It's been known since before the actual release date was announced that GTA VI would generate enough hype that there would be ripple effects throughout the gaming industry, with some analysts estimating that the game would generate as much as $4.5 billion in sales in its first week on the market. However, according to Take-Two Interactive's CEO, Strauss Zelnick, in a recent interview with Variety, GTA VI is already exceeding expectations.

Strauss Zelnick via VarietyGrand Theft Auto VI" presales are "running far in excess of our expectations... That's a good thing. That said, we never claim success before it occurs. So we're just days away from beginning to see the fruits of our labor.

Anduril Industries and Qualcomm have announced the "BlueChip" laptops that will be manufactured in the United States. That's the stated goal of Anduril, the company founded by Palmer Luckey, the creator of Oculus VR. He says that around 90% of the first laptop's components will come from the United States or allied countries. The first "BlueChip" laptops will use the Qualcomm Snapdragon X Series chips that are manufactured at TSMC's newest Arizona facility. The processor is the same you can find in other Snapdragon-powered laptops like the Microsoft Surface. Moving further, Anduril intends to assemble circuit boards at its Arsenal-1 facility in Ohio. The company, however, has plans to extend beyond just the final assembly. In the meantime, it will develop US production capabilities for enclosures, battery components, and other hardware components.

Functional prototypes are ready, with preorders planned for 2027, but exact specifications and pricing remain undisclosed. Palmer Luckey, however, estimates that it will cost roughly 20% more than typical high-end consumer PCs. Keep in mind that the "BlueChip" laptops are mainly designed for security, government, and military use scenarios. That means you will not find them on your usual PC retail store shelves. At least not the first generations. According to TechCrunch, Luckey stated his intention that, in the future, Anduril will produce U.S.-made consumer-oriented laptops.

Valve's Steam store listing for the Valve Index now states that the headset is no longer being produced, with remaining headsets, controllers, and accessories up for sale while supplies last. On the US store, the Index headset is down 20% to $399.20 from its usual $499, and the Replacement Left Controller and Replacement Tether are 20% off as well. Valve says nothing changes for existing owners, and the Index will continue to be supported through Steam and SteamVR. The headset launched back in June 2019, when the full kit went for $999 on preorder. Its successor, the Steam Frame, opened for preorders on September 14 at $1,059 for the 256 GB model and $1,299 for the 1 TB version.

This isn't a sudden decision. Valve's Lawrence Yang already confirmed to The Verge in November 2025 that the company had stopped manufacturing the Index, around the same time Valve announced the Steam Frame. The store page update seems to be the formal send-off for the Index. However, the Steam Frame is currently available only through a reservation lottery system. It also uses camera-based inside-out tracking and doesn't support the Lighthouse base stations the Index relies on, so Index owners can't carry their base stations over to the new headset. Anyone still interested in a Lighthouse-tracked Valve headset, at a lower price than the Frame, should probably act soon, since there is no word on how much stock is left.

NVIDIA is marking the retail launch of its RTX Spark laptops with a public party in Berlin, and anyone aged 18 or older can attend. The RTX Spark Launch Celebration takes place on October 16, the same day the first laptops ship, at XPERION on Alexanderplatz. NVIDIA is presenting it as "a new beginning for Windows PCs" in the run-up to GTC Berlin, and the evening combines a stage program with hands-on demo stations and a laptop raffle. The company is even lighting up the Berlin TV Tower in NVIDIA green for the occasion.

Entry is free, although registration through Luma is required beforehand. The queue opens at 18:00 local time and doors open at 18:45. XPERION sits inside the Saturn store at Alexanderplatz 3, and capacity is limited, especially for the stage show. NVIDIA recommends arriving early for that reason, since that is how visitors secure entry, a spot in the raffle, and a goodie bag. The Berlin event is a chance to try RTX Spark hardware in person, across AI, creative, and gaming workloads.

Microsoft has finally put a price on the Surface Laptop Ultra, and preorders are open as of today. The announcement came at the company's Windows and Surface keynote in San Francisco, with a starting price of $2,599 and shipments set to begin on October 16. Microsoft first showed the laptop at Computex in June without a price or a launch date. The base model gets a 15-inch mini-LED display and the lower of the two NVIDIA RTX Spark N1X configurations, which means an 18-core CPU, a 5,120-core Blackwell GPU, and 24 GB of unified memory. The 20-core version with a 6,144-core GPU starts at $3,699 with 32 GB, and the top model with 128 GB of memory and a 1 TB SSD costs a steep $5,899. The only 2 TB option is a 64 GB model at $4,699. A Surface RTX Spark Dev Box was also announced at a hefty $5,999.

The other reveal is the oversized USB-C port that has had people guessing since June. Microsoft says the Surface Laptop Ultra is the first laptop in the world with a breakaway USB-C port, so a tripped-over cable should pull free without dragging the machine off the desk. The idea is the same as Apple's MagSafe and Microsoft's own Surface Connect, except those are proprietary connectors. This one apparently still works as a regular USB-C port with any USB-C device. As for the price, the $2,599 entry point is a little lower than expected. A TechPowerUp Forums member who spent about a month with a prototype guessed $2,799 for a 24 GB model. That prototype was tested on preview drivers, however, so readers are advised to wait for reviews of retail hardware before preordering.

Nintendo's Legend of Zelda 40th Anniversary Switch 2 sold out within minutes of preorders going live, and scalpers wasted no time flipping it for two to three times retail on eBay. The console launched at $519.99 through Best Buy, Walmart, Target, and Amazon, $20 above the recently hiked $499.99 base Switch 2 price. All four retailers ran out almost immediately, and Nintendo's own store now shows it sold out too. eBay listings currently stretch from $700 up to $1,700 for the console alone, with some sellers bundling in the matching Pro Controller, carrying case, and even the upcoming Ocarina of Time remake, despite Nintendo never offering that combo at retail.

Buying all four items from Nintendo directly costs about $720, so most bundles are charging well over double that. A few have gone further, asking $2,000 for the full set. Nintendo tried to keep scalpers off the original Switch 2 by requiring 50 hours of logged Switch playtime before allowing a preorder. There's no word yet on whether similar rules apply to the next restock, but given how fast this batch vanished, some kind of gating system looks likely. Anyone who missed out is stuck waiting for another round of orders to open if they don't want to pay ridiculous scalping prices. The console ships October 29, a week ahead of the remake on November 5.

Grand Theft Auto 6 pre-orders jumped sharply after Rockstar's extended gameplay look aired on Netflix, according to new estimates from Sensor Tower. The analytics firm says pre-orders rose 436% on August 27, the day of the showcase, compared to the day before. That momentum carried into August 28, pushing the two-day increase to 572% against the prior 30-day average. PlayStation 5 accounted for the bulk of the surge, with PS5 pre-orders up 606% on the 27th alone, while Xbox Series X|S pre-orders rose a comparatively modest 127%. PS5 has led Xbox in GTA 6 pre-orders since Sensor Tower began tracking reservations in June, shortly after Rockstar officially opened pre-orders for the game.

Sensor Tower's cumulative estimate now stands at roughly 4.86 million pre-orders worldwide, worth close to $476 million, with PlayStation buyers accounting for about 77% of that total. Take-Two has not confirmed exact figures, though CEO Strauss Zelnick has previously said demand for the $100 Ultimate Edition has outpaced the standard $80 version. Rockstar has kept a tight grip on gameplay reveals since GTA 6's earlier trailers, so a 26-minute showcase was always going to move the needle. Sensor Tower's own analysts have also suggested the current Ultimate Edition divide is unlikely to hold once mass-market buyers start pre-ordering closer to release, which could shift these percentages again before launch.