd camera irked me at first, until I got used to it), I ended up liking it a lot. I'm looking forward to how it expands the story.