Friday news, part two:

Stalker studio asks for donations to Ukrainian army, laments 'inhuman cruelty' of Russian invasion
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/stalker-studio-asks-for-donations-to-ukrainian-army-laments-inhuman-cruelty-of-russian-invasion/
Following weeks of build-up, Russian forces have invaded Ukraine: there are ongoing reports of explosions and missile strikes against Ukraine's major cities and military infrastructure. Stalker developer GSC Game World is based in the Ukrainian capital city Kyiv, and took to social media to post a message about the conflict.

#FuckTheWar: Game studios voice their support for Ukraine as the country defends against Russian invasion
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/fuckthewar-game-studios-voice-their-support-for-ukraine-as-the-country-defends-against-russian-invasion/
Earlier today, Stalker studio GSC Game World issued a statement on social media decrying the "inhuman cruelty" of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, where it is based, and called for worldwide support for the country's armed forces. (...)
Since then, as Russian forces continue to push into Ukraine, other studios have shared their support for the country. Frogwares, also based in the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv, tweeted, "We can't just stand by. Russia attacks our homeland and denies the sovereignty of Ukraine. We are trying to stay safe, but this is war, there are no two ways about it. We call on everyone to force Putin to withdraw from our lands."

A Steam sale for JRPGs is coming next month
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/a-steam-sale-for-jrpgs-is-coming-next-month/
Valve has announced a new Steam sale for JRPGs, which will run from March 14 through to March 21.
Announced via the Steamworks Development events page, Valve states that the sale is "open to games built around the JRPG style of mechanics and gameplay." It's a definition that leaves a fair bit of room for interpretation. I wonder if games like Anachronox, which borrows heavily from JRPG convention, would qualify by this metric?

Elden Ring's Deluxe Edition is a sad little package
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/elden-rings-deluxe-edition-is-a-sad-little-package/
I'm not typically one to shell out for special editions, but for games I've been especially anticipating I do like to splash out a bit to commemorate finally getting my hands on them, as a treat. It doesn't take much to make me happy—give me a few nifty cosmetics and I'm content—but when faced with Elden Ring's Deluxe Edition, I was left wondering where the rest of it went.

The biggest news about Street Fighter 6 is in Ryu's pants
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/the-biggest-news-about-street-fighter-6-is-in-ryus-pants/
Earlier this week, Capcom announced Street Fighter 6, the latest in the most iconic fighting game series in gaming. The trailer shows Ryu and Luke preparing to battle, glowering moodily at one another, and then... there's a shot looking up at the two fighters that suggests that Ryu's arms aren't the only bulk he's sporting.
>> Some people pay attention to every little (or not so little) detail.

Knockout City is leaving Electronic Arts behind and going free-to-play
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/knockout-city-is-leaving-electronic-arts-behind-and-going-free-to-play/
Velan Studio's dodgebrawler Knockout City is an excellent and original multiplayer experience: PC Gamer's own Morgan Park awarded it 90% and summed up its take on dodgeball as "simply excellent." It looked like the game had got off to a great start too, with over 2 million players taking advantage of the trial period around launch to get in on the action. Nine months down the line, however, things aren't looking so rosy.
A new post on the game's official site has some big announcements about the game's future. It starts with a rundown of the ongoing season 5's offerings before the news that "Knockout City is going free-to-play, beginning this spring with Season 6! We’re really excited to bring our game to millions of new players around the world, by removing the price tag entirely."
>> Maybe the fact that ut was free to play during the first month gave it its initial success, and that's why they're trying to save it by going that route permanently.

EA executive says industry leaders who allow toxic workplaces 'must go'
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/ea-executive-says-industry-leaders-who-allow-toxic-workplaces-must-go/
Electronic Arts chief operating officer Laura Miele took aim at toxicity at the top of the videogame industry in her DICE 2022 keynote address (via IGN), saying that "leaders who fall short of basic standards must go."

Elden Ring has some super cheesy rune farming spots
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/elden-ring-rune-farm-guide/
(...)
For much of the early game—which, remember, will be a good amount of time in its massive open world—you'll be starved of opportunities to level up. Runes, the currency you spend to increase your stats, are hard to come by in large quantities. For a casual or new Souls player, this has the benefit of not being as punishing when you lose your souls because you can't return to your body, but for diehards, you might want a way to punch up your class' stats to equip certain weapons and magic abilities.

Adults only horror game Agony Unrated offered at a discount to players whose copies went missing
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/adults-only-horror-game-agony-unrated-goes-missing-from-players-steam-libraries/
(...) A look at the history of the package containing both games on SteamDB shows that Agony Unrated was removed from it on February 16. Agony Unrated remains available as a separate purchase on Steam, and players who obtained it that way still have access to their copies.
On February 23, Madmind explained it had put together bundles for Agony owners that would discount Agony Unrated to the maximum amount possible in each region, which is anywhere between 65% and 95% off. Obviously, that's not the same as free.

Elden Ring controller not working? Try this fix
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/elden-ring-controller-not-working-try-this-fix/
It looks like Elden Ring's PC version may have some issues recognizing controllers. Dozens of players on the game's official subreddit, in the game's Steam forums, and one member of the PC Gamer team have run into a brick wall getting the game to accept controller inputs, and players are citing several potential solutions.

Lost Ark players are reporting large numbers of gold spammers and farming bots
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/lost-ark-players-are-reporting-large-numbers-of-gold-spammers-and-farming-bots/
Lost Ark players are reporting large numbers of gold spammers and farming bots clogging up the chat and obstructing player progress. These are two slightly different issues, but they both have the same result of hampering players' experiences of the massively popular MMO.

Despite critical acclaim, Elden Ring is currently 'mixed' on Steam
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/despite-critical-acclaim-elden-ring-is-currently-mixed-on-steam/
Despite receiving critical acclaim and cementing itself one of the highest-rated games of all time, Elden Ring has been having a rough time on Steam. The game is currently sitting at a mixed rating with 60% of its 19,000 user reviews being positive.
It's all down to the squiffy performance PC players have been dealing with.
>> FromSoftware is working to improve the performance.

Epic Games makes hundreds of temp staff full-time workers
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/epic-games-makes-hundreds-of-temp-staff-full-time-workers/
Epic Games has announced it will offer hundreds of contract workers full-time contracts, a move that comes in the wider industry context of severe tensions (at best) between major studios and their employees. Part of the latter were reports about Epic staff having to crunch and work long hours in order to keep the content flowing for Fortnite: with some saying they worked 70-hour weeks for months at a time.

It Takes Two gets crowned Game of the Year at the DICE Awards
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/it-takes-two-gets-crowned-game-of-the-year-at-the-dice-awards/
The Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences' 25th annual DICE Awards took place yesterday, and among the big winners were Hazelight's It Takes Two and current man-of-the-gaming-moment Phil Spencer, who received a lifetime achievement award. In case you're curious, DICE stands for Design, Innovate, Communicate, Entertain.

And here are the GOG and Steam deals for the weekend:

+GOG

• The Weekly Sale is full of RPGs and table-top inspired games up to 90% off: https://www.gog.com/promo/202202021_weekly_sale
• The Midweek Sale features up to 90% discounts until next Monday! https://www.gog.com/promo/20220223_midweek_sale
• The Weekend Sale features up to 86% discounts: https://www.gog.com/promo/20220225_weekend_sale
• There's a Special Sale featuring Raw Fury games up to 70% off until Monday: https://www.gog.com/promo/2022_raw_fury_weekend
• 11 bit studios has decided to put This War of Mine 85% off and give all its profits to help the victims of the war in Ukraine, and GOG joins by not taking their part, meaning that all the money will go for them. This deal will run until March 3rd: https://www.gog.com/en/game/this_war_of_mine_complete_edition
• Finally, there's a contest to win 10 double tickets to concerts in London on March 5 and 6. The winners will be announced next Tuesday. Learn more here: https://www.gog.com/en/news/game_music_festival_x_gog_contest

+Steam

• The new daily deal is MageQuit, 50% off: https://store.steampowered.com/app/572220/MageQuit/
• The first Weekend Deal is HITMAN 3, that has a demo, 40% off until the 28th: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1659040/HITMAN_3/
• The Ascent will also be 40% of until Monday: https://store.steampowered.com/app/979690/The_Ascent/
• THE COMPLETE SUPERHOT BUNDLE, that includes 3 items, will be 65% off until Monday 28. The individual items are between 40 and 60% off: https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/13218/THE_COMPLETE_SUPERHOT_BUNDLE/
• Deep Rock Galactic is going to be free to try during the weekend, and also 50% off until March 7: https://store.steampowered.com/app/548430/Deep_Rock_Galactic/
• And of course, there's also the weeklong deals.

Nothing else to add. Until next time, I wish you a happy and gaming weekend.

Intel forgets to release its Day-0 graphics driver for Elden Ring

https://videocardz.com/newz/intel-forgets-to-release-its-day-0-graphics-driver-for-elden-ring

This is the type of stuff that worries me about Intel GPUs. Most likely Nvidia will continue to be in the lead when it comes to drivers followed by AMD and then Intel. For gaming GPUs, Drivers mean the difference between success and failure in a normal market so hopefully, Intel can get their act together.

Denuvo has been removed from Bravely Default II

https://steamdb.info/app/1446650/history/?changeid=U:28515475

Today of course is the launch day of the Steam Deck. In about 2 hours, the emails will start going out and the full reviews including the OS experience and such will start coming out. I might post more stuff then.

So from DF's review, no Windows Drivers as of yet!

It also out performs a PS4 at Steam Decks native resolution but not at PS4's native resolution. While it performs very well, I'd like to see it running on Windows.

Also more reviews:

And this is what I felt like was going to happen with Linux. The compatibility issues!

Going by the DF video, capping the game at 30 fps seems to be the most logical approach as you get more consistent performance and also more battery life as well.

I'll check the other videos later.

Sleep time seems to be 10% battery drain every 24 hours.

From what I am understanding is that there's still quite a lot of quirks that need to be improved. Especially with game compatibility and third party launchers. Hopefully Valve will release Windows Drivers by the time the Steam Deck ships so we can compare it. But the suspend and sleep seems to work very well with the Steam Deck unlike how it works with Windows. The heptics have also improved since launch reviews via updates.

Also for cloud saves. If you are in the middle of the game, you need to save and close before picking up the game on your PC. Valve has introduced a new feature that will allow for more seamless pickup and play but that needs to be implemented by game devs.

Overall though, great hardware but software needs improvements. Sounds like Valve is listening though.

That's annoying, I guess they're still ironing out kinks in the software. But yeah looking at the reviews, I can already tell this is not a device for the average user and some elements like UI need improving like its library navigation and search. And people who aren't a little tech minded are likely going to be in for a rough ride. Though for tech enthusiasts and people who like to tinker this looks great, if not a little under cooked (in software/OS) which looks like is coming hot from Valve (no pun intended).

Lots of Steam games that work on the go, non native applications can be added to main UI and a really good emulation machine on the go. Looks awesome.

Also amazing it can run RPCS3 as well as it can. I can imagine less demanding emulators like Yuzu running near flawlessly on the Steam Deck.

Mac seems to be having fun:

(He really isn't lol).

About what I expect from FS these days. Hilarious that it's highly reviewed, despite the state the PC port is in (That and it looks just like the last Souls game to me).