Welcome to the last week of October and we end this month with what looks to be a big release for those that are into martial arts action RPGs. This week's regular releases are a bit of a mix, starting off with a co-op cooking game, followed by a pixel graphics action RPG and some potentially stolen property. We round off the week with an open world Sci-Fi survival game and a first person dungeon crawler action RPG. Don't forget to check out this week's other release as well.

Phantom Blade Zero / This week's major release / Thursday 29 October
Framed for murdering his master, Soul suffers a devastating wound to the heart, leaving him just sixty-six days to live. Alone and hunted, he roams the Wulin, determined to unravel a conspiracy that has ensnared the martial world. Through rain and blood, kindness and vengeance, he embarks on a journey where love and hatred intertwine in search of a heart. Steam link

Earlier in 2026, when Microsoft announced the Xbox Reset that saw 1,600 employees lose their jobs immediately, with 1,600 more on the chopping block for later, and several game studios either cut loose or shut-down entirely, Arkane Lyon was mentioned as one of the studios at risk of closure. Now, according to a report by Le Monde, it seems as though the Dishonored and Deathloop studio has until November 13 to find a buyer before Microsoft will officially shut it down. Arkane has already been forced to cancel the Blade game it was working on, as a result of the recent layoffs, and if no agreement is reached before the projected date, 217 jobs are at risk.

According to a French union delegate representing employees at the studio, the search for a buyer has not gone well. French businesses with more than 1,000 employees are legally mandated to look for a buyer for any business they wish to close for at least three months, and that obligatory search ends on November 13. The union says it has asked for an extension on that deadline and in order to buy more time in the negotiations over the employee redundancy plan, in the hopes that the studio and its workers would be saved, although the negotiations with Microsoft have not gone well.

The launch of Valve's Steam Deck ignited a renewed interest in both Linux gaming and handheld x86 gaming PCs, and that push has resulted in accelerated development for projects like Bazzite. In a recent post, Bazzite developer, Andy East, aka Andy10115 online, has announced preliminary hardware support for both the ASUS ROG Xbox Ally X20 and the Acer Predator Atlas handhelds in Bazzite.

The developer notes in the update, which also serves as a call for testers, that the ASUS ROG Xbox Ally X20 that there is already full support for the display and back buttons—replete with VRR and HDR on the former and full button remapping on the latter—as well as working sleep/wake support. Support for RGB lighting customization is not yet implemented, but should arrive soon with Open Gaming Collective components. Similarly, fan control is still missing, but can be implemented with the usual Decky plugins, and an official OGUI plugin is in development.

Electronic Arts recently announced that it is shuttering BioWare and cancelling its upcoming Mass Effect game and cutting 400 jobs in the process, after the gaming giant acquired the game studio in 2007. According to a former executive producer at BioWare, Mark Darrah, however, there may still be hope for fans of BioWare's myriad beloved franchises, including Mass Effect.

Mark Darrah on YouTubeRemember, BioWare, 100% owned by EA, so EA owns all the IPs. They own Dragon Age, they own Mass Effect, they own Jade Empire. So, that doesn't change the situation really at all... Now, there's nobody working on a game or games within the EA organization, and chances are there never will be, which might make them more likely to sell off those IPS, but it might also make them more likely to just try to forget that they ever existed and bury them in the vault.

Recently, analysts estimated that Gears of War: E-Day had earned around $42 million in revenue in its first week on the market, but a recent report from Kotaku claims that that revenue is but a drop in the bucket compared to the game's overall budget.

[Editor's note: Our in-depth review of Gears of War: E-Day is now live]

The report cites an insider "familiar with Xbox's business" and claims that the production budget alone—that is to say, excluding the marketing costs—for Gears of War: E-Day was over $500 million. This puts the game's overall estimated revenue at well under 10% of what Microsoft spent to get it out of the door, and, in a report from early October, employees at The Coalition, the Xbox Game Studios subsidiary responsible for the game's development, said that they were concerned about being laid off shortly after the game launched, especially given the ongoing Xbox Reset and the current climate in the gaming industry overall.

At this point, Half-Life 3 has become a meme for its ability to get gamers excited at even the slightest whiff of a mention of its name. For a while now, however, there have been rumors circulating about a Valve project called HLX, which is ostensibly Valve's internal name for a new Half-Life project that some have theorized may be Half-Life 3.

In a recent clip from a Valve Q&A panel at GameSoundCon (shared by @Tyler_McV on X), while addressing a question about HDR implementations in different games, a Valve employee, Mike Morasky, says that "I think Deadlock has their own version of HDR. HLX has its own version, so on and so forth." This mention of HLX is what Half-Life 3 hopefuls have latched onto as evidence of confirmation of the game by Valve itself.

Corsair (Nasdaq: CRSR), a leading global developer and manufacturer of high-performance gear and technology for gamers, content creators, and PC enthusiasts, today announced two special edition collections of officially licensed gaming peripherals made in partnership with CD Projekt Red. The Corsair x Cyberpunk 2077: Arasaka White Collection brings back last year's sought-after Arasaka Edition lineup in the megacorp's signature white and red aesthetic. The all-new Corsair x Cyberpunk: Edgerunners 2 Collection celebrates the new anime series from Studio TRIGGER and CD PROJEKT RED, now streaming on Netflix.

Last December, Corsair and CD Projekt Red marked the fifth anniversary of Cyberpunk 2077 with the Arasaka Edition Collection in black. Fans who missed it have been asking for another chance ever since. This year, they're spoiled for choice.

GALAX has unveiled the specifications for its GeForce RTX 5080 Hall Of Fame Extreme edition graphics card, the only RTX 5080 model featuring two 12V-2x6 power connectors. Interestingly, the card has a TGP of 400 W, and the official GALAX announcement states that the two power connectors are not required for simultaneous use. Instead, they are offered as alternatives to suit different PC builds and cable management preferences, so even if both connections are used, only one will be active. One standard connector is located on the top of the GPU, in the usual spot. The second 12V-2x6 power cable is positioned at the bottom of the card, concealed behind a GPU shroud near the PCIe x16 connector. This serves as an alternative power supply, allowing system builders to hide visible cables for a cleaner look.

For the GPU itself, GALAX has implemented a 20-phase power delivery system for the GPU and a 4-phase power delivery design for the GDDR7 memory, along with a digital PWM controller, eFuse, and HOF-branded inductors. All of this is mounted on a customized white PCB with gold plating on key connections. In OC Mode, which raises the TGP to 400 W, the GPU clock speed reaches 2,805 MHz. In regular Gaming Mode, the TGP is reduced to NVIDIA's reference 360 W, with clock speeds at 2,655 MHz. Since the 12V-2x6 connector is sufficient for these TGP designs, a second power source is unnecessary. GDDR7 memory is running at 30 Gbps on a 256-bit memory bus for a total of 960 GB/s memory bandwidth.

Philips Evnia adds the 36M4C5500P, its world's first 36-inch gaming monitor, adopting a 36-inch curved fast VA 1500R panel with Ultra-Wide QHD resolution and a 260 Hz overclockable refresh rate. The 21:9 ultrawide form paired with high refresh delivers crisp visuals and fluid gameplay. Certified DisplayHDR 400 brings immersive HDR effects, while tailored game modes auto-adjust settings for varied game genres.

Introducing the 36-inch Gaming Monitor
Sitting between conventional ultrawide gaming monitor sizes, the 36-inch form factor creates an enticing new category for immersive gameplay. Gamers seeking bigger displays previously had to pick standard ultrawide or upgrade to bulky, TV-sized panels.

Given ASUS's recent history with warranty repairs, it's likely unsurprising to some to learn that the company has been embroiled in yet another RMA drama. This time, a Reddit user who goes by u/Thriceinabluemoon posted in r/ASUS about their experience sending a 2023 ASUS Zerphyrus G14 in for repair under an extended warranty and receiving the laptop back without its 16 GB SODIMM RAM stick. While this in itself would be a frustration, ASUS customer support in the Netherlands, where the laptop and extended warranty were purchased and serviced, "won't even recognize that the additional RAM came with the product," never mind correcting the issue.

The redditor explains in the comment thread on the original post that the laptop was purchased with 32 GB of RAM—16 GB soldered and 16 GB installed in a SODIMM slot—and it's that same SODIMM stick it was purchased with that has gone missing during the repair process. They have since contacted ASUS, providing the receipt as evidence that the laptop was purchased with 32 GB of RAM pre-installed and have yet to hear back from support with a resolution.

Mchose has officially launched its latest set of affordable wireless gaming headphones, the R9, which retail for $69, but have a pre-order discount of $49. The Mchose R9 headphones focus on a balance of price, sound quality, and comfort, with a lightweight design that comes in at 235 g, a floating headband with a steel frame and leatherette padding that evenly distributes pressure across the top of the head. The Mchose R9 features both Bluetooth 5.4 and 2.4 GHz wireless connectivity, with an optional USB Type-C connection available for listening and charging.

The headband also features a sliding quick-adjust mechanism, 18° of vertical pivot, and 90° of swivel on the earcups. The R9 headset uses 53 mm composite drivers, and it has on-board memory with three customizable sound profiles to quickly adapt to different tasks and media. The EQ is controllable from Mchose's PC or mobile app. The R9 also has a detachable 360° microphone with AI noise reduction. Mchose also says it has tuned the R9 headset in collaboration with the EDG Valorant esports team in order to optimize the stock sound profile for footsteps, gunfire, and in-game audio.

Microsoft has started selling Xbox Cloud Gaming time to people who don't pay for Game Pass. Starting today, Xbox Insiders without an active subscription can buy prepaid playtime and stream games on supported devices, with a broader rollout planned for November. There are three packs at what Microsoft calls introductory launch pricing: 10 hours for $3.99, 25 hours for $7.99, and 50 hours for $11.99. The packs are ad-free and come with shorter wait times, and the purchased hours don't expire until they are used up. Insiders can also keep using the free, ad-supported option Microsoft began testing in July. These pay-as-you-go plans arrive right before the monthly hour limits Microsoft announced in September kick in.

Starting in November, Game Pass Ultimate ($22.99) includes 15 hours of cloud gaming per month, Premium ($14.99) gets 10 hours, and Essential ($9.99) gets just five. Microsoft expects the caps to affect around 4% of subscribers, and said those who run out will be able to buy extra playtime through the Xbox Store. It seems likely these packs will double as top-ups for subscribers, though Microsoft hasn't confirmed that yet. On paper, $11.99 gets you more than three times the streaming hours Ultimate includes each month. Of course, Ultimate also comes with the Game Pass library, while the packs are meant for streaming eligible games you already own. More details on eligible games and market availability should follow in November. Since the current prices are labeled introductory, they could very well change later.

Darmoshark, the Chinese mouse maker previously responsible for the Darmoshark M9, a flagship-spec gaming mouse for gamers with big hands, has come out swinging at the likes of the new Pulsar X2F CrazyLight and G-Wolves Lupine II with the Air28. The new asymmetrical fingertip gaming mouse packs flagship-tier specs into a small shape optimized for a fingertip grip.

Much like the aforementioned G-Wolves Lupine II, the Darmoshark Air28 is an asymmetrical "ergo" fingertip mouse, and it comes in at a claimed 28 g, hence the name. Pricing is unclear as of the time of writing, but the brand has released the specs on its Bilibili page, revealing a PixArt PAW 3955 sensor and a Nordic 54L15 MCU, granting it 8 kHz polling, up to 30,000 DPI, 60 G acceleration, and 850 IPS tracking speed. The Air28 will also have optical mouse switches when it launches, although an exact launch date is as yet unclear. When it launches, it will feature both 2.4 GHz wireless and USB Type-C wired connectivity.

CD Projekt RED's Cyberpunk 2077 Update 2.5 isn't out until October 22, but most of its content has already leaked. YouTuber WesNemo apparently published a video covering the update too early, and while it has since been pulled, players on r/GamingLeaksAndRumours had already summarized it. According to WesNemo, CD Projekt gave him and other creators early access to the update ahead of its official presentation. The studio itself has only confirmed dual-wielding and cyberware customization so far, so treat the rest as unofficial until the patch notes go live.

Apparently, dual-wielding is limited to pistols and comes through a new "Double Trouble" perk in the Cool skill tree. The leak also lists a new Edgerunners 2 gig called "Clampdown," which reportedly acts as a prequel to the anime that premiered on Netflix on October 20, plus a mystery Night City tour sidequest. Glamdoc shops will let players change the look of arm cyberware like Mantis Blades and Gorilla Arms, and there are five new clothing sets, new hairstyles for both male and female V, Quadra skins through Twitch Drops, and a radio station playing Edgerunners music.

When Digital Extremes introduced the powerful Riven mods system, the weapon-specific mods all had dispositions that would be adjusted quarterly as a balance for the resulting high damage output and subsequent popularity of specific weapons due to Riven mods, and the Riven system has seen a number of changes and reworks since it launched, mostly in an attempt to encourage build diversity and experimentation. However, metas have still emerged in the game, many of which came as a direct result of Riven mods. Now, Digital Extremes has decided to rework the Riven system again, doing away with Riven disposition entirely and capping ammo efficiency, resulting in what appears to be a more easily manageable and understandable system that should again encourage build diversity and be more new-player-friendly, to boot.

The high-level overview of the change is that, with a few temporary exceptions, ammo efficiency will be capped at 75%, meaning the best-case scenario is that a weapon will only consume one ammo every four shots, and Riven mods will all be reset to new base values that would represent a disposition of 1.2 in the outgoing system. This means that all new weapons will start out with powerful mods available from the get-go, and existing Rivens may see significant swings in viability in the game. These changes will be introduced in an October 22 update, and Digital Extremes has also said that it will provide all Warframe players with an inbox reward in order to offset whatever impact this may have on builds that relied on those mods for high damage output. Players who used the Riven Splicers and Trait locking that was introduced earlier in 2026 will receive double the rewards as a thanks for testing the new system.

Since Sony announced that it would be ending physical media production for the PlayStation 5 and PlayStation 5 Pro, there has been much discussion about the value of physical games media in the modern gaming landscape. Some argue that physical media is invaluable for game preservation and access to content in some remote parts of the world, while others argue that its value is limited, because the physical media market share is small for most games, and it has limited preservation value, thanks to day-one patches. Alinea Analytics recently posted some data about physical media sales on PlayStation, putting more numbers to the impact of physical games media on PlayStation.

Interestingly, despite the relatively high physical sales split of some games, like Resident Evil Requiem, with disc sales accounting for 30.2% of its sales, and Marvel's Wolverine, whose disc sales came to 32.3% of its total sales revenue, the total physical game sales revenue for games released in 2026 on PlayStation 5 and PS4 amounted to $655 million, which is less than 20% of sales revenue for the year. As the analytics firm explains, that revenue split itself is skewed by digital-only releases and pre-order bonuses, which are all digital sales. The data itself seems to tell a story of a split player base: those who buy first-party, single-player, narrative-driven games tend to skew more towards physical media, while sports and multiplayer gamers tend to buy digital more often.

Helldivers 2 developer, Arrowhead, has just announced a substantial change to the game's anti-cheat systems: A move away from GameGuard to Easy Anti-Cheat. The change will take place on October 20, and Arrowhead explained in a recent Steam post that the justification for the switch away from GameGuard comes down to cracking down on cheat mods and implementing additional security tools to "improve game integrity protection."

• Implementing additional security measures to crack down on recent cheat mods that have been circulating.
• Transitioning from GameGuard to Easy Anti-Cheat today, October 20th, with additional security tools in place to enhance its effectiveness and improve game integrity protection.

NVIDIA shipped its faster DLSS 5 Neural Rendering model with NBA 2K27 on October 16, and it didn't take modders long to pull it out and test it elsewhere. Renan Maniero on X extracted the new 310.9.16.0 build of the DLL. That lets people inject it into games that don't officially support DLSS 5 through tools like RenoDX and OptiScaler. The new DLL also keeps the older model around as Preset A, with the new one sitting under Preset B, so comparing the two is as simple as switching presets. Gaming Optimized on X did exactly that, and found the new model running up to 90% faster than the old one in The Witcher 3. The channel points out that the gain varies from game to game, so 90% looks like the best case rather than the norm.

That roughly aligns with NVIDIA's own claims. The company says the October update shrinks the model by 24% to roughly 118 million parameters, cuts VRAM use at 4K by 20%, and runs the neural rendering workload up to 2x faster than the September version. NVIDIA also quoted up to 40% higher frame rates in NBA 2K27 specifically. Officially, DLSS 5 is still limited to RTX 50-series GPUs and GeForce NOW. NVIDIA plans to bring it to the RTX 40-series, though there's no date yet, and there's no word on RTX 30 or RTX 20 support. Modders, apparently, aren't waiting, since the OptiScaler README notes a modified runtime that gets it running on RTX 20-series cards as well.

Colorful has just released its latest overclocking motherboard, the X870E Ultra-S V14, a new E-ATX unit with 16+2+1 power phases, five M.2 slots, and plenty of high-speed I/O. The new motherboard, as shared by IT Home, is priced at 1,899 CNY, which comes out to around $284 at the time of writing, although it only seems to be available in China for the time being. The iGame X870E Ultra-S V14 is explicitly marketed to overclockers on AMD's AM5 platform, bearing XMP/EXPO memory overclocking and asynchronous BCLK CPU overclocking, a digital debug display, EZ Debug diagnosis, and easily accessible rear I/O buttons for both clear CMOS and BIOS updates.

The motherboard also features Wi-Fi 7 and 5 GbE networking built-in, alongside expansive rear I/O that includes: 4× USB Type-A 5 Gbps, 3× USB Type-A 10 Gbps, 2× USB Type-A 2.0, 2× USB4 40 Gbps, and both 3.5 mm line in/out ports and SPDIF out for audio. Colorful claims that its 16+2+1 VRMs are capable of 80 A, and the VRMs are covered by beefy aluminium heat sinks. It also has five M.2 slots for expanded storage, each with its own heat sink. The Colorful iGame X870E Ultra-S V14 is available on JD.com at the time of writing.

Brandon Stirrup, a senior business strategy manager at Xbox, has stirred up quite a debate after posting on X that the games industry is dragging its feet on AI. Over the weekend, Stirrup shared a rough football game he says he "vibe coded" in about three hours of active work, despite never having made a game before, with an AI agent testing and iterating on it. He went on to say that studios not planning around AI are "planning for a fake future." He also said he'd happily take the hit if it meant hundreds of people at Xbox could stop pretending they don't use AI. Here's part of his X rant:

Look if I'm fired tomorrow it will be because I told you the truth that nobody wants you to know. You can make a game with a simple prompt and yes you can make custom, tailored games. Everything you want in a game is right there for the taking, for better or worse. Gaming is the only industry slow-walking the transition because users have negative sentiment. Everyone else accepts reality, Gaming is the only industry where leaders are afraid to talk about AI. Users want the truth. We're using AI.

Star Wars Battlefront has long been a staple for the Star Wars game franchise, with a recent remake of the 2011 game drawing in over 35,000 peak concurrent players on Steam. According to a recent issue of the Electronic Gaming Monthly magazine, as featured in a recent Giant Bomb Game Mess Mornings podcast, Lucasfilm is eyeing Battlefront 3, with Bungie being one of the studios in the running to create the game. The company is allegedly still deliberating which studio to partner with on the new game, suggesting that Battlefront 3 won't be launching anytime soon.

Electronic Gaming Monthly via Giant BombAccording to what your intrepid rumormonger has dug up, the suits at Lucasfilm have been aggressively deploying probe droids for a development partner to take on the task of creating a follow-up. So far, no one has fully stepped up, but yours truly is hearing two major game studios are circling the project like a couple of snowspeeders—led by the completely unsurprising EA DICE, who we can hope learned from their loot box lesson. Duh. We can expect that one. Here's the other one: There is another. The Quartermann hears that if the Force is not entrusted to DICE, it could land at none other than Halo, Destiny, and Marathon developer Bungie.

We previously covered Xodus, a new open-source project that aimed to bring Xbox Game Pass and Xbox on PC games to Linux via reverse-engineered runtimes and Valve's Proton compatibility layer. Since then, the project has been forked and Xodus Nexus has spun off in the hopes to achieve the same goal but with the added benefit of a sleek UI on top of a modified Xodus runtime.

As detailed on the project's GitHub, Xodus Nexus launcher runs a patched Nexus runtime and backend and allows users to browser the Xbox store, and install and run games in your library—both purchased and available from Game Pass. The launcher also supports Xbox cloud saves and sign-in for supported games. This is in contrast to Xodus, which relies on a command line interface for game installation and management.

High-performance gaming peripheral brand ATTACK SHARK today announced the upcoming release of the R5 TURBO. This next-generation flagship wireless gaming mouse builds on the R5 ULTRA's success with upgraded hardware, dual 8K connectivity, a design optimized for precision control, and a new Dune colorway, alongside classic black and white options.

Gavin Cheng, CEO and Co-Founder of ATTACK SHARK"Following the strong market response to the R5 ULTRA, we pushed further to deliver even greater precision and speed. The R5 TURBO represents our continued commitment to give competitive players the edge they need to perform at their best."

Welcome to a new week of games and this week's AAA release comes with a fishy smell, which kind of goes with its Friday release, but it looks like fans of the franchise will be having a good time based on advanced access feedback. As for this week's regular releases, we kick off with a couple of very different Sci-Fi games, the first is a co-op puzzle, whereas the other one is set in a much more familiar universe, but is set on a planet rather than a star ship. This is followed by a zombie action RPG where you're the zombie, a pixel-art version of a famous JRPG and finally we end the week with cats, but not the kind that is napping on your lap. Don't forget to check out this week's other releases as well.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 / This week's AAA release / Friday 23 October
A young squad of South Korean soldiers fight to survive on the collapsing front lines, while half a world away a vengeful Captain Price wages a personal war from the shadows as he stays one step ahead of those hunting him. As Price's off-book mission collides with the forces behind the invasion, the war spreads beyond anyone's control. Steam link

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 is off to an unusually good start on Steam. The campaign early access went live for pre-order customers on October 16, and at the time of writing, 1,630 of the game's 1,812 Steam user reviews are positive, giving it a "Very Positive" score of 90%. Insider Gaming first spotted the trend when the game had around 900 reviews and a SteamDB rating of 81.15%, which already made it the best-received Call of Duty on Steam since 2015's Black Ops III. The review count has more than doubled since then, and the positive share has climbed to 85.78% at the time of writing. Of course, these are early days. The current reviews come from players who pre-ordered to play the campaign a week early, so they are probably the most enthusiastic part of the audience.

Still, the last few releases fared much worse by comparison. SteamDB rates Black Ops 7 at 38.71%, Black Ops 6 at 45.75%, Modern Warfare III at 48.19%, and Modern Warfare II at 47.10%, while Black Ops III still leads the modern games at 84.36%. SteamDB's formula pulls games with fewer reviews closer to 50%, so as more positive reviews come in, Modern Warfare 4 could leave Black Ops III in the rearview mirror fairly soon. Multiplayer and DMZ only arrive with the full launch on October 23, and the score could look quite different once the wider player base jumps in. PC players should also keep in mind that TPM 2.0 and Secure Boot are mandatory to jump into the action.