Gaming / Gaming & Entertainment
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Nintendo World Championships: NES Edition gave me new respect for gaming speedrunners
Bite-size speed challenges refresh the classics, but require a healthy dose of patience.
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Valve runs its massive PC gaming ecosystem with only about 350 employees
Ars' leak analysis shows a large "Games" department and a very well-paid "Admin" team.
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Full dev build of Space Marine 2 leaks, and players are already leveling up
Developers canceled a beta test—but may have gotten one anyway.
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PC emulator comes to iOS, but Apple’s restrictions hamper performance
UTM SE's lack of JIT compilation means "SE stands for Slow Edition."
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“Superhuman” Go AIs still have trouble defending against these simple exploits
Plugging up "worst-case" algorithmic holes is proving more difficult than expected.
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$500 aluminum version of the Analogue Pocket looks like the Game Boy’s final form
Other Pocket iterations have stuck to colorful (and cheaper) plastic.
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Arm tweaks AMD’s FSR to bring battery-saving GPU upscaling to phones and tablets
Arm "Accuracy Super Resolution" is optimized for power use and integrated GPUs.
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Latest Apple Arcade additions show Apple is looking backward, not forward
Opinion: Games that were popular in 2011 or even 2022 won't move the needle for Apple.
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Microsoft asks many Game Pass subscribers to pay more for less
Launch day access to first-party titles now restricted to $19.99/month "Ultimate" tier.
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Why 1994’s Lair of Squid was the weirdest pack-in game of all time
The HP 200LX included a mysterious maze game called Lair of Squid. We tracked down the author.
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Fallout: London devs will “downgrade” Fallout 4 to save their massive mod
The game's "next-gen update" threatened to upend years of work on the "DLC-sized" mod.
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After two rejections, Apple approves Epic Games Store app for iOS
European iOS users will see the alternative app store launch sometime soon.
Paul Sutter walks us through the future of climate change—and things aren’t great
This episode of Edge of Knowledge focuses on our rapidly transforming world.
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The new Riven remake is even better than Myst
The original developers revised puzzles and realized the immersive world in 3D.
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Patent document showcases the cloud-only streaming Xbox console that never was
Microsoft couldn't get the price of its streaming Xbox low enough to release it.
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Apple rejects PC emulators on the iOS App Store
New iOS emulation rules only apply to "retro game consoles," not retro computers.
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The math on unplayed Steam “shame” is way off—and no cause for guilt
It's fun to speculate, but sales and library quirks make it impossible to know.
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Decades later, John Romero looks back at the birth of the first-person shooter
Id Software co-founder talks to Ars about everything from Catacomb 3-D to "boomer shooters."
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Apple Intelligence and other features won’t launch in the EU this year
iPhone Mirroring and SharePlay screen sharing will also skip the EU for now.
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Why Interplay’s original Fallout 3 was canceled 20+ years ago
OG Fallout producer says "Project Van Buren" ran out of time and money.
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From Infocom to 80 Days: An oral history of text games and interactive fiction
MUDs, Usenet, and open source all play a part in 50 years of IF history.
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Seven years later, Nintendo proves Metroid Prime 4 still exists
2025 release could launch on the still-mysterious "Switch 2."
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Shadow of the Erdtree has ground me into dust, which is why I recommend it
Souls fans seeking real challenge should love it. Casuals like me might wait.
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Star Citizen still hasn’t launched, but it’s already banning cheaters
Developer bans "over 600" players for exploiting an item duplication glitch.
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Retired engineer discovers 55-year-old bug in Lunar Lander computer game code
A physics simulation flaw in text-based 1969 computer game went unnoticed until today.
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Are Diablo fans getting too old for the old-school item grind?
Devs say players no longer want the "very long chase" for rare drops.
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Civilization-like Ara blurs lines between hot-seat and play-by-mail multiplayer
Plus, the game promises an innovative approach to turn-based multiplayer.
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The rent is too dang high in Cities: Skylines 2, so the devs nuked the landlords
It was getting so bad, people were actually suggesting building more homes.
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Gaming historians preserve what’s likely Nintendo’s first US commercial
Mego's "Time Out" spot pitched Nintendo's Game & Watch handhelds under a different name.
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Microsoft Gaming CEO: “I think we should have a handheld, too”
More than just streaming, playing games locally "is really important" to Spencer.
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Microsoft reveals first disc-less Xbox Series X
But don't worry, Microsoft isn't abandoning the console disc drive entirely.
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New Steam Deck competitor lets you easily swap in more RAM, storage
Adata embraces the CAMM2 memory standard for its intriguing handheld prototype.
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Marvel’s Midnight Suns is free right now, and you should grab it (even on Epic)
Sadly overlooked on release, the card/turn-based battler is a real bargain.
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Civilization VII looks like 2K’s next big game announcement
Logo drop comes amid publisher's "beloved franchise" tease for Summer Games Fest.
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You can inherit a dead relative’s GOG account—if you have a court order
"We'd do our best to make it happen... with the help of the justice system."
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Sony removes still-unmet “8K” promise from PS5 packaging
Move could presage an expected resolution bump in the rumored PS5 Pro.
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What kind of bug would make machine learning suddenly 40% worse at NetHack?
One day, a roguelike-playing system just kept biffing it, for celestial reasons.