It’s time to step into the past (but only the recent past, don’t worry) and take a look at what’s been happening in the gaming world this week again.
Political news from around the world might be agonising and difficult to bear, but we’ve got plenty of gaming industry news to keep you distracted, so why not take a few moments out to reminisce?
Here’s what’s been going on in the gaming world this week. We’re not going to be addressing the Elden Ring difficulty conversation, so don’t worry about that!
GAME isn’t stopping physical sales
A report emerged earlier this week suggesting that UK gaming retailer GAME would stop stocking physical games on its shelves, instead only selling digital download codes.
Luckily, GAME provided a statement to Eurogamer shortly thereafter confirming that this report is nonsense and that the store will continue to sell physical games for the foreseeable future.
A spokesperson for the chain described the rumour as “categorically not true”, and a further followup statement clarified that there would be no change in store policy regarding physical games. Looks like those discs are safe for now!
Dr. Disrespect is in trouble
If you’ve encountered the world of gaming streamers, you probably know who Dr. Disrespect is, for better or worse. Whatever you may think of the man, he’s certainly got an outspoken personality.
Well, this week, that outspoken personality may have landed him in hot water. Allegations have emerged suggesting that Dr. Disrespect sent sexually inappropriate messages to a minor in 2020, supposedly resulting in his ban from Twitch.
Said allegations were serious enough to prompt Midnight Society, the studio Dr. Disrespect co-founded, to kick him out, and his own strangely evasive admission of guilt certainly didn’t help matters.
Epic Mickey: Rebrushed gets a release date
Epic Mickey is arguably one of the Wii’s most underrated platformers; it’s not perfect, but it does boast the involvement of creative director Warren Spector, a legend who’s worked on games like Deus Ex.
This week, we learned that we’ll get a chance to play it sooner rather than later, because Epic Mickey: Rebrushed, a remake of the game in the Unreal Engine, is coming in September.
It’ll be available across all modern systems, and will boast lots of gameplay and visual improvements, so even if you think you know the original well, you’ll probably still want to give this a shot.
Dead Rising is getting another remaster
You might have thought that Capcom’s excellent zombie sandbox game Dead Rising was perfectly fine as it is, but Capcom clearly disagrees, as the game is getting another remaster.
Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster, as it’s snappily titled, looks like it’ll bring a new coat of paint to the 2006 classic, although whether it’s going to make any gameplay improvements remains to be seen.
If you ask us, there’s a lot of room for improvement in Dead Rising; we love it, but that difficulty curve could be ironed out, and the idiotic survivor AI could be improved as well.
Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree sells five million copies
Like we said, we’re not touching the Elden Ring difficulty conversation with a ten-foot greatsword, but we do want to take a moment to celebrate the new DLC Shadow of the Erdtree’s impressive sales performance.
Bandai Namco says the game has sold five million copies since its release, achieving that milestone within just three days. That’s a pretty good performance for DLC.
Whether or not you love Shadow of the Erdtree, it’s clear that it’s struck a chord with gamers.
Classic Resident Evil games come to GOG
The Resident Evil remake series is all well and good, but sometimes, you just get a hankering for old-school survival horror that only the original games can fulfil.
Thankfully, this week, GOG announced that the first three Resident Evil games would be coming to the platform. The first is available now, and the following two games will be available on GOG soon.
In an era when remakes are replacing originals left, right, and centre (looking at you, Silent Hill 2), it’s nice to be able to revisit the history of gaming. Let’s hope that other publishers follow suit.
Steam now lets you record your games
You’re probably used to using software like Nvidia’s ShadowPlay or OBS if you’re accustomed to capturing gameplay footage, but there’s now a way to do this from within Steam itself.
Provided you’ve enabled the Steam beta client, you can now check out Steam Game Recording, a new feature that lets you grab gameplay footage, clip it, and share it without using third-party tools.
The feature itself is also in beta, which means that it’s probably got a few kinks that need to be ironed out, but it’s got some neat perks that might set it apart from its competitors.
Frostpunk 2 gets delayed
If you’re a fan of nail-biting moral dilemmas, then you’ve probably already enjoyed Frostpunk to its fullest, and so the prospect of a sequel likely has you as excited as we are.
Sadly, though, we’re all going to have to wait a bit longer for Frostpunk 2, as 11 bit studios announced this week that the game has been delayed to accommodate extra development time.
That time will be used to implement new gameplay features based on player feedback, however, so it’s not all bad news. Hopefully, the version of the game we get to play will be better as a result.
Dragon’s Dogma 2 now lets you change its console graphics settings
When Dragon’s Dogma 2 was released in March, the game was well-received, but criticism revolved around its poor performance on consoles, with many complaining that Dragon’s Dogma 2 was a sluggish and poorly-optimised experience.
Now, Capcom has released a new update to address those criticisms, allowing you to change the game’s graphical settings on PS5 and Xbox Series X/S to improve frame rates.
The developer says that frame rates should have been improved in areas where there are a lot of NPCs, and also that changing the graphical settings to “low” should further improve the game’s frame rates.
Hopefully, this should make the otherwise impressive (if slightly uneven) Dragon’s Dogma 2 a more rewarding experience on consoles.
