Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary surprise launched Tuesday on Windows PC via Steam, Microsoft Store, and Xbox Game Pass for PC. It follows Halo: Reach, which was released last year, as part of Halo: The Master Chief Collection. The rest of the games — Halo 2: Anniversary, Halo 3, Halo 3: ODST, and Halo 4 — are all expected to launch before the year’s end. Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary is a remastered version of the original game, which allows players to switch between “classic game graphics a

Valve will release its first new Half-Life game, the virtual reality exclusive Half-Life: Alyx, on March 23, more than 12 years after the previous entry came to PC. On Monday, Valve released a trio of gameplay videos, totaling more than 10 minutes of footage, of Half-Life: Alyx in action. Each video showcases one of the VR game’s styles of movement. In addition to some familiar looking Half-Life first-person shooting through City 17’s alien-infested, dystopian environment and battles against hea

In the wake of its postponement, however, multiple initiatives have sprung up to help developers recoup lost opportunity and funds. “A cancellation is a huge blow for us,” Dindukurthi told Polygon. All talks will be livestreamed and recorded, which will be helpful for spreading information beyond those in San Francisco. Independent Game Developers Association executive director Renee Gittens told Polygon that studios attend in hopes of finding publishers or making press announcements. WINGS Inte

Even if you don’t find Pokémon games to be particularly challenging, you’re still probably going to incur damage at some point. But one intrepid fan decided to see what would happen if he went through a game without ever getting hit. It takes Smallant1 three tries to get it. The no-damage run goes on like this, with Smallant taking hours upon hours to learn specific moves that have the right priority over his enemies. “Despite having level 100 Pokémon after the third gym, the challenge still was

Talks of an Artemis Fowl movie have circulated since 2001 and now, finally, 19 years later the boy criminal mastermind gets his due on the big screen. Another key difference seems to be that in the movie, Artemis discovers the fairy world after his father’s disappearance, whereas in the books he just goes ahead and kidnaps a fairy, because he’s a little shit. This particular version of Artemis Fowl, directed by Kenneth Branagh (Cinderella, Hamlet) has been in the works since 2015. Artemis Fowl s

Choosing sides2019’s Black and Blue and 2018’s Monsters and Men both open with scenes where a cop confronts a black protagonist. Other black characters call her an Uncle Tom, and one cop asks her, “You think they your people? The cycle of martyrdomStill, these “conflicted black cop” types are familiar and predictable. Escapism and tragedy2019’s Queen & Slim — which just arrived on VOD platforms — is an exception to these rules. A young black cop who discovers them sides with them instead of with

Square Enix released a playable demo of Final Fantasy 7 Remake for PlayStation 4 on Monday, giving fans a taste of the upcoming reimagining of the classic role-playing game. The Final Fantasy 7 Remake demo is available to download from the PlayStation Store. We recently played that mission, plus two more, in a hands-on gameplay preview of Final Fantasy 7 Remake. As noted on the PlayStation Store listing, progress from the demo will not carry over to the final version of the game. Square Enix wil

Pokémon Go has basic missions that players can complete in exchange for Pokémon encounters, items, and Stardust. They’re called Field Research Tasks. Spinning Pokéstops will give players a Field Research Task to complete. Upon completing a task, players will get a stamp marked with the date. Here’s a complete list of the current Field Research Tasks and the rewards, as of March 2, 2020.

Playing the first two chapters of Final Fantasy 7 Remake, it becomes clear just how massive an undertaking Square Enix’s remake of the classic role-playing game will be. The early hours of Final Fantasy 7 Remake offer much better characterization and storytelling than the 1997 original. There are intriguing diversions away from the structure of the original Final Fantasy 7 in Remake. The Air Buster battle itself is multi-phased, and presented me with my first chance to summon the massive Leviath

Valorant is Riot’s new tactical shooter, and it’s going to be playable on more computers than you might think. There are specific requirements for graphics cards and processors that Riot is recommending depending on how many frames-per-second you’re hoping to get. CPU: Intel i3-370MGPU: Intel HD 3000Recommended Specs — 60 FPS60 FPS should give players a pretty good experience with the game. CPU: Intel i3-4150GPU: Geforce GT 730High-end Specs — 144+ FPSThese are the specs you’ll want if you want

Riot Games has finally revealed its tactical shooter Valorant, and it seems that players will get their hands on it sooner rather than later. According to the League of Legends developer, Valorant will be released sometime this summer, with a closed beta coming sometime before then. Valorant is a tactical first-person shooter. The matches themselves take place over rounds, with the first team to 13 rounds winning the match. Valorant will be the first game the developer has released that takes pl

Signature Ability: Curveball – Cast a curving flare that bursts into brilliant light after a brief delay, temporarily blinding all looking at it. Left click curves it left, right click curves it right. Left click curves it left, right click curves it right. Signature Ability: Sky Smoke – Use your map to call in orbital deployment smokescreens that obscure vision. Signature Ability: Healing Orb – Heal an ally or yourself to full health over a few seconds.

According to everyone at Riot speaking for this story, one idea that’s been integral to Valorant from the beginning is competitive integrity. About a year after Romleski and Ziegler started working on Valorant, Riot set out to find someone with experience designing maps in competitive shooters. After a few conversations, it became clear why Riot was looking in his direction, and he took an interview to join the Valorant team. Solving the technical trouble of shootersEarly on, when the Valorant t

Riot calls the game a tactical shooter, putting it in line with games like Rainbow Six Siege and, most notably, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive. While any shooter with heroes can’t avoid Overwatch comparisons, Valorant is a tactical shooter first, and that means its characters and gameplay have some key differences from Blizzard’s more arcadey hero shooter. In Valorant, abilities are important, but they won’t win a round for you. Where Valorant feels like it breaks the tactical shooter mold is

Riot has finally revealed its first major non-League of Legends game: Valorant. Riot announced Valorant as Project A during its League of Legends 10-year anniversary stream in October. Now we know a whole lot more, including the fact that its real name is Valorant. Valorant’s maps are similar to what tactical shooter fans know from Counter-Strike. Each of the two Valorant maps we’ve played so far has had unique twists.

A qualifying-round match for the latest stage of FIFA 20’s FUT 20 Champions Cup had to be determined by a round of virtual Rock, Paper, Scissors when its competitors couldn’t connect to each other. The FIFA series’ subreddit this morning posted reports of match problems in the esports tournament’s qualifying round, one of which were resolved by roshambo. @EASPORTSFIFA @EAFIFADirect We literally had to play a rock paper scissors becauce we couldn’t find each other to invite in an EA LICENSED QUAL

The final of Counter-Strike: Global Offensive’s Intel Extreme Masters Katowice 2020 tournament set a viewership record for a non-major Counter-Strike event, possibly owing to a last-minute quarantine in light of the worldwide coronavirus outbreak. The analysts at Esports Charts pegged the final’s peak viewership at 1,002,132, which it says is a new record for the ESL’s Intel Extreme Masters series. The coronavirus outbreak, which the World Health Organization has declared an emergency of interna

FIFA 20 developers back in December promised improvements to connectivity and responsiveness for its online multiplayer modes. Friday, they announced the next stage of their work, which is a test to help them understand what’s really causing these problems. Further, EA Vancouver developers will be able to better analyze match replays to see what exactly the trouble is regarding input lag, input loss, game speed, and even freezing. EA Vancouver said it’s possible that other live studies of the ga

The bromance between the two continues with Lara Croft jumping into Brawlhalla — remember that? Lara Croft mirrors the abilities of Diana, the legend added to the game in March 2016. Lara Croft will remain in the game following the crossover event, which will add a new map, Temple Ruins, to the Free-for-All rotation. Brawlhalla has done crossovers with Hellboy, Adventure Time, the WWE Superstars, Rayman, and, of course, Shovel Knight. For those Brawlhalla players wanting more insight on how to u

Broadly speaking, that means there’s a Learning lifestyle, and players may choose a focus in Medicine, Scholarship, or Theology. Temptation is what I came here to talk about, because the seduction scheme is coming back from Crusader Kings 2 in a big way. For more on how events work, Paradox published this dev diary back in January. Players who have better ideas for Crusader Kings 3’s lifestyles of the rich and ruthless will appreciate that the perk trees are all fully moddable. Crusader Kings 3