October 2023

As you may recall, earlier this year Blizzard confirmed that Diablo 4 requires players to create new characters each season. And, with season two just around the corner, we thought it would be a good idea to let you know how to ensure you don't lose your stash as well as your character.

When Diablo 4's current season - Season of the Malignant - comes to an end, players will see their seasonal characters moved over to the Eternal Realm with all their items - but there's a time limit to recover them.

Items will be found in your stash in a new "Withdraw Only Stash tab". But don't get complacent, as they won't stay here forever. If you want to withdraw any of your items from this chest, you will need to make sure you do so before Diablo 4's second season comes to a close. Otherwise, they will become "unrecoverable".

Read more

Happy October. We’re in spooky month territory at long last, even if it has felt a little warm for Fall. Many of us are also looking forward to a three-day weekend here in the States, so that means a nice long chunk of time to get some gaming in—and you can pair it with a pumpkin spice latte!

Read more...

NIS America provided Disgaea 7: Vows of the Virtueless players with an update on the Disgaea 7 Season Pass DLC. This update covers what content will be available in reach region. Specifically, it also mentioned the times for the Season Pass' items release.

In the Americas and Europe, "Bonus Story: The Overlord, Demon Lord, and Sheltered Girl" and "Bonus Story: The Hothead, Princess, and Dreamer" are now available to play.  

In all regions at 12am local time on October 9, 2023, "Bonus Story: The Honor Student, Final Boss, and Ex-President", "Bonus Story: The Instructor, Steward, and Fallen Angel of Love", "Bonus Story: The Kind Demon, Singing Princess, and Thief Angel", "Bonus Story: The Zombie Sibs and Angel Little Sister", "Bonus Story: The Delinquent, Curry Lover, and Lady Overlord", and the Pleinair Completion Bonus will be available.

NIS America provided a disclaimer for the DLC. It stated that if the listed DLC are not immediately available at 12am local time, they will be available by the end of the day on October 9, 2023.

The company also noted that the Pleinair Completion Bonus comes with all Disgaea 7: Vows of the Virtueless Complete Editions, the Season Pass, or if all Bonus Stories are purchases separately.

For players in Australia and New Zealand, Disgaea 7 will launch on October 13, 2023 alongside all of the Bonus Stories.

There’s a new Theresa Apocalypse Honkai Impact 3rd Lunar Vow: Crimson Love battlesuit about to debut in-game. HoYoVerse confirmed it will be part of the 7.0 update. This will be an S-rank battlesuit. This will also be the second of her vampire persona battlesuits, as the Luna Kindred already appeared. 

This new video begins with a closer examination of Luna, showing some attacks and a closer look at her dress. From there, members of the team talked about her. They noted she’s waiting to reunite with the Captain, and the concept is showing her dressing up in her gothic dress for that opportunity to reunite. She looks more mature than before, with the team saying she could “break free from cursed chains” while waiting for the Captain to come back. 

However, they note that while she looks cute, she’s still a berserker vampire. They noted her new moveset shows that she’s in control of it. However, she also wields a chainsaw to show her ferocity

Here’s a closer look at the Honkai Impact 3rd Lunar Vow: Crimson Love battlesuit:

Premium Bandai will produce and sell a unique light lamp modeled after a 16-bit Kirby sprite from the SNES entry Kirby Super Star. In its Japanese press release, the company revealed that the sprite light will support multiple brightness levels. The user will be able to set the light to be either bright enough to help read books and play games, or dim enough for sleep time. [Thanks, 4Gamer!]

The lamp will be 20cm (7.87in) wide and 19m (7.48in) tall. It will also have a thickness of 5 centimeters or almost 2 inches.

Takara Tomy confirmed that it will release a special Zoids model kit of the Gatling Fox designed after the Hololive VTuber Shirakami Fubuki. Pre-orders for the kit will be first held physically at the 40th Anniversary Great Zoids Exhibition 2023.

The exhibition will take place at Gallery AaMo in Tokyo Dome City on October 7-22, 2023. One person can order up to three kits — each priced at ¥6,050 (~$40.60) — with an additional shipping cost of ¥1,200. Takara Tomy warns that if the stocks are sold out at the event, there will be no future resales for this kit.

Shirakami Fubuki has been known to have Zoids as one of her favorite franchises. In 2020, the VTuber made a tweet mentioning the Gatling Fox that appeared in Zoids: Wild ZERO. Three years later, her dream collaboration has become a reality.

Teyon and Nacon's forthcoming 80s sci-fi FPS Robocop: Rogue City has a demo, allowing those who wouldn't even buy it for a dollar to spend an hour or two in the game's crime-ridden Old Detroit, fighting crime.

Read more

Amazon’s Prime Big Deal Days sale is proving a decent source of Steam Deck accessory deals. Last week’s early offers shaved cash off some of my personal favourite cases, docks, and microSD cards, and now that the main event is underway, there’s a fresh supply of affordable add-ons for the Valve handheld. Here, we shall catalogue the best.

Read more

Stardew Valley creator Eric "ConcernedApe" Barone has shown more of what he's been working on as development on update 1.6 for the game continues.

The latest feature teased by Barone is maybe the most important one in the update - wearable hats for pets.

A range of headwear for pets will be available, including a very cute bow, allowing players to dress up their farm pets.

Read more

The Call of Duty team has lifted the lid on its upcoming Warzone map, Urzikstan.

This map, which is described as an "urban battleground" was unveiled as part of Call of Duty: Next. It will arrive with the first season of Modern Warfare 3 sometime in December.

Urzikstan is in Western Asia and borders the Republic of Adal. Call of Duty regulars will know this area as the location of Warzone's Al Mazrah map.

Read more

Redfall's player count has dropped so low on Steam that players might find it tough to fill up their team in multiplayer.

For those of you wondering, a full team in Redfall multiplayer is made up of four players. Over the past week, Redfall's concurrent Steam player count dropped to a low of three, as recorded by SteamDB. Its peak during that same period of time is 38.

Redfall's launch didn't go as parent company Microsoft had hoped, as Phil Spencer revealed the company had expected the game to review much higher than it did.

Read more

We finally have a release date for American Arcadia: 15th November on PC (via Steam). So, if you are anything like me and rather looking forward to this release, thankfully there is not too much longer to wait.

If you are unsure of what American Arcadia is all about, I will give you a little overview. It is by Out of the Blue, the same studio that gave us 2020's rather special Call of the Sea, and set in the "retro-futuristic '70 metropolis" Arcadia.

On the outside, Arcadia seems to promise its residents a life of cushy luxury, but all is not what it seems. In fact, the Arcadia residents are all part of a TV show, and they have no idea they are being recorded for the entertainment of the wider public (think The Truman Show). But, it is not all as innocent as that (not that that is especially innocent, really). You see, if the viewers don't like someone, well, it could end in their death. And this is something that our poor everyday man Trevor Hills is trying to avoid.

Read more

Detective Pikachu Returns is out October 6 on Nintendo Switch (Amazon), and it brings a new mystery for the titular Pokémon investigator to solve. But it also dredges up an old mystery that has plagued the character since his debut in 2016: is Detective Pikachu a cop? Well, the only way to solve a mystery is to look…

Read more...

The crackdown on counterfeit Pikachus and Charizards continues. Earlier this week, an investigation by police in Annaka City, Japan led them to a haul of 1,000 cards believed to be fake, including Pokémon trading card game products. The 21-year-old suspect they allegedly belonged to had been caught selling a few of…

Read more...

As a part of Project Voltage, a collaboration between The Pokemon Company International and the Vocaloid Hatsune Miku, producer Inabakumori released a new song. It is called “Denki Yohou (Electricity Forecast).” In the music video, Hatsune Miku is pictured with various Electric-type Pokemon. The song was also promoted on the Project Voltage official social media account and website, where you can see the 18 Pokemon trainer Miku designs that were released sequentially throughout September 2023.

Inabakumori, is best known for creating the song “Lagtrain,” among other Vocaloid tracks including Hatsune Miku ones. The artist that provided the illustration for the music video is Nukunuku Nigirimeshi, who has worked with Inabakumori on “Lagtrain” and other tracks in the past.

“Denki Yohou” is the second song released so far for Project Voltage. It, along with the other Project Voltage tracks, feature samples from the Pokemon series. Last week, DECO*27’s “Volt Tackle” appeared.

Watch the music video for “Denki Yohou” below:

[embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Imcr7rsBxsc[/embed]

Good Smile Company is about to finish a line of figures from a series. The Doki Doki Literature Club Yuri Nendoroid is now available to order. She’ll show up in May 2024 in Japan. After that, she’ll come to read and drink tea in people’s homes in Q4 2024. She costs ¥6,500/$40.99. Also, if people buy her direct from the manufacturer, she comes with a piece of chocolate to hold.

Editor’s Note: The gallery below will feature spoilers for Doki Doki Literature Club.

The base version of the Nendoroid comes with three face plates. One features Yuri smiling and blushing. In another, she looks more anxious and embarrassed. The final one shows her when she’s glitching out. She also has a book she can hold and a cup of tea. There are also background and text box parts.

Here’s a closer look at Yuri.

Another version of Sephiroth is now in FFVII Ever Crisis. This time, it’s in the form of a challenge inspired by a part of Crisis Core FFVII. Square Enix announced the Critical Threat Sephiroth - The Arrival is a new challenge with him as the boss. He is around to fight now until October 19, 2023, and there will be Stamina Tonic rewards for everyone if the clear rate hits certain hallmarks. Square Enix teased a more powerful Sephiroth fight.

The Critical Threat Sephiroth - The Arrival Campaign Quest involves facing the battle simulator version of him. People might recall this sort of fight is akin to the one Zack faced at the very start of Crisis Core FFVII and its Reunion rerelease. As such, someone does need to complete the CC Final Fantasy VII Chapter 1 Main Section 3 Episode 6 fight to access it. If you do, and then face and defeat Sephiroth, you can earn Victory Draw Tickets. The Victory Draw has different prizes at each level, with one being a free weapon. 

As for the Critial Threat Campaign, here are Sephiroth fight reward tiers:

• Beaten 7 million times: Everyone gets 5 Stamina Tonics

A new set of merchandise that pairs Jujutsu Kaisen characters with kaiju from the Godzilla series will appear in Japan. The official Japanese website for Jujutsu Kaisen revealed that these items will be available on the storefronts for both franchises on October 13, 2023.

Here is the full price list for the merchandise lineup. All of the prices are in Japanese yen with tax already included.

• Big hologram badge: ¥550
• Hologram sticker: ¥385
• Set of 2 clear files: ¥990
• Acrylic stand keychain: ¥1,320
• Hand towel: ¥990

And here is the list of the pairings between the Jujutsu Kaisen characters and the Godzilla series' kaiju monsters.

• Yuji Itadori with Godzilla
• Megumi Fushiguro with Rodan
• Nobara Kugisaki with Biollante

Microsoft's long journey to acquire gaming giant Activision Blizzard is finally nearing an end. According to The Verge, a source familiar with Microsoft's plans indicated that it was aiming for Friday, October 13, as a date to close the deal. Ignoring the infamy of the date (it seems Microsoft and Activision Blizzard executives aren't very superstitious), it's not a surprising day to choose. Back in July, the two parties in the deal jointly agreed to extend the deadline of their agreement to October 18 in order to sort out any further regulatory concerns. At the time of publishing, that date is only twelve days away, so the deal would have to be closed soon.

HyperX's Cloud Orbit S is a fascinating wireless gaming headset with planar magnetic drivers. Despite the name, this headset is produced by audio experts Audeze and the Cloud Orbit S is 99% the same as the Audeze Mobius, just with a slightly different colour scheme, simpler microphone and without Bluetooth support. That allows HP to hit a more aggressive price target, making the Cloud Orbit S one of the most affordable ways to try a great planar magnetic gaming headset.

The Cloud Orbit S debuted at a mighty £299.99, but today it's available on Amazon for just £209 - a nice £91 savings.

Read more

Correction: In 2022 the Axis series switched from titling its games for their current year to titling them for next year. Since I skipped last year's installment, and searches for "Axis Football 2022" brought up nothing, I got horribly confused and wrongly stated that the series skipped 2022 entirely. I apologise for this embarrassing error, and for not realising it until the exact moment everyone at RPS went home for the weekend. Although that latter part is at least quite funny.

Axis Football 2024 is part of the little Americaball series that could. Since 2019 I've settled into a habit of skipping every second entry, only to learn that this time, its developers did too.

The result is still iterative improvement, but a more noticeable one in lots of small ways. Its animations in particular combine more naturally, with players visibly struggling to tackle, catch, or shake off an opponent. It feels like a punchier sport, making the significance of blocking and positioning clearer, and bringing out the drama that its coaching mode in particular really thrives on.

Read more

The RTX 4060 Ti has emerged as something of a sweet spot in Nvidia's current-gen graphics card lineup, being more affordable than the RTX 4070 and above while providing better performance per pound than the 4060 below it - despite some reservations over its 8GB VRAM capacity and relatively modest gen-on-gen performance uplift compared to the RTX 3060 Ti. However, if you want access to Nvidia's DLSS 3 frame generation and 3.5 ray reconstruction features, and one of the most power-efficient cards on the market, then the 4060 Ti is definitely worth a look.

The RTX 4060 Ti normally retails for $400 or higher, but today you can pick up the Zotac Twin Edge OC model for just $370, a sweet $60 savings versus MSRP on one of the best-looking and highest-clocked 4060 Ti models.

Read more

At this year’s EVE Fanfest, the annual convention celebrating the 20-year-old space MMO, Icelandic developers CCP announced a new game: EVE Vanguard. A shooter set in their gunmetal grey sci-fi universe, Vanguard puts you into the shoes of mercenaries, dropping onto planets to retrieve equipment from wrecked ships, battling it out with AI-controlled pirates and other squads of human players. It’s Escape from Tarkov by way of the galaxy of New Eden.

If you’ve followed CCP, you may get a sense of de ja vu. This isn’t the first time the developers have tried to make a shooter happen in EVE Online: it’s the fourth. It’s just they've only gotten one out the door before.

Read more

Mega sales events like Amazon Prime Big Deal Days should prick up the ears of anyone wanting a good graphics card deal. As expensive as these slabs of pixel-pushing circuitry can get, even the most luxurious GPUs can find themselves snared in Amazon’s savings net, from which we can pick out solely the best GPU deals of the day. Days, sorry. Until October 11th.

Read more

Hello friend! Have you been suffering from a pronounced lack of domes in your life of late? Are your videogames dispiritingly dome-less? Well, good news - the "small, but perfectly formed tower defence game" Dome Keeper has just received a big free update, adding two new domes to its roster together with a dome supplements system, that you may dome like you've never domed before. Domes!

Read more

Life may be full of regrets, but if one of those regrets is that you decided to call your Baldur's Gate 3 character Bumfart the Third in a moment of weakness, there's some good news: the game's latest hotfix will finally let you change their ill-conceived name.

That's the headline feature for Baldur's Gate 3's Hotfix #9 (or at least it is if you're a remorseful Bumfart), but there's more where that came from. The Magic Mirror, for instance, will - as well as enabling the aforementioned renaming unshaming - allow you to customise your hirelings if their outward appearance isn't to your liking.

Developer Larian notes the same restrictions apply to hirelings that apply when changing the appearance of the player character - presumably meaning you can give them a full aesthetic makeover to suit your dubious whims but you're stuck with their original race, sub race, and any cosmetic modifications resulting from gameplay.

Read more

Last Friday, AMD finally released FSR 3 frame generation, its answer to Nvidia's DLSS 3. Two titles had supported added: Forspoken and Immortals of Aveum. We'd already seen demos of both games under controlled conditions at Gamescom back in August, but this was our first chance to go hands-on and to truly put FSR 3 through its paces. The verdict? Image quality in terms of generated frames is impressive, but elsewhere there are some fundamental issues AMD needs to address.

Let's quickly review what frame generation is about. Nvidia kicked this all off with DLSS 3, and in many respects, FSR 3 follows the exact same principles. The next frame is rendered and the one beyond that too, then via a combination of optical flow analysis informed via inputs from the game engine - such as motion vectors, for example - an intermediate frame is generated that slots in between them. Frame-rate then typically receives an extraordinary boost - in my tests with FSR3 in Immortals of Aveum on an RX 7900 XTX at 4K resolution, it's a 71 percent boost compared to standard rendering.

I'm careful in using words to describe the frame-rate uplift, because similar to DLSS 3, I don't think you can call it 'extra performance' as such, even though both Nvidia and AMD will likely use that term. The game itself is still performing as it was without frame generation and in fact, the extra calculations required to generate the intermediate frame have a cost of their own, so one might even argue that frame generation reduces performance.

Read more

If Dave the Diver is great (which it officially is, of course) then it stands to reason that more Dave the Diver will also be great. So prepare to be showered in additional greatness when Dave the Diver's first proper content updates arrives "real soon".

Dave the Diver's previous big update, which released in August, was predominantly focused on quality of life improvements, and while there're plenty more of those stuffed into October's update, we get a bunch of new content too.

The glacier area, for instance - which primarily exists as a story-focused location with fewer missions compared to its counterparts right now - will receive new quests. Additionally, the ocean is set to welcome new species - crabs and lobsters - both requiring players to use special traps to catch. Oh, and a lobster party event will be added to coincide with their arrival.

Read more

It was only a matter of time, I suppose. Everyone’s favorite broken Armored Core VI build is no more. FromSoftware released a new update for the mech shooter that makes its beloved Zimmerman shotguns less godlike. 621’s days of skating around Rubicon smashing and staggering everything in sight with ease are over.

Read more...

Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game Baldur’s Gate 3 is a horny elven fantasy until you end up in a fight. Then, you and your companions get blood spatter all over your faces—very real and sobering—and it’s hard to woo each other at a safe campsite while you’re staring at gore. Some players try to freshen up their…

Read more...

Remedy announced that the first track off of Alan Wake 2: Chapter Songs soundtrack is now available. The full seven-track album won’t appear until October 27, 2023. However, the Fried Music and Rakel song “Follow You into the Dark” is available now.  

First, here’s the full version of “Follow You into the Dark” from YouTube. People can also find it on Apple Music, Amazon Music, iTunes, Pandora, Spotify, and Tidal. 

There’s also a “Making of” video from Remedy and Fried Music showing what led to the creation of Alan Wake 2 Chapter Songs.