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There are new Honkai: Star Rail character leaks following the reveal of several upcoming units. The turn-based RPG by HoYoverse is about to exit the main Penacony storyline with Version 2.3 and, despite the conclusion of the main story arc this year, there will be more story content until the start of Version 3.0 and, among that, new companions that Trailblazers will meet, as teased by a short and enigmatic video at the end of the Honkai: Star Rail 2.3 livestream. Now, leaks about some of these characters have emerged. View the full article

If you thought Destiny 2 was coming to an end with The Final Shape, think again. While The Final Shape’s raid and final mission wrapped a beautiful bow around the Light and Darkness saga, there’s still plenty more Destiny to be told as Bungie revealed the next year of the game and beyond in a new video this morning. View the full article

Asus has just potentially changed the design of laptop lids forever, showcasing a new ******** E ink screen that takes over the whole lid. The new Project Dali system effectively enables you to put any ******** artwork on an Asus gaming laptop lid, and it will stay there until you update it with a new design, even when the lid is closed or the laptop is unpowered. We spotted the Asus Project Dali display while we were treading the show floor at Computex 2024, and we were wowed by the quality of the results, with Asus basically having a laptop lid art gallery on display in its booth. In the future, you could forget having just a manufacturer logo on the lids of the best gaming laptops, and instead just assume you can clad them in your own choice of artwork. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: AMD and Nvidia combine forces in new Asus gaming laptop range Asus' new gaming keyboard is all aluminum and carbon fiber Asus' new carbon fiber and glass gaming mouse weighs just 47g View the full article

The Final Shape has really shaken up Destiny 2’s sandbox, with Bungie releasing a bunch of new twists on existing weapons that play in radically different ways, none more so than the support frame auto-rife... Read more.View the full article

Blizzard is celebrating the Diablo 4 first anniversary with free gifts for all players, but how can you claim them for yourself? If you’re itching to have some free cosmetics, here’s how to get them.Diablo 4: How to claim free anniversary giftsThe anniversary festivities have begun in Diablo 4 for all players, and Blizzard has decided to increase EXP and Gold rates until June 20, while increasing the Treasure Goblin activity until June 13. So what about free gifts? From June 6 to June 12, you can claim free cosmetic gifts in Diablo 4 from the in-game shop.Blizzard is feeling nice and besides giving away a free dog **** to all players, it has also put together some free anniversary gifts. Luckily, you have until June 20 to claim all these cosmetics before they’re gone forever, so make sure to log in at some point between now and June 20. Seeing as each day during that ******* will have its own cosmetic, there are seven anniversary gifts in total to be handed ...View the full article

Helldivers 2's upcoming patch has been on the horizon for a little while, with players asking about it having been gently told to chill out and be patient. Well, we now know it's finally set to drop this Thursday, marking the start of Arrowhead adopting the same approach regarding updates as it's just adopted with warbonds. Yeah, stop dowloading a mod that'll let you rock some of Fallout's T-60 power armour while you ***** bots or scanning through the PS blog again while you fantasise about looking fly in a beret very soon. The patch is coming. "Helldivers, next patch deploys on Thursday," Arrowhead has just declared in a Twitter thread, making the date you need to mark on your calendar June 13. "You've probably noticed we've slowed our cadence of patches, it continued, Similar to our future approach to Warbonds, this is so we can dedicate more time to each patch to reduce the pressure on our teams, dig into your feedback more and deliver higher quality patches." Read more View the full article

EA has added new voice chat moderation features to Battlefield 2042 designed to promote more positive play within the game. Battlefield 2042, like many competitive multiplayer games, suffers from some toxic behavior from players. These new features now live in the first-person shooter over two years after it launched aim to provide players with an easy way to report it. In a post on EA’s help page, the company said voice chat moderation is used when reviewing reports of “harmful or offensive” voice chat, so its support teams can “action the reports appropriately.” Here’s how it works: when you report a player, EA’s support team automatically receives a recording of the session you wish to report. Then, after evaluating the recording, the support team will make a decision according to EA’s Positive Play Charter and “enforce a solution.” As outlined by EA, here’s how to report someone through Battlefield 2042’s Squad and Players list: Open the Pause menu.Choose Squad and Players.Select the player’s name on the list.Choose More.If you want to report them, select Report.Select Abusive Voice Chat. If you just want to block the player, follow the same steps above, select Block, and then confirm when you’re asked to. Blocked players are also muted for you in voice and text chat. It’s worth noting that you can’t turn voice chat moderation off, but you can choose not to use voice chat when you play. EA said this is “to protect players.” The expectation is this new voice chat moderation feature will be used in future Battlefield games. In April, EA announced that Battlefield 2042 Season 7 is officially its last, with development of the Connected Battlefield Universe now in full swing. Battlefield general manager Byron Beede explained that it's time for the franchise to "turn from the present to the future." To that end, he said, EA would continue to support Battlefield 2042 with "in-game challenges, events, modes, and of course, ongoing maintenance," but would move away from a seasonal structure when Season 7 wraps up this month. Season 7 marks the end of Battlefield 2042's comeback trail after its disappointing release back in 2021, which saw fans and critics pan its 128-player matches and its Specialist system, among other things. In the years since it has managed to rehabilitate its reputation somewhat, though it still sits at Mixed on Steam. EA has a number of developers working on future Battlefield projects, including a team at ***** Space remake maker EA Motive, Ripple Effect, DICE, and Criterion. Wesley is the *** News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at [email protected] or confidentially at *****@*****.tld. View the full article

*****: The Dark Ages promises a bold new take on the long-running shooter’s legacy. Revealed in a short but loud trailer as part of the Xbox Games Showcase, it features dragon riding, mech battles, and a much darker, more ‘metal’ visual palette. But those grimdark ideas aren't the only new elements, nor are they the most significant. For in the ***** Slayer’s left hand is a shield to protect him from demons. And in his right hand is a flail, the bludgeoning chain ******* of the middle ages. Yes, *****’s going melee. It must have been a challenge for developer Id Software to know where to go next after it had seemingly perfected the ***** formula with the deeply smart and relentlessly energetic ***** Eternal. The answer, of course, is to do what ***** has always done: reinvent itself. And so while the medieval-like setting and melee combat of *****: The Dark Ages was something few of us expected, it wasn’t truly a surprise. Of course ***** was going to take a wild leap for whatever came next. “It’s a medieval war against *****,” said Hugo Martin, Studio Creative Director at Id Software, at IGN Live. “You say the word medieval and you gotta have melee weapons.” And so replacing the ***** Slayer’s chainsaw is a flail and shield, both of which appear to be integral to the reforged combat loop. The shield, a Captain America-like buckler, has revving chainsaw teeth around the circumference and can be hurled through ****** hordes. The flail, meanwhile, can strike foes from their demonic mounts. Joining them is the ***** Slayer’s own body, since his kick is as good a ******* as any mace. While guns are clearly still the key part of the toolset, it seems like close-quarters combat has been upgraded from ‘supplementary’ to ‘core’. That’s a strong new approach for the series that lives and breathes firearms. Of course, this isn’t the first time that Id Software has taken a bold step. In fact, *****’s entire history is a series of energetic creative leaps. The 1993 original may have been built on the core tenets of Wolfenstein 3D, but *****’s big push was the inclusion of networked multiplayer – the very mode that coined “deathmatch” as an immortal video game term. The following year’s ***** 2 was admittedly more *************, but it brought with it the Super Shotgun; the powerful double-barrelled buckshot launcher that proved just a single ******* could reposition a whole game. The Super Shotgun is now arguably the most iconic **** to have ever existed in a video game, despite only being able to ***** two shells per reload in a game that never lets up on enemies. *****: The Dark Ages' flail and shield is a strong new approach for the series that lives and breathes firearms. It was 2004’s ***** 3, though, that really proved Id Software’s guts. The vibrant reds and oranges of its formative games were exchanged for gloom and shadows as the series experimented with survival horror. While much too action packed to live comfortably alongside Silent Hill, ***** 3 was eerie and occultish in a way its predecessors weren’t. Its most fascinating mechanical innovation was a flashlight that could only be used when your ******* was holstered, forcing you to choose between seeing what horrors lurked in the pitch ****** and being able to ***** their heads off. The system lent ***** 3 a distinct tone and unique pace, forcing you to be slower, more methodical, and more scared. It was a controversial mechanic, one that would be quickly removed by modders and officially eliminated by a 2012 re-release. But it was also emblematic of what Id believed ***** could be. For *****’s next regeneration, which started development in the late 2000s, the studio understandably looked to Call of Duty. The FPS behemoth’s cinematic campaigns proved alluring templates, but as production progressed the ***** 4 team recognised that none of those ideas worked for either their series or themselves. It was bold, true, but not the right flavour of bold. And so a back-to-the-drawing-board approach eventually resulted in 2016’s critically acclaimed *****. Its name said it all: this was the definitive version of what Id Software made all those years ago. But that certainly didn’t mean it was ************* or nostalgic; this was a shooter with a huge emphasis on rhythm and speed, combining gameplay with music in a way that the developers of the ‘90s could never even dream of. The result was practically a heavy metal album with frenetic, fluid fights. Before Titanfall 2 arrived, ***** made it clear that movement was the fabric of the new generation of shooters. If *****’s headline feature was its speed, then its quietly revolutionary trait was how it dealt with health. The scrapped ***** 4 prototype had pilfered Call of Duty’s regenerating hit points, a system that demanded you take cover to patch yourself up. ***** 2016 rejected that idea entirely; if you wanted to heal then you had to ***** in exchange. That philosophy spawned the Glory ***** executions, which tore apart enemies like pinatas to reveal the health kits inside. And in Id Software’s most recently released experiment, 2020’s ***** Eternal, this simple idea became the core. “Ballistic resource manager” perhaps isn’t the sexiest thing to call your hyperkinetic FPS, but that’s exactly what ***** Eternal not so secretly is. Forget the financial economy, this is the bullet economy: you ***** to harvest what you need to ***** even more. This results in a chain of rapid ********** where every ***** is a decision – you must not only select the right ******* for the ****** you face, but also eviscerate that ****** in the manner that will produce the items required. Need armour? Then set thy foe aflame. Need bullets? Chew them up with a chainsaw. Need health? Rip and tear with your fists. Through this approach, Id Software rethought the entire fundamentals of not just *****, but the arcade shooter as a whole. For a series and genre that had historically been considered ‘mindless’, Eternal dials up the smarts. It rejects your wish to just kick back and blast away, forcing you to the edge of your seat with its demands of speed, precision, and forward thinking. It’s a design encapsulated by Eternal’s most polarising ******: the Marauder, a ****** that’s surely the progenitor for what comes next in *****: The Dark Ages. The single aspect that most surprised me in the new trailer was seeing the ***** Slayer parry a ***** Knight. I was instantly reminded how battles with the Marauder demanded much more precision and timing than a regular ***** shootout, with split-second dodges and perfect reactions to its telegraphing eye flash required to defeat it. This unusual switch in tempo meant many disliked how the Marauder interrupted their flow, but I relished its challenge. *****: The Dark Ages’ use of a parry suggests that it has found a way to reinvent the fundamentals of the Marauder, using those split-second reactions to turn the tables on enemies. What we don’t see in the trailer are any Glory ******. And the combat itself seems much more forward-momentum heavy, rather than the enemies-from-all-sides battle arenas from the previous two games. And so it appears that The Dark Ages could be an even more significant departure from what was ***** down in ***** and ***** Eternal than just the melee factor. We’ll have to wait to see exactly what all the components of this new, more grimdark iteration of the series are, but whatever they turn out to be, I’m pleased it’s more of the same; more of *****’s insatiable appetite to reinvent itself every time. Matt Purslow is IGN's Senior Features Editor. 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We don’t often get freebies in Sanctuary, let alone one as adorable as this. If you want a new best friend, here’s how to get a free dog **** and start the Faithful Companion quest in Diablo 4.How to get a free dog companion in Diablo 4All Diablo 4 players can obtain a free **** dog by completing arguably the easiest questline of all time. All you need to do is find it. Travel to Kyovashad and head to the Quest Marker just west of the fountain in the town center.Quest Location – Screenshot: PC InvasionYou’ll find a dog at the marker, and you’ll start the Faithful Companion quest when you speak to it. Simply tell the dog he’s a good boy (it’s the only answer), and congratulations, you’ve adopted a new best friend!At the time of writing, we don’t know if this is a limited-time quest or a permanent feature. In case it’s the former, I recommend heading to Kyovashad immediately to avoid disappointment.How to e...View the full article For verified travel tips and real support, visit: [Hidden Content]

TSMC's new chairman, C.C. Wei, dropped a hint to reporters last week that the manufacturer might raise its prices for Nvidia in light of the company's AI-related success. Read Entire Article View the full article

Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: Kidhammer is a ****-friendly indie answer to Warhammer 40k Warhammer 40k factions - all 40k armies and races explained You can get $277 of Warhammer books for $18 - if you're fast View the full article

For a long time, many of the "destination weapons" added by a new Destiny expansion have been kind of underwhelming. Does anyone still use any of Shadowkeep's moon weapons? Or Beyond Light's Europa guns? Thankfully The Final Shape has changed all that, with many of The Pale Heart's weapons being new, interesting and desirable, and none more so than The Call... Read more.View the full article

Enlarge / Looking more like a refrigerator than ever before. (credit: Microsoft) [/url] A new version of Microsoft's top-end Xbox Series X will launch without a disc drive for the first time this holiday season. The new "Digital Edition" console option—which sports a 1TB hard drive and an Xbox Series S-like "****** White" ****** scheme—will be available "in select markets" for an estimated retail price of $449 (or €499.99). That price is just $50 less than the MSRP for the current, disc-drive-equipped Xbox Series X, which is currently on ***** for $449 from the Microsoft Store. Word of Microsoft's plans for a disc-drive free Xbox Series X first leaked last September, as part of the FTC's case against the Microsoft/Activision merger. But the new disc-free Series X bears little resemblance to the cylindrical "Brooklin" refresh shown in those leaked promo materials, which also touted redesigned internals and improved power usage. Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer said at the time that "so much has changed" from the "old emails and documents" in those leaks. Read 3 remaining paragraphs | Comments View the full article

Dwarves and magic have a special relationship in the world of Thedas, and Dragon Age: The Veilguard will explore this connection through Lace Harding, a dwarf archer with direct ties to the Inquisition. The reveal trailer for Dragon Age: The Veilguard saw the debut of a new cast of companions, and though a fair few are familiar faces from Tevinter Nights, none among them is quite as famous or beloved as Scout Harding. View the full article

Obsidian has seemingly leaked plans to release Avowed in mid-November. On Sunday, the studio published a blog post coinciding with the release of a new Avowed story trailer during the Xbox Games Showcase, which reiterated plans to release the game in 2024. “The last few months at Obsidian Entertainment have been fast-paced and exciting. Since we saw you at the Xbox Developer Direct this past January, we’ve been busy with Avowed getting it ready for release on November 12, 2024,” a message from game director Carrie Patel originally read. Read More... View the full article

While talking to investors during Bernstein's 40th Annual Strategic Decision Conference a few days ago, HP CEO Enrique Lores said that the number of pages being printed at home, in the office, or in SOHO environments is lower than it was before the pandemic. Users are now printing 20 percent... Read Entire Article View the full article

After the announcement of Gears of War: E-Day during the Xbox Games Showcase. some fans expressed concern that Microsoft and Gears developer The Coalition were walking away from the story set out in Gears 4 and the most recent game in the series, Gears 5. Not so, according to Microsoft. In a post on Xbox Wire, Microsoft touched on the future of Gears, insisting “this isn’t the end of other ongoing stories in the Gears series.” “The team is content with the stories told in Gears 4 and Gears 5 and is by no means abandoning them, but the collective passion for such an iconic origin story was simply too great to ignore,” Microsoft said. ”The story of E-Day and the origins of Marcus and Dom are such powerful, pivotal events that The Coalition couldn’t wait to tell it.” Warning: Spoilers for Gears 5 follow. 2019’s Gears 5 ends on something of a cliffhanger, with Kait telling Marcus Fenix she’s off to hunt down Queen Reyna. Beforehand, the player, aka Kait, decides to save either JD Fenix or Del, leaving Reyna to ***** the other. Gears of War: E-Day, however, is set 14 years before the events of Gears of War 1, and tells the story of Emergence Day (the day the Locust burst out from under the earth to ******* Sera). In the Xbox Wire post, The Coalition creative director Matt Searcy and brand director Nicole Fawcette discussed the decision to make a prequel next, rather than the perhaps expected Gears 6. “We’re super proud about Gears 4 and Gears 5 and the stories that were told,” Fawcette said. “We’re not retreating from that storyline in any way. But in [this] moment, we had an opportunity to write our next step, and this one just felt too good to miss.” In a follow-up interview with IGN, Searcy expanded on the decision. “For us, there is a story here for our studio of how we found our way to E-Day that was about reflection,” Searcy explained. “And part of it is just the energy that rolls up about, this was the story we wanted to tell at this time. So it wasn't really about picking between these things, it was just a snowball of the stuff that was on the table and this is the one we wanted to do right now. “We love those characters. It's really nice to have a franchise where we can tell stories in different places. For us, this is just the one we wanted to work on now, this is the one that felt right.” The decision to go with a prequel was a topic of discussion when IGN interviewed Xbox boss Phil Spencer at IGN Live. Spencer said doing a prequel instead of Gears 6 is “a nice opportunity for that team to establish their Gears.” “Following on Gears 5 just because of the numerical thing, I think it would just… this was an opportunity for them to take it back to an origin story that has a lot of real depth to it in terms of Emergence Day and tell that story through The Coalition as it is today,” Spencer said. “I thought, what a great opportunity. I was excited.” The question, of course, is with Gears of War: E-Day in active development at The Coalition, it may be some time before Microsoft continues the overarching Gears storyline with a potential Gears 6. Some fans have suggested another team be handed the responsibility of continuing the story in partnership with The Coalition, but Microsoft has yet to indicate a willingness to do so. Gears of War: E-Day is currently without a release window. For more of what Microsoft has up its sleeve, check out everything announced at the Xbox Games Showcase 2024. Wesley is the *** News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at [email protected] or confidentially at *****@*****.tld. View the full article

Between the likes of Diablo 4, Last Epoch, and Path of Exile, ARPG fans are eating good right now. Each game offers something a little different while spurring the competition to learn from and bounce off of one another. Last Epoch delivers hundreds of skills while Path of Exile adopts the free-to-play model. So how does Blizzard stay distinctive from its rivals? Speaking exclusively to PCGameN at Summer Game Fest, Diablo series general manager and producer Rod Fergusson explains how D4 is staying ahead of the pack. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: Diablo 4 DLC release date - Vessel of Hatred news and updates Blizzard reveals the new Diablo 4 DLC class, and pets are here today Diablo 4 bonus XP, gold, and free items can be yours if you're quick View the full article

The medieval King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table are usually depicted as heroes, fighting off the Anglo-Saxons as they try to take over Britain. In Sworn, a new co-op roguelite that takes inspirations from Diablo and Hades, Arthur is corrupted, and you must ****** through a fallen Camelot to slay him and save the realm. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: New King Arthur roguelike is basically a co-op Hades set in Camelot View the full article

Like a scantily armoured fugitive making the intrepid trip from Skyrim's de facto starting town of Riverwood to Solitude, or a fresh-off-the-boat fledgling following road signs to get from Seyda Neen to Vivec, The Elder Scrolls Online has had to come through its fair share of tribulations before reaching its destination... Read more.View the full article

The 2024 Xbox Games Showcase featured plenty of exciting reveals and showcases, and the lineup should be especially exciting for Xbox Game Pass subscribers. Access to the service grants access to many games on the day of their release, and the upcoming roster is looking very robust in this regard. This includes a huge first in the day one arrival of Call of Duty: ****** Ops 6, but there's plenty to enjoy for more than just first-person shooter fans. View the full article

After months of speculation, as well as a report that reckoned we'll be seeing the rumored Xbox handheld console at the Xbox Games Showcase, we were left somewhat disappointed after it ******* to materialize. However, Xbox CEO Phil Spencer has offered up some rather promising comments about a potential portable, and it's clear he's in love with the idea. Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: The new Xbox consoles are an almighty, all-digital push from Microsoft Move aside Concord, Xbox's FragPunk is the 5v5 FPS to look out for Xbox VR - everything we know so far View the full article

Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: Praise the Emperor - Space Marine 2 has PVP multiplayer! The Space Marine 2 bosses we want to see The year in Warhammer 2023 - Wargamer's retrospective View the full article

Read the rest of the story... RELATED LINKS: When one MTG deck costs $400, can we admit there's a problem? Scary new artifact MTG card banned right before release This tournament prize MTG card is gold dust for godzilla fans View the full article

Sure, scavenging equipment and supplies in Tarkov is tense, and the gunplay in Battlefield is frenetic, but does either game let you turn into a radioactive bear? They don't, and that's why Striden is a serious rival to these two shooters. Set during the Cold War in the Scandinavian Peninsula, this extraction FPS combines the best of its inspirations and adds its own animal twist. Read the rest of the story... View the full article