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Clair Obscur: Expedition 33’s director had 2 scrapped scenes from the game’s ending, gives props to mocap actors who ‘saved’ it at the last minute

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Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 is maybe one of my favourite games of this year—it’s certainly in the running—which I hope reassures you that I mean this with all the love in the world. It surprises me not one itty-bitty bit that Guillaume Broche, creative director of the game, says he “likes really sad stories”. That’s … Read more

Meta shows off two next-gen VR headsets: One with so many pixels it demands DLSS 3 upscaling, the other with a horizontal FOV twice that of the Quest 3

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In the world of cutting-edge technology, we rarely get to see the behind-the-scenes research and development that goes on at the biggest companies. But every now and then, some details get dropped that remind you just how much better our current gear and gadgets can potentially be. Meta’s VR division has showcased two such examples, … Read more

Doom: The Dark Ages latest update adds a ‘Ripatorium’ that lets you build your own wave shooter from its demonic menagerie

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Doom: The Dark Ages is definitely one of my favourite games from this year, even if it didn’t quite match the dizzying heights of Doom Eternal. But with its latest update, id Software’s action-packed prequel may have taken two thundering steps toward the quality of its predecessor. Update 2 brings one massive new mode to … Read more

‘The prejudice against turn-based RPGs isn’t completely gone’: despite Clair Obscur: Expedition 33’s massive success, its director reckons real-time action games still have an easier time

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The runaway success of Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 has been exhaustively documented by this point. But the game’s ecstatic reception by players came as a surprise not only because the game was made by a small (though not that small) team, but also because it’s a turn-based RPG at a time when the market is … Read more

Valve’s superfans are back to break the player concurrent record for Portal, but the challenge may be steeper than anyone has realised

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I assumed that everyone with access to a PC would have played Portal at this point, but it seems this is far from the case, at least if Portal’s all-time concurrent players are anything to go by. According to Steam Charts, the record for Steam player concurrents stands at just 3,370 players, which is apparently … Read more

‘You’ll now be at the mercy of what loot you can find’: Rust’s latest update brings back hardcore mode tougher than ever, removing the ability to craft guns entirely

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Rust has been playing with its parameters a lot lately (which mum once told me can make you go blind). Back in February, developer Facepunch introduced a medieval-themed Primitive, while April saw Rust’s softcore mode become even softer. But just in case you suspect Rust is losing its edge in its advancing years, the survival … Read more

The ROG Xbox Ally will reportedly launch in October, but I’m still not convinced there’s a good enough reason to buy it yet

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Microsoft, and specifically the Xbox division, has been in a bit of a weird state for some time. With the pivot away from exclusives, a former Xbox team member declared “Xbox hardware is dead”, and it’s easy to see why. It is moving ever closer to becoming a third-party game publisher, and deals to make … Read more