https://store.steampowered.com/category/idle

AMD Radeon RX 9070 series press conference reportedly set for late February

https://videocardz.com/newz/amd-radeon-rx-9070-series-press-conference-reportedly-set-for-late-february

NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Ti reviews samples ship next week, still no update on RTX 5070 non-Ti

https://videocardz.com/newz/nvidia-geforce-rtx-5070-ti-reviews-samples-ship-next-week-still-no-update-on-rtx-5070-non-ti

AMD releases FSR 3.1.3 and Anti-Lag 2 plugins for Unreal Engine 5.5

https://videocardz.com/pixel/amd-releases-fsr-3-1-3-and-anti-lag-2-plugins-for-unreal-engine-5-5

First laptops with AMD Ryzen 9 9955HX3D “Fire Range-X3D” to arrive end of March/early April

https://videocardz.com/newz/first-laptops-with-amd-ryzen-9-9955hx3d-fire-range-x3d-to-arrive-end-of-march-early-april

Very interesting video. Not so much about LTT as them being wrong about things isn't that unusual but the part about Nvidia vs AMD. Worth a watch.

The much, much lighter than yesterday news:

SALES/PLAYER COUNTS & DEALS

Steam’s Top 10

(Click here for the Top 100)

Steam has all these deals:

• Publisher Arbatskii Anatolii presents the Arbatskii Anatolii and friends Sale, with up to 50% discounts until February 10: https://store.steampowered.com/curator/42784786/sale/ArbatskiiAndFriends
• Warner Bros presents the Hogwarts Anniversary Sale, with games up to 70% off until the 10th of February: https://store.steampowered.com/developer/WBGames/sale/hogwartsanniversary
• The RPG Maker Festival 2025 is here, it’s giving away for free RPG Maker VX Ace (click here) and comes with up to 93% discounts until, in theory, the 10th: https://store.steampowered.com/sale/RPGMakerFestival2025
• Unrailed 2: Back on Track, still in Early Access, will be 20% off until the 17th of February: https://store.steampowered.com/app/2211170/Unrailed_2_Back_on_Track/
• The Atari Publisher Sale lands with up to 75% discounts until the 17th: https://store.steampowered.com/curator/40527942/sale/AtariPublisherSale2025
• And of course, there’s also the weeklong deals.
• There is another deal, the Daedalic Multiplayer Sale but, as far as I can see, none of the games has seen any price cuts or deals.

SOFTWARE & DRIVERS

NVIDIA GeForce Hotfix Driver 572.24 Released & Fully Detailed
https://www.dsogaming.com/news/nvidia-geforce-hotfix-driver-572-24-released-fully-detailed/
NVIDIA has just released the NVIDIA GeForce Hotfix Driver 572.24, and shared its full changelog. This brand new driver fixes a couple of issues, and it is recommended for those that play Valorant. So, let’s take a closer look at it.
The NVIDIA GeForce Hotfix Driver 572.24 fixes some crash issues that could occur in Valorant when running it on an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5080. Moreover, it fixes some freeze issues that could occur when exiting Final Fantasy XVI on Windows 11 23H2.
>> If you’re affected by the FF XVI issue (the other one only affects the handful of 5080 owners), you can download it from here.

MODS, EMULATORS & FAN PROJECTS

New Version of Oblivion Fan Remake in Unreal Engine 5 Released
https://www.dsogaming.com/news/new-version-of-oblivion-fan-remake-in-unreal-engine-5-released/
Remember the The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Unreal Engine 5.3 Fan Remake we shared in December 2024? Well, get ready for a treat. Greg Coulthard has released a brand new version of it that you can download right now.
For those unaware, this project brings the entire map of Oblivion in Unreal Engine 5. So, this is what we’d get from a remaster of this classic TES game on a modern engine.
As I’ve already reported, apart from the foliage, all the assets and textures are from the original game. For the lighting, the artist also used Ultra Dynamic Sky. This sky system is designed to be more dynamic and natural than most sky solutions.
In short, you should temper your expectations. This isn’t a full-fledged remake. Still, for a one-man project, it is pretty impressive.
>> There’s an almost 10 minutes video in the article.

GAMING NEWS

Pre-Alpha Gameplay Footage for Battlefield 2025
https://www.dsogaming.com/videotrailer-news/pre-alpha-gameplay-footage-for-battlefield-2025/
EA and DICE announced today an ambitious community testing program, called Battlefield Labs. And at the end of that video, EA and DICE gave us a brief look at the pre-alpha version of the next Battlefield game.

Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 supports DLSS 4 at launch
https://www.dsogaming.com/news/kingdom-come-deliverance-2-supports-dlss-4-at-launch/
NVIDIA has announced that Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2, which comes out in a few hours, will support DLSS 4 at launch. KCD2 is a highly anticipated RPG, so it’s good to know that the game will have support for NVIDIA’s latest tech.

Tuesday news, the second part:

Multiversus director addresses fans angered by its upcoming closure: 'You're entitled to what you say and think, but when there are threats to harm it's crossing the line'
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/fighting/multiversus-director-addresses-fans-angered-by-its-upcoming-closure-youre-entitled-to-what-you-say-and-think-but-when-there-are-threats-to-harm-its-crossing-the-line/
Multiversus game director Tony Huynh says he knows the forthcoming end of development is "painful for everyone," players and developers alike, but while it's okay to express anger and frustration, "threats to harm" members of the development team are not.

'I cannot believe this': Composer Winifred Phillips was 'blown away' after winning a Grammy for a remake of a 44-year-old RPG
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/i-cannot-believe-this-composer-winifred-phillips-was-blown-away-after-winning-a-grammy-for-a-remake-of-a-44-year-old-rpg/
Wizardry: Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord debuted in 1981 for the Apple II and very quickly became a hit, launching an acclaimed and influential series of RPGs that would persist throughout the 1980s and '90s. A remake of that game dropped in 2024, and to our great surprise it was nominated for a Grammy Award in the "Best Score Soundtrack for Videogames and Other Interactive Media" category. And last night, to our even greater surprise, it won.

While you're waiting for Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2, try this free Steam demo of a roguelike kingdom-builder where your peasants won't work unless you're looking directly at them
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/roguelike/while-youre-waiting-for-kingdom-come-deliverance-2-try-this-free-steam-demo-of-a-roguelike-kingdom-builder-where-your-peasants-wont-work-unless-youre-looking-directly-at-them/
I can feel it poised to happen: Kingdom Come 2: Deliverance is gonna hit big on Steam tomorrow when it launches. It's the perfect storm of largely great reviews (including ours), the appeal of a sprawling singleplayer RPG in an age of live-service games, and maybe even the rush to play and finish it before Civilization 7 and Obsidian's Avowed come out in rapid succession over the next couple of weeks.
But what should we do in the handful of hours before Kingdom Come 2: Deliverance actually releases on Steam this Tuesday? Just sit around waiting? Nah. How about another game about a kingdom, only in this one you're the king? As an added bonus, the demo is free, and it's also seriously fun.
In the demo of The King Is Watching, you've got a kingdom to run: wheat to harvest, gold to mine, soldiers to train. And it's all possible thanks to your hardworking peasants—not that you would ever literally thank the peasants, naturally, 'cuz you're a king—who toil in the fields, labor in the mines, and do battle with swarms of goblins trying to breach your walls.

'I feel extremely insulted by this': Platinum removes most of its games from its website, erasing the last signs of life for Project GG
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/i-feel-extremely-insulted-by-this-platinum-removes-most-of-its-games-from-its-website-erasing-the-last-signs-of-life-for-project-gg/
The website for PlatinumGames has undergone an unexpected change: A page that previously listed the studio's game releases has been unceremoniously deleted, and with it some of the last remaining evidence of the Ultraman-inspired Project GG (via Eurogamer).
As https://www.platinumgames.com/games/">archived versions of the Platinum site show, it used to have a page titled "Games," listing 22 of the studio's releases dating back to its founding in 2006. Today, trying to visit that same URL redirects you to the site's homepage. In the Games page's place, there's now a page titled "Works," listing just eight of those 22 games and the recently-announced Ninja Gaiden 4, which Platinum is developing in partnership with Team Ninja.

Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2's guns are very, very bad, but that's what makes them so fun: 'We knew it was going to be a meme weapon, but we were cool with it'
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/rpg/kingdom-come-deliverance-2s-guns-are-very-very-bad-but-thats-what-makes-them-so-fun-we-knew-it-was-going-to-be-a-meme-weapon-but-we-were-cool-with-it/
Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 is a game obsessed with medieval history—specifically the history of Bohemia, a kingdom in the Holy Roman Empire that's now part of modern Czechia. It's an RPG that is fascinated by the social structures, clothing, architecture, weapons and culture of the time.
(...)
Since big pitched battles weren't the focus of Kingdom Come: Deliverance, guns weren't a priority. You spent most of your time traipsing around the countryside getting into duels with knights or fighting small groups of bandits. And the same is largely true of Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2, but this time Warhorse wanted to show players "how firearms looked and operated".
"Just the idea that someone goes through the forest, he's attacked by bandits, and he takes out a boomstick—that's ridiculous," says Bittner. "So we knew it was going to be a meme weapon, but we were cool with it."

Destiny 2 is the latest game to feel the SAG-AFTRA strike as it warns Heresy will be missing an unknown chunk of voiced dialogue
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/fps/destiny-2-is-the-latest-game-to-feel-the-sag-aftra-strike-as-it-warns-heresy-will-be-missing-an-unknown-chunk-of-voiced-dialogue/
Destiny 2: Heresy is set to launch today (February 4), concluding the Light and Darkness Saga and flinging players into the Dreadnought as part of its 3-player game mode, The Nether.
One thing it won't have a lot of however, is voiced dialogue. As part of the January 30 This Week in Destiny blog post on the Bungie website, the community team tempered expectations around voice lines amidst the continuing SAG-AFTRA strike.

Need for Speed is effectively on hold while Criterion musters entirely around Battlefield, but EA assures players the racer will return in 'new and interesting ways'
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/racing/need-for-speed-is-effectively-on-hold-while-criterion-musters-entirely-around-battlefield-but-ea-assures-players-the-racer-will-return-in-new-and-interesting-ways/
Need for Speed fans are in for a long wait before getting behind the wheel of a new game from the series. Developer Criterion Games, which has handled EA's venerable racer for years, has now shifted entirely over to work on EA's next Battlefield title. In a statement to Eurogamer, Battlefield's three-star general Vince Zampella explained that "The Need for Speed team at Criterion are joining their colleagues working on Battlefield."

Ugh! Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 has a body-odour 'broadcasting' system where your stink can alert nearby NPCs
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/rpg/ugh-kingdom-come-deliverance-2-has-a-body-odour-broadcasting-system-where-your-stink-can-alert-nearby-npcs/
Stealth games typically prioritise avoiding causing a stink, but usually in a figurative sense. Keeping a low profile as you skulk around some elaborate mansion or military base is often essential to survival, as you evade or quietly eliminate guards to prevent the alarm being raised. Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2, however, makes being sniffed out a more literal concern, adding a fully simulated pong propagation system that enables NPCs to detect your encroaching stench.

Since Path of Exile's expansion has been delayed, players are instead getting a month-long event featuring 'whacky ideas that never quite made it off the brainstorm board'
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/rpg/since-path-of-exiles-expansion-has-been-delayed-players-are-instead-getting-a-month-long-event-featuring-whacky-ideas-that-never-quite-made-it-off-the-brainstorm-board/
Path of Exile dev Grinding Gear Games bit off more than it could chew when it promised to maintain Path of Exile just like it had always done, even while it was dealing with the Path of Exile 2 launch. But reality is a killjoy and the studio has been reassessing things, resulting in a PoE1 expansion delay, which hasn't gone down well with the original game's stalwarts.
(...)
Unsurprisingly, this announcement led to a lot of drama, with some players going so far as to call GGG's promise to support both games a "scam" just because an expansion has been delayed. But the studio is still planning to give PoE1 some love, in the form of a one-month event. GGG says it will feature "some of our whacky ideas that never quite made it off the brainstorm board".

Liking the guy's essays so far, but I'm not fond of ye old message he says at the end with "we're the true believers of X/Y values/tech", because I have seen so many people use that as some form of moral rallying cry and then years later those same ppl chanting those values end up doing away with them or forgetting them.

So while he is making great points, he should really drop the gun-ho "hoo rah" speeches (I was like that when I was his age and it comes off as a bit obnoxious looking back on it now). He should just stick to explaining the facts and showing the results of how badly optimisation is falling to the wayside in the AAA/dev space, because that's really what matters most and what we're there for. 

Apart from that, great vid, and I hope he makes more to bring awareness to this plight. 

Amazed how tone death he comes off as with his whataboutism argument.

"you guys are mad that we had to launch the game, then take it down for 2 years, then re-launch it again and take your money only to take it down again?, well death threats are bad m'kay. 

Like yeah death threats are bad, but my god so is taking money twice in a row for a live service game you barely kept up for many years. Blizzard still keeps Heroes of the Storm going, a moba since 2013 that had skins and maps all the way up to 2020, but WB just can't keep anything going without either cancelling it, or squeezing the lemon dry.

"you're entitled to say what you think" means sweet fuck all when we know he doesn't care (he can claim he cares all he wants, but words from publishers/studios mean absolute feck all, when actions speak far louder). He's still going to shut down the game, and still unlikely to care about the money ppl dumped into the game. His massive focus on the very few sending those threats tells me he's looking for excuses not to budge, which to me comes off as more vile. Again someone who doesn't want to own up and coming from a high up place, what a surprise (to the shock of no one). 

The games for Humble Choice February 2025 have been revealed:

• Fabledom
• Griftlands
• Immortals of Aveum (origin Key)
• My Little Universe
• Naheulbeuk's Dungeon Master
• Tales And Tactics
• Total War: PHARAOH DYNASTIES
• Trepang2

Immortals of Aveum being Origin key makes me want to press the pause button.

Thanks, Rhonin.

About f*cking time! They need to be able to release those pluggins faster if they want more games using their techs.

I tried to watch it, but I think I lasted 5 minutes before being confused.

Before I give it another try, who is the guy? Like, is he someone with knowledge and talks from things he's seen? Also, what it the video really about? Because he starts attacking an LTT video for saying that ray tracing hardware is the future, which is something we've already talked here and we agree that, like it or not, it is, but then he goes on to say that we're being lied by the media, that upscaling makes games blurry, and that Ghost of Tsushima is a bad port... and then is when I stopped watching it because the whole LTT video seems like a bait to get more viewers.

I'm sorry for those that spend money on the game, but it's a free to play game and whatever money they did spend on it, it was for microtransactions or things like that.

Also, he is the head of the studio that made the game, not from WB. I very much doubt he or anyone from the studio had any saying about the decision to close the game.

So no, I don't think he's "tone deaf", he's sympathetic with the players because he's also frustrated but can't say what he really wants to say because they still depend on who is actually responsible, WB, to keep the studio alive.

And on another note, if the game lost WB $100 last year, it shouldn't come as a surprise that they want to close it before it costs them even more. It sucks for those who liked, played and spent money on the game, but it's a business and they need to make money.

Idk what his complete background is but the point he brings up in the video is that the way developers are using Ray Tracing is not the best way to use it and really the way developers use modern Anti Aliasing is also not the best way. Basically developers are using Ray Tracing in games that don't need it which incurs a huge cost in gpu power where instead, if they were to use traditional lighting for largely static elements while pairing Ray Tracing with more dynamic elements, we wouldn't need so much gpu power being wasted. In other words, developers are using Ray Tracing and Upscaling to forgo optimization. Granted the way he talks isn't easy to swallow. He was picking on LTT because of his video that said Ray Tracing is mandatory now.

But the part I was mainly interested in was his talk about AMD vs Nvidia around 13:45 mark where essentially, Nvidia is the business of "Hardware accelerated software" in games while AMD is in the hardware manufacturing business. And he provides examples of and ways the two companies make decisions and things like that. Granted he does talk like an aggressive teenager lol.

Thanks foe ther summary. I may give it another chance later on, tho I still think his use or miss use of the LTT video and including them in the thumbnail is a too obvious clickbait, and I don't like them.

Also, Nvidia is a software company that makes hardware for it while AMD is a hardware company, while true, is a bit outdated. We haven't seen the transformation yet, but AMD said last year that they would also shift its priorities to the software side of the GPU business.