An Assassin's Creed Black Flag remake has long been rumored, with recent news out of the rumor mill indicating an April launch for what will apparently be called Assassin's Creed Black Flag Resynced. More recently, it has been revealed by a game description scraped from the Indonesian Game Ratings System scraped by IGRSDB that Black Flag Resynced will also include new characters and stories compared to the new game. The game will also have an 18+ rating in Indonesia, and it also lists PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series platforms, suggesting Ubisoft will stick with its previous day-one cross-platform launch strategy. Curiously, there is no mention of the Nintendo Switch 2, but given the launch of AC: Shadows on Nintendo's handheld, it seems reasonable to assume it will launch there as well.

The full game description reads:

This title breathes new life into a fan favourite while remaining carefully faithful to the spirit of the original. It follows the story of charismatic pirate and Assassin Edward Kenway as he adventures through 18th Century Caribbean with parkours in cities, and battles at seas, in search of fortune and glory. Modernized in 2026, the new game includes a cast of new characters and stories.

Hot on the heels of Valve's critical public response to the New York State attorney general's lawsuit against the gaming giant over its in-game monetization and loot boxes, the Pan European Game Information (PEGI) ratings body has updated its rating system to address similar concerns over in-game monetization and "interactive risk categories." As of June 2026, new games registered in Europe and rated by PEGI will be subject to additional scrutiny surrounding "purchases of in-game content, paid random items, communication features, and features that incentivize players to continue playing," according to the announcement. In essence, this will examine daily rewards, loot boxes, in-game cosmetics and premium currency purchases, and in-game chat moderation and content control. Chair of the PEGI Council, Beate Våje, says that "with the updated set of age rating criteria, PEGI aims to make parents aware that certain features in games should be carefully assessed, and that parental tools can be a very helpful assistant when doing that."

Under the new criteria, games that feature in-game purchases, specifically those with quantity- or time-limited sale mechanics, will be rated 12+, while games that use NFTs and other blockchain tech will be rated PEGI 18. Games with "random items" will be PEGI 16 by default, although they will be PEGI 18 in some cases. Games with what the ratings body calls "play-by-appointment" mechanics—things like daily quests or login rewards—will be rated PEGI 7, while games that punish players for not playing daily will receive a PEGI 12 rating. Lastly, PEGI is enforcing age restrictions on "safe online gameplay," which will result in games with entirely unrestricted communication receiving a PEGI 18 rating. Conceivably, games with proximity voice chat that cannot be disabled will also fall into this last box, although PEGI specifies that there needs to be a way to block or report users, so it's possible that being able to mute proximity chat may not be enough to escape a PEGI 18 rating on the grounds of online safety.

MSI, the world's foremost gaming PC hardware brand, is pleased to announce that the MAG A1000GL PCIE5 and MAG A850GL PCIE5 are among the first power supplies to receive the new PPLP ATX 3.0 certification. PPLP, short for "PSU Performance Level Plan," aims to identify and showcase outstanding, high-performance, and highly reliable power supply unit in the market, thereby earning consumer's trust. Similar to other certifications, PPLP offers a range of ratings from Bronze to Super Ti.

With a dedicated team at PPLP boasting over a decade of experience in PC hardware testing, supported by reliable and sophisticated testing equipment, precise measurement is ensured. All performance tests are conducted using comprehensive Chroma instruments. PPLP not only prioritizes power efficiency but also emphasizes power supply performance. It effectively balances consumer demands for both efficiency and performance in power supplies. To learn more about PPLP, click the link for more information.

A new version of Minecraft for Xbox Series X and S consoles has been registered with ratings boards around the world—as reported by Eurogamer, the first appearance arrived back in August through Germany's USK system, and more recently with the ESRB (USA). This lead to speculation that Mojang Studios was prepping a visually-upgraded variant of the game for current generation consoles. Microsoft and Xbox teased a significant ray tracing graphical option back in 2020, prior to Series X launching, but we have not heard much since then. Bedrock Edition, utilizing the RenderDragon engine, is set to improve graphics across most platforms, yet only PC gamers get to enjoy ray tracing features on capable/compatible hardware.

Microsoft has seemingly become fed up with the latest batch of news reports, and reached out to media outlets in order to shutdown further conjecture on the topic.
A company spokesperson informed Eurogamer and other sites about the situation: "Given the number of platforms and geographies in which Minecraft is available, we periodically go through rating reviews and updates with different regional boards. This recent rating is not indicative of any new versions or platform support for Minecraft in the near future." A 2022 test build inadvertently included "prototype code for ray tracing support on Xbox consoles," but was swiftly eliminated from public view soon after release. A spokesperson stated back then: "this early prototype code has been removed from Preview and doesn't signal near future plans to bring ray tracing support to consoles."

Gematsu - a Japanese news site - has discovered that the Game Rating and Administration Committee of Korea uploaded its rating of an announced remake of Quake II (1997) on May 31—apparently "not suitable" for youths. This could repeat a pattern from 2021, where the same committee registered the original Quake's remastered version prior to an official unveiling at that year's livestreamed QuakeCon event.

QuakeCon 2023 is heading back to its roots—with a return to an in-person format "at the Gaylord Texan Resort & Convention Center in Grapevine, Texas from Thursday, August 10 through Sunday, August 13." It is quite possible that Quake II Remastered will get an unveiling at the late summer convention. It will be interesting to see how the upcoming remaster will sit beside the existing RTX version—the South Korean rating info mentions new online multiplayer options, 4K resolution plus widescreen support, as well as support for community modification.

As part of our services towards making the world a better place, we bring you two pieces of news regarding one of the most hotly anticipated video games in the last years. CD Projekt Red's upcoming Cyberpunk 2077 is expected to be one of the games of the decade, much like their previous The Witcher 3 was. And now, we have some additional information on what we can expect in-game when it comes to the maturity of its world. While the game hasn't yet been rated by the ESRB or PEGI, Brazil's game ratings board has apparently already given it their own, and it's 18+. The one 18+ rating the game has received is that of "Cruelty"; check out the leaked list on the image below to see exactly what we're looking at, though it seems obvious that CD Projekt didn't pull any punches in making this game an accurate representation of a cyberpunk world.

The second piece of news here is the release of an 8K, AI-enhanced version of the 15-minute gameplay video that CD Projekt Red released back in 2019. YouTube user Ani HVX has uploaded the video to YouTube, with the AI helping in image clarity, artifact removal, and overall pixel density over the originally-released video. Yes, it's uploaded on YouTube, so that will again degrade quality on its own; that's why a 16 GB uncompressed video of the same 15 minutes is also available for download (expect to hit download limits on Google Drive though). This 2019 build of the game doesn't feature ray tracing (which the game will support), and it still features the old female V design. Quality of the final product can be better than this build (or, *trembles in fear*, worse).

The Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB) is an American regulatory organization that assigns age and content ratings to consumer video games. Today the ESRB announced a new label to indicate games that include in-game purchases of loot-boxes or similar randomized gambling items. This update will compliment the existing In-Game Purchases notice which applies to games with non-randomized purchasable items such as DLC etc.

In April 2018 the ESRB began assigning Interactive Elements to physical video games with the In-Game Purchases and Users Interact notices. The In-Game Purchases Interactive Element informs parents and other consumers of when a game offers the ability to purchase additional items without leaving the game. To provide even greater transparency about the nature of in-game items available for purchase the ESRB will now begin assigning a new Interactive Element: In-Game Purchases (Includes Random Items).

In the wake of many years of getting comfortable with 80 plus efficiency ratings of PC power supplies, in the past year a new company has emerged with the aim to take the testing of power supplies to the next level. Cybenetics has devised a revolutionary testing system where power supplies are examined under even more stringent circumstances than previously. This rating system renders all power supplies easily comparable and it also has added a crucial element to the process - the testing of the sound output of the power supplies.

Seasonic was glad to jump on board to assess the performance of their PRIME units to see how they fare against the new Cybenetics test parameters. Seasonic was even happier to receive back the first test results of its flagship units, which without exception have demonstrated that they have passed the highest level of certifications with flying colors.

Today we're starting to roll out the official release of the update to Xbox LIVE subscribers around the world. To ensure a stable release, this will be a gradual deployment across subscribers and regions over the course of the next week. Our initial deployment will reach approximately three million consoles worldwide, with additional users being updated over the course of a couple weeks. Don't panic if you don't see an immediate update, just keep checking back in.

Today, Congressman Joe Baca (D-Rialto) introduced legislation that mandates all video games with an Electronics Software Ratings Board (ESRB) rating of Teen (T) or higher be sold with a health warning label. The Video Game Health Labeling Act of 2009 creates a new rule within the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), which forces games with a T rating or higher to be sold with a simple warning label, reading: "WARNING: Excessive exposure to violent video games and other violent media has been linked to aggressive behavior."

"The video game industry has a responsibility to parents, families, and to consumers - to inform them of the potentially damaging content that is often found in their products," said Rep. Baca. "They have repeatedly failed to live up to this responsibility. Meanwhile research continues to show a proven link between playing violent games and increased aggression in young people. American families deserve to know the truth about these potentially dangerous products."

2007 was an epic year for games, as over 1500 were submitted to the ESRB for rating. The ESRB recently released all the ratings they have given games in a pretty pie chart. According to the pretty pie chart, a lot more games than you'd think were actually E-rated. 59% were for "everyone", 15% were for "everyone 10+", 20% were for "teen", and only 6% were for "mature". It should be noted that this chart includes all games, not just blockbusters. It should also be noted that this chart includes all games released on all platforms, even "edutainment" platforms designed specifically around little kids.