AMD Radeon RX 9070 series briefly listed by Canadian retailer: RX 9070 XT at $697 USD, RX 9070 at $586 USD

https://videocardz.com/newz/amd-radeon-rx-9070-series-briefly-listed-by-canadian-retailer-rx-9070-xt-at-697-usd-rx-9070-at-586-usd

Really hoping it's place holder pricing and not legit pricing

GeForce RTX 5070 launch reportedly slips to early March, NVIDIA playing cat & mouse with AMD?

https://videocardz.com/newz/geforce-rtx-5070-launch-reportedly-slips-to-early-march-nvidia-playing-cat-mouse-with-amd

AMD reportedly working on gaming Radeon RX 9070 XT GPU with 32GB memory

https://videocardz.com/newz/amd-reportedly-working-on-gaming-radeon-rx-9000-gpu-with-32gb-memory

Redditor reports AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D burned while watching TV series

https://videocardz.com/newz/redditor-reports-amd-ryzen-7-9800x3d-burned-while-watching-tv-series

Retails should package high end hardware with fire extinguishers apparently 

Time for the Wednesday news:

SALES/PLAYER COUNTS & DEALS

Steam has three new deals:

• Dungeon Tycoon will be 35% off until the 25th of February: https://store.steampowered.com/app/2400770/Dungeon_Tycoon/
• The Early Access title SILENT BREATH has a 55% discount until February, the 25th: https://store.steampowered.com/app/2796180/SILENT_BREATH/
• And Sizeable, that has a demo, will be 90% off until the same 25th: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1333910/Sizeable/

At the Humble Store we find the On Sale This Week page, with lots of games on sale with up to 95% discounts during 8 days: https://www.humblebundle.com/store/promo/on-sale-now/.

Fanatical has one new sale and two bundles:

• The Capcom Fire Deals also come to Fanatical with up to 89% deals during 11 days: https://www.fanatical.com/en/publishers/capcom
• The BYO Simulator Collection, with 18 games to choose for your bundles of 2+, 3+ or 5+ during 34 days: https://www.fanatical.com/en/pick-and-mix/build-your-own-simulator-collection
• Meanwhile, the BYO Special Editions Bundle (BundleFest 2025) features 21 titles to choose for your 2+, 3+ or 5+ bundles during 34 days: https://www.fanatical.com/en/pick-and-mix/build-your-own-special-editions-bundle

SOFTWARE & DRIVERS

AMD Radeon Software Adrenalin 25.2.1 driver
https://videocardz.com/driver/amd-radeon-software-adrenalin-25-2-1
Highlights
New Game Support

• Sid Meier’s Civilization VII
• Avowed
• Monster Hunter Wilds
• Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii

Fixed Issues

• Partial black screen may appear in Main Menu while playing Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 with Radeon™ Anti-Lag 2 and Ray Tracing enabled on AMD Ryzen™ 7000 and above series processors.
• Unable to set low black values when using MyXrayDose ViewIQ.

2 years into Unity's long downward spiral, even more employees are being laid off as CEO says it's still 'stretched across too many products'
https://www.pcgamer.com/gaming-industry/2-years-into-unitys-long-downward-spiral-even-more-employees-are-being-laid-off-as-ceo-says-its-still-stretched-across-too-many-products/
A year after laying off 25% of its workforce in what it called "a company reset," engine maker Unity has reportedly put even more people out of work. The layoffs were reported by multiple Unity employees on LinkedIn (via Game Developer) and while the number of people let go is currently unknown, a post on the Unity forums says the entire team responsible for Unity Behavior, a tool used to develop and control the behaviors of NPCs in videogames, has been let go.
The latest round of layoffs at Unity seem to have come as a surprise to at least some impacted employees: One wrote in LinkedIn that the cuts were "totally unexpected," while another wrote that he "didn't expect it to happen so suddenly." A third employee said he was notified of the layoffs by "a 5 am email from 'noreply@unity' informing me that my role was being 'eliminated' and that I’d lose system access by the end of the day."
(...)
In an internal email obtained by 80.lv, current Unity CEO Matthew Bromberg said the company is "currently stretched across too many products, creating complexity and limiting impact."

MODS, EMULATORS & FAN PROJECTS

There are already Civilization 7 mods that improve the UI, unlock all civs, and add 'ludicrous'-sized maps
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/strategy/there-are-already-civilization-7-mods-to-change-the-ui-unlock-all-civs-and-add-ludicrous-sized-maps/
Civilization 7 is officially here, and with it comes (at least for now) a "Mixed" review status on Steam and a lot of complaints about the 4X strategy's UI. While we're keeping up with all the latest Civ 7 news and developments, the community has been busy too: the first Civ 7 mods have arrived on the same day as the game's global launch.
This is the rare occasion where I'm not directing you to Nexus Mods: the early mods that have appeared for Civ 7 are over at the civfanatics.com forums. There aren't a ton of them yet, but there are definitely a few to point out.
Right out of the gate, there are a couple of mods that address one of the biggest complaints about Civ 7: the UI. Civ 7's interface is taking a serious pounding: I've seen Steam reviewers calling it "buggy," "inconsistent," "junk," "a total disaster," and most damningly, "somehow worse than Civ 6."
Firaxis has already issued a patch to address a few of the complaints about the UI and I suspect there will be more coming, but in the meantime you might check out Sukritact's Simple UI Adjustments. I haven't tried it myself yet, but it's got nothing but 5-star ratings in the forums. (…)
Another mod is also focused on improving the UI: TCS Improved Plot Tooltop adds tons more info so it's easier to find what you need, including leader relationship status, settlement ownership, flags for obsolete or unique buildings, district types, and other useful tidbits you can spy at a glance.
If you're an eager beaver and are interested in instant gratification, check out the Civ 7 Unlock All Civs mod. With it, you no longer have to meet the requirements to access civilizations when you reach the Exploration and Modern Ages, they're all immediately available to you.
Work is already underway on bringing you bigger maps, with a beta of Larger Map, TSL, Continents++ available to download. It unlocks "large" and "huge" map sizes and adds a "massive" (128x80) map. The mod also lists experimental (not playable) "giant" maps (180x94) and "ludicrous" maps (230x116) to test out.
>> With so many mods listed, it’s understandable that there’s no media in the article.

Take a new look at Dark Messiah of Might and Magic RTX Remix
https://www.dsogaming.com/videotrailer-news/take-a-new-look-at-dark-messiah-of-might-and-magic-rtx-remix/
NVIDIA has shared a new trailer for the RTX Remix Path Tracing Mod for Dark Messiah of Might and Magic. This trailer will give you a glimpse at the current state of the mod. Plus, it has some cool before/after comparison scenes.
Created by wiltOS Technologies, this mod aims to add full ray tracing, updated textures, assets, lighting, and more. Once the mod is complete, this will be the definitive way to play this classic game. So, here is hoping that the modders will keep working on it.
>> The article includes the less than 2 minutes video.

GAMING NEWS

Crysis 4 is no longer in active development
https://www.dsogaming.com/news/crysis-4-is-no-longer-in-active-development/
In 2022, Crytek announced the next part of its Crysis series (which, at least for now, we’ll be calling “Crysis 4”). However, this new Crysis game is no longer in active development. In fact, as Crytek itself revealed, it put its development on hold in Q3 2024.
>> As the PCGamer article states, Crytek has also laid off 15% of its employees.

Wednesday news, part two:

GOG's bespoke cut of The Elder Scrolls 2: Daggerfall gets delisted tomorrow, so you've got a day to grab it for free as the store works out how 'to publish and maintain such projects better' in future
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/the-elder-scrolls/gogs-bespoke-cut-of-the-elder-scrolls-2-daggerfall-gets-delisted-tomorrow-so-youve-got-a-day-to-grab-it-for-free-as-the-store-works-out-how-to-publish-and-maintain-such-projects-better-in-future/
There's something about Elder Scrolls games. For years, one of the most popular ways for newbies to get into Morrowind was a mod collection called the Morrowind Graphics and Sound Overhaul (MGSO), which bundled up a bunch of gameplay and graphics mods in an easy installer to give the game a 'modern' makeover. Problem was it wasn't great, to the point that even its original creator eventually came out and asked people not to use it.
So it goes with Morrowind's predecessor—The Elder Scrolls 2: Daggerfall. Daggerfall is a weird, wide, rambling thing, and absolutely still worth playing in 2025, especially since it's now free. But if you were to just Google an easy way to play it, chances are you'll stumble across the 2022 Daggerfall GOG Cut, a version of Daggerfall with the GOG stamp of approval, bundled up with a bunch of mods to make it feel a bit more approachable in the modern era.
Problem is, just like MGSO, it's not great. In most ways, it's inferior to just downloading the genuinely excellent Daggerfall Unity by itself and running the game straight from there. The GOG Cut is outdated, the mods it includes aren't their most recent versions, and some of them don't quite mesh. It's been the bête noire of the Daggerfall community for a while now, and so GOG has come out and announced it's delisting the whole thing tomorrow, February 12, at 2 pm GMT.

The best Far Cry game of all time now has achievements on Steam
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/fps/the-best-far-cry-game-of-all-time-now-has-achievements-on-steam/
Ubisoft's return to Steam has continued slowly but surely since September 2024, when the company finally decided that enough was enough and it was time to start selling games where people actually want to buy them. That means day-one releases on Steam, which is a big deal in its own right, but Ubisoft has been going an extra step by adding Steam achievements to its older games on the storefront. That's nice, although it doesn't really interest me personally—or at least it didn't until today, because today Ubisoft brought that love to what is possibly its greatest videogame ever.
I am of course talking about Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon, the "'80s vision of the future" starring Rex "Power" Colt, whose mission in the futuristic world of 2007 is to kill everything, get the girl, and save the world. "Experience every cliché of a VHS era vision of a nuclear future, where cyborgs, blood dragons, mutants, and Michael Biehn collide," the Steam page promises, and let me tell you as someone who grew up in the era of Terminator, Aliens, and Navy Seals, it works: It's dumber than hell and an absolute blast.

Karlach voice actor offers a pre-emptive no thanks to Disco Elysium successors that don't include the original project lead: 'Miss me with that casting call'
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/rpg/karlach-voice-actor-offers-a-pre-emptive-no-thanks-to-disco-elysium-successors-that-dont-include-the-original-project-lead-miss-me-with-that-casting-call/
The post-Disco Elysium world we live in is... complicated. Following the release of one of the biggest and most acclaimed RPGs to come along in years, developer ZA/UM imploded, and left its wake are splinters of the shell, each claiming they're making a Disco Elysium "spiritual successor" and putting in some real effort to discredit everyone else.
It's a mess alright, but one person who's having none of it is Samantha Béart, best known for their portrayal of Karlach in Baldur's Gate 3. That performance has apparently attracted the attention of at least some of the people working on Disco Elysium follow-up projects, but sadly for them Béart said they're not interested unless the project meets one very specific requirement.
>> Meanwhile, Doug Cockle is happy to return to voice Geralt, whether it is an animated work, or The Witcher 4..

To make its fantasy extraction game, this studio of ex-Blizzard devs had to teach itself the art of third-person combat design: 'There's a science to how those are built'
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/action/to-make-its-fantasy-extraction-game-this-studio-of-ex-blizzard-devs-had-to-teach-itself-the-art-of-third-person-combat-design-theres-a-science-to-how-those-are-built/
Late last year, I played in a closed alpha playtest of Legacy: Steel & Sorcery, an upcoming extraction game pairing World of Warcraft-style high fantasy with third-person action combat. Over a couple of hours, I got an early taste of stringing together longbow headshots on skeletons, smashing wolves with maces, and panicked escapes as a priest tried to murder me for my backpack full of goblin ears. This week, Legacy enters early access, aiming to offer its own artisanal blend of RPG extraction.
Ahead of Legacy's early access launch, I spoke last month with Chris Kaleiki, Notorious Studios co-founder and former World of Warcraft class designer. In our interview, Kaleiki explained how Legacy grew out of an idea he had about redesigning World of Warcraft's class fantasy with more action and less action bars.

'It's nice to have options': Blizzard thinks Avowed's new cross-buy feature is breaking down barriers
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/rpg/its-nice-to-have-options-blizzard-thinks-its-breaking-down-barriers-with-avoweds-new-cross-buy-feature/
We're less than a week away from Avowed's full release, which is on February 18, 2025, and as part of the lead-up to this, Blizzard has released a small bit of news about Obsidian Entertainment's upcoming game: players will be able to switch between Avowed on their PC and their Xbox.

Elden Ring Nightreign release date set for May, will cost $40
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/rpg/elden-ring-nightreign-release-date-set-for-may-will-cost-usd40/
Well here's a nice surprise: Elden Ring Nightreign's official release date is May 30, a good chunk earlier in the year than I would've guessed when FromSoftware announced it in December. Coinciding with a bunch of new Nightreign hands-on impressions, Bandai Namco also shared that the co-op Elden Ring spinoff will cost $40, the same price as the Shadow of the Erdtree expansion.

Looks like Neverwinter Nights 2 has been freed from rights hell and is due an imminent enhanced edition release, bringing the 2006 RPG from 5GB to 36GB
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/rpg/looks-like-neverwinter-nights-2-has-been-freed-from-rights-hell-and-is-due-an-imminent-enhanced-edition-release-bringing-the-2006-rpg-from-5gb-to-36gb/
There's probably a few holdouts somewhere, but for the most part, it seems like we've all come to accept Beamdog's "enhanced" versions of D&D classics like Baldur's Gate 1 and 2, Planescape: Torment, Icewind Dale, and Neverwinter Nights 1 as those games' go-to editions. But there are a couple of classics still missing from the lineup: Icewind Dale 2 and Neverwinter Nights 2.
Icewind Dale 2's missing source code means the outlook for a remaster of that one looks grim, but an addition to SteamDB (spotted on Reddit) has me pretty much convinced we're due for an imminent dolled-up re-release of Obsidian's follow-up to the OG Neverwinter Nights, which up to now has reputedly been in licensing rights purgatory.

Subnautica 2 dev sounds foghorn about 'fraudulent links' being sent to community members: 'We will never contact anyone by Steam DM for any potential playtests'
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/survival-crafting/subnautica-2-dev-sounds-foghorn-about-fraudulent-links-being-sent-to-community-members-we-will-never-contact-anyone-by-steam-dm-for-any-potential-playtests/
The Subnautica 2 community drifted into shark-infested waters recently, as developer Unknown Worlds cautioned players about "fraudulent links" to a supposed playtest being sent out to fans and community members on Steam.
Reported by GamesRadar, the Subnautica 2 developer first sounded the alarm on X, posting that it had "been made aware" fake links to a playtest of the highly anticipated sequel were being messaged to community members on Steam, and warned players sthat "we will never contact anyone by Steam DM for any potential playtests."

The price of the 9070XT could be a placeholder with those $999, but the one for the 9070 is too specific to believe it is.

So, three options: 1) They're real, but were the ones AMD had in mind before Nvidia revealed the pricing of the 5000 series, making them outdated and not true anymore; 2) They're real and AMD has been lying about how powerful those cards will be to the point of those prices being "good" for what they'll offer; and 3) They're real and current, and the AMD GPU division has no f*cking idea what "competitive pricing" means anymore.

Sadly, option 3 seems more likely.

I honestly don't see the point. Given how the 5090 and 5080 have performed, it could be rather easy to guess how will the 5070 perform based on the specs we know... and it will be hard for it to beat the 4070Ti. Plus it will still have only 12GB.

There no reason to hold the release because we know it's going to be a turd and people will buy it anyway.

Since a few of you have an RTX 4090, I think this may be of interest:

Here’s what’s happened to the 12VHPWR power cable of our NVIDIA RTX 4090 after two years of continuous work
https://www.dsogaming.com/articles/heres-what-happened-to-the-12vhpwr-power-cable-of-our-nvidia-rtx-4090-after-two-years-of-continuous-work/
So, after some stories that surfaced online about the melting issues of the 12VHPWR power cables for the RTX 5090 and the RTX 4090, I’ve decided to check the one we’ve been using these two years for the RTX 4090. So, what has happened to that power cable? Has it melted? Let’s find out.

Before continuing, I want to make it crystal clear that we’ve been using the official power cable for the RTX 4090 for over two years. We haven’t removed it when testing different GPUs. For instance, for benchmarking the RTX 3080, we’ve been using its own power cable. Same applies to the RTX 5080 and the RTX 5090. Moreover, the power cable is still working, and we haven’t encountered any stability issues.

So, here are some screenshots from the power cable. As you can see, it has signs of degradation. The plastic around one connector has been slightly melted. So yes, the melting issues are real.

As I said, the power cable and the RTX 4090 GPU have been working without issues. They still work without issues. And yes, when I installed the cable, I made sure it was plugged properly. Moreover, the melted connector is not as bad as those you might have seen online. However, we can all agree that there are things that need to be improved here.

For science, I also tried the power cable with the RTX 5090. I did not experience any crashes or stability issues. The RTX 5090 worked fine, and it ran games at full speed without any throttling issues or crashes.

The pic is a snippet from one of the article, to better see the damage.

As far as I know, none of you have had any problem with yours, but the next time you open the case to clean it, it wouldn't hurt to check how's the connector, just in case.

Cool, does that mean Ubisoft finally got FC3 to actually fully work well with modern day HW?, because I tried to run it 2yrs ago with my still same rig from 2017 and it ran like total ass, despite all the fixes attempted from PCGaming wiki...

It either works really well, or those cheevos won't matter. 

I'd say it's much more easier to add achievements than to fix a broken game/port. But I'm sure you already knew that.

I probably should check on mine but I got my cable from Cablemod who guarantees that if their cable shits the bed, they will replace the gpu entirely and based on peoples experiences with them, they have been honouring their word.

It is crazy how much of an issue this cable has been in the press. I do like the idea of the cable. 600 watts needing such a tiny cable vs 3-4 bulky 8 pin cables. But only if it's fool proof which clearly this hasn't been and even 5090s don't seem to be fool proof either. User error or not, the makers of the 12 pin should have ensured it would be as fool proof as 8 pins have been for quite sometime.

Of course, but still, adding in cheevos to a game that cannot function properly on modern hw is really just a nothing burger to even write home about, even for PCgamer, a site that should know full well about the state of Ubi's games. 

But then again, they don't care as much for performance of older games as much as modders and GoG does. 

That's with an adapter, though, native 12VHPWR support from the PSU apparently distributes power more evenly across the cables. That's what I'm hoping, at least... (plus a very good undervolt).