Definitely sus as f*ck. Thanks for raising awareness on this.

New week, new round of gaming news:

SALES/PLAYER COUNTS & DEALS

Battlefield 6 hits a peak of 747k players on Steam, hot on the heels of Baldur's Gate 3's record and in the platform's all-time top 20
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/fps/battlefield-6-hits-a-peak-of-747k-players-on-steam-hot-on-the-heels-of-baldurs-gate-3s-record-and-in-the-platforms-all-time-top-20/
Battlefield 6 is proving a remarkable milestone for the venerable military shooter series. It's not just a great game—as PC Gamer staff writer Morgan Park put it in last week's review-in-progress, "a bullseye where it matters most"—it's also very popular, as evidenced by its recent eye-watering concurrent player count of over 747,000.
That number comes from SteamDB, which shows Battlefield 6 jockeying with Dota 2 for second most-played game on Steam right now behind the platform's perennial #1, Counter-Strike 2. The number has been left to simmer for a bit as I write this on a Sunday morning, but sits proudly at around 600,000 active players regardless.
With a bit more oomph as the game builds up steam, it might just overtake Baldur's Gate 3's historical peak of 875,000 simultaneous players, which would put it very close to the all-time top ten. Still, it's overtaken the likes of Marvel Rivals, Apex Legends, and notably, any Call of Duty game on the platform, so even if it plateaus from here it is a seismic release.
>> It already went past 500k users 25 minutes after launch (link).

Steam has one new deal and two sales/events:

• Wild Assault / 兽猎突袭 , still in Early Access, is going to be 40% off until the 19th of October: https://store.steampowered.com/app/2827230/Wild_Assault
• And these are the sales/events:
  • Publisher Headup puts its games on sale, up to 95% off. The deals will end between the 23rd and the 26th of October: https://store.steampowered.com/sale/headup-publisher-sale-2025
  • For its 44th Anniversary, the Wizardry franchise is on sale with up to 85% discounts until October 27th. The discounts will launch by today’s refresh: https://store.steampowered.com/curator/43658696/sale/Wizardry44thanniversarysale

Fanatical has three new deals:

• Star Deal is Disco Elysium - The Final Cut, featuring a 91% discount during 48 hours: https://www.fanatical.com/en/game/disco-elysium-the-final-cut
• The Scream Sale has lots of games on sale… they’re just mixed with all the others games on sale. Also, if you spend more than a certain amount, you’ll get a free game: https://www.fanatical.com/en/on-sale
• The NeuroVoider - Deluxe Edition bundle is back, with the usual 20% discount, and will last 13 days: https://www.fanatical.com/en/bundle/neurovoider-deluxe-edition

SOFTWARE & DRIVERS

AMD Radeon Software Adrenalin 25.10.1 driver
https://videocardz.com/driver/amd-radeon-software-adrenalin-25-10-1

HIGHLIGHTS
New Game Support

• Battlefield 6 (DX12)

>> It’s a Beta driver.

MODS, EMULATORS & FAN PROJECTS

Lordbound Is A New DLC-sized Expansion Mod For Skyrim
https://www.dsogaming.com/pc-performance-analyses/lordbound-is-a-new-dlc-sized-expansion-mod-for-skyrim
The Lordbound Team has released a new cool DLC-sized fan expansion mod for The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim Special Edition. This mod adds the land of Druadach, a dense new region larger than Solstheim. So, let’s take a closer look at it.
Alongside the new land of Druadach, the mod adds new quests, dungeons, events, and activities for you to enjoy. Lordbound offers over 60 hours of content through main questlines and side content.
According to the team, there are over 40 quests, found through the many new settlements and by exploring the world. Players can also explore over 50 new dungeons. On top of that, they can find new weapons, armor, spells, and surprising consumables.
Right now, roughly half of the mod’s major characters are voiced, but many NPCs, especially supporting ones, will have incomplete or no voiced dialogue. The team plans to add more voices in future versions.
>> The article has no media.

Cyberpunk 2077 Just Got a Brutal New Battle Axe — And It’s Absolutely Devastating
https://www.dsogaming.com/pc-performance-analyses/cyberpunk-2077-just-got-a-brutal-new-battle-axe-and-its-absolutely-devastating
Modder ‘manavortex’ has released a simple but cool mod for Cyberpunk 2077 that introduces a Battle Axe to the game. This mod will enhance the game’s melee combat. By using this new Battle Axe, you can kill and dismember your enemies.
With this new Battle Axe, players can hack and slay their enemies and watch them fall into pieces. For those wondering, the mod re-uses the game’s original grenade explosions and limb removal features.
>> The article has a short video.

The Need for Speed Underground 2 Unreal Engine 5 Fan Remake Looks Better Than Ever
https://www.dsogaming.com/pc-performance-analyses/the-need-for-speed-underground-2-unreal-engine-5-fan-remake-looks-better-than-ever
In January 2025, we shared a demo for the fan remake of Need for Speed Underground 2 in Unreal Engine 5. Since then, the fan remake has been receiving numerous updates. So, here is a video that showcases some of its new features.
Created by apfelbaum, this fan remake attempts to bring the whole game to UE5. As its creator has stated, the Career Mode is playable from start to finish. Yup, you read that right. This project does not bring a portion of the game. Instead, it will allow you to play the whole Career Mode. Now that’s cool.
Right now, the Career Mode does not have any AI opponents or traffic. It also lacks the destructible environments that the original game has. So, hopefully, apfelbaum will add them.
The latest build of the remake will have better driving mechanics. Moreover, it will come with a new weather system, as well as a new car paint model.
The Unreal Engine 5 remake of NFS Underground 2 will also feature a new launcher. This launcher will let you easily download your game files, keep them up to date, and verify their integrity. It will be available with the next version of the fan remake.
>> There are two videos in the article.

Resident Evil 6 Gets a 28GB HD Mod That Overhauls All Textures
https://www.dsogaming.com/pc-performance-analyses/resident-evil-6-gets-a-28gb-hd-mod-that-overhauls-all-textures
Modder ‘Evgeshajk’ has released a must-have 28GB HD Mod for Resident Evil 6 that overhauls all of its textures. This is a must for everyone who wants to replay this RE game. So, if you were planning to replay it, you should do so with this mod.
(...)
Now, as you will see, the vanilla version had some truly awful textures. And that’s where this mod comes in. By using AI tools, the modder was able to upscale the original textures by four times. As such, they look much sharper now. Evgeshajk has also made some manual refinements here and there.
At the end of the article, you can find a comparison video. I’ve also included some comparison screenshots. The vanilla shots are on the left, whereas the modded shots are on the right. These will give you a pretty good idea of what you can expect from these new textures. So, be sure to check them out.

Baldur’s Gate 3 Just Got a Huge DLC-Sized Mod With New Gear and Encounters
https://www.dsogaming.com/pc-performance-analyses/baldurs-gate-3-just-got-a-huge-dlc-sized-mod-with-new-gear-and-encounters
Baldur’s Gate 3 fans, here is something for you today. Modders ‘Halomaster481’ and ‘Sumradagnoth8’ have released a huge new DLC-sized expansion mod for Baldur’s Gate 3, called Chivalry.
Going into more details, Chivalry adds more than 120 new items and 24 new weapons. It also brings 22 new armor sets, 10 new encounters, and over 100 new custom passives and abilities.
Chivalry will give your Baldur’s Gate 3 playthrough an Arthurian legend twist. Players will battle famous heroes and villains, from the Black Knight to the Forgotten Heroes of the Gate. The mod also makes each class more flexible by adding new types of armor and improving less-used areas of the game. You’ll find new weapons and armor scattered across all acts of Faerûn, each with unique abilities and mechanics.
>> There is a shorter than 2 minutes video in the article.

Mass Effect: Legendary Edition Community Patch 1.8 Released
https://www.dsogaming.com/pc-performance-analyses/mass-effect-legendary-edition-community-patch-1-8-released
The Mass Effect Community Patch Team has just released Community Update 1.8 for Mass Effect Legendary Edition. So, let’s see what this new unofficial patch brings to the table.
For those who don’t know, the LE1 Community Patch is a simple bug-fix mod for Mass Effect 1 Legendary Edition. It’s the spiritual successor to ME1Recalibrated. It mainly focuses on fixing bugs without changing the original game’s design or balance. Thus, it’s a must-have for everyone who wants to replay it.
Community Patch 1.8 fixes an issue where the jog animation would play when starting or stopping movement while the walk toggle was on. It also updates Kaidan’s combat hair mesh so his hair no longer clips through helmets. Ashley now has a proper visor when using full-breather mode. The sniper rifle camera sensitivity no longer stays active after zooming out, and the missing text in the Polish version of the FOV menu has been fixed.
And that’s not all. This latest update brings some tweaks, fixes, and changes to Eden Prime, Normandy, and the Citadel. For instance, it fixes the floating grass in the Citadel tower. Running upstairs during a fight in the Lower Markets will no longer cause enemies to stop and stand still, and the bouncer in Chora’s Den will retain his unique face when you fight him. The update fixes a broken Wrex line and Shepard’s response when speaking to him after Virmire in Normandy. It also fixes an issue where Chakwas would not speak to you in the prologue if you spammed through her lines.
>> The article has some screenshots.

Borderlands 4 director says use dialogue skip mod at your peril—it might turbo-brick your missions
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/fps/borderlands-4-director-says-use-dialogue-skip-mod-at-your-peril-it-might-turbo-brick-your-missions/
Sick of Borderlands 4's chatty characters? Just want to press ahead and get to the shooting? Wish you could hammer a button to speed through their dialogue like you can in most other games? Good news! A courageous modder has created a dialogue-skip mod.
Whatever you do, don't ever use it.
That's not me telling you that, it's Graeme Timmins, Gearbox bigwig and creative director on Borderlands 4. Okay, to be fair, Timmins wasn't quite as foreboding as that, but he did caution players against using this (or any other) dialogue skipping mod when they brought it to his attention. Not because he's precious about you hearing his game's lovely words, but because "skipping dialog could lead to broken mission states that might not be recoverable."
Turns out all that nattering is holding something up, and that something is important. While other games might have dialogue-skip functions with hardly a problem, the way BL4 works means that "This request is way more involved and riskier that it appears on the surface with how dialog is integrated within our mission system".
In other words, not triggering some key bit of mission info in dialogue might leave you in mission limbo forevermore. "Don't ask me how I know" concludes Timmins, forebodingly.

Team Fortress 2 Classic open beta halted at the last minute, and something secret is cooking behind the scenes: 'Valve has asked us to ███████'
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/fps/team-fortress-2-classic-open-beta-halted-at-the-last-minute-and-something-secret-is-cooking-behind-the-scenes-valve-has-asked-us-to/
Just over a week after announcing an October open beta for the Steam edition of Team Fortress 2 Classic, the throwback version of Valve's famed team-based shooter, developer Eminoma has an update: Never mind.
It turns out that an application on Steam can't be both a mod, which Team Fortress 2 Classic is, and a demo, which it was about to be, at the same time. You might think somebody would have flagged this ahead of time but, well, no.
"Unfortunately, this was not caught by anyone at Eminoma or at Valve until last Saturday, after initial reviews hadn't flagged it as an issue and gave us the mistaken belief that we were clear to ship," the dev team wrote.
The good news is that the mod is not at risk of being derailed: Eminoma said it's "still very much on track for full release," and that the effort to get everything ready for the cancelled open beta means it's "probably in a better spot than we would have been if we never attempted this in the first place."
But there is also the possibility that something may have to change—specifically, the name of the mod. The team explained: (...)

Battlefield 6 player shows off the power of Portal by immediately dropping a decent Call of Duty 4 Shipment remake, oh, and a Star Destroyer
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/fps/battlefield-6-player-shows-off-the-power-of-portal-by-immediately-dropping-a-decent-call-of-duty-4-shipment-remake-oh-and-the-death-star/
One of the most valuable things you can do for the health of an FPS is let people mess with maps and assemble their own servers. Battlefield 6 is checking both of those boxes at launch with Portal, a web tool and SDK that lets people fire up persistent custom games and create new game modes.
There is no more perfect day-one demonstration of what Portal can do than this surprisingly good remake of Call of Duty 4 Shipment by game dev Matavatar, who had a working version of the map up a day before Battlefield 6 was even live (EA released the Portal editor a bit early).
I played a few minutes of Matavatar's Shipment in a server someone had going and, yep, they pretty much nailed it. Because of how Portal works at the moment, the map itself was actually suspended in the air somewhere in the skybox of Operation Firestorm, which is giving early Portal creations a Halo Forge-y feel (which I mean in a complimentary way).
The same creator is also working on a version of Call of Duty's Killhouse, and even managed to make a crude Star Destroyer out of concrete blocks. That spatial editor is pretty neat, if more obtuse than your average level editor built into the game.
>> The article has a short video of the Shipment creation.

Kick ass and chew brains in Duke Nukem: Horror Castle, a spooky mod where you blast skeletons and chow down on the gooey insides of their skulls
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/fps/kick-ass-and-chew-brains-in-duke-nukem-horror-castle-a-spooky-mod-where-you-blast-skeletons-and-chow-down-on-the-gooey-insides-of-their-skulls/
If you're a die-hard Duke Nukem 3D fan feeling starved for Hallowe'en themed action, that's an oddly specific scenario in 2025. But I have something for you nonetheless. Duke Nukem: Horror Castle takes the bubblegum-starved FPS titan and plonks him into an all-new episode, swapping out the original's sci-fi shenanigans for a spookier theme.
Created by modder WilliamGee, Horror Castle is a sizeable affair. Its nine-level campaign sees Duke explore not one but several gothic fortresses, offering between 3-5 hours of additional FPS fun. It isn't just a level pack either. Horror Castle introduces 24 new enemies including wandering skeletons, vampire bats, and Nosferatu-like bloodsuckers, as well as four minibosses from D3D with the added bonus of being able to shrink them and stomp them to death.
Horror Castle also equips Duke with four additional weapons. Duke can toss enormous spiders to attack enemies, then blast them with skeletal shrapnel using the Bone Crusher, a weapon reminiscent of the Ravager from Doom: The Dark Ages. And rather than replenishing health using medkits, Duke can boost his vitality by cracking open discarded skulls and feasting on the soft and squishy sponge within. Yum.
Duke Nukem: Horror Castle originally released back in May, but WilliamGee recently released an updated version that garlands the mod with a more specific Hallowe'en theme. This includes several newly added Hallowe'en items, like a pumpkin and a ghost, plus a new secret level that features even more bespoke enemies.
>> There is a slightly over 2 minutes video of the mod in the article.

Over 100 of the world's strongest Path of Exile 2 players are lining up to get chomped by a shark with trillions of health and an instant-kill tail swipe
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/rpg/over-100-of-the-worlds-strongest-path-of-exile-2-players-are-lining-up-to-get-chomped-by-a-shark-with-trillions-of-health-and-an-instant-kill-tail-swipe/
Watching a bunch of Path of Exile 2 players step into the ring against a giant land shark is a lot like watching those videos where someone mods in several Elden Ring bosses to fight each other. You think you have an idea of how it'll go and then realize that some enemies are just unbeatable.
Path of Exile 2 YouTuber and streamer XTheFarmerX stumbled into an incredible idea for a competition a few days ago: Call on the world's strongest players and have them fight one-on-one with a shark injected with the deadliest modifiers you can find.
The endgame loop in Path of Exile 2 basically involves running maps and defeating bosses. Each map can have additional difficulty modifiers crafted onto it to increase the potential rewards. Some of those mods can be brutal, like bonus health to all monsters or full immunity to certain types of elemental damage.
>> The article has the over 10 hours video of the whole thing.

The Deus Ex mod that's a better sequel than Invisible War just got a mondo-update, and playing it couldn't be easier
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/rpg/the-deus-ex-mod-thats-a-better-sequel-than-invisible-war-just-got-a-mondo-update-and-playing-it-couldnt-be-easier/
Like so many others, I was real dismayed when Aspyr lifted the veil on its upcoming official Deus Ex Remaster and revealed something alarmingly shiny and remarkably bulbous*. This dismay lasted about 10 seconds, at which point I remembered we PC people have access to Deus Ex: Revision (DX:R)—a fanmade and fan-maintained DX1 modernisation you can install with but a click on Steam.
The thing about Revision is it's essentially a greatest hits of Deus Ex modding. Packed in with its reworked maps are beloved gameplay overhauls like Shifter, BioMod, and Human Renovation, along with new, more modern renderers. Even better: you can turn all the new stuff off and just play vanilla Deus Ex with full compatibility for modern systems and resolutions. You really don't need anything else, at least in my experience.
Even better news: to mark its 10th anniversary (and with great timing, considering the DX remaster stuff), Revision just got its first update since 2023, giving the whole thing a spit-shine, fixing some lingering bugs, and adding some memory-assistance features which are increasingly relevant to the hoary age bracket still playing this game (me): you can now toggle on a saved passwords/keycode feature that will pop up and let you insta-input codes you've found in the world into the game's many terminals.
Which is all well and good, but I actually want to talk about a different update. At the same time as DX:R got its update, The Nameless Mod (TNM) got a humungo-patch too. If you're not familiar, TNM is a total-conversion mod that originally launched all the way back in 2009, when dinosaurs roamed the Earth.
>> The article has a couple of screenshots.

GAMING NEWS

PC demos released for Bubsy 4D, Misery, Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era, and Valor Mortis
https://www.dsogaming.com/news/pc-demos-released-for-bubsy-4d-misery-heroes-of-might-and-magic-olden-era-and-valor-mortis
A number of PC demos went live earlier today, so I’ve decided to share most of them in one big article. So, below, you can find the PC demos for Bubsy 4D, Misery, Valor Mortis, Escape from Even After, Skate Story, and Heroes of Might and Magic: Olden Era.
>> A PCGamer article tried the Bubsy demo and has an article about it (link).

Paper Mario-Inspired RPG ‘Escape from Ever After’ Gets Free PC Demo on October 13th
https://www.dsogaming.com/news/paper-mario-inspired-rpg-escape-from-ever-after-gets-free-pc-demo-on-october-13th
HypeTrain Digital has announced that a PC demo for its upcoming RPG that is inspired by the Paper Mario games, Escape from Ever After, will be released on October 13th. To celebrate this announcement, the team shared a trailer that you can find below.

Black Myth: Wukong’s New Patch Improves CPU & Memory Performance and Adds AMD FSR 4.0
https://www.dsogaming.com/pc-performance-analyses/black-myth-wukongs-new-patch-improves-cpu-memory-performance-and-adds-amd-fsr-4-0
Game Science announced that a new patch will be released later today for Black Myth: Wukong and shared its full patch notes. So, let’s see what this new update brings to the table.

PC Demo Released for the “Minecraft Meets Skyrim” RPG, Everwind
https://www.dsogaming.com/news/pc-demo-released-for-the-minecraft-meets-skyrim-rpg-everwind
Bohemia Interactive has just released the PC demo for the upcoming “Minecraft meets Skyrim” RPG, Everwind. This demo will let you experience this new upcoming first-person sandbox survival RPG.

This is the second part of the gaming news:

NetEase pulls the plug on another studio: Former Riot exec's Fantastic Pixel Castle will 'likely close' if a new publisher isn't found soon
https://www.pcgamer.com/gaming-industry/netease-pulls-the-plug-on-another-studio-former-riot-execs-fantastic-pixel-castle-will-likely-close-if-a-new-publisher-isnt-found-soon/
Former Riot Games vice president Greg Street, who left the company in 2023 and launched a new NetEase-backed studio called Fantastic Pixel Castle, says the partnership with NetEase is coming to an end, and that the studio will likely close if a new publisher can't be found.

Holy baloney Batman: Final Fantasy Tactics genius/maniac proves that Chocobos canonically believe in god
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/final-fantasy/holy-baloney-batman-final-fantasy-tactics-genius-maniac-proves-that-chocobos-canonically-believe-in-god/
Who doesn't love a chocobo? Perhaps the most ever-present member of the Final Fantasy cast, these idealised chad chickens have been in the series since Final Fantasy 2, and are the true series icon. And now one enterprising player has proven that there is a chocobo god.

Blizzard is giving everyone a chance to try out World of Warcraft's new player housing for free next week
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/world-of-warcraft/blizzard-is-giving-everyone-a-chance-to-try-out-world-of-warcrafts-new-player-housing-for-free-next-week/
One of the biggest features coming to World of Warcraft will be available to try for free next week. Blizzard will unlock player housing for everyone, whether you've preordered the Midnight expansion or not, to test on the PTR starting October 13.

MachineGames hints at a new game in the works, and everyone has their fingers crossed for the return of Wolfenstein
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/machinegames-hints-at-a-new-game-in-the-works-and-everyone-has-their-fingers-crossed-for-the-return-of-wolfenstein/
It's the 15th anniversary of MachineGames, the Swedish developer that most recently gave us the hit action adventure Indiana Jones and the Great Circle. The studio announced a free New Game+ update for its big Indy game yesterday to celebrate its birthday, but today it hinted at something more interesting for the future.

Update: EA is deploying a fix for the 'missing content' and 'purchase to play' errors locking EA App users out of Battlefield 6
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/fps/eas-own-launcher-is-making-battlefield-6-unplayable-by-telling-users-theyre-missing-content-or-must-purchase-to-play-what-theyve-already-bought/
It's Battlefield 6 day, and virtual warfighters are flocking to the front to dutifully ignore their squadmates' cries for revives and crash the first helicopter they enter. But as all those hundreds of thousands of launch day players arrive, some who purchased the game through the EA app are being denied deployment.
On the Battlefield subreddit, the Steam discussion forums, and on X, users who bought Battlefield 6 from EA's launcher say that after launching the game—and sitting through the launch day login queue—they're unable to play either multiplayer or the campaign. Even after multiple reinstall attempts, Battlefield 6 will insist that those users are "missing" necessary content, or that they must "purchase to play"—seemingly indicating that the EA app isn't correctly recognizing the software license for users who purchased BF6 through EA's own software.
UPDATE (5 pm EDT, 10/10/2025): On the official Battlefield Comms account on X, EA announced that "team is in the process of deploying a resolution for the issue that causes players on the EA App to be unable to start game modes due to missing DLC/content."
EA estimates that the fix's deployment will be complete "within the next hour or so." Players will need to restart Battlefield 6 for the issue to be resolved.
>> The situation was so bad that Vince Zampalla told gamer to just buy the game from Steam (link). In any case, the situation seems to be fixed and EA is giving away free battle passes and XP boots to those affected by it (link).

Remedy issues 'profit warning' after FBC: Firebreak's big overhaul fails to turn things around: 'Despite improved player and sales metrics after the update, sales have not reached Remedy’s internal targets'
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/fps/remedy-issues-profit-warning-after-fbc-firebreaks-big-overhaul-fails-to-turn-things-around-despite-improved-player-and-sales-metrics-after-the-update-sales-have-not-reached-remedys-internal-targets/
Just shy of two weeks after launching its 'bold gambit' to save the multiplayer shooter FBC: Firebreak, Remedy says the game is still underperforming, to the point that the studio has issued a "profit warning" for 2025 and says it's going to eat a big loss on the whole thing.

One little bug has broken Hollow Knight: Silksong speedrunning wide open with the ability to fly through the game as an unkillable god
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/action/one-little-bug-has-broken-hollow-knight-silksong-speedrunning-wide-open-with-the-ability-to-fly-through-the-game-as-an-unkillable-god/
Hollow Knight: Silksong continues to get picked apart as players try to find every little secret Team Cherry hid inside of it over the course of its long development. That also includes the things it probably didn't intend to be in there, like glitches.
Recently, a user on the Silksong speedrunning Discord found a glitch so powerful that it might lead to a lot more discoveries in the coming days. And it turns you into a nearly unkillable god as a side effect.

Find and photograph cryptids in 2D adventure Lone Pine
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/adventure/find-and-photograph-cryptids-in-2d-adventure-lone-pine/
You can keep "jump", the best verb in videogames is "examine". When an adventure game like Lone Pine lets me examine a campfire and also a bin, then has the protagonist comment on them in a way that says something about her as well as about the object she's looking at, I know I'm in good hands.
Lone Pine is an adventure game about exploring a national park with only your wits and a backpack you can fill with items that might then be combined with each other to solve puzzles. Oh, and a camera for taking photos of cryptids with.

Renegade graphics warlock makes Half-Life look like Half-Life 2, then runs it on an ancient laptop, raising a middle finger to poorly optimised PC games
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/fps/renegade-graphics-warlock-makes-half-life-look-like-half-life-2-then-runs-it-on-an-ancient-laptop-raising-a-middle-finger-to-poorly-optimised-pc-games/
We're in another grim period for poorly optimised PC games, with the last couple of years bringing us a string of power-hungry virtual slideshows such as 2023's Star Wars Jedi: Survivor and, more recently, Borderlands 4. Corpos like Randy Pitchford think we should stop moaning and fork out for a better PC, as playing the best-looking games simply demands a rig capable of lighting a small town.
But perhaps there's another way, one where good design and technical ingenuity can remove some of the sting from system requirements. In a roundabout way, this was recently demonstrated by modder, YouTuber, and mapper Goonya's Animations, who took a map he was making for Half-Life 2 and somehow made it run in Half-Life 1's GoldSrc engine with minimal visual difference.

A sequel to Aliens: Fireteam Elite is almost certainly in development, having briefly burst onto the ESRB's website
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/action/a-sequel-to-aliens-fireteam-elite-is-almost-certainly-in-development-having-briefly-burst-onto-the-esrbs-website/
It sure looks like Aliens: Fireteam Elite 2 is in development, and it could be set for a surprise launch before the end of the year. While this apparent sequel to Cold Iron Studios' 2021 blaster hasn't been officially announced yet, it has seemingly been rated by the ESRB.

You'll need to be careful moving around the forests of Hell Let Loose: Vietnam, as its trees will help players identify potential threats: 'It can be very hard to understand where you're dying from'
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/fps/youll-need-to-be-careful-moving-around-the-forests-of-hell-let-loose-vietnam-as-its-trees-will-help-players-identify-potential-threats-it-can-be-very-hard-to-understand-where-youre-dying-from/
Realism is serious business for the Hell Let Loose series, and that applies equally to the military simulator's upcoming instalment Hell Let Loose: Vietnam. But that commitment to authenticity has posed a significant challenge for developer Expression Games for this iteration, one that was equally a problem for the soldiers who actually fought in the war.

Prepare to have your brain fried by this electric shoot 'em up from an ex-Housemarque designer when it launches next month
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/action/prepare-to-have-your-brain-fried-by-this-electric-shoot-em-up-from-an-ex-housemarque-designer-when-it-launches-next-month/
For a very brief period before becoming PC Gamer's weekend newshound, I wrote a newsletter dedicated to rounding up the best Steam demos of any given week. By far and away the best demo I played during those days was for a little game called Sektori.

Deadlock just shuffled everyone into new ranked leagues overnight, but players suspect matchmaking won't feel any different: 'If you were miserable before, you'll still be miserable now'
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/moba/deadlock-just-shuffled-everyone-into-new-ranked-leagues-overnight-but-players-suspect-matchmaking-wont-feel-any-different-if-you-were-miserable-before-youll-still-be-miserable-now/
I've never played an invite-only beta test with such a fully-formed ranking system as Deadlock's, but I guess when everyone gets unlimited plus-ones, the audience is big enough to warrant it. Besides, the game's beta status didn't stop me lamenting my place in Arcanist IV—below average, assuming ranks fall into normal distribution—but a patch dropped yesterday that majorly shook up everyone's ranked placements, leaving me three full leagues ahead of where I was and terrified for my next solo queue.

User-created games are coming to Genshin Impact in a new mode that couldn't be more Roblox if it tried
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/action/user-created-games-are-coming-to-genshin-impact-in-a-new-mode-that-couldnt-be-more-roblox-if-it-tried/
MiHoYo's version of Roblox was inevitable⁠—Genshin Impact is huge, but it's not Roblox huge. In pursuit of greater horizons to conquer, the anime action game is going to get its own mode where user-created stuff is king.

Borderlands 4 post-launch roadmap includes seasonal event, paid DLC, and its first raid boss
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/fps/borderlands-4-post-launch-roadmap-includes-seasonal-event-paid-dlc-and-its-first-raid-boss/
Members of the Gearbox team came to PAX Australia so Randy Pitchford could do some magic tricks we'll gloss over, and to reveal more about the post-launch plans for Borderlands 4. First up is a Halloween-themed "seasonal mini-event" called Horrors of Kairos that will run from October 23 to November 6, adding "blood rain" to world bosses, new legendary loot, and a pumpkin-head cosmetic for everyone available via Shift code.

And the third part of the gaming news:

A new ToeJam and Earl is 'in the planning stage' according to its co-creator, but don't expect to see it anytime soon: 'We intend to make it happen'
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/adventure/a-new-toejam-and-earl-is-in-the-planning-stage-according-to-its-co-creator-but-dont-expect-to-see-it-anytime-soon-we-intend-to-make-it-happen/
It's been six years since ToeJam and Earl: Back in the Groove heralded the return of gaming's funkiest alien duo, and while that's by no means the longest gap between entries (the third game, Mission to Earth, was released in 2002), fans have naturally been curious about what the future has in store for the series—if anything. The good news is, there are indeed plans for a new ToeJam and Earl game. The bad news is, at this stage, they're little more than that.

Strategy roguelike 9 Kings finally has 9 kings, though a new perk lets you revert it to 8 kings if nine kings proves too many
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/roguelike/strategy-roguelike-9-kings-finally-has-9-kings-though-a-new-perk-lets-you-revert-it-to-8-kings-if-nine-kings-proves-too-many/
Roguelike strategy 9 Kings certainly played its cards right on its early access debut earlier this year. Developer Sad Socket's concept of using cards to place and upgrade units and buildings was so compelling that it even convinced deckbuilding sceptic Fraser Brown of the genre's merits. "Runs are brisk, the mechanics are simple, but there's actually a whole lot to dig into, he wrote back in August. "And honestly, I just love watching my pixel-sized troops going to war."
For all its strengths, however, 9 Kings was missing one small feature...nine kings. Up until this week, 9 Kings only had eight kings available to play as, using their unique decks to construct your base and fend off enemy forces. Talk about an embarrassing oversight! If I were making a game called 9 Kings, I would ensure it had the requisite number of monarchs befitting its title from the start!

Promising RTS Dinolords, which is basically Age of Empires with dinosaurs, is getting a closed alpha playtest that you can join later this month
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/rts/promising-rts-dinolords-which-is-basically-age-of-empires-with-dinosaurs-is-getting-a-closed-alpha-playtest-that-you-can-join-later-this-month/
Dinolords is one of those ideas that sells itself the second you hear about it, a colourful blend of RTS and ARPG that sees medieval knights and marauding Vikings take to battle on the backs of roaring, stomping, terrible lizards. I've been eager to try it ever since it was announced, and the first real opportunity to do so is rapidly approaching. At the end of this month developer Northplay is running a closed alpha playtest, and you can sign up to test its tyrannosaurs right now.

Abiotic Factor gets new roadmap featuring a mystery crossover, DLC plans, and new difficulty modes alongside dev Q&A: 'We're terrified of our obligations to the community so be nice, we love you'
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/survival-crafting/abiotic-factor-gets-new-roadmap-featuring-a-mystery-crossover-dlc-plans-and-new-difficulty-modes-alongside-dev-q-and-a-were-terrified-of-our-obligations-to-the-community-so-be-nice-we-love-you/
Abiotic Factor might seem like a goofy sendup of Half-Life with its balding science guys and story centered around an iconic disaster ending in the word "cascade," but behind the silly facade is one of the best, most atmospheric survival games in recent memory.
If you're ready for a whole lot more of it, get ready: the game's living roadmap was just festooned with tantalizing DLC plans, patch details, and more. Obvious highlights include release windows for two DLCs—Temple of Stone before fall is over and a new sector due next summer—with lots more packed into the margins.

After learning his cult '90s RPG influenced Undertale, this Japanese developer finally got 'the courage' to make another RPG decades later thanks to Toby Fox
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/rpg/after-learning-his-cult-90s-rpg-influenced-undertale-this-japanese-developer-finally-got-the-courage-to-make-another-rpg-decades-later-thanks-to-toby-fox/
You may not know Japanese developer Yoshiro Kimura by name, but you likely do know of someone who does: Toby Fox, who credited Kimura's 1997 Moon: Remix RPG Adventure as an inspiration for Undertale. For as much obvious Earthbound DNA there is in the massively popular Undertale, there's also a critical bit of Moon in there, too. After working on some RPGs at Squaresoft early in his career, Kimura satirized the genre by having you go around healing monsters with kindness instead of killing them. Fox's love for Moon helped convince Kimura to get it translated and released on Steam and Switch after two decades.
(...)
Stray Children is the first RPG Kimura has designed in more than 20 years, and his biggest project since the underappreciated 2009 Wii RTS Little King's Story. It's releasing on Steam in English at the end of October, and it's hard to play the first few hours without drawing a line straight to Undertale. Stray Children's battles put your young character up against a bizarre array of monstrous "Olders," who you can quickly kill with attacks or much more laboriously heal by whispering the correct sequence of encouraging words into their ear.

Ninja Gaiden 4 directors say a 'sense of fairness' is vital for difficult games: 'If the player gets killed unreasonably, it's hard for them to reflect and think about what they could've done'
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/action/ninja-gaiden-4-directors-say-a-sense-of-fairness-is-vital-for-difficult-games-if-the-player-gets-killed-unreasonably-its-hard-for-them-to-reflect-and-think-about-what-they-couldve-done/
Ninja Gaiden 4 will be arriving this month—and while I'm not as experienced with the series as, say, fellow PCG writer Wes Fenlon, I am downright curious to give it a proper try. The earlier Gaiden games were a smidge before my time, but the older I get, the thirstier I am for a challenge—and I have heard many tales of Ninja Gaiden's brutality that have me thinking I might just arrive fashionably late.
I'm also enticed by the words of directors Yuji Nakao and Masakazu Hirayama in an interview with Automaton. Speaking to the publication, they've repeatedly emphasised that fairness is a key component to making difficult games a good time instead of a high blood pressure simulator.

2005 FPS Serious Sam 2 just got a big update for reasons known only to God
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/fps/2005-fps-serious-sam-2-just-got-a-big-update-for-reasons-known-only-to-god/
Serious Sam 2 just got a meaty patch from the devs at Croteam featuring UI updates, graphical improvements, changes to the multiplayer, and bugfixes. George W Bush is president, and the subprime mortgage market can only go up, up, up, baby!

I've been training my whole life for a battle royale like Final Sentence, it's just a shame the demo is a tad undercooked right now
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/battle-royale/ive-been-training-my-whole-life-for-a-battle-royale-like-final-sentence-its-just-a-shame-the-demo-is-a-tad-undercooked-right-now/
I've been typing for most of my life—flogging flax so I could afford a dragon longsword in RuneScape, roleplaying in World of Warcraft, and at present, writing multiple articles a day for the good site PC Gamer. I average about 130 words per minute, which isn't competitive or anything, but I'm pretty nippy compared to the average pecker (it's a typing term, stop giggling).
I've long believed I would never be able to translate these skills to gaming. I mean, sure, you've got games like Typing of the Dead, but I don't do anything if it doesn't have bragging rights. I'm told that's 'mean-spirited' and 'narcissistic' and 'unhealthily competitive', but those people were all losers anyway.
Final Sentence, a battle royale typing game, shows me there's a potential royale out there which could fix this hole in my life, but it's not this one, at least not yet.

https://store.steampowered.com/sale/nextfest

AMD RDNA 2 And RDNA 3 GPUs Reportedly Suffer ~10% Performance Loss With FSR 4 INT8

https://wccftech.com/amd-rdna-2-and-rdna-3-gpus-reportedly-suffer-10-performance-loss-with-fsr-4-int8/

VS FSR3 that is, still gives more fps that native.

AMD “Sound Wave” APU with 32x27mm package appears in shipping manifests

https://videocardz.com/newz/amd-sound-wave-apu-with-32x27mm-package-appears-in-shipping-manifests

Dell puts Intel Core Ultra 200V “Lunar Lake” into rugged tablet series, price starts at €2,900

https://videocardz.com/newz/dell-pusts-intel-core-ultra-200v-lunar-lake-into-rugged-tablet-series-price-starts-at-e2900

Intel’s Former CEO Pat Gelsinger Warns That Money From the U.S. and NVIDIA Won’t Matter If It Doesn’t “Fill the Fabs” — A Goal Still Unmet

https://wccftech.com/intels-former-ceo-warns-that-money-from-the-us-and-nvidia-wont-matter-if-it-doesnt-fill-the-fabs/

Intel Claims to Continue Open-Source Work, But Not at the Cost of Helping Competitors, Hinting at a More Guarded Approach

https://wccftech.com/intel-claims-to-continue-open-source-work-but-not-at-the-cost-of-helping-competitors/

AMD Zen 6 “Ryzen” CPU Support Officially Confirmed By ASUS For Its OC-Ready B850 Motherboard

https://wccftech.com/amd-zen-6-ryzen-cpu-support-confirmed-by-asus-for-its-oc-ready-b850-motherboard/

Updated Intel Patches For Cache Aware Scheduling Net A 44% Win For AMD EPYC

https://www.phoronix.com/news/Cache-Aware-Scheduling-Go

After the fatal Github error and all the tests that have ben done since, the only good option AMD has is ti officially support FSR4 on older cards, even if it makes so with an added disclaimer that to experience the best results of FSR4 you need an RDNA4 GPU. 

A clear example of what Intel tries to avoid.

The biggest problem I have with this change of strategy, compared to what Nvidia has done with CUDA, is that Nvidia has always (or almost) gone with a propietary approach to avoid competition, whereas Intel will now have to face a market and environment used to open standards that may be reluctant to implement Intel's more closed technologies.

We'll see how it develops.

By the way, thanks for posting the news on a holiday. You didn't have to.

There are a couple Problems for AMD right now with this:

1. The image quality is, while a lot better than FSR 3.x, still quite a bit worse than with FSR4 on RDNA4 GPUs. Maybe AMD tries to fix this first before releasing the patch.
2. It doesn't work with all FSR4-enabled games, and in some, it actually comes with a performance regression, indicating that it needs more support before any official launch.
3. Since the performance drop for RDNA3 and RDNA2 is actually pretty much the same, there are many questions about if RDNA3 actually uses Int8 or it only being a workaround to get it running somewhat differently than on RDNA2.

In other words, while the prospects of releasing it right now seems good, evidence shows that it's simply not ready for the primetime just yet. So in my opinion, the best move AMD could do would be to acknowledge it and saying that it needs more work to make it truly work on the older GPUs and dispatch some work towards this end.

I wasn't aware that it didn't work with all FSR4 titles. That would somewhat be fixed or mitigated if AMD provided the necessary tools to officially enable it in those older RDNA cards.

In any case, what AMD can't do is act as if nothing was happening. They need to either support it in older cards with the necessary disclaimers, or make a tech paper or video giving a deeper explanation of how FSR4 works and explaining why, while it may somewhat work in other architectures, they can only guarantee certain results or the necessary stability in RDNA4 cards, thus locking the tech for those cards.

HWInfo Officially Adds Enhanced Support For AMD “Next-Gen” Platforms And Intel Nova Lake-S

https://wccftech.com/hwinfo-adds-enhanced-support-for-amd-next-gen-platforms-and-nova-lake-s/

NVIDIA Officially Taps Samsung Foundry For Custom Silicon in AI Factories, Marking a Major Breakthrough for the Korean Giant

https://wccftech.com/nvidia-officially-taps-samsung-foundry-for-custom-silicon/

Intel & AMD Strengthen x86 Ecosystem With New Standardized Features: AVX10, FRED, ChkTag & ACE

https://wccftech.com/intel-amd-strengten-x86-ecosystem-new-standardized-features-avx10-fred-chktag-ace/

Sapphire RX 9070 XT 16-Pin Connector On The Cable Gets Cooked; The Second Case For RX 9070 XT So Far

https://wccftech.com/sapphire-rx-9070-xt-16-pin-connector-gets-cooked/

Edifier unveils desktop speaker that looks like a gaming PC, with fake GPUs and RGB fans

https://videocardz.com/newz/edifier-unveils-desktop-speaker-that-looks-like-a-gaming-pc-with-fake-gpus-and-rgb-fans

Four more burned power cables reported on GeForce RTX 50 series cards in just 2 days

https://videocardz.com/newz/four-more-burned-power-cables-reported-on-geforce-rtx-50-series-cards-in-just-2-days

Microsoft ends Windows 10 support after nearly a decade, GPU vendors maintain driver support (for now)

https://videocardz.com/newz/microsoft-ends-windows-10-support-after-nearly-a-decade-gpu-vendors-maintain-driver-support-for-now

Oracle Cloud to deploy 50,000 AMD AI chips, signaling new Nvidia competition

https://www.cnbc.com/2025/10/14/oracle-cloud-to-deploy-50000-amd-ai-chips-as-alternative-to-nvidia.html