Tag: pc

Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League Will Add the Joker as a Playable Character via Free Post-Launch DLC

As Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League nears its launch, developer Rocksteady has confirmed that the game’s post-launch DLC will bring iconic DC villain Joker as a playable character. The studio made the announcement Monday in the third episode of its Suicide Squad Insider developer diary series, detailing its plans for delivering free post-launch seasonal content to players who buy the game, multiversal concepts and a few multiplayer features that will be present at launch. According to Rocksteady, each post-launch season will feature two episodes and will follow the theme of a DC villain, bringing new ways to play. The new announcement follows the developers teasing hundreds of character builds and distinct loadouts earlier this month.

In the Suicide Squad Insider episode titled “Introducing Elseworlds,” Rocksteady laid out its plans for alternate universes in the game, each of them bringing unique DC characters to the mix. With the launch of the first season of post-game content in March, players will be able to unlock the Joker as a playable character for their squads, Rocksteady confirmed. The video shows off a younger version of the Clown Prince of Crime from an alternate universe — Elseworld, as Rocksteady calls it. Bear in mind that the Joker in Rocksteady’s Arkham series of games died in Batman: Arkham City. “He (Joker) was part of the Suicide Squad in the Elseworld that he’s from,” associate design director at the studio Johnny Armstrong explained in the video.

While the Elseworld Joker retains the look and mannerism we’ve come to expect from the iconic villain — the purple suit, the green hair and face makeup and a penchant for chaos, he will have to figure out his place in a new universe, Rocksteady said. The younger, more inexperienced Joker will, however, come with his own unique combat and traversal gameplay systems and distinct weapons to boot. Joker’s new traversal mechanics are based around a rocket-power umbrella, which can be used to propel the DC villain up in the air and glide around. Joker’s umbrella can also be flipped down to grind along buildings like a skateboard and knock away enemies in your path.

From the Joker gameplay footage shown in the video, the villain can be seen gliding around the map with his umbrella and dispatching enemies with glee using melee weapons and firearms. Joker will be the first of a series of DC villain recruits that players will be able to unlock as part of post-launch seasonal content. Rocksteady said it intends to build a library of playable DC characters over time, each with their unique move sets for combat and traversal.

Along with new characters, post-launch content also promises to bring new environments, challenges, missions, gear and more, all at no extra cost to players who have purchased the main game. Rocksteady also confirmed that post-launch playable content will not be locked behind a Battle Pass system and will be directly delivered into the game with the launch of a new season. In addition to detailing their seasonal content plans in their latest video, Rocksteady also provided details on Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League’s multiplayer features like squad-based leaderboards and emotes. Additionally, the developers showed off an outfit customisation system for the squad members.

While Suicide Squad developers have promised a ton of free post-launch content to keep players engaged, the studio, which was earlier known for narrative-focussed single player titles in the Arkham series, and publishers Warner Bros. have attracted criticism over the live service direction of their upcoming DC game. The gameplay reveal for the title back in February 2023 was met with fan backlash over its looter shooter leanings.

Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League puts players in the shoes of four DC supervillains — Captain Boomerang, Deadshot, Harley Quinn, and King Shark, allowing players to play solo or up to four-player co-op and take on brainwashed and rogue members of the Justice League. The game releases February 2 across PC, PS5 and Xbox Series S/X.

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Palworld Accused of Plagiarising Pokémon as Game Sells 6 Million Copies, Pocketpair CEO Responds

Palworld, the viral hit action-adventure survival title from Japanese developers Pocketpair, has taken the gaming industry by storm, climbing to the top of Steam charts and selling six million copies in just four days of release. But as the game’s player count balloons, it has found itself embroiled in a plagiarism controversy, with many on the Internet pointing out alleged similarities between the designs of Palworld’s creatures and those in popular Pokémon games. A user on social media platform X has gone as far as to compare in-game 3D models from both Palworld and Pokémon, claiming evidence of outright plagiarism.

Palworld features Pokémon-style animals, or Pals, that can be captured and utilised for combat, traversal and base building in the game’s open world. Gamers and commentators have even called the new survival title from Pocketpair “Pokémon with Guns.” Some, however, have gone beyond the claims of Palworld’s creatures being inspired by or satirising cute pocket monsters from the iconic Game Freak franchise and levelled accusations of plagiarising in-game assets.

On Sunday, X user @byofrog posted side-by-side mesh comparisons for character models from both Palworld and Pokémon games, first highlighting the similarities between a creature from the newly released game and the Cinderace model from Pokémon Sword and Shield. The user went on to post several other side-by-side comparisons, sparking more copycat accusations against Pocketpair. Since Palworld’s January 19 early access release, gamers and game developers have engaged in intense discourse over the game’s perceived Pokémon inspirations, with some alleging plagiarism and others defending the developers.

A former game designer at Blizzard, Eric Covington, quoted one of @byofrog’s comparison posts and claimed that the close similarity seen between character models couldn’t be accidental. “To “accidentally” create a complex model mesh with so near-exact proportions is practically impossible. To repeat that improbability throughout your roster… doesn’t pass the sniff test,” he said in a post on X. Others, meanwhile, were more cautious in their judgment, claiming the game included enough original ideas. Dinga Bakaba, studio/co-creative director at Arkane Lyon, defended Palworld in a series of posts on X, saying the game effectively mixed and matched gameplay concepts from popular games like Pokémon, Fortnite, Ark: Survival Evolved and Rust. “As a game designer, I’m baffled that some say this is lazy. Even if you copy an idea from another game you can just copy/paste it. Even doing a sequel to your own game with the same programmer in a new engine, it takes crazy amount of time to develop a viable V2.0 of a mechanic,” Bakaba said in one of his posts.

X user @byofrog also went on to qualify his posts comparing Palworld and Pokémon in a later post, saying the 3D models from the two games weren’t identical, despite close resemblances. “I want to emphasize that while some elements are similar these meshes are not literally “exact” copies of each other,” they said.

Meanwhile, game director and Pocketpair CEO Takuro Mizobe responded to the plagiarism accusations on X Monday, claiming the team had received what appeared to be death threats on the socil media platform. “I have received a variety of opinions regarding Palworld, but all productions related to Palworld are supervised by multiple people, including myself, and I am responsible for the production,” Mizobe said in his post (translated from Japanese). “I would appreciate it if you would refrain from slandering the artists involved in Palworld.”

Amid all the noise, Pocketpair confirmed Tuesday that Palworld had sold six million copies in just four days, with its all-time peak player count surpassing 1.7 million. The studio also said that it was prioritising issuing fixes for bugs and other issues reported by Palworld players. At the time of writing, Palworld has hit the third-highest all-time peak concurrent players in Steam history, surpassing Lost Ark and Dota 2. Palworld is also currently the most played title on Steam with almost double the player count of Counter Strike 2.

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Palworld Hits Fifth-Highest Peak Concurrent Players in Steam History, Beats Cyberpunk and Elden Ring

Palworld, an open-world action-adventure title where players can combat and capture Pokemon-like creatures, has become a phenomenon, rising to the top of Steam charts days within launch. The game, which also incorporates elements of the survival genre, now has the fifth-highest peak concurrent players in the history of the Valve storefront, going past heavyweight titles like Cyberpunk 2077, Elden Ring and Hogwarts Legacy. Palword developers Pocketpair also confirmed Monday that the game has sold over five million copies within three days of launch.

Released on January 19, Palworld, popularly described as “Pokemon with guns,” is tearing up Steam charts to become one of the most played titles in the platform’s history. According to SteamDB, which aggregates Steam player data, Palworld is now the fifth most played game on the service, with an all-time peak of 1,291,967 concurrent players. The action-adventure survival title is now only behind games like PUBG: Battlegrounds, Counter Strike 2, Lost Ark and DOTA 2.

Palworld’s massive success also means that it has left behind top-selling games like Cyberpunk 2077, Elden Ring and Hogwarts Legacy in its wake. CD Projekt Red’s RPG has all-time peak concurrent player count of 1,054,388, while FromSoftware’s acclaimed action-RPG stands at 953,426. Hogwarts Legacy, which sold over 22 million copies in 2023, peaks out at 879,308 all-time concurrent players.

The numbers are even more staggering if we look at current concurrent player counts. Palworld tops the chart with 895,847 players at the time of writing, with CS 2, DOTA 2 and PUBG: Battlegrounds rounding out the second, third and fourth positions, respectively. Palworld also tops the list of titles with highest peak concurrent players in the last 24 hours.

In a post on X, Palword developers Pocketpair announced Monday that the game had sold a whopping five million copies in only three days. Palworld reached the four-million mark on Sunday, with Pocketpair claiming latest sales momentum figures of 86,000 units per hour. The gamemaker has also been flooded be support requests, receiving over 50,000 inquiries. Players have complained about server outages, bugs and other serious issues hampering the game. The developer said that it was working to bring fixes for the reported issues, but it might take some time. “The development team is aware of serious bugs that are occurring, such as being unable to enter servers, unable to play multiplayer, and losing saved data, and are currently working on fixing them,” the developer said on X. “We will share information about the fixes for these issues as soon as possible.”

Palworld released January 19 across PC, Xbox One and Xbox Series S/X consoles. The game allows players to capture, utilise and combat cute Pokemon-like creatures — Pals — and survive in an open-world multiplayer setting. The game has been received well on Steam, with the overall verdict standing at “Very Positive” after 39,554 reviews. On Steam, Palworld is currently available in Early Access for Rs. 1,300, with an introductory discount of 10 percent live till January 25.

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Hogwarts Legacy Sold Over 22 Million Copies in 2023, WB Claims; More Harry Potter Games in Development

Hogwarts Legacy, the RPG set within the Potterverse, sold over 22 million copies in 2023. Speaking to Variety, Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment president David Haddad claimed that it was the best-selling game of the said year and that about 2 million of those sales were made during the Christmas holiday season, presumably owing to heavy discounts. Despite his statement, several developers in the industry, including Larian Studios (Baldur’s Gate 3) and Activision (Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3) have yet to reveal the latest sales numbers; so, take the claims with a grain of salt.

“It brought Harry Potter to life in a new way for gamers where they could be themselves in this world, in this story,” Haddad said in the interview. “And that’s what the team at Avalanche set out to do when they were developing the game and I think that’s really why it resonated so well and remains the best-selling game of the year in the entire industry worldwide.” Going forward, WB will continue betting on well-established franchises and using its namesake to generate better sales. In fact, CEO David Zaslav touched upon this in November, with plans to heavily veer into a live service model that would transform the company’s biggest names into long-term products, dropping new content regularly and deep monetisation. This also includes free-to-play mobile games and MultiVersus, the fighting game featuring characters from WB properties, which is expected to undergo a full launch this year.

Launched in February 2023, Hogwarts Legacy got off to a great start, with players worldwide discovering secrets, while developer Avalanche enjoyed staggering sales, partly bolstered by the drama revolving around the boycott of author J.K. Rowling. Although the interest gradually decreased in the following months — the game failed to earn a single nomination at The Game Awards 2023 — WB still seems hellbent on expanding its Harry Potter portfolio with its Quidditch Champions game, which underwent a closed playtest last year. The magical sport was not included in Hogwarts Legacy, so it would be interesting to see how it plays out as a multiplayer entry. Could the company try to make it a live service affair? Only time will tell. Regardless, there are plans for more Harry Potter spin-off games.

So far, wizards around the world have brewed 819 million potions, harvested 1.3 billion magical plants, bested 4.9 billion dark wizards in combat, and rescued 593 million fantastical beasts in Hogwarts Legacy. As per Haddad, another key area of success was NetherRealm Studios’ latest fighting game Mortal Kombat 1, which he alluded to have garnered more players than any other entry in the fighter franchise in its ‘30-plus year history.’ Selling 3 million copies as of November, the fighting game featured some aggressive microtransactions — something gamers have always shown a dislike for. WB Games’ upcoming Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League also falls under the live service umbrella, causing longtime fans of developer Rocksteady to be sceptical of it.

Hogwarts Legacy is available on PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series S/X, and Nintendo Switch.

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Microsoft Adds AI Copilot Key in First Change to PC Keyboard in Decades

Microsoft is adding a button to the Windows keyboard to activate its AI Copilot service, with the first devices to sport the new key available this month.

The Copilot key, which will sit to the right of the space bar, is the first change to the Windows keyboard layout since Microsoft added the Windows/Start key in 1994, underscoring the company’s commitment to artificial intelligence. Microsoft’s hardware partners will show off Windows 11 computers with the Copilot button over the coming days at the CES technology conference and, over time, it will become a required feature.

The shortcut will help users create images, write emails and summarize text with the help of AI.

“AI will be seamlessly woven into Windows from the system, to the silicon, to the hardware,” Microsoft’s consumer chief marketing officer, Yusuf Mehdi, said in a blog announcing the change.

The Redmond, Washington-based company sees 2024 as “the year of the AI PC,” according to Mehdi, mirroring the budding trend among smartphone makers to tout their latest models as “AI phones.” Those labels don’t carry much weight by themselves, but Microsoft has spent the past year retooling its biggest products around AI tech that can generate new content from massive datasets. That list now includes Windows, Office, Bing search, security software and customer and finance products. The work heavily leverages the GPT-4 technology from OpenAI, in which Microsoft has invested $13 billion (roughly Rs. 1,08,201 crore).

For device makers, Microsoft’s push into AI services has not yet translated into a boost for sales, as the novel Copilot features are being rolled out to new and existing devices alike. Mehdi’s promise of weaving AI into hardware and silicon may signal more pressure on consumers to upgrade as Microsoft evolves and improves its AI proposition.

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Samsung launched the Galaxy Z Fold 5 and Galaxy Z Flip 5 alongside the Galaxy Tab S9 series and Galaxy Watch 6 series at its first Galaxy Unpacked event in South Korea. We discuss the company’s new devices and more on the latest episode of Orbital, the Gadgets 360 podcast. Orbital is available on Spotify, Gaana, JioSaavn, Google Podcasts, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music and wherever you get your podcasts.
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Steam’s Best of 2023 Reveals Its Highest-Selling and Most-Played Games of the Past Year

Valve has unveiled its annual ‘Best of 2023′ list on Steam, revealing which titles dominated sales on PC. The titles haven’t been numerically ranked, but have been grouped into tiers — Platinum, Gold, Silver, and Bronze — based on data collected from January 1 through December 15, 2023. The Top 12 category is populated by both free-to-play multiplayer games and the biggest launches, with the award-winning Baldur’s Gate 3, Starfield, Cyberpunk 2077, and Hogwarts Legacy emerging as the best-selling titles. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, which was disliked by both fans and critics alike, also made it to higher echelons, thanks to a dedicated fanbase wanting to experience its multiplayer segment.

The usual suspects like Counter-Strike 2, PUBG: Battlegrounds, Apex Legends, Dota 2, and Destiny 2 also made it to the Platinum rank — the last of them is getting a new expansion, ‘The Final Shape,’ in June, this year. Meanwhile, the Gold tier contains some absolute bangers like the Resident Evil 4 remake, Red Dead Redemption 2, and Elden Ring, for which the last-reported sales number was 20 million copies across all platforms. Its popularity was highly instrumental in plunking Armored Core VI: Fires of Rubicon, a lesser-known FromSoftware franchise, among the top 24 best-selling games on the platform. Even FIFA 23 from last year made the cut, which shouldn’t be surprising considering its follow-up EA Sports FC 24 launched mid-year.

In addition to an overall Top-Sellers field, Steam has additional sections for New Releases by gross revenue, Most Played, Early Access purchases, and more. Multiplatform games that were received poorly seem to be the centre of attention among the latest releases, with Star Wars Jedi: Survivor and Payday 3 emerging on top, with the latter being criticised for lack of content. As you’d expect, multiplayer games held the highest player count (above 300,000 minimum), though some single-player affairs like Goose Goose Duck and Hogwarts Legacy charted alongside Baldur’s Gate 3, which at one point, peaked at over 800,000 concurrent players on Steam. Developer Larian Studios only anticipated 100,000, given the game had been out for nearly three years in early access. At the time of writing, over 176,000 concurrent players are logged into the expansive RPG, which is placed fourth among the most-played games on the platform.

2023 was also a great year for studios to test out their games in early access and gain feedback on them. The ocean exploration and fishing game from Mintrocket, Dave the Diver, was among the favourites, even turning out to be one of the most played games on the Steam Deck. While it’s only natural to expect less graphically intensive games like Vampire Survivor and Half-Life on there, somehow Starfield made it to the top despite its lack of optimisation causing heavy stutters in crowded areas like New Atlantis and the Wild West-themed Akila. Beat Saber and The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim VR emerged among the favourites in virtual reality gaming, along with Half-Life: Alyx, pitting you in a vicious fight against the alien Combines.

Currently, Steam also has its annual Winter Sale going on, bringing steep discounts on new and returning games. It runs until January 5 at 10:30pm IST.

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The Day Before Delisted From Steam Days After Troubled Launch, Studio Fntastic Announces Shutdown

The Day Before, once Steam’s most wish-listed open-world survival MMO, has been delisted from Valve’s platform. The game launched in early access to an almost immediate flood of negative reviews last week, with most players claiming that it wasn’t really an MMO but an extraction shooter reminiscent of Escape from Tarkov, combined with the post-apocalyptic threats of The Last of Us. The misleading gameplay claims were made worse by several game-breaking glitches that caused characters to clip off from the map, an incomplete and sparse world devoid of action, and inconsistent online features. Merely five days after release, the game is no longer available to buy on Steam and Fntastic, the studio behind the game, has announced it is shutting down and working on refunds for customers who bought the game.

“Today, we announce the closure of Fntastic studio. The Day Before has failed financially, and we lack the funds to continue,” the blog post reads, with the developer originally claiming that all earned income would be used to pay off its debts. There are no plans to patch the game and turn it into something that the creators originally hoped for either, since more funding is out of the picture. Sure, the shooter was never crowd-funded, but the accusations of stolen or repurposed assets, a barrage of misleading gameplay trailers, and a $40 price tag on a game that was quite possibly a scam didn’t work in the studio’s favour. Debuting with 38,000 concurrent players on Steam, the player base has been steadily going down — no uptick during the weekend either — as players realised how the expectations from the trailer had been wrecked. At the time of writing, The Day Before has 749 concurrent players. (Probably the select few who are looking to capture funny gameplay compilations before the server is shut down.)

Fntastic isn’t sure of the studio’s direction going forward but assures players that the servers for The Day Before and its previous multiplayer hide-and-seek game Propnight will remain operational. Understandably, disappointed players are looking for refunds and publisher Mytona is willing to do that even if the playtime on Steam exceeds two hours. As usual, this can be achieved through Steam’s Help section, which will lead to a questionnaire asking the reasons for the refund. To calm the loud accusations of a scam, Fntastic claims that it will not receive any money from the sales and admitted to heavily overestimating its capabilities as a game developer. Adding fuel to the fire was an immature response to criticism on Twitter, where Fntastic replied, “This was our first big experience. Shit happens.” For what it’s worth, hopefully, we get a new ‘Crowbcat‘ video from this colossal mess.

With the Fntastic CEO wiping his Twitter account from the internet, followed by the deletion of the studio’s YouTube channel, it’s almost as if the game maker is trying to erase any proof that the company ever existed. The Day Before currently has an Overwhelmingly Negative rating on Steam, having garnered 18,000 bad reviews, at one point placing it amongst the 10 worst reviewed games on the platform. The only reason it’s no longer listed there is because the game as a whole has been removed from the platform.

The road to launch wasn’t without its own hitches as well. The Day Before suffered countless delays — one of them a month before launch, got into a trademark dispute, and was accused of facilitating unpaid labour. Fntastic later dismissed those claims saying that those were all ‘volunteer’ help.

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Call of Duty: MW 3, Warzone Season 1 Is Out Now: New Maps, Drivable Trains, Zombies Story Mission, More

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 and its Warzone component kicked off its Season 1 multiplayer today, marking its first major update since launch. The former gets three new maps as part of its 24/7 playlist, in addition to a 6v6 arena set in Rio, which will be available later in the season. As usual, there are some rewards for racking up kills without dying, granting players an EMP upon getting a 13 killstreak and the ability to summon mosquito swarms as cover on a 15 killstreak. There’s also a new perk called the Assassin Vest, which makes players immune to UAV scans and doesn’t pop skulls on the minimap upon performing an execution.

The three new maps take you to a coastal town in ‘Greece’, a blood-drenched close-quarters slaughterhouse called ‘Meat’, and a ‘Training Facility’ set in a warehouse that enables 2v2 gunfights. Building on that, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III brings back two fan-favourite modes — the All or Nothing equips players with throwing knives and an empty pistol, taking them with slowly upgrading armaments via killstreaks and perk activations. Then there’s the standard round-based Gunfight with small teams. Ranked Play is expected to drop later in Season 1, alongside promotional skins for the upcoming Denis Villeneuve movie Dune: Part 2 — Paul Atredis and Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen — and an in-game event titled ‘Trial of Power.’ There are no specifics of the event yet, but we can assume that the timing of the collaboration had to do with the film’s delay from November to March 2024 due to the Hollywood labour strikes. Still, a weird game to pick for promoting Dune 2.

Over on Warzone, Call of Duty’s long-running battle-royale mode, the brand-new Urzikstan map is now live, throwing you onto a greyish metropolis punctuated by lavish resorts, power mills, a military base, a luxurious mansion and more. Activision describes it as a point where the Middle East meets Europe — or to put it more bluntly in the game’s universe, it’s located on the ‘easter border of the Black Sea and bordering Al Mazrah.’ As previously reported, the map adds a few unique mechanics for traversal such as horizontal ziplines and a drivable train, whose speed can be controlled by players using dedicated levers. Of course, one could also flip the brakes by heading to the backside. With such major changes comes a new 1v1 Gulag called ‘Silo,’ which is entirely symmetrical but will be varied based on luck.

Season 1 also brings a new story mission to the Zombies mode, plopping a ‘massive gateway’ in the Exclusion Zone for players to investigate. Additionally, there’s a new battle pass, promising new weapon unlocks such as the XRX Stalker, RAM-7, and Stormender, which can be added to your loadout. The Call of Duty roadmap also reveals plans for Christmas-themed events and game modes, a skin for A-Train from the Amazon Prime Video series The Boys, and more — you can check out the complete patch notes on the official website.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 and Warzone Season 1 is now live on PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series S/X.

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Everything You Need to Know About The Game Awards 2023: When and How to Watch in India, Nominees, and More

The Game Awards is back for its 2023 edition, signalling that time of the year when the industry and fans gather together to celebrate the best in video games. Marking the 10th iteration of the Geoff Keighley-hosted show, the annual event is held in high regard by developers worldwide, who will be competing in 31 categories that acknowledge games across genres. As usual, the ceremony will be spruced up by big announcements and trailers for upcoming titles, backed by a dedicated musical orchestra conducted by returning composer Lorne Balfe. There haven’t been as many leaks this year, so anticipation is high as gamers keep their fingers crossed hoping for the biggest reveals.

Given how the trailers and awards are spaced out, host Keighley once again expects The Game Awards to run for around three hours, albeit this year, Valve isn’t giving out free Steam Decks every minute to online viewers. Instead, the company is doing a sweepstake to hand out 100 Steam Deck OLEDs (1TB models) to the lucky few — residing in North America, Europe, and select Asian regions — who can all enter once the show goes live. There aren’t any big changes to the nominations this year, but Keighley has confirmed that the creators are moving away from using the ‘World Premiere’ card at the start of their announcements to treat every trailer or first look as ‘great game content.’

Security is also getting tightened, as we’ve seen two instances of stage crashers walking in to interrupt good moments and making absurd comments — the first one occurred during The Game Awards 2022 when Elden Ring lifted the trophy for Game of the Year, while the other occurred at Summer Game Fest, earlier this year. Understandably, Keighley hasn’t gone into the specifics of the beefed-up measures.

The Game Awards 2023: Date and time

The Game Awards 2023 kicks off on Thursday, December 7 at 4:30pm PT/ 7:30pm ET, just like last time. For India, this translates to early morning Friday, December 8 at 6am IST with plans to end at 9:30am — not the most comfortable time to catch up on the biggest gaming event of the year. The first thirty minutes of that runtime will be dedicated to a pre-show, hosted by Sydnee Goodman, serving as a way for smaller developers to showcase their games and content creators to talk about what they’re expecting from the show.

So if you’re only planning to watch the main show, tune in at 5pm PT/ 8pm ET in the US and 6:30am in India.

The Game Awards 2023: How to watch?

The ceremony will be held live from the Peacock Theatre in Los Angeles with an in-person audience, but as always, there’s a simultaneous livestream planned. You can watch The Game Awards 2023 for free on its official Twitch and YouTube channels, in addition to major platforms such as X (formerly Twitter), Facebook Live, Steam, TikTok Live, and Instagram Live. Of course, one could also watch it through other gaming livestreamers’ channels, who will have registered to co-stream the event and react to it. Viewers in India can also stream the show live on Disney+ Hotstar, MX Player, Voot, JioTV, and Loco, and can tune into YouTube Gaming for a Hindi-language feed.

Or you can just watch the embedded stream below:

In case you happen to miss The Game Awards live, a VOD will be published soon after the event ends and there are always 4K uploads of the trailers and biggest moments, available individually on its official YouTube channel.

What to expect from The Game Awards 2023?

One of the biggest reasons players tune into The Game Awards is to learn about any upcoming games and have their unrealistically high expectations checked. Larian Studios will finally unveil when Baldur’s Gate 3 will be coming to Xbox, which is still on track for release this month, as promised. The studio was initially facing trouble with incorporating split-screen co-op on the Xbox Series S due to its technical limitations, so it will be interesting to know whether the team decided to ditch it or maintain content parity. There’s also some exclusive Xbox reveals in store for us at The Game Awards, which many are hoping is a tease for Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II news.

Meanwhile, SEGA has been sending letters to fighting game content creators around the world with the quote ‘New Era New Energy,’ promising some exciting stuff. Supermassive Games — best known for the choice-based horror titles like the Dark Pictures anthology — is collaborating with Behaviour Interactive to develop a single-player game based within the universe of Dead by Daylight. Staying with the horror theme, The Outlast Trials developer Red Barrels has planned an ‘important broadcast’ for us. Then, Epic Games prepares to show a trailer for Rocket Racing, a car racing game mode built within Fortnite, featuring all the exaggerated mechanics from Rocket League such as boosting and taking flight. The mode is expected to launch for free on December 8, but the publisher plans to show something at the awards show.

The Game Awards’ official Twitter account briefly teased a Hideo Kojima announcement using a side-eyes emoji, before getting deleted. This could very well be a trailer for Death Stranding 2, which was revealed at last year’s event via a cryptic teaser with returning leads Léa Seydoux and Norman Reedus. So yeah, its game director Hideo Kojima is also expected to make an appearance, having arrived in Los Angeles earlier this week. Fans also expect FromSoftware to drop a trailer and release date for the much-awaited Elden Ring DLC ‘Shadow of the Erdtree,’ announced last year, with hints pointing at a new explorable region and the presence of the Empyrian Miquella. While it was initially believed that the expansion would be out in early 2024, an interview from last week suggests that it’s ‘a little ways off’ but promises new battles and characters.

Reports claim Arkane Studios will showcase its next title at The Game Awards 2023, which is expected to be Dishonored 3 — details of which emerged from the Microsoft v US FTC court proceedings in September. We might also get another glimpse at Final Fantasy VII Rebirth, Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth, the untitled Mass Effect game, Tekken 8, Hades 2, and more.

The Game Awards 2023 presenters

To honour the winners, Keighley loves mixing things up by inviting both game industry titans and Hollywood actors. Christopher Judge, who played Kratos in the God of War reboot games, is returning to the stage to present an award this year — presumably for Best Performance, given he was the winner last year. Other standout presenters include Anthony Mackie, whose show Twisted Metal is also competing in the Best Adaptation category; Respawn Entertainment CEO Vince Zampella; and famous DJ and EDM artist Zedd. Besides them, the lead cast of the Fallout series will be making an appearance at The Game Awards 2023 — specifically Ella Purnell, Walton Goggins, and Aaron Moten.

Alan Wake 2 fans are in for a treat as the Poets of the Fall band will be performing a musical piece live on stage, under its in-game alter ego Old Gods of Asgard. And as we all know, Keighley’s love for Muppets knows no bounds, so The Great Gonzo will also be around as a presenter.

The Game Awards 2023 nominees

As mentioned before, The Game Awards 2023 plays host to 31 categories, from which Baldur’s Gate 3 and Alan Wake 2 are tied for eight nominations each, in addition to competing for the prestigious Game of the Year trophy. Other GOTY nominees include The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, Marvel’s Spider-Man 2, Resident Evil 4 remake, and Super Mario Bros. Wonder — Keighley is strictly sticking to his six nominations rule, despite an extremely strong year for gaming. There are some strong contenders for Best Adaptation as well, with favourites being HBO’s The Last of Us and The Super Mario Bros. Movie.

The nominee list also sparked some debate on what constitutes an ‘independent game’ when people online noticed that Dave the Diver, the pixelated roguelike about deepsea fishing and selling sushi, was nominated as ‘Best Independent Game.’ The thing is, despite its aesthetic, the game is developed by Mintrocket, which belongs to a massive South Korean publisher Nexon — making it technically not indie. Keighley addressed these concerns in a live Q&A stating that the word ‘indie’ could mean different to different people — “Does independent mean the budget of the game? Does independent mean where the source of financing was? Is it based on the team size? Is it the kind of independent spirit of a game, meaning kind of a smaller game that’s different?”, he said (via Kotaku), adding that the concern is justified.

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Cyberpunk 2077’s Final Major Update Brings Metro Service, Romantic Hangouts, Improved Bosses, More

Cyberpunk 2077 is getting the last major update before developer CD Projekt Red moves on to the next project. Dubbed ‘Update 2.1,’ the patch finally brings the long-requested metro system, the ability to hang out with romantic partners, radios, and a ton of quality-of-life changes. It drops alongside the Ultimate Edition on December 5 at 4:30pm IST in India/ 12pm CET in Europe. Bear in mind that this is a free downloadable update, so it won’t be included natively in the physical disc versions releasing on the PS5 and Xbox Series S/X. That said, the 2.0 Update released in September will be included across all versions, entirely overhauling the perk system and adding a range of tech augmentations, which weren’t present in the original 2020 version.

Once the update goes live, the protagonist V will be able to access the in-game metro service to travel between 19 destinations, punctuated across five railway lines. The public transit system can be accessed via a special card, and the players themselves can chill out on the seats and soak in the sights of Night City, amongst other NPC passengers busy staring at screens or napping. The feature was originally shown in the Cyberpunk 2077 cinematic trailer and three years later, becomes finally accessible after finishing the Konpeki Plaza sequence. Of course, one can always skip the travelling cutscene and just jump into the next location once the immersion starts getting repetitive. Your pocket will also be filled with a radio system, which lets you scroll through multiple frequencies and listen to the music you like while walking through the streets and in vehicles. The music will turn off during dialogue sequences, though.

Since its launch, Cyberpunk 2077 players have expressed their desire to just hang back and spend quality time with their in-game romantic partners. That’s now possible in Update 2.1, with V having the option to invite back people to ‘any of the apartments’ for an unlimited number of times, as long as the romance path has been completed successfully. Another thing that’s replayable is car races, which can be accessed by visiting red flag icons scattered across the map, to make big eddies. One must complete ‘The Beast in Me’ quest for this section to unlock, with CD Projekt Red claiming that the enemy racers’ AI has been made significantly smarter to make these experiences more thrilling and challenging. Adding to the immersion are sightseeing binoculars that let you observe various scenic vistas in the world of Cyberpunk.

Other major improvements include not-so-clunky bike combat, minor bug fixes, and better boss fights. It’s unclear what the developer means by that, though the patch notes detail that the ruthless Adam Smasher can now activate the Sandevistan perk, letting him blink around the map and get close to you before slashing down. A range of visual and lighting enhancements, weapon balance changes, new bikes to purchase, and vehicular tricks are all available in Update 2.1 — a complete list of which you can browse in the official blog post. Cyberpunk 2077 had a rocky launch in 2020, characterised by low framerates and bugs, forcing the developer to fix the game in the following years through numerous patches and hotfixes. It is in a far better state now, with the Phantom Liberty expansion earning it nominations in The Game Awards 2023.

Both Cyberpunk 2077: Ultimate Edition and its Update 2.1 release December 5 across PC, PS5, and Xbox Series S/X.

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